Why was Botticelli important to the Renaissance?

Sandro Botticelli was born in the mid-1440s in Florence, Italy. As a boy, he apprenticed as a goldsmith and then with master painter Filippo Lippi. By his forties, Botticelli was himself a master and contributed to the decoration the Sistine Chapel. His best known work is The Birth of Venus

Loved by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and an important influence on art nouveau, he was part of a late 15th-century movement which admired the ornamental, linear qualities of Gothic painting. Botticelli is best known for his mythological allegories, Primavera (c. 1478), The Birth of Venus and Pallas and the Centaur.