The life and inspiring works of the artist who gives your room his name: 12. Paolo Uccello***

Cinq maîtres de la Renaissance Florentine. Detail. Anonymous mid-16th C. Musée du Louvre Peintures INV 267. Photo: Shonagon, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Paolo Uccello (1397-1474) was a pioneer of the use of linear perspective, invented (or re-discovered) by Filippo Brunelleschi in the early 1400s.

Uccello was so obsessed with the new technique that it affected his married life. His wife said that he stayed up all night in his studio making intricate drawings and when she called for him to come to bed, he would cry out: “Oh, what a sweet thing this perspective is!” Mrs Uccello’s further comments are not recorded!

Paolo Uccello. Perspective Study of a Chalice, pen and ink on paper, 29 x 24.5 cm, Gabinetto dei Disegni, Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Uccello is Italian for bird and we have been trying, unsuccessfully, to resist a quasi-Italian pun, by saying “He was a strange old bird, that Uccello.” )

The Battle of San Romano

Paolo is probably best known for his three paintings of the Battle of San Romano (1432). Here is the one in the Uffizi gallery in Florence (first picture, below).

For perspective and foreshortening, note particularly the backside of the bucking brown horse on the right (second picture, below):

Paolo Uccello. Battle of San Romano (dating uncertain, c. 1435–1455), tempera on wood, Uffizi Gallery, Florence. Picture: Gleb Simonov – Own work, CC0. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Paolo Uccello. Battle of San Romano, Detail. Tempera on wood, Uffizi Gallery, Florence. Picture: Gleb Simonov – Own work, CC0, Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

An eccentric legacy in Florence Cathedral

Uccello also painted the imposing clockface inside Florence Cathedral. As if in tribute to his eccentricity, the hands revolve anti-clockwise!

Paolo Uccello, Clock with heads of prophets. Florence Cathedral, 1443. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

*** Who wants a number on the bedroom door when they could be staying in Botticelli, Bronzino or Brunelleschi? Or Gentileschi, Ghirlandaio or Ghiberti? Or one of another half-dozen famous Italian artists, from Alberti to Fra Angelico, from Lippi to Vasari?

Some years ago, we decided to switch from numbers to names in each of our rooms. They celebrate famous Italian artists, mainly from the Renaissance and mainly men, because (a) the early Renaissance is our favourite artistic period and (b) because few women were painting professionally in those days, and even fewer have become famous.

At Lois’ insistence we included Artemesia Gentileschi on our list a few years ago, and in 2026 we have introduced Sofonisba Anguissola, despite her tongue-twisting name.