Giovanni Battista di Jacopo, nicknamed Rosso Fiorentino for his fiery red hair, brought an experimental and unsettled energy to the High Renaissance. Trained in Florence, he grew frustrated with the balanced formulas of his masters. Instead, he pioneered Mannerism, a style that favored emotional distortion, acidic colors, and unstable compositions.

His paintings traded classical harmony for eerie tension. He abandoned soft lighting to render figures with sharp, angular limbs and expressive faces caught in spiritual crisis. After narrowly surviving the brutal Sack of Rome, his flight from the city brought him to the French court of King Francis I.

At the Château de Fontainebleau, his style evolved. Tasked with decorating royal galleries, he blended frescoes with intricate stucco framing. This achievement laid the foundations for the School of Fontainebleau, securing his legacy as an avant-garde visionary.