MUSIC SATURDAY - MICHAEL PRAETORIUS

“Faith is the bird that feels the light when the dawn is still dark.” - Rabindranath Tagore

Michael Praetorius (probably February 15, 1571 – February 15, 1621) was a German composer, organist, and music theorist. He was one of the most versatile composers of his age, being particularly significant in the development of musical forms based on Protestant hymns, many of which reflect an effort to improve the relationship between Protestants and Catholics.

Praetorius was born Michael Schultze, the youngest son of a Lutheran pastor, in Creuzburg, in present-day Thuringia. After attending school in Torgau and Zerbst, he studied divinity and philosophy at the University of Frankfurt (Oder). He was fluent in a number of languages. After receiving his musical education, from 1587 he served as organist at the Marienkirche in Frankfurt. From 1592/3 he served at the court in Wolfenbüttel, under the employ of Henry Julius, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. He served in the duke’s State Orchestra, first as organist and later (from 1604) as Kapellmeister.

His first compositions appeared around 1602/3. Their publication primarily reflects the care for music at the court of Gröningen. The motets of this collection were the first in Germany to make use of the new Italian performance practices; as a result, they established him as a proficient composer. These “modern” pieces mark the end of his middle creative period. The nine parts of his Musae Sioniae (1605–10) and the 1611 published collections of liturgical music (masses, hymns, magnificats) follow the German Protestant chorale style. With these, at the behest of a circle of orthodox Lutherans, he followed the Duchess Elizabeth, who ruled the duchy in the duke's absence. In place of popular music, one now expected religious music from Praetorius.

When the duke died in 1613 and was succeeded by Frederick Ulrich, Praetorius retained his employment. From 1613 he also worked at the court of John George I, Elector of Saxony at Dresden, where he was responsible for festive music. He was exposed to the latest Italian music, including the polychoral works of the Venetian School. His subsequent development of the form of the chorale concerto, particularly the polychoral variety, resulted directly from his familiarity with the music of such Venetians as Giovanni Gabrieli. The solo-voice, polychoral, and instrumental compositions Praetorius prepared for these events mark the high period of his artistic creativity.

Until his death, Praetorius stayed at the court in Dresden, where he was declared Kapellmeister von Haus aus and worked with Heinrich Schütz.Michael Praetorius is said to have died on his 50th birthday, in Wolfenbüttel, Germany and is entombed in a vault beneath the organ of the Marienkirche there.

Praetorius was the greatest musical academic of his day and the Germanic writer of music best known to other 17th-century musicians. Although his original theoretical contributions were relatively few, with nowhere near the long-range impact of other 17th-century German writers, like Johannes Lippius, Christoph Bernhard or Joachim Burmeister, he compiled an encyclopaedic record of contemporary musical practices. While Praetorius made some refinements to figured-bass practice and to tuning practice, his importance to scholars of the 17th century derives from his discussions of the normal use of instruments and voices in ensembles, the standard pitch of the time, and the state of modal, metrical, and fugal theory. His meticulous documentation of 17th-century practice was of inestimable value to the early-music revival of the 20th century.

His expansive but incomplete treatise, Syntagma Musicum, appeared in three volumes (with appendix) between 1614 and 1620. The first volume (1614), titled Musicae Artis Analecta, was written mostly in Latin, and regarded the music of the ancients and of the church. The second (De Organographia, 1618) regarded the musical instruments of the day, especially the organ; it was one of the first theoretical treatises written in the vernacular. The third (Termini Musicali, 1618), also in German, regarded the genres of composition and the technical essentials for professional musicians. An appendix to the second volume (Theatrum Instrumentorum seu Sciagraphia, 1620) consisted of 42 beautifully drawn woodcuts, depicting instruments of the early 17th century, all grouped in families and shown to scale. A fourth volume on composition was planned, with the help of Baryphonus, but was left incomplete at his death.

Praetorius wrote in a florid style, replete with long asides, polemics, and word-puzzles – all typical of 17th-century scholarly prose. As a lifelong committed Christian, he often regretted not taking holy orders but did write several theological tracts, which are now lost. As a Lutheran from a militantly Protestant family, he contributed greatly to the development of the vernacular liturgy, but also favoured Italian compositional methods, performance practice and figured-bass notation.

Here is his “Magnificat per omnes versus super ut re mi fa so la” performed by Paul Van Nevel and the Huelgas Ensemble. The Magnificat (Latin: [My soul] magnifies [the Lord]), also known as the Song of Mary, the Canticle of Mary, and, in the Byzantine tradition, the Ode of the Theotokos (Greek: Ἡ ᾨδὴ τῆς Θεοτόκου), is a canticle frequently sung or spoken liturgically in Christian church services. It is one of the eight most ancient Christian hymns and perhaps the earliest Marian hymn.

Its name comes from the incipit of the Latin version of the canticle’s text. The text of the canticle is taken directly from the Gospel of Luke (1:46–55) where it is spoken by Mary upon the occasion of her Visitation to her cousin Elizabeth. In the narrative, after Mary greets Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist, the latter moves within Elizabeth’s womb. Elizabeth praises Mary for her faith (using words partially reflected in the Hail Mary), and Mary responds with what is now known as the Magnificat.

Within the whole of Christianity, the Magnificat is most frequently recited within the Liturgy of the Hours. In Western Christianity, the Magnificat is most often sung or recited during the main evening prayer service: Vespers in the Catholic and Lutheran churches, and Evening Prayer (or Evensong) in Anglicanism. In Eastern Christianity, the Magnificat is usually sung at Sunday Matins. Among Protestant groups, the Magnificat may also be sung during worship services, especially in the Advent season during which these verses are traditionally read.

MUSIC SATURDAY - EUSTACHE DU CARROY

“A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself.” - Abraham Maslow

Eustache du Caurroy (baptised February 4, 1549 – August 7, 1609) was a French composer of the late Renaissance. He was a prominent composer of both secular and sacred music at the end of the Renaissance, including musique mesurée, and he was also influential on the foundation of the French school of organ music as exemplified in the work of Jean Titelouze.

According to Jean-Benjamin de La Borde, writing in 1780, Du Caurroy was born in Gerberoy and was baptised in Beauvais. He probably entered royal service around 1569, and in 1575 is first mentioned in documents from the royal court, when he won a song competition. He was to win two more, in 1576 and 1583, for a motet and a chanson respectively. He became sous-maître de la chapelle royale, a post that he held until 1595, at which time he was appointed to be official composer of the royal chamber; in 1599 he also acquired the post of composer at the royal chapel.

Du Caurroy accumulated wealth and honours in the first decade of the 17th century, including benefices and a large estate in Picardy. In his late years he also held the post of canon at several churches, including Sainte-Croix in Orléans, Sainte-Chapelle in Dijon, as well as others in Passy and Saint-Cyr-en-Bourg.

Du Caurroy was a late practitioner of the style of musique mesurée, the musical method of setting French verse (vers mesurés) in long and short syllables, to long and short note values, in a homophonic texture, as pioneered by Claude Le Jeune under the influence of Jean-Antoine de Baïf and his Académie de musique et de poésie. Many of Du Caurroy’s chansons written in this style were not published until 1609, long after the disbanding of the Académie, and they contrast significantly with his otherwise more conservative musical output. According to Du Caurroy, he was initially hostile to writing in the style, but was so moved by a performance of a composition of Le Jeune’s, a pseaume mesuré sung by a hundred voices, that he wanted to attempt it himself.

Du Caurroy was primarily interested in counterpoint, and was widely read in the theoretical work of the time, including that of Gioseffe Zarlino, who provided the best available summation of the contrapuntal practice in the 16th century. His contrapuntal interest is best shown in his sacred music, of which the largest collection is the two volumes of motets, 53 in all, entitled Preces ecclesiasticae, published in Paris in 1609. They are from 3 to 7 voices. His Missa pro defunctis, first performed at the funeral of Henry IV of France, was the requiem mass which was played at St. Denis for the funerals of French kings for the next several centuries. It is a long composition containing the Libera me responsory, the chant for which is similar to the famous Dies Irae. Du Caurroy also used the musique mesurée technique in his sacred compositions, including seven psalm settings, published in his Meslanges (Paris, posthumously, 1610): One is in Latin, one of the few examples of a musique mesurée setting in a language other than French.

Marin Mersenne’s Harmonie universelle contains a setting by Du Caurroy of Pie Jesu, which is a canon for six voices. In this same book, Mersenne held that Du Caurroy was the finest composer of musique mesurée, outranking even the renowned Claude Le Jeune. Du Caurroy also wrote instrumental music, including contrapuntal fantasies for three to six instruments. The collection of 42 such pieces, published posthumously in 1610, is considered to be a strong influence on the next generation of French keyboard players, especially Jean Titelouze, the founder of the French organ school.

Here is Du Caurroy’s “Vingtcinquiesme Fantasie. A Quatre (sur le Seigneur dès qu’on nous offense)” interpreted by Jordi Savall and Hesperion XX.

16/10/16

ART SUNDAY - HUGO VAN DER GOES

“Just as a candle cannot burn without fire, men cannot live without a spiritual life.” - Gautama Buddha

Hugo van der Goes, (born c. 1440—died 1482, Roode Kloster, near Brussels [now in Belgium]) one of the greatest Flemish painters of the second half of the 15th century, whose strange, melancholy genius found expression in religious works of profound but often disturbing spirituality.

Early sources disagree about van der Goes’s birthplace, with Ghent, Antwerp, Bruges, and Leiden mentioned as potential candidates. Nothing is known of his life before 1467, when he was accepted as a master in the painters’ guild in Ghent. From then until 1475 he received many commissions from the town of Ghent and provided decorations (heraldic shields, processional banners, etc.) for such occasions as the marriage of Charles the Bold in Bruges (1468) and the transference of the remains of Philip the Good to Dijon (1473). In 1474 he was elected dean of the guild, but the following year (when he was at the climax of his career) he decided to enter Roode Kloster, a priory near Brussels, as a lay brother. There he continued to paint and received distinguished visitors; he also undertook journeys.

In 1481 a tendency to acute depression culminated in a mental breakdown during which he tried to kill himself. An account of the artist’s last years at Roode Kloster, written by a monk, Gaspar Ofhuys (who apparently resented some of van der Goes’s privileges), has survived. Van der Goes’s masterpiece, and his only securely documented work, is the large triptych usually known as the Portinari Altarpiece (c. 1474–76 - see illustration above) with a scene called The Adoration of the Shepherds on the centre panel. The work was commissioned by Tommaso Portinari, agent for the Medici in Bruges, who is portrayed with his family on the wings.

It is one of the greatest of the early examples of northern realism, yet it subordinates this quality to spiritual content, uses still-life detail with symbolic intent, and shows unprecedented psychological insight in portraiture, especially in the faces of the awe-struck shepherds and the Portinari children. It achieves an emotional intensity unprecedented in Flemish painting. Soon after its completion it was taken to Florence, where its rich colours and careful attention to detail impressed many Italian artists.

Van der Goes’s earlier and more tentative style shows that he had studied the leading Netherlandish masters of the first half of the 15th century. A diptych (begun about 1467) in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, reflected an awareness of the Ghent Altarpiece of Jan van Eyck in the Fall of Man, while the Lamentation is reminiscent of Rogier van der Weyden. A comparison between the large Adoration of the Magi and The Nativity reveals the direction in which van der Goes’s later works were to evolve. The Adoration is spatially rational, compositionally tranquil, and harmonious in colour. By contrast, the Nativity (also called Adoration of the Shepherds), a later work painted on a curiously elongated panel, is disturbing even in its format—an emotionally charged supernatural drama on an uncomfortably low stage revealed by the drawing of curtains.

This exploitation of space and colour for emotional potentiality rather than rational effect characterises van der Goes’s later works. It appears in the Holy Trinity Adored by Sir Edward Bonkil and The Royal Family of Scotland, panels that were probably designed as organ shutters (c. 1478–79), and culminates in the Death of the Virgin, executed not long before van der Goes’s death. The unearthly colours of this work are particularly disturbing, and its poignancy is intensified by the controlled grief seen in the faces of the Apostles, who are placed in irrationally conceived space. Van der Goes’s art, with its affinities to Mannerism, and his tortured personality have found a particularly sympathetic response in the 20th century.

ART SUNDAY - GIOTTO

“Every painting is a voyage into a sacred harbour.” - Giotto di Bondone

Known as “the great Giotto”, Giotto di Bondone (Born: 1267 - Death: January 8, 1337) was the leading artist at the start of Italy’s Renaissance and the Florentine School of painting. According to Giorgio Vasari (1511 – 1574), who dedicated a chapter to the painter in his book “The Lives of the Artists”, Giotto was the tipping point of Italian art from the Byzantine style, into the Renaissance.

It is said that that last great painter of the Byzantine era, Cimabue (1240 – 1302), discovered a young Giotto in his rawest stage. As written by Vasari: “One day Cimabue was going about his business between Florence and Vespignano, and he came upon Giotto who, while his sheep were grazing, was sketching one of them in a lifelike way with a slightly pointed rock upon a smooth and polished stone without having learned how to draw it from anyone other than Nature. This caused Cimabue to stop in amazement…” It is from here that Cimabue brought Giotto into the bustling activity of the art world in Florence, where he excelled beyond measure of the time. How much of this story is true, is open for debate, but it is true that Giotto apprenticed in Cimabue’s studio in Florence.

Vasari’s other account of Cimabue and Giotto tells of the young artist painting a fly so life-like that Cimabue continually tried to brush it off the canvas. He also travelled with Cimabue to Rome and there may be several works that Giotto contributed to in Cimabue’s commissions. His earliest individual works include a fresco of the Annunciation and his quite large Crucifix, painted for the Santa Maria Novella in Florence. Giotto also painted in Rome from 1297 – 1300 and created his Badia Polyptych for the high altar of the Badia in Florence, which now hangs in the Uffizi Gallery.

Giotto’s masterpiece is often considered the fresco cycles he painted for the Scrovegni Chapel or Arena Chapel in Padua, with depictions of salvation seen in the Life of Christ and the Life of the Virgin and also a Last Judgment piece. The combined works, completed in the course of up to 7 years, have become known as a defining early masterwork of the Renaissance, going on to influence many artists in Florence and beyond.

Giotto painted other works in Padua, as well as in Assisi, and traveled back and forth between Rome and Florence. These made up most of his later works, including his Madonna altarpiece in the Church of Ognissanti in Florence, from around 1310. The piece, now in the Uffizi Gallery, finds its display in comparison to Cimabue’s Santa Trinità Madonna and Duccio’s (1255 – 1260) famous masterpiece, the Rucellai Madonna.

Receiving a great number of religious commissions in Rome, Giotto also traveled to work in Bologna and Milan. The artist was also an accomplished architect, appointed to work on the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore, (The Duomo of Florence). Dante (1265 – 1321) praised Giotto in the Divine Comedy, saying, “Once Cimabue thought to hold the field as painter; Giotto now is all the rage, dimming the lustre of the other’s fame.”

Above is a fresco from the Scrovegni Chapel. It is “Lo Sposalizio della Vergine” (Marriage of the Virgin), painted in 1305 and is one of the series “Scenes from the Life of the Virgin”.  Genre: religious painting Media: fresco Its dimensions are 185 x 200 cm and is found in the Scrovegni (Arena) Chapel, Padua, Italy. While the style is akin to Byzantine art in its formality and use of some conventional pictorial elements (for example the building in the background), the figures are beginning to show a liveliness and informality that goes beyond a simple devotional image. The scene depicted is rich in detail and characterisation, especially as seen in the accompanying figures who do not take centre stage in the work. Joseph and Mary are painted with gusto and their personality comes through, with the viewer not simply being a passive onlooker, but becoming more involved n the scene because of its familiarity and the depiction of the saintly figures as living, breathing human beings.

ART SUNDAY - PINTURICCHIO

“In essence the Renaissance was simply the green end of one of civilisation’s hardest winters.” - John Fowles

Pinturicchio, original name Bernardino di Betto di Biago (born c. 1454, Perugia, Romagna Italy – died Dec. 11, 1513, Siena, Republic of Siena) early Italian Renaissance painter known for his highly decorative frescoes. He was born in Perugia, the son of Benedetto or Betto di Blagio. He may have trained under lesser known Perugian painters such as Bonfigli and Fiorenzo di Lorenzo. According to Vasari, Pinturicchio was a paid assistant of Perugino. The works of the Perugian Renaissance school are very similar; and paintings by Perugino, Pinturicchio, Lo Spagna and a young Raphael may often be mistaken one for the other. In the execution of large frescoes, pupils and assistants had a large share in the work, either in enlarging the master’s sketch to the full-sized cartoon, in transferring the cartoon to the wall, or in painting backgrounds or accessories.

By 1481 Pinturicchio was associated with the Umbrian artist Perugino, whose influence on him was to be permanent. It is generally agreed that he assisted Perugino on some of the frescoes (“Journey of Moses” and the “Baptism of Christ”) in the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican (1481/82). In the 1480s he worked in the Bufalini Chapel in Santa Maria in Aracoeli and in Santa Maria del Popolo (both in Rome).

Pinturicchio’s most important work of this period was the decoration of the suite of six rooms in the Vatican known as the Borgia Apartments for Pope Alexander VI between 1492 and 1494. In these frescoes he retains Perugino’s figure types but lacks his clarity of conception. Instead, Pinturicchio relies on brilliant, often jarring colours, gilding, and ancient Roman ornamental motifs. Pinturicchio’s last major works were the 10 scenes from the life of Pope Pius II painted (1503–08) in fresco in the Piccolomini Library in Siena. In these, space, colour, and detail are handled with a crisp proficiency that may have influenced Raphael.

The Ashmolean Museum (University of Oxford), Biblioteca Ambrosiana (Milan), the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Courtauld Institute of Art (London), the Denver Art Museum, the Fitzwilliam Museum (University of Cambridge), the Honolulu Museum of Art, the Louvre, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the National Gallery, London, Palazzo Ruspoli (Rome), the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana (Milan), Princeton University Art Museum, Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, the Vatican Museums and the Museum of Fine Arts (Budapest) are among the public collections holding works by Pinturicchio.

Above is “The Anunciation” a fresco in the Baglioni Chapel, in the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore commissioned in 1500 by Troilo Baglioni to the artist Pinturicchio.

ART SUNDAY - PAOLO UCCELLO

“I prefer drawing to talking. Drawing is faster, and leaves less room for lies.” - Le Corbusier

Paolo Uccello, original name Paolo di Dono (born 1397, Pratovecchio, near Florence—died Dec. 10, 1475, Florence), was a Florentine painter whose work attempted uniquely to reconcile two distinct artistic styles: The essentially decorative late Gothic, and the new heroic style of the early Renaissance. Probably his most famous paintings are three panels representing “The Battle of San Romano” (c. 1456 - Panel 1 is shown above). His careful and sophisticated perspective studies are clearly evident in “The Flood” (1447–48).

By the time Paolo was 10 years old he was already an apprentice in the workshop of the sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti, who was then at work on what became one of the masterpieces of Renaissance art, the bronze doors for the Baptistery of the Florence cathedral, which consist of 28 panels illustrating New Testament scenes of the life of Christ. In 1414 Uccello joined the confraternity of painters (Compagnia di San Luca), and in the following year he became a member of the Arte dei Medici e degli Speziali, the official guild in Florence to which painters belonged.

Though Uccello must by then have been established as an independent painter, nothing of his work from this time remains, and there is no definite indication of his early training as a painter, except that he was a member of the workshop of Ghiberti, where many of the outstanding artists of the time were trained. Uccello’s earliest, and now badly damaged, frescoes are in the Chiostro Verde (the Green Cloister, so called because of the green cast of the frescoes that covered its walls) of Santa Maria Novella; they represent episodes from the Creation. These frescoes, marked with a pervasive concern for elegant linear forms and insistent, stylised patterning of landscape features, are consistent with the late Gothic tradition that was still predominant at the beginning of the 15th century in Florentine studios.

From 1425 to 1431, Uccello worked in Venice as a master mosaicist. All his work in Venice has been lost, however. Uccello may have been induced to return to Florence by the commission for a series of frescoes in the cloister of San Miniato al Monte depicting scenes from monastic legends. While the figural formulations of these ruinous frescoes still closely approximate those of the Santa Maria Novella cycle, there is also a fascination with the novel perspective schemes that had appeared in Florence during Uccello’s Venetian sojourn and with a simplified and more monumental treatment of forms deriving from the recent sculpture of Donatello and Nanni di Banco.

In 1436 in the Florence cathedral, Uccello completed a monochrome fresco of an equestrian monument to Sir John Hawkwood, an English mercenary who had commanded Florentine troops at the end of the 14th century. In the Hawkwood fresco, a single-point perspective scheme, a fully sculptural treatment of the horse and rider, and a sense of controlled potential energy within the figure all indicate Uccello’s desire to assimilate the new style of the Renaissance that had blossomed in Florence since his birth. Following the Hawkwood monument, in 1443 Uccello completed four heads of prophets around a colossal clock on the interior of the west facade of the cathedral; between 1443 and 1445 he contributed the designs for two stained-glass windows in the cupola.

After a brief trip to Padua in 1447, Uccello returned to the Chiostro Verde of Santa Maria Novella. In a fresco illustrating the Flood and the recession of the water, Uccello presented two separate scenes united by a rapidly receding perspective scheme that reflected the influence of Donatello’s contemporary reliefs in Padua. Human forms in “The Flood,” especially the nudes, were reminiscent of figures in Masaccio’s frescoes in the Brancacci Chapel (c. 1427), perhaps the most influential of all paintings of the early Renaissance. More than any other painting by Uccello, “The Flood” illustrates the artist’s love for perspective.

Perhaps Uccello’s most famous paintings are three panels representing the Battle of San Romano, now in the Louvre, Paris; the National Gallery, London; and the Uffizi, Florence. These panels represent the victory in 1432 of Florentine forces under Niccolò da Tolentino over the troops of their archrival, Siena. There are Renaissance elements, such as a sculptural treatment of forms and fragments of a broken perspective scheme in this work, but the bright handling of colour and the elaborate decorative patterns of the figures and landscape are indebted to the Gothic style. The older style continued to be used through the 15th century in Florence to enrich the environments of the new princes of the day, such as the Medici, who acquired all three of the panels representing the Battle of San Romano.

Uccello is justly famous for his careful and sophisticated perspective studies, most clearly visible in “The Flood,” in the underdrawing (sinopia) for his last fresco, “The Nativity,” formerly in San Martino della Scala in Florence, and in three drawings universally attributed to him that are now in the Uffizi. These drawings indicate a meticulous, analytic mind, keenly interested in the application of scientific laws to the reconstruction of objects in a three-dimensional space. In these studies he was probably assisted by a noted mathematician, Paolo Toscanelli. Uccello’s perspective studies were to influence the Renaissance art treatises of artists such as Piero della Francesca, Leonardo da Vinci, and Albrecht Dürer. Uccello apparently led an increasingly reclusive existence during his last years.

Uccello was long thought to be significant primarily for his role in establishing new means of rendering perspective that became a major component of the Renaissance style. The 16th-century biographer Giorgio Vasari said that Uccello was “intoxicated” by perspective. Later historians found the unique charm and decorative genius evinced by his compositions to be an even more important contribution.

MUSIC SATURDAY - ANNIBALE PADOVANO

“Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.” - William James

Annibale Padovano (1527 – March 15, 1575) was an Italian composer and organist of the late Renaissance Venetian School. He was one of the earliest developers of the keyboard toccata. Padovano was born in Padua (hence his surname) but little is known about his early life. He first appears at St. Mark’s in Venice on November 30, 1552, when he was hired as first organist at an annual salary of 40 ducats. He stayed at this post until 1565.

St. Mark’s at this time also began to employ a second organist (it was Claudio Merulo for the last eight years of Padovano’s tenure), which allowed two simultaneous, spatially separated organs to perform in the huge space of the cathedral: This was a key development in music of the Venetian school, which was already using spatially separated choirs of voices. Merulo took over the job of first organist when Padovano left.

In 1566, Padovano left Venice to go to the Habsburg court in Graz. Many Venetian musicians left their native area to seek their fortunes in Habsburg domains, which generally remained friendly to Venice. Padovano became the director of music at Graz in 1570, and died there five years later.

Although Padovano published a book of motets, a book of masses, and two books of madrigals, he is mainly remembered for his instrumental music. He was a notable early composer of ricercars, a predecessor of the fugue; many of the themes he used derived from plainchant, but he included considerable ornamentation in the melodic lines. In addition he often broke the theme up for motivic development in a surprisingly “modern” way, anticipating the developmental techniques of the common practice period.

Probably his most famous compositions are his toccatas, which were perhaps the earliest examples of the toccata in its more modern sense as an improvisatory, highly ornamented piece. Usually he included imitative interpolations between improvisatory sections, and also meter changes from duple to triple, anticipating later music of the Venetian school.

While in Bavaria he wrote an enormous Mass for 24 Voices, which makes use of three choirs of eight voices each. This composition was likely performed for the wedding of Duke Wilhelm V of Bavaria to Renata of Lorraine. This piece has been recorded by the Huelgas Ensemble, led by Paul Van Nevel. Here is this mass:

ART SUNDAY - RAPHAEL

“It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” - Pablo Picasso

Raphael (Italian in full, Raffaello Sanzio or Raffaello Santi; born April 6, 1483, Urbino, Duchy of Urbino, Italy – died April 6, 1520, Rome, Papal States Italy), master painter and architect of the Italian High Renaissance. Raphael is best known for his Madonnas and for his large figure compositions in the Vatican. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Early years at Urbino Raphael was the son of Giovanni Santi and Magia di Battista Ciarla; his mother died in 1491.

Italian Renaissance painter and architect Raphael was born Raffaello Sanzio on April 6, 1483, in Urbino, Italy. At the time, Urbino was a cultural centre that encouraged the Arts. Raphael’s father, Giovanni Santi, was a painter for the Duke of Urbino, Federigo da Montefeltro. Giovanni taught the young Raphael basic painting techniques and exposed him to the principles of humanistic philosophy at the Duke of Urbino’s court. In 1494, when Raphael was just 11 years old, Giovanni died. Raphael then took over the daunting task of managing his father’s workshop. His success in this role quickly surpassed his father’s; Raphael was soon considered one of the finest painters in town. As a teen, he was even commissioned to paint for the Church of San Nicola in the neighbouring town of Castello.

In 1500 a master painter named Pietro Vannunci, otherwise known as Perugino, invited Raphael to become his apprentice in Perugia, in the Umbria region of central Italy. In Perugia, Perugino was working on frescoes at the Collegio del Cambia. The apprenticeship lasted four years and provided Raphael with the opportunity to gain both knowledge and hands-on experience. During this period, Raphael developed his own unique painting style, as exhibited in the religious works the Mond "Crucifixion" (circa 1502), "The Three Graces" (circa 1503), "The Knight’s Dream" (1504) and the "Oddi altarpiece, Marriage of the Virgin", completed in 1504.

In 1504, Raphael left his apprenticeship with Perugino and moved to Florence, where he was heavily influenced by the works of the Italian painters Fra Bartolommeo, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Masaccio. To Raphael, these innovative artists had achieved a whole new level of depth in their composition. By closely studying the details of their work, Raphael managed to develop an even more intricate and expressive personal style than was evident in his earlier paintings. From 1504 through 1507, Raphael produced a series of "Madonnas," which extrapolated on Leonardo da Vinci's works. Raphael's experimentation with this theme culminated in 1507 with his painting, La belle jardinière. That same year, Raphael created his most ambitious work in Florence, the Entombment, which was evocative of the ideas that Michelangelo had recently expressed in his Battle of Cascina.

Raphael moved to Rome in 1508 to paint in the Vatican “Stanze” (Room), under Pope Julius II’s patronage. From 1509 to 1511, Raphael toiled over what was to become one of the Italian High Renaissance’s most highly regarded fresco cycles, those located in the Vatican's Stanza della Segnatura (“Room of the Signatura”). The Stanza della Segnatura series of frescos include The Triumph of Religion and The School of Athens. In the fresco cycle, Raphael expressed the humanistic philosophy that he had learned in the Urbino court as a boy. In the years to come, Raphael painted an additional fresco cycle for the Vatican, located in the Stanza d'Eliodoro (“Room of Heliodorus”), featuring The Expulsion of Heliodorus, The Miracle of Bolsena, The Repulse of Attila from Rome and The Liberation of Saint Peter. During this same time, the ambitious painter produced a successful series of “Madonna” paintings in his own art studio. The famed Madonna of the Chair and Sistine Madonna were among them.

By 1514, Raphael had achieved fame for his work at the Vatican and was able to hire a crew of assistants to help him finish painting frescoes in the Stanza dell’Incendio, freeing him up to focus on other projects. While Raphael continued to accept commissions -- including portraits of popes Julius II and Leo X -- and his largest painting on canvas, The Transfiguration (commissioned in 1517), he had by this time begun to work on architecture. After architect Donato Bramante died in 1514, the pope hired Raphael as his chief architect. Under this appointment, Raphael created the design for a chapel in Sant’ Eligio degli Orefici. He also designed Rome’s Santa Maria del Popolo Chapel and an area within Saint Peter’s new basilica. Raphael’s architectural work was not limited to religious buildings. It also extended to designing palaces. Raphael’s architecture honoured the classical sensibilities of his predecessor, Donato Bramante, and incorporated his use of ornamental details. Such details would come to define the architectural style of the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods.

On April 6, 1520, Raphael’s 37th birthday, he died suddenly and unexpectedly of mysterious causes in Rome, Italy. He had been working on his largest painting on canvas, The Transfiguration (commissioned in 1517), at the time of his death. When his funeral mass was held at the Vatican, Raphael's unfinished Transfiguration was placed on his coffin stand. Raphael’s body was interred at the Pantheon in Rome, Italy. Following his death, Raphael's movement toward Mannerism influenced painting styles in Italy’s advancing Baroque period. Celebrated for the balanced and harmonious compositions of his "Madonnas," portraits, frescoes and architecture, Raphael continues to be widely regarded as the leading artistic figure of Italian High Renaissance classicism.

The painting above is the “Parnassus” a fresco painting in the Raphael Rooms (Stanze di Raffaello), in the Palace of the Vatican in Rome, painted at the commission of Pope Julius II. It was probably the second wall of the Stanza della segnatura to be painted, in about 1511, after “La disputa” and before “The School of Athens”, which occupy other walls of the room. The whole room shows the four areas of human knowledge: philosophy, religion, poetry and law, with The Parnassus representing poetry.

The fresco shows the mythological Mount Parnassus where Apollo dwells; he is in the centre playing an instrument (a contemporary lira da braccio rather than a classical lyre), surrounded by the nine muses, nine poets from antiquity, and nine contemporary poets. Apollo, along with Calliope, the muse of epic poetry, inspired poets. Raphael used the face of Laocoön from the classical sculpture “Laocoön and His Sons”, excavated in 1506 and also in the Vatican for his Homer (in dark blue robe to the left of centre), expressing blindness rather than pain.

Two of the female figures in the fresco have been said to be reminiscent of Michaelangelo's Creation of Adam, Euterpe and Sappho, who is named on a scroll she holds. Sappho is the only female poet shown, presumably identified so that she is not confused with a muse; she is a late addition who does not appear in the print by Marcantonio Raimondi that records a drawing for the fresco. The window below the fresco Parnassus frames the view of Mons Vaticanus, believed to be sacred to Apollo. Humanists, such as Biondo, Vegio, and Albertini, refer to the ancient-sun god of the Vatican.

ART SUNDAY - CARPACCIO

“It is human nature to instinctively rebel at obscurity or ordinariness.” - Taylor Caldwell

Vittore Carpaccio (born c. 1460, Venice - died 1525/26, Venice), was the greatest early Renaissance narrative painter of the Venetian school. Carpaccio may have been a pupil of Lazzaro Bastiani, but the dominant influences on his early work were those of Gentile Bellini and Antonello da Messina. The style of his work suggests he might also have visited Rome as a young man. He probably painted “Salvator Mundi with Four Apostles” before 1490. Other works from this early period are sometimes attributed to Carpaccio, although, because he did not sign and date his early works, there is often little proof he painted them.

At about 1490 he began painting a cycle of scenes from the “Legend of St Ursula” for the Scuola di Santa Orsola, now in the Galleries of the Academy of Venice. In these works he emerged as a mature artist of originality, revealing a gift for organisation, narrative skill, and a command of light. The genre scene of the “Dream of St Ursula” has been especially praised for its wealth of naturalistic detail.

Carpaccio’s later career can be charted in terms of three further narrative cycles. The first of these survives intact in the Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavoni, in Venice, and involves scenes from the life of St. Jerome; dating from 1502, these paintings represent the climax of Carpaccio’s art. A cycle of scenes from the life of the Virgin, executed after 1504 for the Scuola degli Albanesi, is now scattered. Also dispersed is the cycle of scenes from the life of St. Stephen, painted between 1511 and 1520, that is stylistically reminiscent of his earlier works.

Carpaccio completed three notable altarpieces for Venetian churches: “St. Thomas Aquinas Enthroned” (1507), “Presentation in the Temple” (1510), and “Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand” (1515). His last dated works are two organ shutters for the Duomo at Capodistria (1523). Carpaccio’s precise rendering of architecture and the luminous atmosphere of his paintings were praised by the 19th-century English critic John Ruskin. Carpaccio’s panoramic depictions of pageants, processions, and other public gatherings are notable for their wealth of realistic detail, sunny colouring, and dramatic narratives. His incorporation of realistic figures into an orderly and coherent perspectival space made him a predecessor of the Venetian painters of vedute (townscapes).

The image above is “The Meditation on the Passion” ca. 1490. The medium is oil and tempera on wood (total: 70.5 x 86.7cm; painted surface 66.5 × 84.5 cm). It is exhibited in the European Paintings Department of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. It is an extraordinary work, quite a landmark in the history of devotional images. It can be seen as a meditation on the theme of Death and Resurrection.

To the right, the Old Testament figure Job sits on a block inscribed in pseudo-Hebrew, while on the left, portrayed as a hermit, is Saint Jerome (ca. 347–420), who wrote a commentary on the book of Job. Christ’s dead body is displayed on a broken throne, also inscribed in pseudo-Hebrew. A bird (symbol of the soul) flies upwards. The landscape, barren on the left and pastoral on the right, alludes to the contrasting themes of life and death, as do the animals that inhabit it. The turbaned figures in the background would have been familiar to Venetians through their trade with the Middle East and Egypt.

ART SUNDAY - LA PRIMAVERA

“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.” - Anne Bradstreet

For Art Sunday today a single painting, “La Primavera”, one of my favourite by Botticelli. Sandro Botticelli was born in Florence, in 1445. He spent his whole life there except for a visit to Rome. Botticelli was a member of the Medici clan and his real name was Alessandro Filipepi. He was nicknamed Botticelli (“little barrel”) when he went to be apprenticed by his brother, a goldsmith.

Botticelli had deep-set eyes, flowing fair locks and a prominent nose. His sense of humour was well-known in his times and his pranks were the talk of the town. He was also a very talented draughtsman, something that did not escape the practised eye of his brother. When Botticelli was about 15 he was sent to the great painter, Fra Filippo Lippi. There, as was the custom of the times, he learned how to mix colors and clean brushes in the great artist’s studio. He then moved up in the studio hierarchy by painting grounds and backgrounds, drapery, and finally lesser compositional features. Botticelli was greatly influenced by his teacher in both style and colour. However, as soon as the young artist could decide to paint his own canvases, his themes and iconography became very different from his master’s.

By 1465, Botticelli had his own studio. His family connections ensured that the Medicis commissioned works from him. Sure enough, Botticelli made his living, like any other artist of the time, by painting religious scenes, although his interest was far removed from religion. Behind the walls of the Medici Palace Botticelli listened to philosophical debates and classical legends, discussed amongst Lorenzo de’ Medici’s intellectual friends. Botticelli was inspired, and under the protection of the Medici, he created an entirely new genre of art: That of the mythological allegory. After the age of 56 years no paintings were found that were painted by him. Botticelli died alone and infirm. He lived to be about 65 and died around 1510.

“La Primavera” (1478) is not portrait, not icon nor holy celebration. It is pure fantasy, inspired by poetry, and fuelled by the artist’s fertile imagination. This painting shows Venus, ancient goddess of beauty and fertility, celebrating the arrival of Spring, “la Primavera”. She is surrounded by allegorical figures representing the virtues and gods of the ancient world. It was a subject guaranteed to please Lorenzo de’ Medici, Botticelli's protector, and no detail was overlooked. Even the laurel bushes behind Venus served to represent the rebirth of a golden age, under the patronage of Laurentius - Lorenzo – de’ Medici.  With such a sophisticated understanding of his friends' arcane ideas, Botticelli had successfully developed his own form of visual poetry, peppered with symbolism and private jokes.

In this enormous painting (203 x 314 cm) Sandro Botticelli paints a rich tapestry of allegory, celebrating Spring, Nature’s favourite season. Spring in her flowered dress enters the scene from the right, attended by Chloris (Flora), who is the goddess of vegetation and flowers. Zephyrus is the Greek god of the west wind, who was believed to live in a cave in Thrace. He is the one who abducted the goddess Chloris and gave her dominion over flowers. Botticelli captures the moment of the abduction here, and Zephyrus’s gift of flowers is seen to grace Chloris’ face, as she seeks the protection of Spring. La Primavera seems to be serene and impassive, unwilling to interfere in the abduction. Her enigmatic smile and eyes that look away, towards us (almost complicitly) as if to tell us that none should stand in the way of such passion. Spring ushers in love and the male force, unstoppable and impetuous overwhelms the female force, which seemingly is overcome, but will emerge the winner.

Counterbalancing this scene, the Charites, or three Graces, are depicted on the left. These are the goddesses that personify charm and beauty in nature and in human life. They protect all things beautiful and bestow talent upon mortals. Together with the Muses they serve as sources of inspiration in poetry and the arts. Originally, they were goddesses of fertility and nature, closely associated with the underworld and the Eleusinian mysteries. As classical civilisation became more sophisticated, their fertility associations waned and their artistic sympathies became their prime patronage.

Aglaëa (“Splendour”) is the youngest of the Graces and is sometimes represented as the wife of Hephaestus. The other Graces are Euphrosyne (“Mirth”) and Thalia (“Good Cheer”). They are usually considered the daughters of Zeus and Eurynome, or Dionysus and Aphrodite. According to Homer the Graces belonged to the retinue of Aphrodite. The Romans knew them under the collective name of the Gratiae. Botticelli paints them intertwined in a delicate dance, their gossamer pepla counterpointing their delicate and beautiful features.

On the extreme left is the only other male figure in the painting, Hermes (Mercury), the herald of the gods. He was the god of communication, commerce and patron of shepherds, land travel, merchants, weights and measures, oratory, literature, athletics and thieves, and known for his cunning and shrewdness. It was one of his main duties to guide the souls of the dead down to the underworld, for which he is known as a psychopomp (“soul sender”). He was also closely connected with bringing dreams to mortals. Hermes is usually depicted with a broad-brimmed hat or a winged cap, winged sandals and the herald’s staff.

One of his older manifestations was as a fertility god of vegetation and animal generation. He was invoked for good fortune, and he was also a patron of roads and boundaries. In this role he was commemorated by “herms”. A herm is a square or rectangular pillar in either stone or bronze, with the head of Hermes (usually with a beard), which adorned the top of the pillar, and male genitals near to the base of the pillar. These were used for road and boundary markers. In Athens they also stood outside houses to help fend off evil.

Central in the painting is the goddess Aphrodite (Venus) and above her flies her son, Eros (Cupid). Aphrodite is the goddess of love, beauty and sexual rapture. According to Hesiod, she was born when Uranus (the father of the gods) was castrated by his son Cronus. Cronus threw the severed genitals into the ocean, which began to churn and foam about them. From the aphros (“sea foam”) arose Aphrodite, and the sea carried her to either Cyprus or Cythera. Hence she is often referred to as Kypris and Cytherea. Homer calls her a daughter of Zeus and Dione.

After her birth, Zeus was afraid that the gods would fight over Aphrodite’s hand in marriage so he married her off to the god Hephaestus, the smith of the gods. He could hardly believe his good luck and used all his skills to make the most lavish jewels for her. He made her a girdle of finely wrought gold and wove magic into the filigree work. That was not very wise of him, for when she wore her magic girdle no one could resist her, and she was all too irresistible already. She loved gaiety and glamour and was not at all pleased at being the wife of sooty, hard-working Hephaestus, and cuckolded him many a time.

Aphrodite loved and was loved by many gods and mortals. Among her mortal lovers, the most famous was perhaps Adonis. Some of her sons are Eros, Anteros, Hymenaios and Aeneas (with her Trojan lover Anchises). She is accompanied by the Graces. Eros is usually depicted as a young winged boy, with his bow and arrows at the ready, to either shoot into the hearts of gods or mortals which would rouse them to desire. His arrows came in two types: Golden with dove feathers which aroused love; or leaden arrows which had owl feathers that caused indifference. Sappho the poet summarised Eros as being bitter sweet, and cruel to his victims, yet he was also charming and very beautiful. Being unscrupulous, and a danger to those around him, Eros would make as much mischief as he possibly could by wounding the hearts of all.

ART SUNDAY - FRA BARTOLOMMEO

“For though we love both the truth and our friends, piety requires us to honour the truth first.” - Aristotle

Fra Bartolommeo, (also spelled Bartolomeo; also called Bartolomeo della Porta or Baccio della Porta) is an Italian artist born March 28, 1472, Florence and died Oct. 31, 1517, Florence. He was a prominent exponent in early 16th-century Florence of the High Renaissance style. Bartolommeo served as an apprentice in the workshop of Cosimo Rosselli and then formed a workshop with the painter Mariotto Albertinelli.

His early works, such as the “Annunciation” (1497), were influenced by the balanced compositions of the Umbrian painter Perugino and by the sfumato (smoky effect of light and shade) of Leonardo da Vinci. In 1499 Bartolommeo was commissioned to paint a large-scale fresco, “The Last Judgment”, for one of the cemetery chapels in Santa Maria Nuova. Influenced by the preaching of the Florentine Dominican religious reformer Girolamo Savonarola, Bartolommeo joined a convent in 1500, and in 1501 he gave up painting and joined the Dominican order.

He began painting again in 1504, producing devotional paintings mostly at the service of his order. His “Vision of St. Bernard” (completed 1507) shows him achieving the transition from the subtle grace of late Quattrocento painting to the monumentality of the High Renaissance style. In 1508 Fra Bartolommeo visited Venice, where he assimilated the Venetian painters’ use of richer colour harmonies. Back in Florence soon afterward, he painted a number of calm and simple religious pictures in which monumental figures are grouped in balanced compositions and portrayed with a dense and somewhat shadowy atmospheric treatment. Among such works are his “God the Father with SS. Catherine of Siena and Mary Magdalene” (1509) and the “Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine” (1512).

Bartolommeo visited Rome in 1514, where he saw Raphael’s mature work and Michelangelo’s frescoes on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. In response Bartolommeo’s art took on a greater power of dramatic expression, as in the “Madonna della Misericordia” (1515) and the “Pietà” (c. 1515; see above). Also in this vein were his large frescoes of St. Mark and St. Sebastian on the wall at San Marco in Florence. The St. Sebastian, an ornamental pendant, was later purchased by King Henry I of France.

Despite Bartolommeo’s assimilation of the progressive currents of his time, his art is restrained, conservative, and somewhat severe, and he painted religious subjects almost exclusively. His production of drawings and preparatory sketches shows a delicate sensitivity and technical superiority. His landscapes are among the most notable of his time. 

ART SUNDAY - FEDE GALIZIA

“Whatever women do, they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult.” - Charlotte Whitton

Happy International Women’s Day! To celebrate, Art Sunday today is dedicated to a woman artist, Fede Galizia (1578–1630), who was an Italian Renaissance painter, a pioneer of the still life genre.

Fede Galizia, was born in Milan in 1578. Her father, Nunzio Galizia, also a painter of miniatures, had moved to Milan from Trento. Fede (whose name means “Faith”) learned to paint from him. By the age of twelve, she was sufficiently accomplished as an artist to be mentioned by Gian Paolo Lomazzo, a painter and art theorist friend of her father, who wrote: “This girl dedicates herself to imitate our most extraordinary art.” At a young age, Galizia was already an established portrait painter handling many commissioned works. Perhaps it was her father’s influence as a miniaturist that led to Galizia’s attention to detail in her portraits. Her treatment of jewels and clothing made her a very desirable portrait painter. She was often commissioned to paint religious and secular themes as well.

Several of her paintings based on the story of Judith and Holofernes, a popular theme in art of the period, survive in private collections. Perhaps her earliest was “Judith with the Head of Holofernes” painted in 1596 which is now in Sarasota Florida at the Ringling Museum of Art. She also created miniatures and altarpieces for convents. The style of her portraits derived from the naturalistic traditions of the Renaissance in Italy with a sharply realistic approach. Galizia’s artistic skills of drawing and painting are evident in her Portrait of Paolo Morigia, a Jesuit scholar and one of her earliest patrons and supporters. Morigia, also a writer and historian, was very pleased with Galizia’s work, and was portrayed in her 1596 Portrait of Paolo Morigia to be writing a poem about the picture Galizia was painting.

She received several public commissions for altarpieces in Milanese churches; one of these was the “Noli me tangere” (1616; Milan, S Stefano), made for the altar of Santa Maria Maddalena Church. When not painting portraits, Galizia was primarily interested in painting still lifes, a genre in which she was a pioneer and for which she is best remembered. Although very few contemporary sources mention Galizia’s still life paintings, they are the majority of her surviving works. Sixty-three works have been catalogued as hers, of which 44 are still lifes. One of her signed still lifes made in 1602 is said to be the first dated still life by an Italian artist, and proves her involvement in this new style of painting. Galizia never married. On June 21, 1630, she made her will and is thought to have died of the plague in Milan shortly afterward.

Fede Galizia’s paintings were not given the recognition they deserved until well into the 20th century, when special attention was given to her work in studies made in 1963 and 1989. Galizia shows a style related to the Lombard mannerism of the late 16th century, centred in Mantua, but known internationally, especially in France. Galizia’s still lifes are among the earliest examples of painting in a new genre in which women (partly because they were excluded from other kinds of painting), would excel. Galizia’s still lifes differ from her father's works in their greater detail and more vibrant colours. Most of these works featured fruit centerpieces in simple, frontal arrangements. They were often composed of a basket or bowl filled with a single type of fruit, such as peaches or pears, with a few fruit, sometimes sliced, scattered at the base of the bowl. The painting above, “Cherries in a Silver Compote” is typical of this genre she excelled in.

Many of her still lifes had fresh flowers or other fruits set on the counter to provide a noticeable contrast and scale as seen in her work titled “Still-life with Peaches and a Porcelain and a Bowl”. Galizia’s work displayed influences from such works as Caravaggio’s “Basket of Fruit”. Associating with the more restrained style of the Counter Reformation period, she did not explore the more lavish compositions and forms taken up by many of her contemporaries working in this genre; she preferred instead to use a stricter, more simplistic style like that seen in Francisco de Zurbarán’s slightly later still life paintings.

Galizia’s paintings were deft with detail, perfectly balanced, and her attention to shadow, light, and texture was unrivalled at the time. She was particularly good at creating inviting space in her paintings. Her compositions are not crowded. They look as if one could reach out and touch the fruit, grasp it, and pull it from the painting without disturbing the rest of the work. Her graceful, flowing arrangements were natural and poetic, unlike their predecessors. Galizia’s aesthetic treatment of still lifes would not be seen again until the middle of the century.

The modern direction taken in still life painting was shaped entirely by her works. Many of the still life paintings we see today draw their influence from her original ideas. Currently, it is unknown just how many paintings Galizia was responsible for. Many works that could have possibly been hers have been attributed to her male counterpart Panfilo Nuvolone, who drew significant inspiration from Galizia. She may have inspired the Bergamese Francesco Codino and the Baroque still life painter Giovanna Garzoni.

ART SUNDAY - ANDREA MANTEGNA

“Happy is the man whom the Muses love: Sweet speech flows from his mouth.” - Hesiod

Andrea Mantegna (1431-1506) was one of the foremost North Italian painters of the 15th century. He was a master of perspective and foreshortening, and he made important contributions to the compositional techniques of Renaissance painting. Born at Isola di Carturo, between Vicenza and Padua in 1431, Mantegna became the apprentice and adopted son of the painter Francesco Squarcione of Padua. He developed a passionate interest in classical antiquity.

The influence of both ancient Roman sculpture and the contemporary sculptor Donatello are clearly evident in Mantegna’s rendering of the human figure. His human forms were distinguished for their solidity, expressiveness, and anatomical correctness. Mantegna’s principal works in Padua were religious. His first great success was a series of frescoes on the lives of St. James and St. Christopher in the Ovetari Chapel of the Church of the Eremitani (1456; badly damaged in World War II).

In 1459 Mantegna went to Mantua to become court painter to the ruling Gonzaga family and accordingly turned from religious to secular and allegorical subjects. His masterpiece was a series of frescoes (1465-74) for the Camera degli Sposi (“bridal chamber”) of the Palazzo Ducale. In these works, he carried the art of illusionistic perspective to new limits. His figures depicting the court were not simply applied to the wall like flat portraits but appeared to be taking part in realistic scenes, as if the walls had disappeared. The illusion is carried over onto the ceiling, which appears to be open to the sky, with servants, a peacock, and cherubs leaning over a railing. This was the prototype of illusionistic ceiling painting and was to become an important element of baroque and rococo art.

Mantegna’s later works varied in quality. His largest undertaking, a fresco series on the Triumphs of Caesar (1489, Hampton Court Palace, England), displays a rather dry classicism, but Parnassus (1497, Louvre, Paris), an allegorical painting commissioned by Isabelle d’Este, is his freshest, most animated work. His work never ceased to be innovative. In Madonna of Victory (1495, Louvre), he introduced a new compositional arrangement, based on diagonals, which was later to be exploited by Correggio, while his Dead Christ (Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan) was a tour de force of foreshortening that pointed ahead to the style of 16th-century Mannerism.

One of the key artistic figures of the second half of the 15th century, Mantegna was the dominant influence on north Italian painting for 50 years. It was also through him that German artists, notably Albrecht Dürer, were made aware of the artistic discoveries of the Italian Renaissance. He died in Mantua on September 13, 1506.

“Parnassus” of 1497 is shown above. Around 1495 Isabella d’Este planned to have the most famous painters of her time contribute pictures for her studiolo; she was unsuccessful in obtaining pictures from Leonardo (although he drew her portrait) and Giovanni Bellini, but not for want of trying. Mantegna, her court painter, and Lorenzo Costa, Mantegna’s successor, each completed two canvases and Perugino one.

Mantegna’s so-called “Parnassus”, is one of his finest works, much discussed and admired, although the exact meaning of the allegory remains elusive. As a painter dedicated to the study of antiquity and ancient archaeology, it is fitting that Mantegna should have produced a masterpiece with a classical theme. In the centre of the painting representing a mythological scene the dancing Muses are easily identifiable, both on account of their number and the presence of the mountains in the top left of the picture.

There was a tradition that the song of the nine sisters caused volcanic eruptions and other cataclysms which could only be stopped by Pegasus stamping his hoof - and indeed we see, on the right, the winged and bejewelled horse engaged in his providential pawing of the ground. Beside him is Mercury, whose presence is justified by the protection, which he (together with Apollo) afforded the adulteress in the love affair between Mars and Venus. The two lovers hold sway over the scene from the top of Parnassus; a bed is beside them. The cuckolded husband, Vulcan, springs out from the entrance of his forge, fulminating against the faithless pair.

Apollo is seated lower down, his lyre in his hands. Mantegna has integrated the landscape elements with the figures, using rocky cliffs as foils, while the central arch permits a deep vista into the rolling landscape. In this late work Mantegna has maintained a monumental approach to human figures. Stocky and heavy-limbed, they plant their weight solidly in easy contrapposto.

ART SUNDAY - PIERO DI COSIMO

“A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” - Christopher Reeve

Piero di Cosimo (January 2, 1462 - April 12, 1522), sometimes known as Piero di Lorenzo, was born in Florence, son of a goldsmith, and apprenticed under the artist Cosimo Rosselli (1439 – 1507), from whom he derived his popular name. He assisted Rosselli in the painting of the Sistine Chapel in 1481.

In the first phase of his career, Piero was influenced by the Netherlandish naturalism of Hugo van der Goes (1440 – 1482), whose Portinari Triptych (now at the Spedale of Santa Maria Novella in Florence) helped to lead the whole of Florentine painting into new channels. From him Cosimo acquired the love of landscape and the intimate knowledge of the growth of flowers and of animal life. The manner of Hugo van der Goes is especially apparent in Cosimo’s Adoration of the Shepherds, (Berlin Museum).

He journeyed to Rome in 1482 with his master, Rosselli and proved himself a true child of the Renaissance by depicting subjects of Classical mythology in such pictures as the “Venus, Mars, and Cupid”, and “The Death of Procris”. This also includes his Perseus and Andromeda series, of which the painting “Perseus Frees Andromeda” (see above) is now at the Uffizi. Cosimo’s mythical compositions show the bizarre presence of hybrid forms of men and animals, or the man learning to use fire and tools. The multitude of nudes in these works shows the influence of Luca Signorelli (1445 – 1523) on Piero’s art.

During his lifetime, Cosimo acquired a reputation for eccentricity; reportedly, he was frightened of thunderstorms, and so pyrophobic that he rarely cooked his food. He lived largely on hard-boiled eggs, which he prepared 50 at a time while boiling glue for his artworks. He also resisted any cleaning of his studio, or trimming of the fruit trees of his orchard; he lived, wrote Giorgio Vasari (1511 – 1574), "more like a beast than a man”.

If, as Vasari asserts, he spent the last years of his life in gloomy retirement, the change was probably due to the religious reformer, Savonarola (1452 – 1498), under whose influence he turned his attention once more to religious art. The death of his master Rosselli may also have impacted Piero’s morose elder years. “The Immaculate Conception with Saints”, (or Incarnation) at the Uffizi, and “The Holy Family”, at Dresden, best illustrate the religious fervour to which he was stimulated by the stern preacher. Cosimo enjoyed a great reputation as a portrait painter: the most famous of his work being the portrait of a Florentine noblewoman, Simonetta Vespucci (1453 – 1476), mistress of Giuliano de Medici (1453 – 1478).

According to Vasari, Cosimo excelled in designing pageants and triumphal processions for the pleasure-loving youths of Florence. Cosimo exercised considerable influence upon his fellow pupils on Rosselli’s workshop, such as Albertinelli (1474 – 1515) and Fra Bartolomeo (1472 – 1517). He was the master of the influential Florentine Mannerist, Andrea del Sarto (1486 – 1531).

Perseus, in Greek mythology, was the son of Zeus and Danaë, the daughter of Acrisius of Argos. As an infant he was cast into the sea in a chest with his mother by Acrisius, who knew of a prophesy that said he would be killed by his grandson. The chest grounded on the island of Seriphus where Perseus grew up. King Polydectes of Seriphus, who desired Danaë, tricked Perseus into promising to obtain the head of Medusa, the only mortal among the Gorgons (winged female creatures of a terrible beauty, whose hair consisted of snakes).

Helped by the gods Hermes and Athena, Perseus pressed the Graiae, sisters of the Gorgons, into helping him by seizing the one eye and one tooth that the sisters shared and not returning them until they provided him with winged sandals (with which he could fly), the helmet of Hades (which made him invisible), a curved sword, or sickle, to decapitate Medusa, and a bag in which to conceal the head. Because the gaze of Medusa turned all who looked at her to stone, Perseus guided himself by her reflection in a shield given him by Athena and beheaded Medusa as she slept. He then returned to Seriphus and rescued his mother by turning Polydectes and his supporters to stone at the sight of Medusa's head.

On his way to Seriphus, Perseus rescued the Ethiopian princess, Andromeda. Andromeda's mother, Cassiopeia, had claimed to be more beautiful than the Nereids (sea nymphs), so Poseidon had punished Ethiopia by flooding it and plaguing it with a sea monster. An oracle informed Andromeda's father, King Cepheus, that the ills would cease if he offered Andromeda to the monster as a sacrificial vicitm, which he did. Perseus, passing by, saw the princess and fell in love with her. He turned the sea monster to stone by showing it Medusa's head and afterward married Andromeda.

Later Perseus gave the Gorgon’s head to Athena, who placed it on her shield, and gave his other accoutrements to Hermes. He accompanied his mother back to her native Argos, where he accidentally struck her father, Acrisius, dead when throwing the discus, thus fulfilling the prophecy that he would kill his grandfather. He consequently left Argos and founded Mycenae as his capital, becoming the ancestor of the Perseids, including Heracles. The Perseus legend was a favourite subject in painting and sculpture, both ancient and Renaissance. The chief characters in the Perseus legend, Perseus, Cepheus, Cassiopeia, Andromeda, and the sea monster (Cetus), all figure in the night sky as constellations.