Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 01 (of 10): Cimabue to Agnolo GaddiVasari, Giorgio
History
Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 01 (of 10): Cimabue to Agnolo Gaddi
Vasari, Giorgio
Art, Italian; Artists -- Italy -- Biography
Guglielmo of Forli was also a disciple of Giotto, and besides many other
works he painted the chapel of the high-altar in S. Domenico at Forli,
his native city. Disciples of Giotto, also, were Pietro Laurati and
Simon Memmi of Siena, Stefano, a Florentine, and Pietro Cavallini, a
Roman; but, seeing that of all these there is account in the Life of
each one of them, let it suffice to have said in this place that they
were disciples of Giotto, who drew very well for his time and for that
manner, whereunto witness is borne by many sheets of parchment drawn by
his hand in water-colour, outlined with the pen, in chiaroscuro, with
the high lights in white, which are in our book of drawings, and are
truly a marvel in comparison with those of the masters that lived before
him.
Giotto, as it has been said, was very ingenious and humorous, and very
witty in his sayings, whereof there is still vivid memory in that city;
for besides that which Messer Giovanni Boccaccio wrote about him, Franco
Sacchetti, in his three hundred Stories, relates many of them that are
very beautiful. Of these I will not forbear to write down some with the
very words of Franco himself, to the end that, together with the story
itself, there may be seen certain modes of speech and expressions of
those times. He says in one, then, to give it its heading:
"To Giotto, a great painter, is given a buckler to paint by a man of
small account. He, making a jest of it, paints it in such a fashion that
the other is put to confusion."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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