Polidoro de Renzi known as Polidoro da Lanciano (Lanciano, 1515 - Venice, 1565) (attr.), Holy Family with Saint John the Baptist

Polidoro de Renzi known as Polidoro da Lanciano (Lanciano, 1515 - Venice, 1565) (attr.) Holy Family with Saint John the Baptist Oil on canvas, 76 x 93 cm With frame, 88 x 104 cm   The valuable canvas can be linked to the Venetian painter of Titianesque training, Polidoro da Lanciano, due to clear stylistic affinities. The compositional scheme of the Holy Family with Saint John the Baptist recurs in many works of Polidoro's production, see for example the canvases of Ca' Rezzonico, the Accademia Carrara, the Museo di Castelvecchio, the Pinacoteca Capitolina and Palazzo dei Diamanti: in particular, our painting takes up the composition of the one from Ferrara, which presents evident Titianesque motifs: the farmhouses in the background with the typical sloping roofs, Saint John the Baptist embracing the lamb, the morphology of the foliage and drapery. As in the present work, the composition is based on an ascending diagonal that culminates from the head of Saint John the Baptist to the serene face of the Virgin, always placed in a privileged position compared to the other characters. Behind her, a lush natural landscape highlights and focuses our attention on the sacred group. The full and rosy face slightly bent to the side of the Virgin, on the other hand, evokes models by Francesco Vecellio, in whose workshop Polidoro seems to have begun his career in the lagoon. The pleasant amber landscape of sloping hills looks to the work of another Venetian painter, Bonifacio de Pitati, whose influence is very present in Polidoro's works of the 1530s. Even the bearded figure of Saint Joseph refers to the elegant ways of Pitati, suggesting a total immersion of our painter in the best art of his time. The work is well suited to the production aimed at creating devotional paintings and Sacred Conversations of a narrative nature, following tested iconographic formulas of great success. Born in Lanciano, in Abruzzo, around 1515, Polidoro soon moved to Venice, the city that consecrated him as a painter. Information on his artistic training is scarce. It is presumed that he had an apprenticeship in his hometown, before moving to Rome around 1536. In the papal city, Polidoro came into contact with the artistic current of Raphaelism, undergoing the influence of artists such as Raffaello Sanzio and Giulio Romano. In the same year he seems to arrive in Venice where his name is registered Fraglia dei Pittori Veneziani. The first pictorial proofs suggest a period of work, or at least of close collaboration within the Vecellio workshop, although his art also appears influenced by Paris Bordon and Bonifacio de Pitati. The opportunity to emerge came in 1544 when he was called by the Scuola dello Spirito Santo to execute the Descent of the Holy Spirit, now at the Galleria dell'Accademia. But other large-format works are placed in this decade, where clear Tintoretto-esque suggestions are evident: in 1552 he created the lost banner for the Scuola Grande di San Teodoro, in 1559 he received the commission for the organ doors of the Church of San Giovanni in Bragora, while his style manifests clear suggestions of Veronese classicism, from which he draws iconographic modules and a renewed chromatic modernity.