Foundation of the Library

religious

History was not kind to the Emilian painter Melozzo da Forli, since his only work that survives in excellent condition is this group portrait executed in fresco for the Vatican Palace. The reigning pope, Sixtus IV, seated on the right, is shown in the company of several individuals, including two of his nephews. The standing figure in the centre of the composition facing Sixtus can be identified as his nephew Giuliano, later Pope Julius II.

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About the Artist

Melozzo Da Forli

1438 – 1494

Italian painter from Forli in the Romagna, active mainly in Loreto, Rome, and Urbino. He was an attractive and idiosyncratic painter who achieved a high reputation in his time, but little of his work survives intact and he has been a neglected figure until fairly recently. His style was indebted to Piero della Francesca and he was renowned for his skill in perspective and illusionism; he was, indeed, credited with being the inventor of extreme form of foreshortening known as sotto in sù, of which Mantegna was another great exponent. Melozzo's skill in this field is seen in his fresco of the Ascension (1478-80) for the dome of SS. Apostoli in Rome, fragments of which are in the Quirinal Palace and the Vatican.

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