Francesco Laurana - Life and Works

Life and Works

Laurana was born in Vrana, near Zadar, in Dalmatia. Under the rule of Venice Vrana was named La Vrana, forme romance de Vrana, which is the name used by Francesco Laurana.

After an apprenticeship under a sculptor, he began his solo career at Naples, where he was one of the team of sculptors finishing the triumphal arch of Castel Nuovo for Alfonso V of Aragon. After the death of Alfonso (1458) he was called to the court at Aix-en-Provence, of René d'Anjou, the former and still titular King of Naples, who commissioned from him a series of bronze portrait medals of personages at the court.

From 1466 to 1471 Laurana was in Sicily. Works of this period include the Mastrantonio Chapel and the tomb of Pietro Speciale in the church of S. Francesco in Palermo, the side door of the church of St. Marguerite in Sciacca, Madonna and Child sculptures in the Cathedrals of Palermo (1471) and Noto, and a bust allegedly portraying Eleanor of Aragon, now in the Palazzo Abatellis in Palermo, Sicily.

In 1471 he returned to Naples where he executed the sculpture of the Virgin in the Sta. Barbara Chapel. In 1474-1477 Laura spent three years in Urbino, where his relative Luciano Laurana worked. Then he transferred again to Marseille, where he built a small chapel in the Cathedral of S. Marie Majeure (1475–81) that is the first structure in France entirely in the Renaissance style, and his workshop executed the St. Lazarus marble altar there. From his workshop also came the retable of the Calvary in St. Didier d'Avignon and the tombs of Giovanni Cossa at Sainte-Marthe de Tarascon and of Charles, comte du Maine, in Le Mans.

Laurana died at Marseille or Avignon, in 1502.