There _is_ a second Francisco Vieira, also a historical painter;
but, to distinguish him from his predecessor, he is called Vieira
Portuense--Vieira of Oporto, the place where he was born, 1765. In
1789 he went to Rome. After about two years' study there, he repaired
to Parma, where he was elected one of the directors of the Academy,
and gave lessons in drawing to a daughter of the Duke. In 1794 he
returned to Rome, where he staid three years more, and then proceeded
to Dresden. Few of his works are found in his native city. Mr Allen
possesses two or three. There is one at the house of the British
Association--Eleanor of Castille extracting the poison from the arm of
our Edward the First. The outline of the two figures is not ungraceful,
but the effect is tame. The queen looks more asleep than the king;
her lips do not touch the wound, yet are so close to it as to seem to
express that action. In this, as in most of this artist's productions,
the colouring is fluent but weak. Yet some of his church-pictures at
Lisbon, and one also of the few at Oporto--St Margaret on her deathbed
confessing to a Monk--are stamped with a holy fervour of intention, a
deep and unaffected sentiment of piety, that is strength in itself,
and not always to be found in religious paintings of higher name.
Of his lighter performances, a Cupid and Venus in a landscape, very
elegant, and not unworthy of Albani, was engraved at Lisbon by his
friend Bartolozzi. His life, it is said, was embittered by the malice
of Sequeira his rival. They went to Rome about the same time. Taborda,
Fusquini, and Cyrillo, their contemporaries, also studied at Rome. We
agree with M. Raczynski in his estimate of Sequeira, whose St Bruno
and other ambitious displays are so highly extolled by his countrymen.
He is a clever and disagreeable performer on canvass, except in some
few of his minor pictures, such as the Translation of St Francis. In
his large and finished works he strains at intenseness of effect, and
vulgarises his art. But his numerous sketches have quite a contrary
character. They appear to have cost him no trouble; and the best of
them, if always true to proportion, would be almost as valuable as
those of the elder Vieira, the Lusitanian, of which many, in red
crayon, are preserved in the library at Evora. As to Taborda, Fusquini,
and Cyrillo, and some other recent artists, we would say, to the
inquirer, "Go to the palace of Ajuda, and by their works you shall know
them! They are as precious there as flies in amber."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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