Piero della Francesca (1420-1492)
Piero della Francesca was one of the most respected artists of the early Renaissance. He was born in Italy in 1410 and soon became interested in mathematics, drawing and Latin classics. He studied art with great masters of the day: Domencio Veneziano, Masaccio and Donatello.

Piero was famous during his time. He received many commissions for portraits and religious paintings throughout Italy. As an old man, Piero began to lose his eyesight and spent his final years writing books about mathematics, perspective and painting. He died in 1492 at age 82.

Piero's paintings are orderly, precise and formal. He made careful observations of the world and painted very realistically. Like many Renaissance artists, he spent many hours using geometry to plan the composition of each artwork. Sometimes he even made models of geometric forms instead of working with live models. He also used light, color and linear perspective to create the illusion of depth in his works. Piero was also the first Italian artist to include a landscape in the background of his paintings.

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