BARONCELLI, Niccolò
Italian sculptor and bronze-caster, born in Florence. According to Vasari, he was a disciple of Filippo Brunelleschi. He is first mentioned on 27 April 1434 as having completed a large wooden Crucifix (destroyed) for Santa Margarita, Vigonza (Padua). In 1436 he was commissioned to make the monument to the Santasofia Family (destroyed) in the Eremitani, Padua. This comprised statues of 10 professors, the recumbent effigy of Galeazzo Santasofia, 12 statues of pupils and four unspecified statues. On 12 July 1440 the Confraternità dei Fabbri e Maniscalchi commissioned an altarpiece (completed 1442) for their altar in San Clemente, Padua, from which survives a terracotta relief of the Miracle of St Aegidius (Museo Civico, Padua).
Baroncelli was commissioned on 28 August 1442 to make the south-west portal of the Eremitani. This includes the Labours of the Months, the Annunciation, angels, putti and rinceaux carved in low relief and shows the influence of Fra Filippo Lippi, who worked in Padua in 1434.
In 1443 Lionello d’Este decided to erect a bronze equestrian monument in Ferrara to his predecessor, Niccolò III d’Este, Marquess of Ferrara (destroyed 1796). Two models, by Baroncelli and Antonio di Cristoforo da Firenze, were submitted on 27 November 1443. Documentary evidence indicates that Antonio executed the effigy of Niccolò and that Baroncelli made the horse. Thereafter he was called ‘Niccolò del Cavallo’.
His workshop included his son Giovanni and son-in-law Domenico di Paris. Baroncelli was also commissioned to make a marble monument to Borso d’Este, Duke of Ferrara (destroyed 1796). It was completed by Giovanni and Domenico di Paris and other assistants and erected on 19 December 1454 in front of the Palazzo della Ragione. In 1472 it was made a pendant to the Niccolò monument.
In 1450 Baroncelli was commissioned to make life-size bronze statues of the Crucified Christ, the Virgin, St John the Evangelist, St George and St Maurelius to be placed on an architrave before the high altar in Ferrara Cathedral (now in the right arm of the transept). With his son Giovanni he completed the first three statues.
Baroncelli’s other documented works in Ferrara have been destroyed.
