Italian sculptor, nephew of Antonio Susini. He studied in his uncle's workshop, becoming a highly skilled bronze-caster: his first documented commission, in 1614, is for a bronze altar frontal (untraced) for the Pitti Palace. But he also worked in marble, and the marble Dissimulation (Florence, Pitti) - in Giambologna's idiom, but with gestures derived from the Antique - may be his earliest surviving work. He travelled to Rome c. 1624-26, making copies of newly discovered antique works such as the Hermaphrodite (Paris, Louvre) for casting as bronze statuettes. Francesco's masterpiece, the bronze statuette group Paris and Helen (1626; Skulpturensammlung), made after his return to Florence, improvises on Giambologna's theme of a male figure lifting a female and masterfully employs Giambologna's multiple-viewpoint system, but also shows the Roman influence of Bernini's Pluto and Proserpina (1621-22; Rome, Galleria Borghese) in the energetically contrasted diagonals of the bodies. The undated bronze statuette David with the Head of Goliath (Vaduz, Sammlung Liechtenstein) draws on the Ludovisi Mars in Rome (Museo Nazionale Romano). //