The Shadow of the Florentine School To understand Giottino, one must look past the moniker little Giotto and see a painter who functioned as a vital link in the fourteenth-century Florentine tradition. Born around 1324, Maso di Stefano—better known by his diminutive title—did not simply mimic his predecessors. He operated within a specific lineage of naturalism established by his father, Maestro Stefano Fiorentino. This elder artist, nicknamed the Ape of Nature for his commitment to realism, provided the technical foundation that allowed Giott and his son to move away from rigid Byzantine fo…