Portrait of a Woman with a Book of Music by Bacchiacca was created in 1540 -1545. The painting is in Getty Center Collection. The size of the work is 103,2 x 80,3 cm and is made as an oil on panel.
This unidentified woman wears an elegant, colorful dress of a type that was the height of Florentine fashion around 1540. Her costume and music book indicate her cultured, patrician background; she may have been a member of the Frescobaldi, a powerful Florentine banking family that once owned the painting. The surprising juxtaposition of the bright green of the tablecloth alongside the sitter’s pink dress, and the polished, sculptural treatment of flesh tones are characteristics associated with Florentine painting of the early sixteenth century. The artist here shows off his ability to represent intricate embroidery and textures, such as the fur trim of the sitter’s sleeves and patterns on her dress… (read more in Getty Center)
About the Artist: Italian Renaissance period, mannerist Painter Francesco Bacchiacca was born in Florence in 1494. He took his first training from Perugino. Initially, Pontomo and Rosso Fiorentino followed the artistic line. He worked with Perugino towards Mannerism and was influenced by him. He stayed in Rome for a while. In 1540, he returned to Florence and worked for Cosimos I. Medici. Not dependent on a single style. For example, the mother and father figures in ’Adam and Eve with their Children’ painting are from Perugino’s ‘Apollo… Read more
