Domenico Ghirlandaio (1449 – January 11, 1494) was a renowned Florentine Renaissance painter whose contemporaries included Botticelli and Filippino Lippi. Among his many apprentices was Michelangelo.
Ghirlandaio's compositional schemes were simultaneously grand and decorous, in keeping with the 15th century's restrained and classic experimentation. His chiaroscuro, in the sense of realistic shading and three-dimensionalism, was reasonably advanced, as were his perspectives, which he designed on a very elaborate scale by eye alone, without the use of sophisticated mathematics. His colour is more open to criticism, but such evaluation applies less to the frescoes than the tempera paintings, which are sometimes too broadly and crudely bright. His frescoes were executed entirely in buon fresco which, in Italian art terminology, refers to abstention from additions in tempera.
Ghirlandaio died of pestilential fever and was buried in Santa Maria Novella. The day and month of his birth remain undocumented, but since he died in early January of his forty-fifth year, he most likely did not reach that birthday. He had been twice married and left six children. One of his three sons, Ridolfo, also became a noted painter. Although he had a long line of descendants, the family died out in the 17th century, when its last members entered monasteries.
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