ABBATE, Niccolò dell'

The chimney breast was realized by the workshop of Niccolò dell’ Abbate. It features figures, putti, flowers, fruit, and symbols (among them the sword symbolizing the constable’s office) in trompe-l’oeil painting.

The chimney breast in the large royal hall was realized by the workshop of Niccolò dell’ Abbate. It features figures, putti, flowers, fruit, and symbols (among them the sword symbolizing the constable’s office) in pink, white, and black marble.

King Francis I of France concentrated his patronage of art and artists on the decoration of the Chateau of Fontainebleau. To this and he imported such major artists as he could. He did get the aging Leonardo, he imported Rosso in 1530, Primaticcio in 1532, then Niccolò dell’Abbate, Vignola, Andrea del Sarto, Cellini. Some stayed, some went back; but the work they left behind was decisive in the replacement of Gothic style in France.

The Fontainebleau decorations included a Long Gallery, a Ballroom and several royal rooms. Only a fraction survives, since much were destroyed in later rebuildings, and most of the paintings were drastically restored in the nineteenth century.

Niccolò dell’Abbate arrived about 1552. His main contribution was his fantastic landscapes, which are a genre quite apart from either the poetic realism found in late fifteenth-century Italian pictures, or the homely kind in the background of the Raphael cartoons. They have a dreamlike quality with extremes of light and colour, rainbows and flickering storms.

Suggested listening (streaming mp3, 7 minutes):

Cristoph Willibald Gluck: Orfeo, Act I, Orpheus’ aria in G Major

In April 1528 Francis I commissioned Gilles Le Breton for a programme of building (completed 1540) at Fontainebleau. The Cour de l’Ovale was to be rebuilt using the old foundations and retaining the old keep, while a gallery, now the Galerie Fran�ois I, was to be constructed linking this with the Trinitarian abbey to the west, which was soon demolished and replaced by the Cour du Cheval Blanc. The north range of the Cour du Cheval Blanc survives almost unaltered and is of plastered rubble with brick dressings. The medieval gatehouse (now called the Porte Dor�e) in the south-west corner was rebuilt in Renaissance style, based on the entrance to the ducal palace at Urbino. Adjoining the Porte Dor�e to the east is the vast Salle de Bal, designed by Sebastiano Serlio, and next to it in turn is the Chapelle St-Saturnin, on the site of the original medieval chapel.

In 1530 Rosso Fiorentino was entrusted with the decorations of the interior, later joined (1532) by Francesco Primaticcio. Together they developed the style of the first Fontainebleau school, in effect the first extensive and consistent display of Mannerism in northern Europe.

The photo shows the Salle de Bal (also called Galerie Henri II) designed by Sebastiano Serlio (1541). The frescoes, designed by Primaticcio, were painted by Niccolò dell’Abbate in 1550.

The photo shows the Salle de Bal (also called Galerie Henri II) designed by Sebastiano Serlio (1541). The frescoes, designed by Primaticcio, were painted by Niccolò dell’Abbate in 1550.

The portrait depicts a young man with parrot and pomegranate.

Niccolò dell’Abbate was one of the most important artists of the first Fontainebleau school, which was developed at the French court by Rosso Fiorentino and Francesco Primaticcio, and he introduced the Italian Mannerist landscape into France.

The interior of the Renaissance Palazzo Torfanini in Bologna were frescoed in 1549 by Niccolò dell’Abbate. The decoration represented scenes from Tasso’s Orlando Furioso. The frescoes were destroyed in 1732 when the palace was refurbished. The remaining parts of the frescoes are displayed in the Pinacoteca Nazionale.

The interior of the Renaissance Palazzo Torfanini in Bologna were frescoed in 1549 by Niccolò dell’Abbate. The decoration represented scenes from Tasso’s Orlando Furioso. The frescoes were destroyed in 1732 when the palace was refurbished. The remaining parts of the frescoes are displayed in the Pinacoteca Nazionale.

The portrait shows a gentleman, half length, wearing a black coat with grey sleeves and a hat, a falcon perched on his finger.

Niccolò dell’Abbate was associated with the Mannerist movement which was virtually a European court style in the first half of the sixteenth century. It was in the newly independent genre of landscape that dell’Abbate made his most enduring contribution to the history of Western art. In portraiture he was a canny observer of the interior life of his subjects, managing to suggest something of the uniqueness of their psychology. The north Italian aristocrat portrayed here has an almost indecisive air at odds with his masterful pose and sporty regalia.

In a fabulous setting we see the last moments of a stag hunt. The very small size of the figures in the foreground does not prevent the artist from lingering over every detail of the elegant clothing, the hairstyles and the harness of the horses. We sense a refined climate of diversion that was certainly inspired by the Estense court of the castle of Ferrara, from which “Camerini” this painting probably comes. The natural scenery, which shows the influence of Dosso Dossi’s landscapes and numerous aspects of Flemish art, is lit up in the background by unreal flashes of light, oscillating between pale pink and gray-green, from which ruins emerge, the spires of fairytale works of architecture.

This painting is typical of the elegant art emerging in Fontainebleau inspired by Primaticcio.

In this painting - which may belong to a series of landscapes painted in 1570 for the Cabinet du Roi in the Château de Fontainebleau - the artist applies the formula of a vast landscape animated by small, graceful figures. He takes as his source works by Joachim Patenier.