Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 05 (of 10): Andrea da Fiesole to Lorenzo LottoVasari, Giorgio
History
Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 05 (of 10): Andrea da Fiesole to Lorenzo Lotto
Vasari, Giorgio
Art, Italian; Artists -- Italy -- Biography
After this Andrea executed a head of Christ, now kept by the Servite
Friars on the altar of the Nunziata, of such beauty, that I for my part
do not know whether any more beautiful image of the head of Christ
could be conceived by the intellect of man. For the chapels in the
Church of S. Gallo, without the Porta S. Gallo, there had been painted,
in addition to the two panel-pictures by Andrea, a number of others,
which were not equal to his; wherefore, since there was a commission to
be given for another, those friars contrived to persuade the owner of
the chapel to give it to Andrea; and he, beginning it immediately, made
therein four figures standing, engaged in a disputation about the
Trinity. One of these is S. Augustine, who, robed as a Bishop and truly
African in aspect, is moving impetuously towards S. Peter Martyr, who is
holding up an open book in a proud and sublime attitude: and the head
and figure of the latter are much extolled. Beside him is a S. Francis
holding a book in one hand and pressing the other against his breast;
and he appears to be expressing with his lips a glowing ardour that
makes him almost melt away in the heat of the discussion. There is also
a S. Laurence, who, being young, is listening, and seems to be yielding
to the authority of the others. Below them are two figures kneeling, one
a Magdalene with most beautiful draperies, whose countenance is a
portrait of Andrea's wife; for in no place did he paint a woman's
features without copying them from her, and if perchance it happened at
times that he took them from other women, yet, from his being used to
see her continually, and from the circumstance that he had drawn her so
often, and, what is more, had her impressed on his mind, it came about
that almost all the heads of women that he made resembled her. The other
kneeling figure is a S. Sebastian, who, being naked, shows his back,
which appears to all who see it to be not painted, but of living flesh.
And indeed, among so many works in oils, this was held by craftsmen to
be the best, for the reason that there may be seen in it signs of
careful consideration in the proportions of the figures, and much order
in the method, with a sense of fitness in the expressions of the faces,
the heads of the young showing sweetness of expression, those of the old
hardness, and those of middle age a kind of blend that inclines both to
the first and to the second. In a word, this panel is most beautiful in
all its parts; and it is now to be found in S. Jacopo tra Fossi on the
Canto degli Alberti, together with others by the hand of the same
master.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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