Jacopo da Empoli

Biography

On 30 April 1551, Jacopo was born in Florence as Jacopo Chimenti; he later became known after Empoli, the birthplace of his father.

Jacopo worked mostly in his native city. He apprenticed under Maso da San Friano. Like his contemporary in Counter-Maniera (Counter-Mannerism), Santi di Tito, he moved into a style often more crisp, less contorted, and less crowded than mannerist predecessors like Vasari. He collaborated with Alessandro Tiarini in some projects.

Jacopo's younger brother, Domenico Chimenti, born in Empoli, was also a painter.

Jacopo took on many pupils, including Felice Ficherelli, Giovanni Battista Brazzè (Il Bigio), Giovanni Battista Vanni, and Virgilio Zaballi.

After the 1620s, working in a thematic often shunned by Florentine painters, Jacopo completed a series of exceptional still-life paintings.

On 30 September 1640, at the age of 89, Jacopo died.

Stereogram controversy

Around 1600, Jacopo created a pair of drawings that seem to show the same figure from two different vantage points, such as the left and right eyes of an observer. In 1859, the images were rediscovered by Alexander Crum Brown, who suggested that they were intended to create a stereoscopic image.

The drawings might have been done to complete a commission for Giambattista della Porta to be used in a book on optical illusions called De refractione optices parte libri novem (1593).

Precise measurements of the drawings have been made that demonstrate that the pair of drawings are not perfectly stereoscopic, with significant parts actually pseudoscopic, implying that any stereoscopic effects were accidental.

Selected works

• Madonna in Glory with Saint Luke and Saint Ives (1579) – Louvre, Paris
• Sacrifice of Isaac (1590s) – Oil on copper, 32 x 25 cm, Uffizi, Florence http://www.wga.hu/html/e/empoli/sacrific.html
• Susanna and the Elders (1600) – Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
• Sant'Eligio (1614) – Uffizi, Florence
• Carlo Borromeo and the Rospigliosi Family (1613) – San Domenico, Pistoia
• Still Life with Games (1620s) – Oil on canvas, 114 x 152 cm, Private collection
• Judgement of Midas (1624) – Pistoia
• Saint Ives, Protector of Widows and Orphans – Palatine Gallery, Florence
• Adoration of Shepherds (attributed) – https://web.archive.org/web/20070927233334/http://www.cottoniancollection.org.uk/main/collection/content/index.cfm?fsa=dspObject&objectID=33&sectionID=3&edu=0
• Preaching of John the Baptist – San Niccolò Oltrarno, Florence
• Michelangelo presents his model of San Lorenzo to Leo X (1617–1619) – Casa Buonarroti, Florence
• The Wedding of Caterina de Medici to Henry II
• Drunkedness of Noah – Uffizi Gallery, Florence
• Saint Clair accepts the veil (vows) https://web.archive.org/web/20061124105430/http://www.ville–caen.fr/mba/Empoli.htm (1620) – Caen, France
• Final Judgement – http://www.fondazioneitalianelmondo.com/2004/NOTIZIARIO/Sezione_ARTE/Jacopo_da_Empoli_galleria_3.htm
• Pala della Concezione – San Bartolomeo https://web.archive.org/web/20060511071310/http://www.carasantalucia.it/pittura/Empoli/Empoli.htm
• "Three Marys At Tomb" – Blanton Art Museum, Austin, Texas

References

Bibliography

References

1. Galleria Nazionale dell'Umbria. (1903). "Catalogo dei quadri che si conservano nella Pinacoteca Vannucci in Perugia".
2. Ticozzi, Stefano. (1830). "Dizionario degli architetti, scultori, pittori, intagliatori in rame ed in pietra, coniatori di medaglie, musaicisti, niellatori, intarsiatori d'ogni etá e d'ogni nazione". Gaetano Schiepatti.
3. Hobbes J.R. p. 81
4. Brooks, Kevin R.. (2017-01-01). "Depth Perception and the History of Three-Dimensional Art: Who Produced the First Stereoscopic Images?". Perception.
5. Smith, A. Mark. (2017). "Optical Magic in the Late Renaissance: Giambattista Della Porta's De Refractione of 1593". Transactions of the American Philosophical Society.
6. Wade, Nicholas. (2003-02-01). "The Chimenti Controversy". Perception.