Franciabigio

Florentine Francesco di Cristofano Bigi, better known as Franciabigio (1482–1525) was the most temperamental of Andrea del Sarto’s associates but only mildly Mannerist in style.

Among his early works are the frescoes of the Marriage of the Virgin (1513) in Santissima Annunziata, which would have been his fresco masterpiece if only the friars unveiled it before Franciabigio finished it, making him so angry that took a hammer to the Virgin's head.

He followed this with a Cenacolo in the style of Andrea Mantegna at San Giusto della Calza. He worked with del Sarto in the Chiostro dello Scalzo and his Nola mi tangere hangs near del Sarto's Cenacolo in San Salvi.

Franciabigio's also painted secular works, including the Triumph of Cicero at the Villa Medicea di Poggio a Caiano and the Calumny of Apelles in the Palazzo Pitti.

Francibigio later came under the spell of Raphael, so much so that some of his paintings and his portraits, which are some of his finest works, have been attributed to Raphael over the years, including his Madonna del Pozzo in the Uffizi.