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
He was, then, so diligent in painting and so greatly devoted to it,
that, although many of his works are not to be found, those nevertheless
that have been found are good and in a beautiful manner, for the reason
that the draperies, the hair, the beards, and all the rest of his work
were made and harmonized with so great softness and diligence, that it
is seen that without doubt he added harmony to this art and had it much
more perfect than his master Giotto and his father Stefano. In his youth
Giottino painted a chapel near the side-door of S. Stefano al Ponte
Vecchio in Florence, wherein, although it is to-day much spoilt by damp,
the little that has remained shows the dexterity and the genius of the
craftsman. Next, he made the two Saints, Cosimo and Damiano, for the
Frati Ermini in the Canto alla Macine, but little is seen of them
to-day, for they too have been ruined by time. And he wrought in fresco
a chapel in the old S. Spirito in that city, which was afterwards ruined
in the burning of that church; and in fresco, over the principal door of
the church, the story of the Sending of the Holy Spirit; and on the
square before the said church, on the way to the Canto alla Cuculia, on
the corner of the convent, he painted that shrine that is still seen
there, with Our Lady and other Saints round her, wherein both the heads
and the other parts lean strongly towards the modern manner, for the
reason that he sought to vary and to blend the flesh-colours, and to
harmonize all the figures with grace and judgment by means of a variety
of colours and draperies. In like manner he wrought the stories of
Constantine with much diligence in the Chapel of S. Silvestro in S.
Croce, showing very beautiful ideas in the gestures of the figures; and
then, behind an ornament of marble made for the tomb of Messer Bertino
de' Bardi, a man who at that time had held honourable military rank, he
made this Messer Bertino in armour, after the life, issuing from a
sepulchre on his knees, being summoned with the sound of the trumpets of
the Judgment by two angels, who are in the air accompanying a
beautifully-wrought Christ in the clouds. On the right hand of the
entrance of the door of S. Pancrazio the same man made a Christ who is
bearing His Cross, and some Saints near Him, that have exactly the
manner of Giotto. In S. Gallo (which convent was without the Gate called
by the same name, and was destroyed in the siege) in a cloister, there
was a Pieta painted in fresco, whereof there is a copy in the aforesaid
S. Pancrazio, on a pillar beside the principal chapel. In S. Maria
Novella, in the Chapel of S. Lorenzo de' Giuochi, as one enters by the
door on the left, on the front wall, he wrought in fresco a S. Cosimo
and a S. Damiano, and, in Ognissanti, a S. Christopher and a S. George,
which were spoilt by the malice of time, and then restored by other
painters by reason of the ignorance of a Provost little conversant with
such matters.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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