Certain it is that Lomazzo, whilst he resided with him in Milan, mentioned him in the highest terms, and enumerated in the list of his pupils Sabbatini, and Sammachini too. I shall not here repeat what I have detailed in the Milanese School respecting Ercole and his sons; but, pa.s.sing on to the others, I shall begin with Fontana, the princ.i.p.al cause of the decline above alluded to.
The long protracted life of this artist comprehended the whole of the period now under our view, and even extended beyond it. Born in the time of Francia, educated by Imola, who at his death selected him to finish one of his pictures, and subsequently employed for a long period as the a.s.sistant of Vaga, and of Vasari, he continued to labour and to teach without intermission, until the Caracci, once his disciples, drew all his commissions and followers to themselves. For this result he was indebted to his own conduct. Devoted to pleasure (the most fatal enemy to an artist"s reputation) he could only provide the means of gratification by burthening himself with works, and executing them with little care. He possessed a fertility of ideas, a vehemence, and a cultivation of mind, well adapted for works of magnitude. Abandoning, therefore, the careful finish of Francucci, he adopted the method of Vasari, and like him covered with his works a vast number of walls in a short s.p.a.ce of time, and nearly in the same taste. In design he is more negligent than Vasari, in his motions more energetic; his colours have the same yellow cast, but rather more delicacy.
In Citta di Castello a hall of the n.o.ble family of Vitelli is filled with family histories, painted by him in a few weeks, as Malvasia informs us, and the work confirms the a.s.sertion. Similar specimens, or but little superior, are met with in Rome, at the Villa Giulia, and at the Palazzo di Toscana, in the Campo Marzio, and in various houses in Bologna. Yet in other places he appears an artist of merit for a declining age; as in his Epiphany, at the Grazie, where he displays a facility, a pomp of drapery, and a magnificence nearly approaching the style of Paul Veronese. This work bears the name of the painter written in letters of gold. But his best claim to distinction is founded on his portraits, which are more highly prized in cabinets than are his compositions in the churches. It was this talent which induced Michelangiolo to present him to Julius III. by whom he was pensioned as one of the Palatine painters of his time.
He had a daughter and a pupil in Lavinia Fontana, named also Zappi, from the family of Imola, into which she was married. This lady executed several altar-pieces at Rome and at Bologna in the paternal style, as far as regards colouring; but less successful in point of design and composition.
She felt the inferiority, as is observed by Baglione, and sought reputation from portrait-painting, a branch in which she is preferred by some to Prospero. It is certain that she wrought with a sort of feminine perseverance, in order that her portraits should more faithfully express every line and feature of nature in the countenances, every refinement of art in the drapery. She became painter to Pope Gregory XIII., and was more particularly applied to by the Roman ladies, whose ornaments she displayed more perfectly than any male artist in the world. She attained to so high a degree of sweetness and softness in the art, especially after knowing the works of the Caracci, that one or two of her portraits have been attributed to Guido. With equal ability she produced a number of cabinet pictures, such as that Holy Family for the Escurial, so much commended by Mazzolari, and her Sheba at the throne of Solomon, which I saw in the collection of the late Marchese Giacomo Zambeccari. She has there expressed, in the form of allegory, the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Mantua, surrounded by many lords and ladies of their court, arrayed in splendid style; a painting that would reflect credit on the Venetian School. Gifted with such genius, she was by no means chary of her own likenesses executed by herself, which ornament the royal gallery of Florence and other collections. But there remains no specimen more truly speaking and delightful than the one belonging to the Conti Zappi, at Imola, where it is accompanied by the portrait of Prospero in his declining days, also painted by her.
Lorenzo Sabbatini, called likewise Lorenzin di Bologna, was one of the most graceful and delicate painters of his age. I have heard him enumerated among the pupils of Raffaello by keepers of the galleries, deceived doubtless by his Holy Families, designed and composed in the best Roman taste, although invariably more feebly coloured. I have also seen some of his Holy Virgins and Angels painted for private ornament, which resemble Parmigianino. Nor were his altar-pieces inferior; the most celebrated of which is that of St. Michael, engraved by Agostino Caracci, from an altar of S. Giacomo Maggiore; and this he held up as an example of gracefulness and beauty, to his whole school. He was, moreover, a fine fresco painter, correct in design, of copious invention, universal master in the subjects of the piece, and what is still more remarkable, most rapid in point of execution. Endowed with such qualities, he was engaged by many n.o.ble houses in his native place; but on proceeding to Rome in the pontificate of Gregory XIII., according to Baglione, he there met with success; insomuch, that even his fleshes and naked figures were highly commended, though this was by no means a branch of his pursuits at Bologna. In the Capella Paolina, he represented the histories of St. Paul; in the royal hall, the picture of Faith, shewn in triumph over Infidelity; in the gallery and the lodges a variety of other pieces, always in compet.i.tion with the best masters, and always with equal applause. Hence, in the immense list of artificers at that period congregated at Rome, he was selected to preside over the labours of the Vatican, in the enjoyment of which honourable post he died at an early age in 1577.
It is difficult to believe, as a.s.serted by some writers, that Giulio Bonasone was his pupil, an artist who practised engraving in copper as early as 1544. On reaching a more mature age, he seems to have devoted himself to painting, leaving several paintings on canva.s.s, but feeble and varying in their style. At S. Stefano there is one of Purgatory, in the style of Sabbatini, extremely fine, and composed, as it is conjectured, with the a.s.sistance of Lorenzino. The productions, also, of Cesare Aretusi, of Felice Pasqualini, and of Giulio Morina, are in existence, though the name of Sabbatini might perhaps be justly subst.i.tuted for theirs; such was the part he took in their labours. The latter, with Girolamo Mattioli, after the celebrity gained by the Caracci, became their eager followers.
The labours of Mattioli, who died young, were distributed among different private houses, particularly in that of the n.o.ble family of Zani: those of Morina are seen in various churches at Bologna, and for the most part betray a degree of affectation of the style of Parma, at which city he some time painted in the service of the duke.
Orazio Samacchini, the intimate friend of Sabbatini, his contemporary, and who followed him at a short interval to the tomb, began his career by imitating Pellegrino and the Lombards. Proceeding next to Rome, and employed in painting for the royal hall, under Pius IV.; he succeeded in catching the taste of the Roman School, for which he was praised by Vasari, (who calls him Fumaccini) and afterwards by Borghini and Lomazzo. In the display of this his new style, however, he contrived to please others more than himself; and returning to Bologna, he was accustomed to lament that he had ever removed from upper Italy, where he might have carried his early manner to greater perfection, without deviating in search of a new. Still he had no reason to feel dissatisfied with that which he had thus formed of various others, and so moulded by his own genius, as to exhibit something singular in its every character. In his altar-piece of the Purification, at S. Jacopo, it is all exquisite delicacy, in which the leading figures enchant us with at once a majestic and tender expression of piety; while those infant figures seen conversing near the altar, and that of the young girl holding a little basket with two doves, gazing on them in so peculiar a manner, delight us with their mingled simplicity and grace. Skilful judges even can take no exceptions but to the display of too great diligence, with which, during several years, he had studied and polished this single painting. This, however, as one of the most celebrated of its school, was engraved by Agostino, and it would seem that even Guido availed himself of it in his Presentation, painted for the cathedral of Modena, yet he was an equally powerful artist where his subjects required it of him.
His chapel, of which we gave an account in the Parmese School, is highly commended, though his most vigorous effort is shewn in the ceiling of S.
Abbondio, at Cremona. The grand and the terrible seem to strive for mastery in the figures of the prophets, in all their actions and positions; the most difficult from confinement of s.p.a.ce, yet the best arranged and imagined. There is, moreover, a truth in the shortenings, and a skilful use of the _sotto in su_,[12] which appears in this instance to have selected the most difficult portion of the art, in order to triumph over it. His forte is believed to have consisted in grand undertakings in fresco, on which he impressed, as it were, the seal of a vast spirit, at once resolute and earnest, without altering it by corrections and retouches, with which he laboured his paintings in oil, as we have stated.
Footnote 12: Foreshortening figures; here meant on a ceiling.
Bartolommeo Pa.s.serotti has been commended by Borghini and Lomazzo; and he is casually named also by Vasari among the a.s.sistants of Taddeo Zuccaro; indeed, it may rather be said, this is the artist with whom Vasari ceases to write, and Malvasia to inveigh.[13] He possessed excellent skill in designing with his pen; a gift which drew to his school Agostino Caracci, and which a.s.sisted the latter as a guide in the art of engraving. He likewise wrote a book, from which he taught the symmetry and anatomy of the human body, essential to the artist; and was the first who, to make a grander display, began to vary scriptural histories at Bologna by drawing the naked torsi. The finest of these specimens are, the Beheading of St.
Paul, at Rome, in the Tre Fontane; and at S. Giacomo, of Bologna, a picture of the Virgin among various saints; a work meant to compete with the Caracci, and embellished by their praise. One of his pictures too of "Tizio" was much celebrated, which, being exhibited to the public, was supposed by the professors of Bologna to have been the work of Michelangiolo. This exquisite degree of diligence and refinement he rarely used; most generally he was bold and free, somewhat resembling Cesare, only more correct. In his portraits, however, he is by no means a common painter. After t.i.tian, Guido included him among the very first, not preferring before him the Caracci themselves, whose name, indeed, in several galleries, is attached to the portraits of Pa.s.serotti. The most commendable of all however, are those he executed for the n.o.ble family Legnani--entire figures extremely varied in costume, in action, and att.i.tudes; it being his usual custom to compose portraits, such as Ridolfi described of Paris, which should appear ideal pictures. By means of such a talent, which made him agreeable to the great, by his polite and refined manners and malicious strictures, he became a match for the Caracci; for whom he also prepared rivals in a number of his sons, whom he carefully instructed in the art. Among these, Tiburzio possessed real merit, of which his fine picture of the Martyrdom of St. Catherine, conducted in the taste of his father, displays sufficient proof. Pa.s.serotto and Ventura, however, were below mediocrity. Aurelio was a good miniaturist, and in the same branch Gaspero, a son of Tiburzio, also met with success. In the works of Bartolommeo we often meet with a sparrow, the symbol of his own name; a custom derived from the ancients, and followed by many of our own artists.
It is a well-known fact relating to two sculptors, Batraco and Sauro, that for their proper names they subst.i.tuted, the former a frog, and the latter a lizard.
Footnote 13: This worthy writer would appear to have been aware that he sometimes exceeded due bounds. In the course of that work we meet with other expressions highly creditable to Vasari; and it is well known, that having spoken contemptuously of Raffaello, by designating him _boccalaio Urbinate_, the potter of Urbino, because some vases there had been painted from his designs, "he repented of the expression so much as to lead him to erase it from as many copies of the work as he could meet with." _Lett.
Pitt._ vol. vii. p. 130.
Dionisio Calvart, born at Antwerp, and hence also called Dionisio the Fleming, came, when young, into Bologna, and displayed some ability in landscape painting. In order to become a figure painter, he entered first the school of Fontana, and next that of Sabbatini, whom he greatly a.s.sisted in his labours for the Vatican. But after quitting also this master, and occupying himself, some little time, in designing from Raffaello"s pictures, he returned to Bologna, opened a studio, and there educated as many as a hundred and thirty-seven masters in the art, some of whom were excellent. He was a fine artist for his age; understood perspective well, which he acquired from Fontana, and designed both correctly and gracefully in the taste of Sabbatini. He moreover possessed the art of colouring, in the taste of his own countrymen, a quality which induced the Bolognese to regard him as a restorer of their school, which in this branch of painting had declined. If there were some degree of mannerism in his style, some action in his figures too little dignified, or too extravagant; the former was the fault of his age, and the latter of his temperament, which is described as extremely restless and violent. Notwithstanding, he instructed his pupils with a.s.siduous care, and from the cartoons of the most celebrated inventors he gave them lectures in the art. Different collections abound with his small pictures, painted chiefly on copper, representing incidents from the Gospel, which attract by the abundance of the figures, by their spirit, and by the lusciousness of their tints.
Similar commissions in this line were then very frequently given in Bologna; most times proceeding from the noviciate nuns, who were in the habit of carrying with them into the cloister similar little paintings to decorate their lonely cells; and Calvart provided abundance of them, with the a.s.sistance of his young men, whose pieces he retouched; and they obtained immense circulation both in Italy and Flanders. In particular those conducted by Albano and Guido, his two pupils, boast the most attractive graces, and may be known by a certain superior decision, knowledge, and facility. In the list of his altar-pieces, the S. Michele, at S. Petronio, and the Purgatory, at the Grazie, bear the palm; and from these, as well as others, the best disciples of the Caracci confessed the a.s.sistance which they received.
On the rise of the new Bolognese School, the pupils of Calvart for the most part changed their manner, attaching themselves some to one master, and some to another. Those who preserved most evident traces of their former education, in other words, who continued more feeble and less natural than the Caracceschi, were but few. Malvasia enumerates Gio. Batista Bertusio in this list, who vainly aspired at resembling Guido, leaving a variety of paintings both at Bologna and its villages, displaying beauties more apparent than real. Two other artists, Pier Maria da Crevalcore, a painter in oil, and Gabriel Ferrantini, known by his frescos, called also Gabriel degli Occhiali, seem both to have seen, and attempted to imitate the Caracci. Emilio Savonanzi, a Bolognese n.o.ble, attached himself to the art when nearly arrived at manhood, but he attended Cremonini more than Calvart; and strongly addicted to changing masters, entered the school of Lodovico Caracci, next that of Guido at Bologna, of Guercino at Cento, and finally the studio of Algardi, an excellent sculptor at Rome. By such means he became a good theorist and an able lecturer, applauded in every particular of his art; nor was he wanting in good practice, uniting many styles in one, in which however that of Guido most prevails. Still he was not equally correct in all his pieces, even betraying feebleness of touch, and not scrupling to denominate himself an artist of many hands. He resided at Ancona, next at Camerino, at which places, as well as in the adjacent districts, he left a variety of works. Of another Bolognese, who flourished at the same period, there remains at Ancona a picture of the offering of the Infant Jesus at the Temple, ornamenting the larger altar of S. Jacopo.
The inscription shews him to have resided at Brescia, _F. Tiburtius Baldinus Bononiensis F. Brixiae_, 1611. This date proves him to have belonged to the present epoch. His taste, from what I am informed by Sig.
Cav. Boni, extremely well informed on subjects of the fine arts, reminds us of the excellent school that flourished in 1500: magnificence in the architecture, great copiousness of composition, and clearness of effect, except that in the general tone of his tints, and in his fleshes, he is somewhat cold. One artist there was, who declared that he had laid down for himself a maxim, never to alter with other styles that of Calvart; and this was Vincenzo Spisano, called likewise Spisanelli. He however is inferior in solidity and truth of design, and displays quite as much caprice and mannerism as any of the pract.i.tioners of his time. Nor does he always preserve the colours peculiar to his school; but deadens them with a leaden hue, which is still not unpleasing. His altar-pieces, executed at Bologna, and in the neighbouring cities, are less celebrated than his small pictures for private ornament, which abound in Bologna, and which he was in the habit of enlivening with very attractive landscape. It has already been observed that those who were mannerists in their style, like Zuccaro and Cesari, always when working on a small scale, improved upon themselves.
Bartolommeo Cesi fills the rank also of head of a school, among those who cleared the path to the good method pursued by the disciples of the Caracci. From him Tiarini acquired the art of painting fresco, and his works gave the first impulse to Guido in attaining to his sweet and graceful manner. On examining a work by Cesi, it sometimes seems doubtful whether it may not have been that of Guido when young. He dares little, copies every thing from nature, selects fine forms of each period of life, and makes sparing use of the ideal; his lines and folds are few, his att.i.tudes measured, and his tints more beautiful than strong. He has some paintings at San Jacopo, and at San Martino, which are extremely pleasing; and it is said that Guido, during his early youth, was in the habit of sitting to contemplate them sometimes for hours. His frescos, perhaps, display more power, where he has introduced many copious histories with great judgment, variety, and mastery; and such are those of aeneas, in the Favi palace. His Arch of Forli, painted for Clement VIII., with different exploits, surprises us even more. Though exposed to the action of the open air, during so many years, this piece retains the vividness of its tints to a surprising degree. Malvasia"s opinion, in commendation of this artist, is very remarkable, that he had a manner which at once satisfies, pleases, and enamours the beholder, as truly exquisite and sweet as any style of the best Tuscan masters in fresco. In the larger chapel of the Bolognese monastery of Carthusians, there are distinguished examples in both kinds of painting; and the describer of the Carthusian monastery, in his account of them, likewise enumerates Cesi"s works for other monasteries of the same order, those of Ferrara, of Florence, and Siena. He was held in esteem by the Caracci, and very generally so by the different professors, no less for the candour of his character, than for his love of the art. To his efforts it was chiefly owing that the company of painters, in 1595, obtained a separation from the artificers of swords, of saddles, and of scabbards, with all of whom they had for centuries been united in the same corporation, and that a new one being formed of painters and of cotton manufacturers,[14] it not being possible wholly to exclude the latter, they were to rank inferior to the artists, or, to use the words of Malvasia, "that they should condescend to furnish to the amount of two hundred, or more, crowns, rich purple cloaks to decorate the wearer of the laurel crown, preceding their vice steward."[15]
Footnote 14: In the original the term used for these cotton merchants is _bambagiai_.
Footnote 15: In the Italian called _proma.s.saro_.
Cesare Aretusi, a son, perhaps, of Pellegrino Munari,[16] was distinguished as a colourist in the Venetian taste, but in point of invention weak and dull; while Gio. Batista Fiorini, on the other hand, was full of fine conceptions but worthless in his colouring. Friendship, that introduces community in the possessions of friends, here achieved what is narrated in the Greek anthology of two poor rogues, one of whom was blind and stout, and carried on his shoulders a sharp-eyed cripple, who thus provided himself with a friend"s pair of feet, while he afforded him the advantage of as many eyes. So it fared with our two artists, who separately could accomplish very little; though in uniting their powers they produced paintings of considerable merit. In the _Guida di Bologna_ they are very properly rarely divided from each other; and I believe, that in every painting we find attributed to Aretusi, we ought farther to seek for some companion of his labours. Of such kind is a Nativity of the Virgin at S.
Afra in Brescia, pa.s.sing under his name, and painted in a very powerful style. Respecting this picture, however, Averoldi is of opinion that it was in part the workmanship of Bagnatore, in part of other painters, or, perhaps, only painter; in other words that of his useful friend Aretusi.
Nevertheless in the branch of portrait, Cesare possessed merit above sharing it with others, and in this capacity he was employed by different princes, and he also succeeded in copying the works of excellent masters better than any other of his age. He could a.s.sume the style of almost every painter, and even pa.s.s off his imitations for the originals. In his imitation of Coreggio, he was more particularly successful, and received a commission to execute a painting from the celebrated Night, by that master, for the church of S. Gio. di Parma, where it still remains. Mengs, who saw it, declared that were the original at Dresden by any accident lost, it might be well supplied by so fine a duplicate. It was this performance that obtained him the honour of restoring the painting, formerly executed by Coreggio for the same church, of which mention was made in the school of Parma, and to which we here refer the reader. Here too we should add, that such was the success of that picture, "from its accurate imitation of the taste displayed in the original, of its conception, and of its harmony, as to lead those unacquainted with the fact to suppose it to be the work of Allegri." Such are the words of Ruta in his _Guida_.
Footnote 16: See vol. iv. p. 43.
Little attention seems to have been given to inferior branches of the art during this epoch, if, indeed, we except that of portrait, whose leading artists must not again be introduced here, having treated of their merits in the proper place. Nor probably were there then wanting painters in oil, who severally produced ornamental pieces of landscape and animals, besides Cremonini and Baglione, whose ability in this line we shall shortly notice, in the cla.s.s of ornamental fresco painters; though none, as far as I can learn, acquired celebrity. In one instance only I meet with handsome eulogiums on a miniature painter, occasionally mentioned throughout this work. He was called Gio. Neri, also Gio. degli Ucelli, from his peculiar talent in delineating all kinds of birds from the life. With these, and with fish of various species, with quadrupeds and other animals, he filled seven folio volumes, which are cited by Masini in the studio of Ulisse Aldovrandi.
Throughout the whole of this epoch we find no mention in Malvasia of any ornamental or perspective painters, except, perhaps, some figurist, who paid little attention to decorations. There is reason, however, to suppose that the celebrated Sebastiano Serlio, while yet a youth, painted perspectives. The Cav. Tiraboschi, in the seventh volume of his history, remarks that "there is no account of Serlio"s occupation during the early part of his life." But the _Guida_ of Pesaro, p. 83, alludes to him at the close of 1511, and subsequently in 1514, as residing in that city in quality of an artist; and in what branch can we more probably suppose him to have been engaged than in perspective? For this, indeed, was the tirocinium of other able architects, where, previous to being entrusted with the anxious duties of their profession, they were enabled, with more facility, to sustain themselves, until their reputation permitted them to a.s.sume the character of architects, and abandon the pursuit of painting.
Indisputably he could not have been an architect at Pesaro, otherwise there would never have been written on a parchment of 1514, remaining in the archives of the Servi:--_Sebastiano qu. Bartholomaei de Serlis de Bononia pictore habitatore Pisauri_. And it is about 1534 that we have an account of his being at Venice, no longer handling the pencil, but the square.
Masini, who had written his _Bologna Perl.u.s.trata_ only a short period before the _Felsina Pittrice_, commends an Agostino dalle Prospettive, who had reached such a degree of perfection in that art, as even to deceive animals and men with his illusive staircases and similar works, executed at Bologna. It is doubtful whether he did not belong to another school, and may have been omitted by Malvasia as a foreigner. I suspected him to be a Milanese in my fourth volume (p. 231), and pupil to the great Soardi, not inferior to his master. Next to him, and to Laureti, Gio. Batista Cremonini of Cento was employed in such commissions more than any other artist. He had received rather superior instructions in the rules of perspective, and respectable practice in the line of statues, figures, and histories, with whatever went to give splendour and effect to a facade, a theatre, or a hall; more particularly he succeeded in delineating animals, however ferocious and wild. There was scarcely a house of any account in all Bologna, which, if nothing more, could not boast some specimen of his chiaroscuro, some frieze for ornament, chimney-piece, or vestibule, decorated by Cremonini; to say nothing of his numerous works in fresco which filled the churches. He was also employed for the adjacent cities, and in different courts of Lombardy kept open school and instructed Guercino, Savonanzi, Fialetti, who flourished in Venice as before stated.
He had for his companion Bartolommeo Ramenghi, cousin of Gio. Batista, with whom also lived Scipione Ramenghi, son of Gio. Batista himself, and both eminent ornamental painters during that period.
Cremonini had a rival in one Cesare Baglione, an artist in the same sphere, and of the same eager and expeditious character in the art. He was, moreover, a better painter of landscape, and even surpa.s.sed all others, including the most ancient, in the method of drawing his foliage. In his inventions too, both of a serious and comic kind, he displayed greater novelty and variety than Cremonini. He thus became a favorite at Parma, where in the ducal palace he left some of his best works, all in harmony with the places which he painted; in the larder illusive eatables of every kind, and cooks employed in dressing them; in the bakehouse utensils for the bakers, and incidents relating thereto; in the washhouses women were seen busied in their different duties, and all in dismay at some untoward or comic accidents; works abounding in spirit and reality sufficient to procure him reputation in his line, had he shewn less eagerness in the execution. This praise will not apply, however, to his decorative taste, which excited the ridicule of the Caracci, who were in the habit of laughing at the fantastic ornaments of his capitals, and those arabesques, most resembling, they declared, the staves of barrels; as well as that custom of filling his compositions with useless ornaments, without rule or discretion, which his own pupils afterwards proceeded to introduce, especially Spada and Dentone. Several others were instructed by him in the art, as Storali and Pisanelli, and some of less note, who painted well in perspective, without aspiring to the reputation of figurists.
Thus we have taken a brief survey of the state of painting in Bologna from the time of Bagnacavallo to the Caracci, who already rising into repute about 1585, in some measure competed with the elder artists, and in some measure by their example, and the spirit of emulation, tended to improve them, of which more in the following epoch. Meanwhile, let us turn our attention to what was pa.s.sing during this period in Romagna.
Ravenna prides herself on the name of Jacopone, a pupil of Raffaello, who, by his paintings at S. Vitale, introduced into that city the principles of the modern style, and of whom we shall shortly state our opinion, not without some degree of novelty. Another of Raffaello"s disciples, if what is averred of him be correct, nourished at Ravenna about 1550, called Don Pietro da Bagnaia, a canon of the Lateran. In the church of his order he painted the altar-piece of S. Sebastian; in the Refectory, the scriptural history of the Loaves and Fishes, besides leaving in another place a history-piece of the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ, abounding in figures equal to the preceding. To these, enumerated by Orlandi, may be added the picture of Padua, with the Virgin between St. John the Baptist and St.
Augustine, executed for the church of S. Giovanni di Verdara; in the sacristy of which is a Holy Family by him, imbued with all the graces of Raffaello in every feature and action, but sadly wanting in strength and harmony of colouring. There is another Holy Family at the Lateran Friars in Asti, on a larger scale, designed and composed with equal grace, but with similar feebleness of tints, even more lifeless; and to both pieces is appended an inscription, entreating the beholder to pray for the soul of the painter. I am not aware whether this worthy ecclesiastic was in Ravenna in 1547, at the period of Vasari"s visit thither, but the latter makes no mention of his name.
Yet he mentioned, among the excellent artists who still flourished there, Luca Longhi, whose ability in the essentials of the art is highly praised.
He regrets, however, that he should always have resided in his native place, which had he left for objects of improvement, he might have become a very distinguished artist. He was a good portrait-painter, and produced a great number of pictures for Ravenna. Some, too, he sent elsewhere, and they are met with at San Benedetto in Ferrara, in the Abbey at Mantua, in that of Praglia near Padua, at S. Francesco in Rimini, with the date of 1580, in Pesaro, and other places. They are chiefly composed in the ancient manner, but on comparing some of the earlier with those that follow, a more modern air is perceptible, a circ.u.mstance attributed by Vasari to his own conversations with the artist. Longhi"s style, however, was opposed to that of Vasari, being very correct and highly finished; his conceptions sweet, varied, and graceful; with a powerful union of colours; more nearly resembling Innocenzo da Imola, if I mistake not, than any other artist of the times, though inferior to him in point of grandeur and beauty. Luca"s most perfect pictures that I have met with in Ravenna are those of S.
Vitale, of S. Agata, of S. Domenico, all with a representation of the Virgin between two or more saints, and with some graceful cherubs playing above. There are others more laboured, which please us less, and demonstrate that to succeed in grand compositions, it is previously necessary to have studied the great schools. Luca had a daughter, named Barbara, yet a child at the period when Vasari published his work, but who had begun to paint "with a tolerable degree of grace and manner." From the hand of this lady there is only a single specimen remaining in public.
Respecting a son of Luca, named Francesco, the historian is wholly silent, being, doubtless, at the time he wrote, still younger than his sister, but who became an artist in maturer years. In 1576 he produced a picture for the church of the Carmine, and there are accounts of him, even down to 1610. He chiefly pursued the steps of his father, though he is more common in his countenances, and more feeble in point of colouring, which he copied rather from Vasari.
Francesco Scannelli mentions a pupil of Raffaello at Cesena, omitted by all other historians, named Scipione Sacco. He painted a picture of S. Gregory for the cathedral of Cesena, in a grand style,[17] and the Death of St.
Peter the Martyr for the church of S. Domenico. Doubtless he was of Raffaello"s school, and not remembered out of Romagna.
Footnote 17: On this picture is inscribed, _Caesenas_, 1545.
_Oretti_, _Memorie_, MSS.
While the family of the Longhi was employed at Ravenna, that of the Minzocchi, which was surnamed San Bernardo, was distinguishing itself at Forli. Francesco, called also the elder di S. Bernardo, studied the works of Palmigiani in his native place; and there remain pictures conducted in his youth, but feeble in point of design, such as his Crucifixion at the Padri Osservanti. But under Genga, according to Vasari, and, as some writers add, under Pordenone, he changed his manner, a.s.suming a more correct style, graceful, animated, and of an expression which looks like nature herself in these his subsequent productions. Among the works he executed with most care are two lateral pictures at the cathedral of Loreto, in a chapel of S. Francesco di Paola. These consist of a Sacrifice of Melchisedec, and the miracle of the Manna, in which the prophets and the princ.i.p.al characters boast all the dignity and n.o.bleness of drapery becoming the school of Pordenone. The crowd, however, is represented in the most popular features and att.i.tudes, sufficient almost to excite the envy of Teniers, and the most natural artists of the Flemish school. His delineations in these pictures, of numerous and various animals, are expressed to the life, with baskets and different utensils like reality, though the attempt to excite our mirth in treating serious subjects has a bad effect. Scannelli extols a specimen of his works in fresco at S. Maria della Grata in Forli, representing the Deity on the ceiling, surrounded by a number of angels; figures full of spirit, majestic, varied, and painted with a power and skill of foreshortening, which ent.i.tles him to greater celebrity than he enjoys. He left a variety of productions, likewise, at S.
Domenico, at the cathedral, and at private houses in his native place, where such is his reputation, that on the chapels being taken down, his least celebrated frescos were carefully cut out, and replaced elsewhere.
Among his sons and pupils were Pietro Paolo, mentioned also by Vasari, and Sebastiano, both artists of the same natural style, not very select, with little relief, and mediocrity of invention. To Pietro Paolo belong several figures at the Padri Francescani at Forli, of feeble execution; and to Sebastiano a picture at S. Agostino, composed in 1593 in the ancient taste, and of a style like his other works, inferior to the character of his age.
Subsequent to the elder Minzocchi, Forli produced two other artists deserving commemoration; namely, Livio Agresti, conspicuous in the histories of Vasari and Baglione, as a daring designer, a copious composer, and universal in point of manner; the other, Francesco di Modigliana, an artist of more limited genius, but still deserving to be known. Of Livio, I spoke in the third epoch of the Roman School, to which, as pupil to Perino, and resident in Rome, where he was employed at the Castello, in the Vatican, at S. Spirito and elsewhere, he doubtless belongs. His native place, however, seems to have culled the fairest fruit of his labours, Rome possessing nothing nearly so Raffaellesque, as are his Scriptural Histories in the public palace at Forli. Nor ought we to pa.s.s over that finely decorated chapel in the cathedral, where he represented the Last Supper, with some majestic figures of the prophets upon the ceiling; a work that for depth and intricacy of perspective yields in nothing to Minzocchi. I shall not stop to inquire, with Malvasia, whether having gone to Rome in a moment of disgust and in haste, instead of there advancing himself, he wholly failed; but of this I am convinced, that his history in the Cappella Paolina, is by no means his masterpiece.
Francesco di Modigliana is said to have been pupil to Pontormo, in whose school he almost fills the same rank as Bronzino in that of Florence; not remarkably powerful, nor always consistent with himself, but very graceful and beautiful, and deserving a place in our pictoric Lexicons, where his name is wanting. His works at Urbino consist of those which are pointed out under the name of Francesco da Forli; a picture of Christ taken down from the cross, in oil, at S. Croce; and some angels in fresco at S. Lucia; productions much commended, and resembling in style his best at the Osservanti in Forli, and at the Rosario in Rimini. Here, perhaps, he most distinguished himself; in his picture of Adam driven from Eden, his Deluge, the Tower of Babel, with similar histories already treated by Raffaello at Rome, and by Agresti in Forli, from imitating whom, if I mistake not, he greatly improved and advanced himself. Dying suddenly he left his work imperfect, afterwards continued by Gio. Laurentini, called Arrigoni, who painted the Death of Abel at the same place.
After Bartolommeo da Rimini, who inclined more towards the modern than the ancient style, I find no other artist of celebrity in that city besides Arrigoni. Even his name has not been recorded by Orlandi, nor by his continuator. He diligently employed himself in his native place, and two of his pictures representing martyrdoms, met with surprising success; one of St. John the Baptist, at the Augustine friars, and another of the Saints John and Paul, at the church bearing their name. Yet they do not display that _beau ideal_, so attractive at that period in the productions even of the inferior disciples of the Roman School; but they convey the impression of grand compositions, a vivacity of action, a boldness of hand, a splendor in the retinue of horse and arms, and military ensigns, calculated to compete with the chief part of the painters employed at Rome in the service of Gregory and of Sixtus.
Faenza, too, at the opening of this epoch, boasted her Jacopone, or Jacomone, of whom we treated among the a.s.sistants of Raffaello, and among the masters of Taddeo Zuccaro. Vasari makes brief mention and smaller account of this artist; recording only one of his productions, the tribune of S. Vitale at Ravenna, and which has ceased to exist. In the cupola of the church, however, subsequently repainted by another hand, there were visible, in the time of Fabri, author of "Ravenna Ricercata," (researches in that city) several figures of saints richly apparelled, bearing this inscription: "Opus Jacobi Bertucci et Julii Tondutii Faventinorum. Pari voto f. 1513."[18] At present I no longer doubt but that under this Jacopo was concealed the name of Jacopone di Faenza, though according to Orlandi they were two several painters, and though it has never occurred to Baldinucci and Bottari, and other writers of pictoric history, to unite them into one. My conjecture is founded upon a picture which I saw in the church of the Dominican nuns in Faenza, representing the Birth of the Virgin, with the name of Jacopo Bertucci of Faenza, and dated 1532. It is a work which arrests the eye by its resemblance to the style of Raffaello, though his harmonious gradations have not been well observed, and the colouring inclines more to the strong than to the beautiful. The women busied about the couch of St. Anne are beautiful, graceful, and animated figures, and there are some animals, and in particular a fowl, which a Ba.s.sano himself would not have been sorry to have painted. Now what other Jacopo of Faenza could in the year 1532, have painted in this style, with more shew of reason and probability than Jacopone da Faenza, whose family would here appear to be discovered?
Footnote 18: Sig. Abbate Zannoni, a librarian in Faenza, a.s.sisted by Sig. Zauli, a distinguished professor of design in that Lyceum, has made some clever remarks upon that school. They observe that this date of Fabri must be erroneous, it not being possible for Jacopone to have commenced painting in 1513, and much less Tonduzzi, pupil to Giulio Romano, probably, in Mantua: I suspect that the order of the last two figures should be inverted, so as to read 1531.
They inform me that I was misled in supposing the picture of the Dominican Nuns to be from the hand of Jacopone, its great height preventing me from distinguishing the name. It belongs to his nephew and pupil, Gian Batista, and thus resembles his style, though coloured with stronger tints in the taste of t.i.tian, whom he is known to have greatly consulted in after years. Other pictures of Jacopone might be cited, that still exist, but injured by time and by retouches of other destroyers. Yet, they continue, all are surpa.s.sed by a figure that was placed at the Celestini, and is now in the general collection. It represents St. John pointing out to the ecclesiastic who ordered the picture, the Virgin crowned, between Saints Celestino and Benedetto; a grand piece wonderfully preserved, formed upon the composition of Raffaello, and coloured after t.i.tian. On the right side is written, "F. Jo. Bapt. Para Brasius hoc opus ob devotionem fieri jussit anno domini 1565:" (the most a.s.sured epoch of his life;) and on the left hand, "Et semper Jacobius Bertusius F. (for Faventinus) invicto tandem Momo faciebat." Who this Momo was, against whose desire (since we must read _invito_) he completed the picture, I know not; whether a painter, or perhaps a friar, whom Jacopone"s dilatoriness had offended, and who wished to subst.i.tute another artist, in which good office he did not succeed.
The same city possesses a variety of other pieces by this Bertucci, and in the soffitto of S. Giovanni, various histories, both of the Old and New Testament, were pointed out to me as his. There too are several of inferior character attributed to another Bertucci, his son, an artist who in his heads repeats the same idea, even to satiety. Still his merit ought not, I think, to be estimated from a single work, but rather from some pictures cited by Crespi.[19] One of these is the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, animated and high toned in its colours, beautiful in point of design and character, and worthy of decorating the Ercolani collection at Bologna.
Upon it is inscribed "Bertucius pinxit, 1580." The other is at the Celestini of Faenza, a singular work, as Crespi denominates it, from which he appears to have learnt the proper name of this younger Bertucci, whom he calls Giambatista. Baldinucci treats of Jacopone at the commencement of his fifth volume, and on the credit of Count Laderchi, he enumerates his different paintings, which then remained at Faenza. Of his surname he mentions nothing; nothing of his altar-piece of the Nativity; nothing of S.
Vitale; nothing of the son, or the other artist of Faenza lately alluded to. He adds, that works of Jacopone were to be seen up to the year 1570, but I believe these last to have belonged to the son, inasmuch as the father, at the period when Vasari wrote, was already deceased. Other pictures by this artist are mentioned, painted in glowing and attractive colours, and in particular the Baptizing of Christ, preserved in the public collection, valuable from its giving the epoch of 1610, which must have been towards the close of his days.
Footnote 19: Lettere Pittoriche, vol. vii. p. 66.
By Giulio Tonduzzi there is pointed out at Ravenna the Stoning of St.
Stephen, on the large altar of a church consecrated to that saint, a beautiful picture, but not indisputably proved to be his. I conjecture it to be a copy of the St. Stephen that decorates the church of Faenza, in which the whole style of Giulio Romano is apparent; so much so, that it has been attributed to him, a mistake arising from resemblance of names; but Tonduzzi is known to have been Giulio"s pupil. I omit other productions of this excellent artist, though I ought to notice, that in the soffitto of S.
Giovanni, he also painted several sacred histories, in compet.i.tion with all the first artists, who then flourished at Faenza, on which account that very cultivated city has preserved the whole of these paintings, although much defaced by age, in the Lyceum collection, belonging to the commune, mentioned in other places. I also find one M. Antonio da Faenza, commended by Civalli for a very excellent picture, possessing fine relief, at the church of the Conventuali of Monte Lupone, in the Marca, dated 1525.
Contemporary with these must have been Figurino da Faenza, enumerated by Vasari among the best disciples of Giulio Romano, though I meet with no mention of him elsewhere. It is conjectured, however, with good reason, that Figurino was only a surname given to Marc Antonio Rocchetti, a painter of great reputation at Faenza, who in youth took great delight in minute drawing, producing, among other pieces, little histories of St. Sebastian, for the ornament of that church, now destroyed, when they came into possession of various individuals who treasure them up in the present day.
In maturer years he enlarged his manner, attaching himself to the imitation of Baroccio, which he did with a simplicity of composition and sweetness of tints, that made him conspicuous in different churches which he adorned, as we may gather from the picture of the t.i.tular Saint at S. Rocco, with the year 1604, the latest period which we find mentioned on his productions. In the Communal collection, also, there is seen a picture of the Virgin, known in Faenza under the name of the Madonna of the Angels, with a St. Francis, a holy bishop, and two portraits below. It bears the inscription, _M.
Antonius Rochettus Faventinus pingebat, 1594_. It was requisite to mention this picture, which I find extolled above all other specimens that have remained. The name of Niccolo Paganelli, before unknown to us, is also met with in the Oretti correspondence, contained in a letter of Zanoni, which we cite in treating of Benedetto Marini. He is supposed to have been a good pupil of the Roman School, and some attribute to him the fine picture of S.
Martino, in the cathedral of Faenza, the supposed work of Luca Longhi. His genuine pictures are recognized by the initials N.+P.