Alesso Baldovinetti. Alesso or Alessio Baldovinetti was an Italian early Renaissance painter.
Baldovinetti was born in Florence to a rich noble family. In 1448 he was registered as a member of the Guild of St. Luke: Alesso di Baldovinetti, dipintore.
He was a follower of the group of scientific realists and naturalists in art which included Andrea del Castagno, Paolo Uccello and Domenico Veneziano. Tradition says that he assisted in the decorations of the church of S. Egidio, however no records confirm this.
These decoration were carried out during the years 1441-1451 by Domenico Veneziano and in conjunction with Andrea del Castagno. That he was commissioned to complete the series at a later date is certain.
In 1462 Alesso was employed to paint the great fresco of the Annunciation in the cloister of the Annunziata basilica. The remains as we see them give evidence of the artist's power both of imitating natural detail with minute fidelity and of spacing his figures in a landscape with a large sense of air and distance; and they amply verify two separate statements of Vasari concerning him: that he delighted in drawing landscapes from nature exactly as they are, whence we see in his paintings rivers; bridges, rocks, plants, fruits, roads, fields, cities, exercise grounds, and an infinity of other such things, and that he was an inveterate experimentalist in technical matters. His favourite method in