Verrocchio, Andrea

(Andrea Cione, ca. 1435-1488)

   Floren-tine artist, primarily known as a sculptor. Born the son of a kiln worker and initially trained as a goldsmith, as early as 1463 he re-ceived a major commission for a monumental bronze sculpture, The Incredulity of St. Thomas. Another early work was a tomb for two members of the Medici family in San Lorenzo at Florence, Piero I and Giovanni de'Medici (1472). For a fountain at a Medici family villa he produced Putto with a Dolphin and a David that directly chal-lenged the much-admired earlier treatment of the same figure by Do-natello. Both of these works are thought to date from the 1460s or 1470s. His most widely known work, also in a sense a challenge to Donatello, is his Equestrian Monument of Bartolomeo Colleoni (ca. 1483-1488), a monumental bronze statue erected at Venice in honor of one of the city's most successful mercenary generals. Verrocchio headed a large workshop which trained many younger artists, of whom the most famous was Leonardo da Vinci. In his own time he was also a famous and successful painter, though the attribution of his works is often disputed. Even his most important painting, The Baptism of Christ (ca. 1475-1485), is known to have been retouched (if not repainted) by Leonardo. Many of the Italian artists of the next generation show traces of his influence.