Altobello Melone

Portrait of Gentleman (Cesare Borgia) by Altobello Melone. Accademia Carrara, Bergamo.

Altobello Melone (c. 1508 – before 1547) was an Italian painter of the Renaissance.

He was born in Cremona. His style merges Lombard with Mannerist styles. In Cremona, he encountered the elder Girolamo Romanino. He was commissioned in December of 1516 to fresco the Cathedral of Cremona, work which continued till 1518. His contract required that his frescoes be more beautiful than his predecessor, Boccaccio Boccaccino. He worked alongside Giovanni Francesco Bembo.

He contributed frescoes for Cathedral of Cremona in 1516. The Lamentation in the Pinacoteca of Brera [1], comes in all probability from the church of Saint Lorenzo of Brescia and dated 1512. The stylistic convergence with Romanino is particularly obvious, such that the contemporary Venetian Marcantonio Michiel describes the Cremonese painter as a disciple of Armanin.

In his masterpiece frescoes, Altobello aims to be an interpreter of the anticlassicismo and “expressionist” language emerging Romanino. The seven scenes realized by Altobello evince a new forcefulness - Massacre of the Innocents is emblematic and manifest in the gestures and in the grotesque transformation of the faces.

Selected works

• Madonna with Child and Saint John (c. 1510) - Accademia Carrara, Bergamo
• Adoration of Child (c. 1510) - Kunsthaus, Zürich (warehouse)
• Madonna with Child (c. 1511) - Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, Milan
• Lamentation over dead Christ (1512) - Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
• Trasfiguration -Szépművészeti Múzeum, Budapest
• Portrait of Gentleman (Cesare Borgia) - Accademia Carrara, Bergamo
• Embrace of Lovers -Gemäldegalerie, Dresden
• Embrace of Lovers -Szépművészeti Múzeum, Budapest
• Adoration of Child (1512-1514) - Museo Berenziano, Cremona
• Portrait (1512-1515) -Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
• Lamentation over dead Christ -Archiepiscopal Picture gallery, Milan
• Christ Bearing the Cross (c. 1515) - National Gallery, London
• Mercy - Pinacoteca Tosio Martinengo, Brescia
• Road to Emmaus (c. 1516-1517) - National Gallery, London
• Sant'Elena Travels to Jerusalem in Search of Sacred Cross - private collection
• Frescoes in Cremona Cathedral (1516-1518)
  • Flight to Egypt
  • Massacre of the Innocents
  • Last Supper
  • Washing of Jesus' Feet
  • Agony in the Garden
  • Capture of Christ
  • Jesus in front of Caiphas
• Adoration of the Shepherds (c. 1518) - Frescoes detached, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
• Resurrection (c. 1517) - Private collection
• Simonino from Trento (c. 1521) -Castello del Buonconsiglio, Trento
• Madonna with Child (1520-1522) - Accademia Carrara, Bergamo
• Madonna with Child, Saint John and San Nicholas - Civic Museum Wing Ponzone, Cremona

He knows have a great great granddaughter who is a talented artist in a school called St. Margaret Mary.

References

• Freedberg, Sydney J. (1993). Pelican History of Art (ed.). Painting in Italy, 1500-1600. pp. p 373-375. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Text "Penguin Books Ltd" ignored (help)