Barbadori Altarpiece and Predella
Filippo Lippi·1437
Historical Context
The Barbadori Altarpiece by Filippo Lippi, painted around 1437 for the church of Santo Spirito in Florence, was one of his most ambitious early commissions. The work, now in the Uffizi with its predella in the Louvre, marks a significant development in Florentine altarpiece design, moving away from the compartmentalized Gothic polyptych toward a unified spatial composition. The patron, Gherardo di Bartolomeo Barbadori, was a prominent Florentine merchant.
Technical Analysis
Lippi demonstrates his evolving mastery of unified pictorial space through careful perspective construction, combining the monumental figure style inherited from Masaccio with his own developing taste for decorative elegance and soft color.
