Comparative Analysis

For the following comparative analysis I will be comparing two works; Pontormo’s “Entombment” and Bronzino’s “Allegory with Venus and Cupid”. Both these works were achieved during the High Italian Renaissance around 1520 and both incorporate the style of Mannerism. Jacopo Carcucci, or Pontormo as he was known, was an Italian artist during the onset and early years of Mannerism. His paintings depict a different perspective then High Renaissance artists, and his figures seem to elegantly float in the air, a characteristic of Mannerism. Pontormo uses bright colors to depict a group of people in a grieving manner, supporting Jesus and encompassing the space around him.

These figures seem to be almost struggling, perhaps implying that help is needed to sustain the weight of Jesus. The man holding him on the bottom seems to be peering back towards the viewer with an empathically look of fret. The rest of the figures seem to carry the same look about them, floating in this bleak space. Even the man on the bottom seems to be barely grounded, however holding an immense weight.

The landscape of this oil painting consists of a dark flattened space, with solid ground and a single cloud in the sky. It is very interesting that no cross is visible in this painting, and perhaps the only item relevant to the “natural world” in this piece consists of the clothing worn by these figures. The figure in the front right, facing completely backwards, seems to be suggesting to the viewer that she is following along with the rest of the figures and perhaps there are more people following that are not depicted in the painting. Pontormo leaves the viewer with a quite ambiguous composition in this sense, and rather implies a more “visionary” painting. The way he has expressed these figures as more elongated and stretched out, is typical of the Mannerism style. Rather then being influenced by nature, artists began looking more at past works and sculptures. It is for this reason that Mannerism has been called as “anti-classical”.

Agnolo Bronzino’s Allegory with Venus and Cupid (also called An Allegory of Venus and Cupid and A triumph of Venus, is another great piece characteristic of the Mannerism style. Displaying elongated and obscured figures, while expressing grace and ambivalence, it is similar to Pontormo’s Entombment. However this piece, which was done maybe twenty years or so after Entombment does seem to incorporate a variety of depictions within figures. It also expresses a much more crowded space, and a well-defined foreground. The different characters within Bronzino’s piece are still presented in a manneristic style of exaggerated graceful forms, but with each figure having different expressions; varying from Pontormo’s figures.
As Stokstad states, this composition does carry with it the complex allegoric ambiguity relevant from this time period, but could imply a rather disturbing difference then Pontormo’s work. The erotic imagery, which appealed to mid-sixteenth century courts, suggests emotions of lust and jealousy. Mannerism is made up of several approaches and ideals defining its style. Rather then the humanistic approach of life like figures, Mannerism, is more concerned with grace and elegance. It was very much influenced by the more naturalistic works of artists like da Vinci and Raphael.