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Three drawings by Jan van der Straet, called Stradanus (1523-1605) ‘Of our Academy, also, is Giovanni della Strada, a Fleming, who has good design, the finest fantasy, much invention, and a good manner of colouring.’1 Thus does Giorgio Vasari describe the Flemish artist Jan van der Straet, known as Stradanus, who was to spend most of his career in Italy. Born in Bruges, Stradanus was trained in Antwerp, where he was a pupil of Peter Aertsen. He became an independent master in Antwerp in the early 1540s, and was accepted into the local painter’s guild in 1545. Soon afterwards, however, Stradanus travelled to Italy, and after a few months in Venice settled in Florence in 1546. He was to work in Florence for much of the remainder of his career, apart from a period in Rome in the early 1550s and Naples in the late 1570s. Known in Italy as Giovanni Stradano, he began his Florentine career by designing tapestry cartoons for the newly-founded Arazzeria Medicea, the tapestry factory established by Cosimo de’ Medici in 1546, and continued to work in this field for many years. After his return from Rome, where he assisted Francesco Salviati and worked with Daniele da Volterra on the decorations of the Vatican Belvedere, Stradanus joined the group of artists working on the extensive decoration of the Palazzo Vecchio under the supervision of Vasari, whose principal assistant and collaborator he became. More than perhaps any other artist except Vasari, Stradanus’s work as a painter and tapestry designer dominated the extensive decoration of the Palazzo Vecchio. His paintings and frescoes, in which he ‘employed a Vasarian manner with a distinctly Flemish accent’2, are found throughout the palace, notably in the rooms dedicated to Cosimo I de’ Medici and Pope Clement VII, as well as in several paintings for the ceiling of the Salone dei Cinquecento and a large part of the fresco decorations of the apartments of Eleanora of Toledo. Stradanus also designed numerous tapestries and wall-hangings for the different rooms in the Palazzo Vecchio, and produced two paintings for the Studiolo of Francesco I de’ Medici. Indeed, as Vasari noted, ‘having made much proficience during the ten years he has worked in the Palace in distemper, fresco, and oils, after the designs and directions of Giorgio Vasari, he can bear comparison with any of the many painters that the said Lord Duke [Cosimo de’ Medici] has in his service.’3 Stradanus worked for the Medici throughout much of his career, eventually creating over 130 cartoons for the Arazzeria Medicea. Among his most important tapestry commissions were a series of twentyeight hunting scenes, intended for wall hangings to decorate the Medici villa at Poggio a Caiano. These were woven, under the artist’s supervision, at the Arazzeria Medicea between 1567 and 1578, but only fifteen tapestries and a few fragments of their decorative borders survive. Stradanus also continued to maintain a close working relationship with Vasari, painting several altarpieces in the late 1560s for Florentine churches remodelled by Vasari, notably at Santissima Annunziata, Santa Maria Novella, and Santa Croce, where in 1564 he had earlier contributed to the decoration of the tomb of Michelangelo. By the early 1570s, however, he seems to have established himself as fully independent of Vasari’s influence, in such paintings as the Christ Driving the Moneychangers from the Temple in the church of Santo Spirito. Stradanus was an early member of the Accademia del Disegno in Florence, founded in 1563, and remained closely involved with the Academy throughout his later career, often inscribing his status as an academician alongside his signature on his drawings and paintings. Apart from his large-scale public commissions, Stradanus also painted easel pictures of religious and allegorical subjects, as well as a handful of portraits. According to the 16th century writer Raffaello Borghini, in 1576 Stradanus went to Naples, where he painted frescoes and canvases for the monastery of Monte Oliveto. He also seems to have spent some time in Antwerp, having accompanied the newlyappointed viceroy, Don John of Austria, from Naples. Stradanus was back in Italy by 1583, when he was commissioned by the Pazzi family to paint an extensive series of frescoes for their villa at Parugiano, near Montemurlo. Between 1585 and 1587 he also painted frescoes and altarpieces for the chapel of the Palazzo della Gherardesca in Florence, commissioned by Cardinal Alessandro de’Medici.