ARCIMBOLDO, Giuseppe

Italian painter, draughtsman and tapestryGLOSSARYAs historical climatologists have not shown that Renaissance Italian winters and springs were warmer than they are now, it is puzzling that Italy did not fabricate tapestries to decorate and draught-proof the stony rooms of its palaces until 1545, when Cosimo I set up a manufactory in Florence. To hardiness or stinginess (tapestry was by far the most expensive form of wall decoration) we owe the existence of such secular frescoed decorative schemes as the labours of the months in the castle at Trent (c. 1407), the Arthurian scenes of Pisanello and the courtly ones of Mantegna in the Ducal Palace of Mantua, the delicious calendar fantasies of Cossa and others in the Palazzo Schifanoia in Ferrara - and, doubtless, many others that await liberation from whitewash or later panelling. These are all in situations where northern patrons would have used tapestries. These were imported, chiefly from Flanders, into Italy. The influence of their hunting and ceremonial scenes in particular registered on Italian 'gothic' painting or illumination and stained glass, and in literature. But the Italians did not make them. The most famous of all 'Italian' tapestries, those for the Sistine Chapel designed by Raphael, were made in Brussels from the full-scale coloured patterns, or cartoons, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Nor is it clear whether imported tapestries were used habitually or simply to add grandeur to special occasions. Even when Cosimo's manufactory was in being, and working from designs by court artists of the calibre of Bronzino, Salviati and Allori, his own headquarters, the Palace of the Signoria (now the Palazzo Vecchio), was being decorated with frescoes. The subject is underexplored. designer, active also in Austria and Bohemia. He came from a distinguished Milanese family that included a number of archbishops of the city; his father was the painter Biagio Arcimboldo. He is first documented in 1549, working with his father for Milan Cathedral; he received payments until 1558 for supplying paintings, designs for an altar baldachinGLOSSARYOriginally a textile canopy supported on poles and carried dignitaries and relics. Later, an architectural canopy of stone or wood set over a high altar or bishop's throne. and stained-glass windows for the cathedralGLOSSARYThe principal church of a province or diocese, where the throne of the bishop is placed. For reasons lost to time and tradition, a cathedral always faces west - toward the setting sun. The altar is placed at the east end. The main body, or nave, of the cathedral is usually divided into one main and two side aisles. These lead up to the north and south transepts, or arms of the cross, the shape in which a cathedral is usually formed..

In 1556 he worked with Giuseppe Meda on frescoes for the Cathedral of Monza, a work that must have been completed by 1562. In 1558, he drew the cartoonGLOSSARYA full-scale preparatory drawing for a painting, tapestry, or fresco. In fresco painting, the design was transferred to the wall by making small holes along the contour lines and then powdering them with charcoal in order to leave an outline on the surface to be painted. In the 19th centurry designs submitted in a competition for frescos in the Houses of Parliament in London were parodied in the magazine Punch. From this the word has acquired its most common meaning today - a humorous drawing or parody. for a large tapestry of the Dormition of the Virgin Mary, which still hangs in the Como Cathedral today. On the basis of stylistic comparison with the windows in Milan and the frescoes in Monza, the design of a tapestry representing St John the Baptist Preaching and Baptizing (Monza, Museo e Tesoro del Duomo) can be attributed to Arcimboldo.

In 1562 he became court portraitist to Ferdinand I at the Habsburg court in Vienna, and later, to Maximilian II and his son Rudolf II at the court in Prague. A group of portraits representing persons at the Habsburg court can be attributed to Arcimboldo. At the Imperial Court his original and grotesque fantasy was almost immediately unleashed. He invented a portraitGLOSSARYThe Roman portrait bust survived in the form of life-sized reliquaries of saints, but it was in 15th century Florence that the individual features and character of a contemporary sitter were accurately recorded by sculptors such as Donatello, Desiderio da Settignano, Mino da Fiesole and the Rossellino. A similar degree of realism occurs in 15th century tomb sculpture. The equestrian portrait, based on antique statues such as the Marcus Aurelius monument (Rome, Campidoglio), was revived in the 14th century. Two examples in fresco are Simone Martini's Guidoriccio (c. 1328; Siena, Palazzo Pubblico) and the posthumous portrait of Sir John Hawkwood (1436; Florence, Cathedral) by Uccello, which gives the illusion of a 3-dimensional statue seen from below. The Venetian Republic ordered imposing monuments from Donatello (1447; Gattarnelata, Padua) and Verrocchio (14799; Colleoni, Venice), whilst other statesmen ordered their own images to be erected in public places, directly relating themselves to the military heroes of ancient Rome. Another form of political portraiture derived from antiquity was the commemorative portrait medal designed by artists such as Pisanello. The carved or painted profile portrait became popular in the 1450s. The realism of the clear, flattened image, painted under the influence of Flemish examples by the Pollaiuolo brothers, Piero della Francesca and Botticelli, was superseded by the three-quarter and frontal portrait, psychologically more complex, such as Leonardo's enigmatic Mona Lisa (Paris, Louvre) with her momentary smile or Andrea del Sarto's arresting Portrait of a Man (London, National Gallery). The 16th century portrait became generalized, Lotto's Andrea Odoni (1527; Royal Collection) being an idealized concept of a collector rather than an individual. Group portraits, decorating whole rooms, include the narrative scenes of the Gonzaga court painted by Mantegna (completed 1474; Mantua, Palazzo Ducale) and the elaborate schemes commissioned by the Farnese family in Rome from Vasari (1546; Palazzo della Cancelleria) and Salviati (after 1553; Palazzo Farnese). Portraits were also incorporated into religious narratives, as in Ghirlandaio's fresco cycle painted for Giovanni Tornabuoni in S. Maria Novella, Florence (1486-90). type consisting of painted animals, flowers, fruit, and objects composed to form a human likeness. Some are satiric portraits of court personages, and others are allegorical personifications.

Arcimboldo's conventional work, on traditional religious subjects, has fallen into oblivion, but his portraits of human heads made up of flowers, vegetables, fruit, animals, sea creatures and tree roots, were greatly admired by his contemporaries and remain a source of fascination today. Arcimboldo's most famous paintings had contemporary allegorical meanings and were unique compositions of edibles and culinary objects placed together in such a way as to represent the contours or heads of cooks, gardeners, waiters, and symbolic figures related to the world of sciences. He was not prolific, but his paintings of fantastic heads and social satirical subjects were popular.

There is a codex in the manuscriptGLOSSARYcollective term for books or other documents written by hand; in a specific sense, the hand-written medieval book, the Codex manuscriptus, often ornamented with decorative borders, illuminated initials and miniatures, and containing works of ancient philosophy or scholarly, ecclesiastical, and literary texts. Manuscripts were usually produced on commission. At first the scriptoria (writing rooms) of monasteries transcribed the contents of famous manuscripts and made copies. Monastic communities in the Netherlands and northern Germany began producing manuscripts around 1383/84. Flanders, Burgundy, and in particular Paris became major centres for the mass production of breviaries (prayer books) and Books of Hours. collection of the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, which contains original studies of animals drawn from nature. Some of these drawings can be related to Arcimboldo's painting Earth, and it was suggested that Arcimboldo was the author of a group of drawings to be found in this codex (Codex min. 42). The contents of the codex are representations of animals and plants.

Arcimboldo was also the court decorator and costume designer. He also created the illusionistic sceneries for the Habsburg court theater. His drawings for courtly pageants were included in the Habsburg imperial art collection. Emperor Rudolf II set him the task of researching and buying works of art and natural curiosities, as well as giving him countless commissions for paintings.

Arcimboldo's work became especially well known throughout Europe after the Austrian Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II exhibited Arcimboldo's paintings in the many residences of the Habsburg imperial family. In fact Arcimboldo's bizarre pieces and grotesque portraits pleased the Habsburg emperor so much that he appointed the Italian painter Habsburg court painter at Vienna and Prague and also made him a count palatine.

Arcimboldo's style has been so often imitated over the centuries that it is sometimes difficult to make exact attributions. He has been seen by some as the forerunner of Surrealism in the 20th century, but, more to the point, he should be seen in his own context at the end of the Renaissance. This was a time when people (collectors and scientists alike) were beginning to pay more attention to nature.

In 1587 Arcimboldo went back to Milan but stayed in contact with the Emperor. Towards the end of his life, he sent the Emperor the idiosyncratic portrait of him in the guise of the Greek god Vertumnus. His Italian contemporaries honoured him with poetry and manuscripts celebrating his illustrious career. He died in Milan in 1593.

When the Swedish army invaded Prague in 1648, during the Thirty Years' War, many of Arcimboldo's paintings were taken from Rudolf II's collection.