Geronimo Savoldo, sprung of a noble family in Brescia, flourished also about 1540, and is ranked by Paolo Pino among the best artists of his age. I know not where he acquired the rudiments of his art; but from a specimen which I saw at Brescia, he must have possessed great accuracy and delicacy of hand. Upon transferring his residence to Venice, he is known to have become one of the most formidable of Titian's rivals; not, indeed, in works of a large scale, but in smaller pieces conducted with an exquisite degree of care, which may, in a manner, be said to have been his chief characteristic. With such as these he beguiled his time, presenting them gratuitously as ornaments for churches. He produced others for private persons, now extremely rare and valuable, in different collections.
Zanetti, in his description of his little Presepio, (Christ in the manger), recently retouched, which is to be seen at San Giobbe, observes that the tint of his pictures is truly beautiful, and the whole composition conducted with a singular degree of care. In Venice, says Ridolfi, he is known by the name of Girolamo Bresciano, neither Romanino nor Muziano having employed themselves there, with whom he might possibly have been confounded. There he resided for many years, and terminated his days at the same place. His happiest production, though unknown to the historian, was placed in the Altar-Maggiore, of the Padri Predicatori, at Pesaro, a noble piece, which produces a striking impression upon the eye. Our Lord is seen placed on high, seated upon a cloud, which appears truly illuminated by the sun, and on the foreground are represented four saints, drawn with a force of colouring that seems to bring them as near to the eye, as the soft colour of the perspective and of the upper part of the picture throws its objects into the distance. A small, but beautiful piece, in excellent preservation, is also seen in the Royal Gallery of Florence, exhibiting the Transfiguration of our Lord, placed there along with specimens of other Venetian artists, by the Cavalier Puccini, one who has conferred so many obligations upon that princely collection of art.
Finally, after Savoldo, may be placed, among the Brescian disciples of Titian, Pietro Rosa, son of Cristoforo, and nephew to Stefano Rosa, both excellent artists in oil. He was one of those pupils whom Titian, induced by the friendship he bore his father, instructed with most care, and the best success. Hence it is, we trace that clear and true force of colouring, which shines in every one of his pieces. Brescia boasts several, at the church of San Francesco, in the Dome, and at the Grazie, where such as have the fewest figures produce the happiest effect. In his composition he is not so perfect as in other parts, whether it were that he had not naturally the best talent for it, or, as is more probable, that it is a branch of the art most difficult to young practitioners. For he died in the outset of his career, at the same period as his father, in 1576, whether from the plague or from poison is not known.
Although Bergamo, at that period, boasted many distinguished imitators of Giorgione, it yet produced an artist, Girolamo Colleoni, who ought to be included in the present list. Some frescos from his hand are found at Bergamo, and an oil painting in the Carrara Gallery. It exhibits the marriage of S. Catherine, which the best judges, on a first view, pronounced to be the work of Titian, till the superscription, with the name of Hieronymus Colleo, 1555, vindicated it for his own. This distinguished artist, conscious of his merit, and not finding himself appreciated in his own country, foreign and inferior painters being preferred before him, sought better fortune at the court of Madrid. But before setting out, he painted upon a façade the figure of a horse, of which great encomiums, in different works, are all that remain; and to this he affixed as a motto, Nemo propheta in patriâ. He is known to have employed, as an assistant, Filippo Zanchi, who, together with a brother of the name of Francesco, has more recently been brought into view by Count Tassi, besides some others who might here add to the number, but not to the eminence, of so rich a school. An artist celebrated also by Ridolfi, ought not, in this place, to be omitted; the beauty of his tints, the design of his infant figures, and the nature of his landscape, all shewing that he aspired to the Titian manner. He painted in fresco, but possessed an universal genius, as has been pronounced by Muzio, in his "Teatro di Bergamo;" the truth of which more clearly appears from his own works. His name was Giovan-Batista Averara, and he died young about the middle of the most flourishing period of the art. Another artist deserving commemoration is Francesco Terzi, who long resided at the Austrian court, and is distinguished in most of the capitals of Italy for works he has there left. He has been mentioned by Lomazzo, in whose native place are still seen, at San Sempliciano, two noble histories, representing our Lord with his Apostles, somewhat dry in point of design, but bold in colouring.
In Gio. da Monte, Crema boasted a disciple of Titian, as he is described by Torre, who numbers him among the more distinguished artists who ornamented Milan. A grado, executed by him in chiaroscuro for an altar of Santa Maria, at San Celso, where he ought also to have painted the altarpiece, obtained for him a high reputation; but he was deprived of the altarpiece, owing to the intrigues of Antonio Campi.[[62]] The work of Campi still remains there, and the opinion is that though it was paid for at a higher rate than the grado itself, it is yet a work of inferior merit to that of Giovanni, which much resembles Polidoro da Caravaggio, giving rise to a suspicion that Aurelio Buso, of Cremona, a scholar and assistant of Polidoro's, in Rome, may have been the only, or at least the earliest master of Giovanni. We know from Ridolfi that Buso produced various histories, in his native place, in the manner of his master, and historians of Genoese art record other works from his hand in their city. They assert that he departed thence unexpectedly, while Ridolfi concludes his life, by saying, that notwithstanding his worth, he died in poverty. From the period in which he flourished, he might possibly have been the master of Gio. da Monte, no less than Titian.
Callisto Piazza is likewise announced, by Orlandi, as another imitator of the latter, which is very evident from his picture of the Assumption, in the collegiate church of Codogno. It contains figures of apostles, and two portraits of the Marchesi Trivulzi, not unworthy of any of Titian's disciples. And for such, indeed, was Callisto esteemed, both elsewhere and in Lodi, possessing, in the church of the Incoronata, three chapels, each ornamented with four of his very beautiful histories. One of these contains the mysteries of the Passion, another the acts of S. John the Baptist, and the third displays histories in the life of the Virgin. A report is current there, that Titian, in passing through Lodi, produced several heads, probably only a story originating in the exceeding beauty that may be observed in some. It appears, however, certain, that he also imitated Giorgione, in whose style he conducted his altarpiece, representing the Virgin between various saints, at San Francesco, in Brescia, esteemed one of the most beautiful in the whole city. He produced others for Brescia, for Crema, for the dome of Alessandria, and for Lodi, though in this last he succeeded better in fresco than in oil. From the circumstance of his residing in so many different places, I shall not refer him to the school of Milan, preferring to place him here, no less because of the vicinity of Crema to Lodi, than from his belonging to the list of the imitators of Titian.[[63]] Little justice has been done to the memory of such a man by Ridolfi, who commends him for nothing besides his colouring in fresco, and water colours; when, in fact, he boasts very noble design, and forms tolerably select, more particularly in the Assumption already mentioned. Moreover, he calls him Callisto da Lodi Bresciano, as if da Lodi were a family name; although in signing his own name, he gave it Callixtus de Platea, at the Incoronata, and elsewhere desirous of marking his country, Callixtus Laudensis. Ridolfi, too, says little or nothing of the period in which he flourished. Padre Orlandi found, affixed to one of his pictures, at Brescia, the date of 1524. I may add, that in Lodi he gave the years 1527 and 1530; and that, in the Nuptials of Cana, in the refectory of the Padri Cisterciensi, at Milan, he marked 1545. It is truly a surprising production, no less for its boldness of hand than for the number of its figures, although the whole of them are not equally well studied, and a few, among others that seem to breathe and live, are really careless and incorrect.[[64]] He painted in the same city, within a courtyard, the choir of the muses, including the portraits of the president Sacco, the master of the house, and of his wife; respecting which, writes Lomazzo, I may, without fear of temerity, observe, that it is impossible to produce any thing more perfectly graceful and pleasing, more beautiful in point of colouring, among works in fresco. (Trat. p. 598.)
We next arrive at the name of Jacopo Robusti, the son of a Venetian dyer, and for this reason surnamed Tintoret. He was pupil to Titian, who, jealous of his talents, soon banished him from his studio. He did not aspire, like the preceding artists, to the name of Titian's follower; for he burned with ambition to become the head of a new school which should carry his manner to perfection, adding to it all that was yet wanting; a vast idea, the offspring of a grand and fervid genius, and as bold as it was great, not even banishment from his master's school being able to damp his ardour. Constrained by circumstances to confine himself to an incommodious apartment, he ennobled it with specimens of his early studies. Over the door of it he wrote, "Michelangiolo's design, and the colouring of Titian;" and as he was an indefatigable imitator of the latter, so he was equally studious, both night and day, in copying the models, taken from the statues in Florence, belonging to the former. To these he added many more of bassi relievi, and of ancient statues. In a catalogue of ancient pieces of sculpture, cited by Morelli, and belonging to the year 1695, is recorded a head of Vitellius, upon which "Tintoretto was always employed in designing and learning," (note, p. 152). He was frequently in the habit of designing his models by lamplight, the better to obtain strong shades, and thus acquire skill in the use of a bold chiaroscuro. With the same view he wrought models in wax and chalk, and having clothed them carefully, he adapted them to little houses, composed of pasteboard, and slips of wood, supplying them through the windows with small lights, by which he might thus regulate his own lights and shades. The models themselves he suspended from the ceiling by cords, placing them in a variety of positions, and designing them from different points of view, the better to acquire a mastery of the sotto in sù, or foreshortening on the ceiling, a science not so familiar to his school as to that of Lombardy. Nor did he neglect the study of anatomy, to obtain a thorough knowledge of the muscles, and the structure of the human frame. He designed also the naked parts, as much as possible, in various shortenings and attitudes, in order to render his compositions as diversified as nature herself. By such studies he prepared himself to introduce the true method to be pursued by his followers, beginning with designing from the best models, and having obtained the idea of a correct style, proceeding to copy the naked parts, and to correct their defects.[[65]] To such aids he united a genius which extorted the admiration of Vasari, one of his severest critics, who pronounced it the most terrible of which the art could boast—an imagination fertile in new ideas, and a pictorial fire which inspired him with vigour to conceive well the boldest character of the passions, and continued to support him until he had given full expression to them on his canvass.
Yet to what did it amount?—what is the noblest genius, and all the rarest qualities meeting in a single artist, without diligence, a virtue which of itself, says Cicero, seems to include all the rest. Tintoretto possessed it for a period, and produced works in which the most captious of critics could not find a shade of defect. Of such kind is that Miracle of the Slave, adorning the college of St. Mark, a piece he executed in his thirty-sixth year, and which is held up as one of the wonders of Venetian art. The colours are Titian's; the chiaroscuro extremely strong; the composition correct and sober; select forms; studied draperies; while equally varied, appropriate, and animated beyond conception, are the attitudes of the men assisting at the spectacle, in particular of the saint who flies to succour, giving an idea of the swiftness of an aërial being. There, too, he painted other beautiful pieces, whose merit extorted from the lips of Pietro da Cortona these words: "Did I reside in Venice, not a festival should pass without still resorting to this spot, in order to feast my eyes with such objects, and above all, with the design!" His picture of the Crucifixion at the college of San Rocco, is also esteemed a work of singular merit; displaying as it does, so much novelty upon so hackneyed a subject. Nor are other examples of his sovereign power wanting in the same place, filled with pictures as various as new; but, for brevity's sake, I shall merely record, in the third place, his Supper of our Lord, now at the Salute, having been removed from the refectory of the Crociferi, for which it was drawn. Those who have beheld it in its place, write of it as a miracle in the art, inasmuch as the construction of the place was so well repeated in the picture, and imitated with so much knowledge of perspective, as to make the apartment appear double its real size. Nor are these three works to which he affixed his name, as his favourite productions, the only ones worthy of his genius, Zanetti having enumerated many more, conducted with the most finished care; the whole exhibited to the Venetian public, without including those dispersed throughout the different cities of Europe.
But diligence is rarely found long united to a rage for achieving much; the true source in this instance, as in numerous others, of false, or at least of inferior composition. Hence, Annibale Caracci observed, that in many pieces Tintoretto was inferior to Tintoretto; while Paul Veronese, so ardent an admirer of his talents, was in the habit of reproaching him with doing injustice to the professors of the art, by painting in every manner, a plan that went far to destroy the reputation of the profession (Ridolfi). Similar exceptions will be found to apply to such of his works as, conceived at a heat, executed by habit, and in great part left imperfect, betray certain errors both in point of judgment and design. Sometimes there appears a crowd of superfluous or badly grouped figures, and most generally all in the most energetic actions, without any spectators regarding them in quiet, as was practised by Titian and all the best composers. Neither in these figures are we to look for that senatorial dignity, which Reynolds discovers in Titian.
Tintoretto aimed rather at liveliness than at grace, and from the studied observation of the people of his native state, perhaps the most spirited in Italy, he drew models for his heads, as well as his attitudes, sometimes applying them to the most important subjects. In a few specimens of his Suppers, the Apostles might occasionally be taken for gondoliers, just when their arm is raised, ready to strike the oar, and with an air of native fierceness they raise the head either to look out, to ridicule, or to dispute. He likewise varied Titian's method of colouring, making use of primary grounds no longer white, and composed of chalk, but shaded; owing to which his Venetian pictures have felt the effects of time more than the rest. Neither were the choice, nor the general tone of his colouring the same as Titian's; the blue, or the ash coloured, being that which predominates; one which assists the effect of the chiaroscuro, as much as it diminishes the amenity of the whole. In his fleshes there appears a certain vinous colour, and more particularly in his portraits. The proportions of his bodies are also different; he does not affect the fulness of Titian; he aims more at lively action than the latter, and sometimes attenuates his figures too much. The least correct portion of his pictures is the drapery; few of them being free from those long and straight folds, or flying abroad, or in some other way too common and obvious. It would be useless to insist upon his want of judgment, or rather his pictorial extravagances, Vasari having already said too much of them, upon the subject of his Universal Judgment, at Santa Maria dell'Orto.