"Pier Jacopo Alari Bonacolsi (c. 1460–1528), called L´Antico by his contemporaries for the refined interpretation of the Antique they recognized in his work, was a 16th-century North Italian sculptor, known for his finely detailed small bronzes all´Antica—coolly classicizing, often with gilded details, and silver-inlaid eyes, a refinement that is found in some classical and Hellenistic Greek bronzes.
There is very little documentation of Bonacolsi, in spite of the aristocratic name he bore, that of the signori of Mantua who preceded the Gonzaga until 1328. Born probably in Gazzuolo, near Mantua, he may have been trained as a goldsmith, like his only rival in Mantua, Andrea Riccio. He found patronage among the Gonzaga, at first in the court that gathered at Gazzuolo around the natural son and favorite of the marquis of Mantua, Ludovico Gonzaga, Gianfrancesco, and his wife Antonia del Balzo, whose wedding in 1479 was commemorated in a pair of medallions by Bonacolsi. Gianfrancesco had recently come into possession of the fief, and a refined court gathered round the young couple, of personalities both intellectual and artistic: Ludovico Ariosto, Bernardo Tasso, Matteo Bandello, Baldassare Castiglione and l´Antico. At Gazzuolo the parish church became the burial place of the Gonzaga: there Pico della Mirandola is also interred." - (en.wikipedia.org 16.05.2020)
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