The History of Painting in Italy, Vol. 5 (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. 5 (of 6): From the Period of the Revival of the Fine Arts to the End of the Eighteenth Century
Lanzi, Luigi
Painting -- Italy -- History
He became painter to Duke Ranuccio at Parma, where he decorated that
admirable theatre, which then stood unrivalled. In that city, and at
Modena, as well as other places, I have seen some of his pictures in a
taste wholly opposed to those of Bologna, displaying a mixture of the
Caracci and of Parmigianino. His histories in the ducal gallery at Modena
are highly beautiful; such as the Susanna and the Elders, and the Prodigal
Son. One of his most remarkable is the Martyrdom of a Saint, at S. Sepolcro
in Parma, and the St. Jerome, in the Carmelitani, in the same city.
Specimens such as these must have been among his last, at a period when he
was residing in affluence at court, and enabled to conduct his works at
leisure. His good fortune terminated with the life of Ranuccio; for with
the loss of such a patron his talent, too, seemed to have deserted him, and
he shortly followed to the tomb. The names of some of his scholars occur in
the schools of Lombardy. Here too we ought to add that of Pietro Desani of
Bologna, who following him into Reggio, there established himself; a young
artist of rapid hand and quick genius, whose works are to be met with very
frequently in Reggio and its vicinity.
Lorenzo Garbieri was an artist of more learning and caution than Lionello,
though resembling him in point of style. His austere, and almost fiery
disposition, with an imagination abounding in wild and mournful ideas,
impelled him to a style of painting less open than that of the Caracci. To
this cause must be added his emulation of Guido, whom, like Lionello, he
wished to humble, by adopting a very powerful manner; and, though he did
not put himself under Caravaggio, he eagerly copied his pictures, including
all the best at Bologna. Garbieri was one of the most successful imitators
of Lodovico; less select in the heads, but grand in the forms, expressive
in the attitudes, and studied in his large compositions; insomuch that his
paintings at S. Antonio in Milan, which are less loaded with shade, were
attributed by Santagostini in his Guide to the Caracci. To this style of
the Caracci he added the daring character of Caravaggio, and he was skilful
in selecting always funereal subjects most suitable to his genius; so that
we meet with little else than scenes of sorrow, slaughter, death, and
terror, from his hand. At the Barnabiti, in Bologna, he painted for the
chapel of S. Carlo an altar-piece with two lateral pictures; it presents us
with the horrors of the Milanese plague, amidst which is seen the saint
visiting the sick, and conducting a penitential procession. He painted also
at the Filippini in Fano a picture of St. Paul, near the St. Peter of
Guido, in the act of raising the young man from the dead; a work of such
power of hand and expression as to excite at once terror and pity in the
beholders. At S. Maurizio, in Mantua, he exhibited in a chapel the
Martyrdom of S. Felicita and her seven children; a piece inferior indeed to
the Miracle of St.
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