Pietro Vannucci, called Perugino

by George C. Williamson

THE MADONNA AND CHILD WITH PENITENTS, 1497

Both of these pictures have signs of hurried execution, and do not appear to be in all their details the work of the master, and my contention is that they were planned when the Fano ones were in progress and executed partly by pupils under the control of the artist who was himself working close at hand. The 1497 altar-piece at Fano is really a fine picture, and the five predella pictures are remarkably good, perhaps the finest of this style of miniature-like painting that Perugino ever executed. In the predella scene can be noted Perugino's method of representing the "Sposalizio," and the arcade and temple doorway, the arrangement and grouping of the figures, and the open air effect of the whole, and entire absence of crowding will all be noted as characteristics which the Caen picture does not possess. The lunette of this fine altar-piece is the same scene as the artist used in the scattered altar-piece for St. Agostino, and should be compared with the lunette from this altar-piece which now hangs in St. Pietro in Cassinense at Perugia. In the latter the Virgin and the Magdalen are each holding one of the hands of the dead Christ. In the Fano picture these hands hang down loosely and rest on the tomb. In other respects the two pictures are almost identical.

Alinari photo] [Perugia Gallery

THE INTERCESSION OF ST. FRANCIS ON BEHALF OF PERUGIA

The other Fano picture is a very charming "Annunciation." The arched colonnade again appears. The Eternal Father, within a circular mandorla, is above, and below, flying towards the Madonna, is the white dove of the Holy Spirit. In the distance is Fano itself, and in the far distance the sea.

We now come to the two Perugia pictures. The one which is known to have been painted in 1497 for the altar of the noble confraternity of "San Pietro Martire," represents the Madonna seated upon a throne or tomb, crowned, and holding the Christ on her knee. Above in the air are two angels kneeling in adoration, while on the ground around and partially behind the Queen of Heaven, are two groups of white-robed penitents. There is a study for this picture in the Uffizi.

It ought to be quite easy to discover the exact date of the other picture. It was painted for the noble confraternity "della Giustizia," who deposited it in the gallery, and it evidently alludes to the union of the original confraternity of San Andrea della Giustizia, with a smaller but similar body dedicated to San Bernardino and connected with the church of San Francesco. San Bernandino of Siena is one of the two saints who are kneeling in the foreground, and is distinguished by the tablet bearing the I.H.S. surrounded by rays of light which floats in the air close to him. He lived at the convent of San Francesco al Prato, and close to the convent now stands the oratory dedicated in 1461 to his memory, the front of which is decorated with Agostino Ducci's wonderful marble and terra-cotta façade. The confraternity for whom the picture was painted, specially honoured the memory of San Bernardino, and therefore had a peculiar devotion toward his patron saint, St. Francis of Assisi. St. Francis, in the picture in question, kneels opposite to San Bernardino. In the background is a large group of kneeling people headed by the Priori in their furred gowns, and near at hand are women and penitents, all intent upon the same petition. Still more remote is a representation of the city, differing in many respects from the view of Perugia given in the St. Agostino altar-piece painted in 1521, and resembling much more closely the town of San Gemignano as it now appears.

One would have naturally expected that this picture would have been named by Mariotti, or that documents in Orsini or in the Perugian archives would have mentioned it. My chief reason for giving it to 1498 is that in that year there was an outbreak of plague in the city which the records inform us suddenly ceased in response to great supplication, and it is possible that this picture was painted for the confraternity in commemoration of this answer to prayer. There are perhaps only two other instances in which St. Francis is represented, but the reason already stated may well account for his presence in this picture.