The History of Italian Painting. Luigi Lanzi

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СКАЧАТЬ shewing art in the distribution of light and shade, and as harmonious to the eye as is the orator to the ear, who enchants an audience by his well turned periods; the delightful fascination is felt, but the source of it cannot be assigned. In that metropolis we shall find him master of the new style; but in Tuscany we cannot point out many of his pictures besides those in the ducal palace: private collections are rich only in his crayon pieces, which are likewise well known out of Italy. There is one of his large pictures on canvass at Pisa, the subject of which is the Vestment of S. Ranieri; and it is the most admired among the larger paintings of the cathedral. Luti sent it to Gabbiani for his correction before it was exposed to the public; a circumstance highly honourable to the modesty of the scholar and the abilities of the master.[234] His portrait is in the ducal gallery; and the more rigid critics, on looking at it, have been known to say, "Behold the last painter of his school."

Tommaso Redi was a pupil of the same master; and is noticed in the Lettere Pittoriche, as a good composer of historical pictures, and is also praised for design, colouring, and spirit. From the school of Gabbiani he went under the tuition of Maratta and Balestra, both artists respectable for their style, and declared enemies to the innovations which have occupied and debased our schools for so long a period. Redi also visited the most celebrated schools, but for the sole purpose of studying the old masters, and of making copies of their works, some of which, with a few pieces of his own invention, remain in his family. In the eulogy of Anton Domenico we find honourable mention made of his nephew, Gaetano Gabbiani; of Francesco Salvetti, his intimate friend; of Gio. Antonio Pucci, a painter and a poet; of Giuseppe Baldini, whose promising career was cut short by death, and of Ranieri del Pace, a native of Pisa, who afterwards yielding to the torrent of fashion, became a complete mannerist. Ignatius Hugford, born in Florence, but whose father was a native of England,[235] was admirably skilled in recognizing the hands of different masters, and likewise painted in a good manner a picture of S. Raphael at S. Felicità, and some other pieces, which were mostly small, and have been admitted into the royal museum. The feeble paintings in possession of the Vallombrosani at Forli, and some of the same stamp at Florence, are likewise by this artist.

Alessandro Gherardini, a rival of Gabbiani, and in the opinion of many, his superior in genius as a painter, had wonderful facility in counterfeiting different styles. He would have equalled any of his contemporaries, had he always painted in the style of his Crucifixion of our Lord in Candeli, in which he calls to mind a happy imitation of different schools. It is a work studied in every part, especially in the general tone, which artfully expresses the darkness of that hour. A history piece of Alexander the Great, in Casa Orlandini, with figures of half-length, and executed with great industry, is also held in high esteem; but he aimed at painting pictures of every degree of merit. One of his pupils, no less fertile in talent, and named Sebastiano Galeotti, is rather remembered than known at Florence. He left his native place when young, travelled about a long time without any fixed residence, and has left specimens behind him in many parts of Upper Italy. He at length settled at Genoa, where we shall again notice him. The ducal gallery contains portraits both of the master and of the scholar, by the side of those of Gabbiani and Redi. Other considerable painters of this epoch have obtained a similar honour; among whom we may mention Agostino Veracini, a scholar of Sebastian Ricci, Francesco Conti, a disciple of Maratta, and Lapi, a follower of Giordano; each of these has successfully imitated his guide.[236] The S. Apollonia of the first, painted for the church of that name; various Madonnas of the second, in the hands of private gentlemen; and the Transfiguration of the last, in the ducal gallery, are calculated to do them honour, and even to shed a lustre on some of their less refined productions. Some others now dead have been equally honoured by a portrait, of whom I have not discovered any other work. Of this number are Vincenzio Bacherelli, Gio. Francesco Bagnoli, Anton Sebastiano Bettini, Gio. Casini, Niccolo Nannetti, and others, who are mentioned in the Museo Fiorentino.

      Giovanni Camillo Sagrestani, a scholar of Giusti, was esteemed at Florence, even during the lifetime of Gabbiani and Gherardini. To study different masters, he visited the best schools of Italy, and for some time attended the school of Cav. Cignani, whose manner he copied rather than emulated. One of his Holy Families is in the Madonna de' Ricci, the beauty of which has more of an ideal cast, and the colouring is more florid, than is usual with his contemporaries of this school. One of the first judges in Florence assured me that this painting was the work of Sagrestani, although others ascribe it to his scholar, Matteo Bonechi. Bonechi had excellent parts, but not an equal knowledge of the art, in which he is reported to have been instructed by a species of dictation; for he practised under the eye, and was directed by the voice of his master. He thus became one of those practical artists who make up for the poverty of their design by their spirit and their colouring. There are some of his pictures that in any collection would be particularly calculated to attract the eye. Among his works in fresco, the picture at Cestello, where he finished what was begun by Gabbiani, is worthy of record; and also that in the Capponi palace near the Nunziata, where he continued the work of Marinari.

      About this time Cignani died in Bologna, and Gio. Gioseffo del Sole, denominated the modern Guido, enjoyed the highest reputation. Florence employed three of his eminent pupils; one of the two Soderini, Meucci, and Ferretti, who although called da Imola, was born and lived in Florence. Mauro Soderini enjoyed the reputation of a good designer, and aimed at beauty and effect in his pictures. The Death of S. Joseph in the cathedral is said to be by his hand, though it is in fact by Ferretti; the Child revived by S. Zanobi, in the church of S. Stephen, is really his. Vincenzio Meucci was chiefly employed in works of perspective, which he executed in many parts of Tuscany, and even in the cupola of the royal chapel in S. Lorenzo. If there was any one who could dispute with him pre-eminence in fresco painting, it was his fellow disciple, Giovanni Domenico Ferretti, whose works may be seen in Florence, in several other parts of Tuscany, and at Bologna; from which he appears to have surpassed Meucci in fancy and in spirit, and especially at the Philippini at Pistoia, where his performance in the cupola is highly praised. In fresco works they were both excellent; but in oil paintings they often were too hasty, an error into which all fresco painters, not excepting the most esteemed, have fallen. Hence Ferretti, although he painted the Martyrdom of S. Bartolommeo, for the church dedicated to that saint at Pisa, in an excellent style, did not give equal satisfaction by his History of S. Guido, in the archiepiscopal church. Several of the works of Meucci are dispersed through the various churches in Florence; and in a chapel of the Nunziata, where he painted the recess, he coloured a Madonna, which is allowed to be one of his most diligent and best finished pictures. He was there rivalled by Giuseppe Grisoni, a scholar of Redi; and it is reported that vexation at this circumstance shortened his days. Grisoni had travelled more than he in visiting the schools of Italy, had even gone to England, and had acquired great skill in figures, and still more in landscape. He therefore was induced to add landscape not only to historical, but also to portrait painting; as in the instance of a portrait of himself that is one of the most respectable in the second chamber of painters. He added it also to the S. Barbara, painted in competition with Meucci; and it is a picture which does honour to the school in form, relief, and taste of colouring. He likewise painted other pieces on the same plan, in which, however, he did not succeed so well.

      Meucci and Grisoni cannot be reckoned Italian artists of the same rank with Luti; but if all are to be estimated by the times in which they flourished, each was eminent in his day. I had noticed them briefly in my first edition, and some painters have informed me, that with them I ought to have mentioned Giuseppe Zocchi, who was a painter of note, and should not have been omitted even in a compendium of the history of the art. I now correct my error, and produce what information the noble family of Gerini, under whose protection he was received when a boy, and who, after his elementary studies at Florence, sent him to Rome, to Bologna, and other parts of Lombardy, for his instruction in the different schools, have supplied me. I may be allowed to add, that the Florentine nobility have always been most liberal in this way; and there are not a few living artists who owe their education in the fine arts to the bounty of some noble family: such clients are an ornament to a nobleman, and are not to be numbered among СКАЧАТЬ