Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 04 (of 10): Filippino Lippi to Domenico PuligoVasari, Giorgio
History
Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 04 (of 10): Filippino Lippi to Domenico Puligo
Vasari, Giorgio
Art, Italian; Artists -- Italy -- Biography
Margaret, which is so strange and horrible, that it
is revealed to us as a true fount of venom, fire, and death; and the
whole of the rest of the work is so fresh and vivacious in
colouring, that it deserves infinite praise.
He also wrought certain things in Lucca, particularly a panel in a
chapel of the Church of S. Ponziano, which belongs to the Monks of
Monte Oliveto; in the centre of which chapel there is a niche
containing a very beautiful S. Anthony in relief by the hand of
Andrea Sansovino, a most excellent sculptor. Being invited to go to
Hungary by King Matthias, Filippo refused, but made up for this by
painting two very beautiful panels for that King in Florence, and
sending them to him; and in one of these he made a portrait of the
King, taken from his likeness on medals. He also sent certain works
to Genoa; and beside the Chapel of the High-Altar in S. Domenico at
Bologna, on the left hand, he painted a S. Sebastian on a panel,
which was a thing worthy of much praise. For Tanai de' Nerli he
executed another panel in S. Salvadore, without Florence; and for
his friend Piero del Pugliese he painted a scene with little
figures, executed with so much art and diligence that when another
citizen besought him to make a second like it, he refused, saying
that it was not possible to do it.
After these things he executed a very great work in Rome for the
Neapolitan Cardinal, Olivieri Caraffa, at the request of the elder
Lorenzo de' Medici, who was a friend of that Cardinal. While going
thither for that purpose, he passed through Spoleto at the wish of
Lorenzo, in order to give directions for the making of a marble tomb
for his father Fra Filippo at the expense of Lorenzo, who had not
been able to obtain his body from the people of Spoleto for removal
to Florence. Filippo, therefore, made a beautiful design for the
said tomb, and Lorenzo had it erected after that design (as has
been told in another place), sumptuous and beautiful. Afterwards,
having arrived in Rome, Filippo painted a chapel in the Church of
the Minerva for the said Cardinal Caraffa, depicting therein scenes
from the life of S. Thomas Aquinas, and certain most beautiful
poetical compositions ingeniously imagined by himself, for he had a
nature ever inclined to this. In the scene, then, wherein Faith has
taken Infidelity captive, there are all the heretics and infidels.
Hope has likewise overcome Despair, and so, too, there are many
other Virtues that have subjugated the Vice that is their opposite.
In a disputation is S. Thomas defending the Church "ex cathedra"
against a school of heretics, and holding vanquished beneath him
Sabellius, Arius, Averroes, and others, all clothed in graceful
garments; of which scene we have in our book of drawings the
original design by Filippo's own hand, with certain others by the
same man, wrought with such mastery that they could not be bettered.
There, too, is the scene when, as S. Thomas is praying, the Crucifix
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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