These are the 12 most famous paintings by Filippino Lippi, who was a 15th-century Florentine, Early, and High Renaissance painter. He was very famous and had a good reputation throughout Italy. Lippi painted a major series of frescoes in Florence and Rome, but also altarpieces, and he completed his apprenticeship in the workshop of the great Sandro Botticelli, who had been a pupil of Filippino’s father. This Renaissance master is best known for painting his characters in a landscape that recreated the ancient world but also showed the influence of the Grottesco style.
Biography of Filippino Lippi
Filippino Lippi is unique as he was not only a great painter but the son of a great painter. Though not as famous as other Renaissance painters Lippi’s importance cannot be overstated.
Early Life
The painter was the son of another painter Fra Filippo Lippi and his partner, Lucrezia Buti in Prato, in the Florentine Republic. It appears that Lippi was apprenticed to a master painter. This was the traditional way to train in the art of painting.
Filippino Lippi’s training
At first, he trained with his father but upon his death, he trained with Sandro Botticelli, who had once been his father’s pupil. The painter finished his apprenticeship in about 1473 and became a member of the Guild of St Luke. It appears that from an early date, his talents were recognized.
Employment & influence
He was employed along with other notable artists to create frescoes for the Villa of Lorenzo De Medici. Lippi also worked for the powerful Strozzi family and created frescoes for their chapel.
It appears that Lippi became influenced by the teachings and thoughts of the Humanists and he became fascinated with the works of the Ancient Greeks and Romans. His reputation was such that he was commissioned to finish painting the Brancacci Chapel in the Carmine, which had been left unfinished when the original artist Masaccio died in 1428.
Lippi spent nearly all of his life in Florence apart from a few years living and working in Rome, Pavia, and Bologna.
Family
Filippino Lippi was the illegitimate son of Fra Filippo Lippi and his partner, Lucrezia Buti. At the time being born out of wedlock was scandalous and certainly uncommon. His father was a Carmelite priest who would later become a noted painter.
His mother had been a nun and Lippi was conceived when his father became chaplain to the convent where his mother lived. Fra Filippo Lippi was one of the finest painters of the Fifteenth Century.
Style of Painting
Lippi’s work clearly shows the influence of the Italian Renaissance’s rediscovery of perspective and anatomy. His work is realistic yet also highly decorative and idealized.
Early work
His early work shows the clever use of lines. Gradually he developed his own individual style and his work focuses on the humanity of his subjects even when dealing with mythological and Christian subjects.
Filippino Lippi’s style can be characterized as a form of Humanism and realism. Many of his subjects depict Christian subjects drawn from the Bible and Classical mythology and yet they remain very real.
Later work
Filippino Lippi painted within the tradition demanded by his famous patrons, however, he was able to produce a very individual style and one that was to be much admired by later artists.
Many of his works depart from strict realism and contain fantastic images or anthropomorphic forms. Lippi’s style is considered to be one of the finest examples of Grottesco, a style characterized by its enigmatic, unusual, and eccentric images and often weird.
They often have a dream-like quality and are often disturbing. Many believe that Lippi’s style reflects the tensions between Christianity and Paganism that lay at the heart of the Renaissance.
Education
Lippi was taught by his father Fra Filippo Lippi and also later by Sandro Botticelli, two of the most distinguished painters of the Early Italian Renaissance.
First major work
It is believed that Filippino Lippi’s first major work was The Coronation of the Virgin which he painted in 1480 at the young age of 23, however, he may have contributed to major frescoes and other paintings during his apprenticeship. The Coronation of the Virgin is now in the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. in the United States.
Influences
Among his influences were his father and above all his mentor Sandro Botticelli. Lippi was greatly inspired by the Florentine School.
Other artists Lippi worked with
Among the artists that Lippi Filippino collaborated with include Pietro Perugino (Annunziata Polyptych from 1504–1507), Ghirlandaio, and of course Sandro Botticelli.
Lippi was the assistant to Botticelli when he was painting some of the most important paintings of the 15th century.
Lost Works
Lippi’s work on the frescoes at Lorenzo de’ Medici’s villa at Spedaletto sadly, has been lost. His completion of Perugion’s fresco in Palazzo della Signoria in Florence has also been lost.
It is impossible to determine how many works of Lippi have been lost down the centuries.
Final Painting
Lippi’s last work was the fresco the Deposition for the Santissima Annunziata church which he left incomplete at the time of his death. Pietro Perugino would finish it three years later in 1507.
Later Life & Death
Lippi moved to Rome and here he worked for Cardinal Oliviero Carafa, one of the greatest patrons of the Renaissance. After completing a cycle of frescoes for the Cardinal he returned to Florence. His fame grew in his native city and he had his own workshop. Another noteworthy work is the Wounded Centaur (1500).
Filippino Lippi died on April 18, 1404, at the age of 47 in Florence, Italy. The cause of his death is unknown, however, his fame and respect by his contemporaries at the time of his passing was large – all workshops in the city of Florence were closed in his honor on the day he died.
Legacy
Lippi’s later paintings in the Grottesco style have been of particular importance. Their artificial and often fantastic style inspired the Mannerists in the 16th century.
This was a European-wide movement that is noted for its elegant distortions of the human figure and often Mannerist is a sixteenth-century style of art and design characterized by artificiality, elegance, and sensuous distortion of the human figure and decorative compositions.
Famous Paintings by Filippino Lippi
Madonna and Child (1465)
Madonna and Child is one of the most famous paintings by Filippino Lippi, this painting is also called The Uffizi Madonna, as it is housed in the Ufizzi Gallery in Florence. Madonna is sitting on a chair, which is overlooking a landscape of plains, mountains, a city, and a bay. These landmarks are symbolic as the seashore alludes to her title “star of the sea and port of our salvation”, while the rocks symbolize tales of the prophet Daniel. She is looking down, while her hands are folded in prayers while Child Jesus is held up to her by two angels. Her clothing and accessories represent the elegance of the 1450s.
Apparition of Christ to the Virgin (1493)
Apparition of Christ to the Virgin dates to the period after Lippi’s return to Florence after his works in Rome, at the Carafa Chapel. It shows Mary, kneeling under God who is depicted in a golden disc on the sky. She is surrounded by the Angel of the Annunciation and the Virgin Mary. The background landscape is painted using an aerial perspective, with depicted small figures of monks by the river. This iconography seems uncommon and could be a result of the commissioner of the painting’s wishes.
Annunciation with St John the Baptist and St Andrew (1485)
Annunciation with St John the Baptist and St Andrew was Lippi’s early work. It might have been commissioned by the Florentine institution, as the background is a view of the city itself (the Florence Cathedral, Giotto’s Camapanile, Badia Florentina, and Piazzo del Bargello). This painting was heavily influenced by two important mentors in Lippi’s life – his father Filippo and his teacher and later colleague, Botticelli.
Coronation of the Virgin (1480)
Coronation of the Virgin depicts a scene very popular in Italy from the 13th to the 15th century. It holds great significance as the procurator of the Sant’Ambrogio church, Francesco Maringhi, left money on his deathbed for a new high altar painting of the church. So, Lippi was invited to do the work along with six external painters. The central scene features biblical figures in informal positions. In the middle, are Christ and the kneeling Madonna who is about to be crowned. Besides anglers, figures in the middle can be recognized as Mary Magdalene and St. Eustace with his family.
Madonna with Child and Saints (1488)
The figures in Madonna with Child and Saints are St. John the Baptist, next to the right hand of the Virgin, child Christ, who is turning towards his precursor dressed in animal skins (appropriate for desert saint), and staff who has a crossbar which is announcing the Crucifixion. In the background, we can observe the ancient architecture, and the commissioner himself, hugging the high daughter who is standing next to his wife.
Marsuppini Coronation (1460)
This panel was done in an archaic style and is divided into three parts. The central one depicts a scene of the coronation of Mary who is kneeling at the feet of Christ, while at the sides are symmetrical compositions of three musician angels and two standing saints.
Annunciation with two Kneeling Donors (1445)
This work pivots around the Virgin, who is occupying the central part of it. The two donor portraits show the anonymous men kneeling and being cordonata. It is probable that they could be identified as Folco Portinari and Fogonaccio, and that they were painted by one of Lippi’s students. It was most likely made for the Florentine church of Sant’Egidio. The depicted figures are the Mother of God and the Archangel Gabriel announcing the news from God.
Allegory of Music (1500)
This painting is also known by the name Erato. This idyllic composition most probably depicts the Muse Erato leading a swan by a golden leash, because this bird, who is Apollo’s attribute may be associated with Musica as well. The other explanation is that it depicts the mythological scene of woman Leda and God Zeus, who was in the guise of a swan
Mystic Wedding of St Catherine Virgin and Martyr (1501)
This oil-on-panel painting pivots around the scene of the mystical marriage of St. Catherine of Alexandria. She was a Christian saint and virgin, martyred in the 4th century at the hand of the Roman emperor, Maxentius. The other figures are St. Paul, and St. Sebastian to the left, and St. Peter and St. John the Baptist on the right.
Tobias and the Angel (1480)
Tobias and the Angel depicts a 2nd-century Jewish book about how God tests the faithful and responds to prayers. The angel depicted is archangel Raphael in human disguise who is accompanying Tobias, a Biblical character and son of Tobit, and helping him on his quests.
Annunziata Polyptych (1507)
This painting was started by Lippi, but he passed away in 1504, so it was finished by Pietro Perugino, an artist of the Umbrian school whose most famous pupil was Raphael. It was originally meant to be the high altar of the Annunziata Basilica in Florence, but the painting was criticized by the Florentines due to the lack of originality of composition. This painting shows the moment in which Jesus Christ is taken down from the cross after his passing. Besides Jesus, the figures depicted are the Virgin, Mary Magdalene on the left, and St. John the Apostle on the right.
Adoration of the Magi (1496)
Adoration of the Magi was primarily commissioned by Leonardo da Vinci, who never finished it. Lippi followed da Vinci’s setting, especially in the central part of the painting. He derived inspiration from Botticelli’s Adoration of the Magi (ca. 1475), which is no surprise as he was his teacher and mentor. Several members of the famous Medici family are depicted, such as Pierfrancesco de’ Medici, who is depicted kneeling on the left. Behind him are his two sons, Giovanni who is holding a goblet, and Lorenzo from whom a page is removing a crown.
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