Filippo Lippi

Timeline

1. c. 1421–1450Camaldolese Monastery of Santa Maria, Florence · Republic of FlorenceFilippo Lippi was born around 1406 in Florence to a poor family and, after being orphaned young, was raised in a Camaldolese monastery. Around 1421 he took vows as a monk; near Santa Maria del Carmine he witnessed Masaccio's revolutionary frescoes in the Brancacci Chapel, absorbing its perspective and realism and introducing this new concern with the human body and light into his own work, gradually forming a personal language combining realism and tenderness.
2. 1452–1465Prato Cathedral · PratoIn 1452, recommended by Cosimo de' Medici, Lippi was commissioned to paint large frescoes in the main chapel of Prato Cathedral on the lives of John the Baptist and Saint Stephen. The project took over thirteen years (1452–1465); Lippi took on multiple commissions simultaneously, progress was slow, and he was even briefly detained by the Prato authorities to be pressed on. The frescoes, with their flowing narrative compositions, precise expressions, and multi-layered spatial depth, are regarded as the summit of his career and deeply influenced generations of Florentine painters. In 1456 Lippi eloped with the convent pupil Lucrezia Buti; their son was the later painter Filippino Lippi.
3. 1467–1469Spoleto Cathedral · SpoletoIn 1467 Lippi was invited to Spoleto in Umbria to paint a fresco of the life and Assumption of the Virgin in the apse semi-dome of the local cathedral. He died in Spoleto on 8 October 1469 before it was finished; his assistant Fra Diamante completed the remaining work. He is buried in Spoleto; Lorenzo de' Medici asked the local authorities to have his ashes moved back to Florence, but was politely refused, as locals regard him as the city's artistic glory.