Gozzoli, Benozzo

, an artist, born at Florence in 1400, was the disciple of Fra Angelico, but the imitator of Masaccio, to whom he was little inferior in most, and superior in some parts of the art. He lived long at Pisa, where his best works still exist, and appear less loaded with the gaudy extravagance of that missal style which deluded the age. The Bible-histories, with which he filled one entire side of the Campo Santo at Pisa, are by Vasari styled “a terrible work, performances to intimidate a legion of painters.” It is in that place where he displays a power of composition, a truth of imitation, a variety of character and attitude, a juicy, lively, lucid colour, and a pathos of expression that places him next to Masaccio. The inequality of the work, however, seems to betray more than one hand. He died at Pisa in 1478, and a sepulchre, erected to his memory by the gratitude of his employers, is placed near the above work, with an epitaph in his praise. His works were engraved by Lasinio, and published in 1805 and 1807. ²