FERRUCCI, Francesco - b. ~1570 Firenze, d. ~1620 Firenze

Italian craftsman. He was probably a member of the Ferrucci family of sculptors and masons. He was active in the Galleria dei Lavori, the Medici Grand Ducal manufactory in Florence, and was one of the first Florentine artisans to attempt the difficult technique of pietra dura mosaic. He is known through documents of the late 16th century and early 17th relating to certain works using this technique.

He is first mentioned in 1589 as carving letters in lapis lazuli for the coats of arms of Tuscan cities for the Cappella dei Principi, Florence. In 1597 he produced a portrait in soft stone of Cosimo I (Florence, Museo dell’Opificio delle Pietre Dure), based on an oil painting by Domenico Passignano. Ferrucci’s supremacy in stone mosaic portraiture was such that he was commissioned to make portraits of Henry IV, King of France, a wedding gift from Marie de’ Medici to her bridegroom, and of Ferdinando I (both untraced).

The last recorded work that Ferrucci did for the Medici was the pietra dura pavement (in situ) of the chapel of Santissima Annunziata, Florence, commissioned by Ferdinando I at the end of the 16th century and still under construction in 1611-12.