The History of Painting in Italy, Vol. 2 (of 6): From the Period of the Revival of the Fine Arts to the End of the Eighteenth CenturyLanzi, Luigi
History
The History of Painting in Italy, Vol. 2 (of 6): From the Period of the Revival of the Fine Arts to the End of the Eighteenth Century
Lanzi, Luigi
Painting -- Italy -- History
In the Floreria of the Vatican is still to be seen a large fresco
painting, in which the above named pontiff is represented with cardinals
and prelates, and there is a degree of truth in the countenances highly
interesting. Taja does not assert that it is by Pietro, but says that it
is attributed to him.[17] Those which are pointed out in Arezzo
doubtless belong to him, and the most remarkable are the histories of
the holy cross in the choir of the church of the Conventuals, which shew
that the art was already advanced beyond its infancy; there is so much
new in the Giotto manner of foreshortening, in the relief, and in many
difficulties of the art overcome in his works. If he had possessed the
grace of Masaccio he might with justice have been placed at his side. At
Città S. Sepolcro there still remain some works attributed to him; a S.
Lodovico Vescovo, in the public palace, at S. Chiara a picture of the
Assumption, with the apostles in the distance, and a choir of angels at
the top, but in the foreground are S. Francis, S. Jerome, and other
figures, which injure the unity of the composition. There are, however,
still traces in them of the old style; a poverty of design, a hardness
in the foldings of the drapery, feet which are well foreshortened, but
too far apart. As to the rest, in design, in the air, and in the
colouring of the figures, it seems to be a rude sketch of that style
which was ameliorated by P. Perugino, and perfected by Raffaello.
In the latter part of this century there flourished several good
painters at Foligno, but it is not known from whom they derived their
instructions. In the twenty-fifth volume of the Antichità Picene we
read, that in the church of S. Francesco di Cagli there exists (I know
not whether it be now there) a most beautiful composition, painted in
1461, at the price of 115 ducats of gold, by M. Pietro di Mazzaforte and
M. Niccolo Deliberatore of Foligno. At S. Venanzio di Camerino is a
large altarpiece on a ground of gold, with Christ on the Cross,
surrounded by many Saints, with three small evangelical histories added
to it. The inscription is _Opus Nicolai Fulginatis_, 1480; it is in the
style of the last imitators of Giotto, and there is scarcely a doubt
that the artist studied at Florence. I believe him to be the same artist
as Niccolo Deliberatore, or di Liberatore; and different from Niccolò
Alunno, also of Foligno, whom Vasari mentions as an excellent painter in
the time of Pinturicchio. He painted in distemper, as was common before
Pietro Perugino, but in tints that have survived uninjured to our own
times. In the distribution of his colours he was original; his heads
possess expression, though they are common, and sometimes heavy, when
they represent the vulgar. There is at S. Niccolò di Foligno a picture
by him, composed in the style of the fourteenth century, the Virgin
surrounded by saints, and underneath small histories of the Passion,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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