Lives of the most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 06 (of 10): Fra Giocondo to Niccolo SoggiVasari, Giorgio
History
Lives of the most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 06 (of 10): Fra Giocondo to Niccolo Soggi
Vasari, Giorgio
Art, Italian; Artists -- Italy -- Biography
But while he was working in Genoa, the fancy came to him to fetch his
wife from Rome, and so he bought a house in Pisa, being pleased with
that city and half thinking of choosing it as his place of habitation
when old age should come upon him. Now at that time the Warden of the
Duomo at Pisa was M. Antonio di Urbano, who had a very great desire to
embellish that temple, and had already caused a beginning to be made
with some very beautiful ornaments of marble for the chapels of the
church, which had been executed by the hand of Stagio da Pietrasanta, a
very able and well practised carver of marble: removing some old,
clumsy, and badly proportioned chapels that were there. Having thus made
a beginning, the Warden proposed to fill up those ornaments in the
interior with altar-pieces in oils, and on the outer side with a series
of scenes in fresco and decorations in stucco, by the hands of the best
and most excellent masters that he could find, without grudging any
expense that might be incurred. He had already set to work on the
sacristy, which he had placed in the great recess behind the high-altar,
and there the ornamentation of marble was already finished, and many
pictures had been painted by the Florentine painter Giovanni Antonio
Sogliani, the rest of which, together with the altar-pieces and the
chapels that were wanting, were finished many years afterwards by order
of M. Sebastiano della Seta, the Warden of the Duomo in those days.
At that time Perino returned from Genoa to Pisa, and, having seen that
beginning, at the instance of Battista del Cervelliera, a person well
conversant with art and a most ingenious master of wood-carving,
perspective, and inlaying, he was presented to the Warden. After they
had discoursed together on the subject of the works of the Duomo, Perino
was asked to paint an altar-piece for an ornament immediately within the
ordinary door of entrance, the ornamental frame being already finished,
and above that a scene of S. George slaying the Dragon and delivering
the King's Daughter. Perino therefore made a most beautiful design,
which included a row of children and other ornaments in fresco between
one chapel and the other, and niches with Prophets and scenes of various
kinds; and this design pleased the Warden. And so, having made the
cartoon for one of them, the first one, that opposite to the door
mentioned above, he began to execute it in colour, and finished six
children, which are very well painted. He was to have continued this
right round, which would have made a very rich and very beautiful
decoration; and the whole work together would have proved to be
something very handsome. But he was seized with a desire to return to
Genoa, where he had involved himself in love affairs and other
pleasures, to which he was inclined at certain times: and on his
departure he gave to the Nuns of S. Maffeo a little altar-piece that he
had painted for them in oils, which is now in their possession in the
convent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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