THE UMBRIAN SCHOOL
AT the head of the various local centres of painting which form the school of Umbria we must place Alegretto Nuzi (died 1385), whose works are very rarely met with in museums north of Italy. He inherited the best Giottesque traditions, and became the teacher of Gentile da Fabriano (1360?–1428), an early master whose influence was more far-reaching and inspiring than we can to-day trace in any detail. The Louvre has the good fortune to contain a precious little predella panel of the Presentation in the Temple (No. 1278), which is very decorative and exhibits a strongly marked appreciation of architecture. It is the only separated panel from the predella of Gentile’s large and magnificent altarpiece of the Adoration of the Magi, of 1423, which was seized by Napoleon but was returned in 1815. It is now in the Accademia at Florence.
The Miracle of St. Nicholas giving a Dowry to the Three Daughters of a Nobleman (No. 1659), which is officially classed among the unattributable works of the Florentine school, is now considered to be by Giovanni Francesco da Rimini, while the Madonna and Child (No. 1300a or 1300b) which is officially ascribed to Piero dei Franceschi, the leading painter of his generation in the school of Umbria, must, as we have seen, be given to Alessio Baldovinetti of the Florentine school.
Again, the three-panel picture (No. 1415) which is credited to Pesellino of Florence is in reality from the hand of the Umbrian artist Fiorenzo di Lorenzo (1440–1521). The collection is not rich in the works of the earliest painters of this school, but the Birth of the Virgin (No. 1525), a detached panel from a lost or unidentified altarpiece by Luca Signorelli (1441–1523), gives us some idea of the great power of this influential master, whose knowledge of composition and anatomy is best seen in his frescoes at Orvieto. Signorelli’s sense of complicated movement and crowded action mark an epoch in the art of Umbria. The Fragment of a Large Picture (No. 1527) seems to be imbued with his spirit, but the large Adoration of the Magi (No. 1526) which comes from Città di Castello, and a Madonna and Child with St. Louis of Toulouse, St. Catherine, and other Saints (No. 1528), contain none of the vigorous originality of that master from whom even Michelangelo did not disdain to borrow on occasion. Three predella panels (No. 1120) have been dismembered from a large altarpiece by Niccolò da Foligno, and were originally painted for a side altar in the Church of S. Niccolò at Foligno. In the art of this over-emotional Umbrian, what is meant for deep religious feeling is by exaggeration almost transformed into grimacing passion.