MONTELUPO, Raffaello da
(b. 1504, Firenze, d. 1566, Orvieto)

Biography

Italian sculptor, part of an Italian family of sculptors and architects active in central and northern Italy from the end of the 15th century to the mid-16th. He was the son of Baccio da Montelupo. Trained by his father and the goldsmith Michelangelo Viviani in Florence, he worked briefly in Carrara in 1521 and entered the workshop of Lorenzo Lotto in Rome in 1523. There he assisted on projects including the tomb of the poet Bernardino Capella (c. 1460–1524) in S Stefano Rotondo, the tomb of Raphael (Pantheon) and in the Cappella Chigi (S Maria del Popolo). It was probably through the circle of Raphael that he met influential supporters, such as Baldassare Turini and Antonio da Sangallo. He also made drawings after the Antique during this formative period, which ended in 1527 with the Sack of Rome.

His first major commission was to assist in the execution of the marble decoration designed by Andrea Sansovino for the Santa Casa (1530–33) at Loreto, where he worked with Niccolò Tribolo, Francesco da Sangallo, Simone Mosca (1492-1553) and others under the direction of Antonio da Sangallo. He carved the relief of the Adoration of the Magi, the left half of the Birth of the Virgin, the Visitation and some putti. In 1533–34 for Michelangelo he carved the statue of St Damian for the New Sacristy in S Lorenzo, Florence. Influence from his period in Loreto is apparent in his relief of the Adoration of the Magi (1538–41) for Simone Mosca's altar of the Magi in Orvieto Cathedral. In 1541–2 Raffaello completed the seated figure of Leo X, left unfinished by Baccio Bandinelli, for the Pope's tomb (Rome, Santa Maria sopra Minerva). Between 1542 and 1545 for Michelangelo’s tomb of Julius II (Rome, San Pietro in Vincoli) he worked on the over life-size statues of the Virgin and Child, on the Prophet and Sibyl and possibly on Leah and Rachel.