The Gallery of Portraits: with Memoirs. Volume 4 (of 7) — John Shaqi
The Gallery of Portraits: with Memoirs. Volume 4 (of 7)Malkin, Arthur Thomas
History
The Gallery of Portraits: with Memoirs. Volume 4 (of 7)
Malkin, Arthur Thomas
Biography
Vertumnus and Pomona, miscalled Vanity and Modesty, in the Sciarra
Palace at Rome; a holy family, now in Russia; the supposed portrait of
Joan of Naples, in the Doria Palace; and the Christ among the Doctors,
formerly in the Aldobrandini Palace at Rome. His numerous imitators
render, however, all decision as to the originality of some of these
works doubtful; and the last-mentioned picture, now in the National
Gallery, has been thought, by more than one writer, to have been, at
least in part, painted by his scholars. A portrait of the celebrated
Captain, Giangiacomo Triulzio, may have been painted in one of
Lionardo’s short visits to Milan. For a fuller list of his works,
Amoretti, and the authors he quotes, may be referred to.
In 1514, after the defeat of the French at Novara, Lionardo, being then
at Milan, left that city for Rome, passing through Florence. His stay in
Rome was short. Pope Leo X. seems to have been prejudiced against him by
the friends of Michael Angelo and Raffaelle, and was displeased at his
dilatory, or rather desultory habits. From the notes of Lionardo
himself, collected by Amoretti, it appears that, while in Rome, he
improved the machinery for the coinage; but the only certain painting of
his done at this time is a votive picture on the wall of a corridor in
the Convent of S. Onofrio.
Francis I., who succeeded Louis XII. in 1515, having reconquered the
Milanese, Lionardo again repaired to Milan, and once more superintended
a pageant, in this instance intended to celebrate the triumph of the
king after the victory of Marignano. Francis, having in vain attempted
to remove the painting of the Last Supper from Milan to Paris, desired,
at least, to have the painter near him. Lionardo accepted the
invitation, and afterwards accompanied his new patron to France. This
being little more than two years before the death of Lionardo, and as he
was occupied in planning canals in the department of the Cher et Loire,
he painted nothing, although the king repeatedly invited him to execute
his cartoon of the Virgin and St. Anne, which was afterwards painted by
Luini. His usual residence in France was at Cloux, a royal villa near
Amboise, in Touraine, where he died, May 2, 1519. The story of his
having expired in the arms of Francis I., which, as Bossi observes, does
more honour to the monarch than to the artist, appears to be without
foundation. Francesco Melzi, who wrote an account of Lionardo’s death
from Amboise soon after it happened, not only does not mention the
circumstance, but was the first, according to Lomazzo, to inform the
king himself of the artist’s decease; and Venturi has ascertained, that
on the day of Lionardo’s death the court was at St. Germain en Laye. He
was buried in the church of St. Florent, at Amboise, but no memorial
exists to mark the place; and it is supposed that his monument, together
with many others, was destroyed in the wars of the Hugonots.
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