This explains how it is that the Spaniard’s chief works have been
ascribed to his Florentine master, Domenico Alexandro. These are the
funeral monuments of Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic sovereigns,
in the Royal Chapel of Granada (Plate 76), and that of Don Juan, their
only son, which is in the Church of St. Thomas at Avila (Plate 77). This
last monument is of great purity and beauty of style. Domenico Alexandro
died in 1520, two years before the Granada tombs were executed. A recent
discovery noted by M. Marcel Dieulafoy of three names of those who
presided at the mounting of the monuments, all of whom belonged to the
studio of Ordóñez, gives further proof that we owe these splendid
funeral monuments to him. There is confusion about all the works of this
great sculptor. It is probable that he was the author of the tombs of
Philip the Handsome and Juana la Loca, which are also in Granada’s Royal
Chapel; while many anonymous sculptures of this date, as well as others
that have been assigned to the early Renaissance artists, may well be
his work. But the question of attributions, always difficult, is
especially so in the case of an artist who, like Bartolomé Ordóñez,
assumes a style typical of his period.
The most famous of the early Renaissance artists was Philip Vigarni,
better known by his surname Borgoña. He was of Burgundian origin, but a
native of Burgos, and he spent his life in the country of his birth. We
hear of him first in the year 1500, gaining a competition to execute the
great retablo of the Tras-Sagrario in the Cathedral of Burgos.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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