Bronzini's Descent of Christ into Limbo (1552)

This painting by Angelo Bronzini hands in 1552 is on magnificent display the opera at Santa Croce in Florence. Bronzino was arguably the greatest master of mannerism, the highly stylistic and profane style that dominated Florentine art through the middle of the 16th century. He was born in 1506, and by 1527, Rome was about to be ransacked by Charles V, the Medici expelled from Florence and the Catholics counter-attacking the Reformers. Shuffled through these social and economic upheavals, art moved away from the classical ideals and equilibrium of the Renaissance to a new style later identified as ‘Mannerism'. The maniera moderna of the great Renaissance masters was emulated so as to create a style awkwardly strange and artificial as if removed from reality. The classical contrapposto was so exaggerated that figures look languid and overly sensual. Naked or clothed in tight garments, the bodies revealed their forms – they looked like shiny, rose-tinted porcelain. The cold light used by Mannerists and their juxtaposing of colours such as purple, apple green and orange also enhanced the weirdness and mystical aura of the painting. Not to mention that Jesus doesn't look the least bit unhappy in limbo. Not your typical religious painting. There is also an interesting anomaly in this painting: instead of Jesus alone rescuing the unbaptized souls from Limbo, a woman is helping them to get onto the rock. Grace in the form of an enticing female nude? I am not alone in this thought. It is the naturalist portraiture, which Bronzino included in his religious paintings that aroused criticism. Among the contemporary Florentines he portrayed in Descent into Limbo, he daringly included two great beauties of the day that he clothed in transparent veils and little more – a practice that religious extremist Savonarola condemned as an ‘insult to God’ in his Lentens sermon in 1496 (too early for Bronzini). This was backed up by the Council of Trent in 1563. Be that as it may, this is a spectacular painting, which has been gorgeously restored and should not be missed.