Cimabue

Giovanni Cimabue ( CHEE-mə-BOO-ay, Italian: [tʃimaˈbuːe]; c. 1240 – 1302), also known as Cenni di Pepo or Cenni di Pepi, was an Italian painter and designer of mosaics from Florence.

Although heavily influenced by Byzantine models, Cimabue is generally regarded as one of the first great Italian painters to break from the Italo-Byzantine style. Compared with the norms of medieval art, his works have more lifelike figural proportions and a more sophisticated use of shading to suggest volume. According to Italian painter and historian Giorgio Vasari, Cimabue was the teacher of Giotto, the first great artist of the Italian Proto-Renaissance. However, many scholars today tend to discount Vasari's claim by citing earlier sources that suggest otherwise.