His most characteristic works in his main media show largely naked male figures in complicated poses of violent action, drawing from classical examples and often centred on a heroic Hercules.

[5] Contemporaries, and Giorgio Vasari, saw Antonio as by far the more talented, and responsible for the design and main painting of most works,[6] but in recent decades the reputation of Piero has strengthened somewhat, and he is now given sole authorship of, for example, the small Apollo and Daphne (1470–1480) by its owner, the National Gallery.

According to Kenneth Clark, two factors have reduced his prominence in the modern view of Quattrocento art: the loss of his very large paintings of some of the Labours of Hercules, and "a name which looks difficult to pronounce".

Galli only attributes to Antonio the reduced versions of the two Labours of Hercules (Uffizi), the Dancing Nudes fresco, and an early altarpiece with the Elevation of the Magdalen.

Vasari began the tradition of stressing the contribution of Antonio rather than Piero to the paintings, which went largely unchallenged until the 20th century,[11] despite suspicions by art historians such as Martin Davies, Director of the National Gallery.

The brothers took the nickname pollaiuolo meaning "poulterer" in Italian from the trade of their father Jacopo, who sold poultry, pollaio.

According to Benedetto Dei, the contemporary "fanatical enumerator" of Florentine life, there were only 8 poultry suppliers in Florence in 1472, but 44 goldsmith's workshops.

The youngest brother, Piero, was also an artist, apparently only in painting, and he and Antonio very frequently worked together, though their workshops were physically "separate but mutually accessible".

[15] Their work shows both classical influences and an interest in human anatomy; reportedly, the brothers carried out dissections to improve their knowledge of the subject.

This is not contradicted by the possibility that he was the "Antonio di Jacopo" listed in 1457 as a "lavorante" for Miliani Dei, twin brother of the chronicler and from a long-established goldsmithing family.

He was buried in the church of San Pietro in Vincoli, where a joint monument was raised to him and his brother, who had died in Rome two years earlier.

[32] He was early as a significant painter depicting subjects from classical mythology, especially those featuring Hercules, but the surviving examples of these are small paintings for private houses.

Unlike the most famous Davids of the period, by Donatello (in both marble and bronze), Verrocchio, or Michelangelo, this lacks any documentary evidence linking it to the Florentine government or the Medici family.

[37] The composition of a banner, documented but now lost, of the Archangel Michael in combat with the devil in the form of a dragon or serpent, is known from a copy, and is enthusiastically described by Vasari.

It is his largest and most ambitious surviving work, "a milestone in Renaissance art", as the first large scale painting where the composition is dictated by the actions of the figures.

[39] A fresco frieze of dancing nude figures, in a villa near Florence, perhaps from the 1470s, is in very poor condition, but shows the same interest in extreme body poses as works mentioned above, but this time in a spirit of joy.

[40] This was for the Lanfredini family, close allies of the Medici who seem to have been important early patrons of Antonio, willing to put pressure on others to get payments due to him.

[43] His main contribution to Florentine painting lay in his analysis of the human body in movement or under conditions of strain, but he is also important for his pioneering skill interest in depicting wide landscape backgrounds.

[44] Artists who were both painters and sculptors were not very uncommon in 15th-century Italy; Andrea del Verrocchio is a near-contemporary example in Florence, with a similar career pattern, beginning as a goldsmith, then working for the Medici and finally leaving the city in 1483.

He also produced a large crucifix with the corpus in painted cork,[49] and a parade shield with a relief of Milo of Croton in gilded plaster (Louvre).

[52] Two surviving drawings, one owned and described by Vasari, record his involvement in the long planned by never realized project for an equestrian statue in bronze, as a memorial to Francesco Sforza, Duke of Milan (d. 1466).

[53] Goldsmith work was probably his "primary activity" through most of his career, and perhaps its most profitable aspect, but apart from major church commissions almost nothing clearly attributable has survived, except for the Baptistery crucifix and plaques.

[55] Large secular commissions, now vanished, include some for the government: in 1472 a ceremonial silver bowl weighing 32 pounds, with a relief "garland of children" inside, and in 1472–1473 an ornamental "display helmet", silver-gilt with enamels, and topped with a figure of Hercules.

[60] Pope Sixtus IV had begun planning for his floor tomb before his death in 1484, including the construction of a new side chapel near the main altar.

[75] The engraving is signed: OPVS ANTONII POLLAIOLI FLORENTINI ("the work of Antonio Pollaiuolo the Florentine") on a tablet at left.

[77] The main inscription on the tomb of Pope Sixtus IV is given above; there are two shorter ones in other parts of the monument: ANTONIUS POLLAIOLUS FLORENTINUS and OPUS ANTONII DE FLORENTIA.