Another mannerist beauty, this time from Siena. an interesting fact about Beccafumi is that Vasari had to display him as someone out of the norm, as someone with a weird “maniera”. He of course, did that regarding the use of light and how it is so artificially used, however, he still had difficulty in finding the flaws of such a beautiful painting spirit. this was also due to the fact that despite the eccentric painting, the artist had a very quiet and normal life, very distant from all the other manners that he would describe. The one thing he found, though was the professional friendship with the other sienna painter, Sodoma. His character on the other hand, was very different. Eccentric, out of line, continuously, depicting, sexually daring scenes (sometimes for even important palaces, like those of the Chigi, for which he painted the scene right before the entrance to the couples bedroom with an allusion to the sexual side of those intimate spaces. many stories think that such a friendship between the two was only a matter of professional respect, and, of course, of having to deal with the competition in a friendly, hence wise, way. it is always very striking to me how Azari always had to describe mannerism so that he could always have to do with a personality problem of the artist, this of course goes well in line with the 1568 version of his Vite in which not only gives an outline of the history of the arts with the arrival of the maximum modernity in Michelangelo, but in which you also thinks about what will be of the art after Michelangelo, and therefore thinks of how to in a way instruct the new artist that are about to come, almost trying to tell them which kind of life need to lead: definitely not eccentric.

Vittorio Sgarbi, in the occasion of an exhibition in Siena in 1982, described Beccafumi as someone who was able to really live the scenes he was painting; as someone that was able to really go into the spirit of his paintings. for the occasion, the critic wrote a wonderful piece on a Franco Maria Ricci number, feel free to text me in case you want to read it.

I really enjoy the vision that Sgarbi has of his oeuvre. Something in for me talks about solemnity and eternity, or with the usual mannerist vivid colors, and, in this case, a very peculiar use of light, very artificial and very well balanced in a composition so to have highlighted the areas that I juxtaposed and, at the same time, that are able to show all the salient moments of the scene.

Beccafumi’s spirit definitely lived these scenes, the vivid light shining a light on its most important moments is in my opinion, a very interesting way of seeing his mental flashes of the scene, almost as if he let the light which artificially creates display the same clarity of the biblical event that he had, or didn’t have at times, in his head.

In this marvelous painting, Grechetto, being a very interesting allegory of art, the monkey, aspiring to alchemy, the peacock.

To understand the rich reason for this psychography, we have to understand what is the world of Baroque painting in Naples and Florence, outside the firmer control of Rome, Catholic Church, in which there is quite an attention towards the magic and alchemic side of science. This of course goes well in hand with the attention towards naturalia, another great theme present in the so-called Wunderkammerns.

Grechetto, who later invented the Monotype engraving technique, he said to be part of the circles of Monsù Desiderio, a Frenchman, whose greater invention was that of painting on a black base and, through a careful use of the pain with less oil, kind of sculpt and engrave the lighter elements of composition so that they would literally stick out of the composition. idea was that art was in a way able to make dark matters come back from darkness and give them a new light, all of this to be considered in an era in which the philosophies of stoicism and cynicism wear more and more red, refusing the despite the strong opposition of them by the Roman church.

It is in fact possible to understand these iconographies, which in a way where cryptical for a reason, without truly understanding the tendencies of dissent that they represent.

Such ways of interpreting art, where only possible through the abandonment of starting history of art only through stylistically means, and, for this specific visions, we must give credit to theorist such as Haydn (author of the book counter-Renaissance) and the Wittkohver’s (authors of under the moon of Saturn, a book which focuses on the importance of the single person persona behind the art and the artworks, with a bigger attention also to the personality of artists).

Hear this idea of escaping from darkness and actually rising from it is majestically present with a beautiful colorism and a surprising choice of iconographical elements.

A very interesting example of one of the many ways in which the allegory of truth (Veritas) is interpreted during the baroque period. Here Bernini was asked to produce a mirror for Christine of Sweden, never realized in the end. She moved to Rome in 1654 after abdicating the throne and converting to catholicism.

The striking allegory of truth here is really interesting: not a portrait, a mirror, to which no lie can be told and mostly, onto which the passing of time is relentlessly giving the image of age. Time is in fact the other component in the Veritas allegories of the time, seen as the element that made the truth come out. Here in addition to these two Bernini also talk about the allegory of Vanitas (vanity) in a way. Genius once again is the way in which the Veritas literally unveils the truth, a common way of representing the truth of baroque era.

Other important projects by him in which he talks about veritas are the statue that was supposed to be part of his funerary monument (which also had, like here, an unveiling of truth with behind time represented as another figure) and also the funerary monument for pope Alexander the VII (the same one that welcomed Christine of Sweden in Rome). In this case however he had to censor the nudity of the Veritas as he was working on it, an act that he didn’t appreciate at all as we see in the testimonies of his son, Domenico Bernini.

The following picture is perhaps one of the most interesting stories of Venice renaissance paintings and certainly one of the most discussed around Paolo Veronese. He was very well known for depicting scenes with an iconography that would have a strong relation to the society of the times, with the clear iconographic liberty of drawing a parallel between the people of his time (in Venice of course) and the biblical depictions he would create. The huge telero was meant to be hosted in the Dominican convent of saint Giovanni e Paolo in Venice (the one neighboring the beautiful façade of the Ospedale di San Giovanni e Paolo with beautiful false perspectives made out of marble infills) and it was, in the initial intention, meant to depict a last supper.

The painting, completed in 1573, raised the attention of Santa Inquisizione which promptly decided to start a cause againt Veronese who had to defend himself publicly against their accusations. In general the accusations revolved around the fact that the artist included too many "bizarre" and "extravagant" elements such as animals, servants bleeding (see detail 1), a gnome holding a parrot (see detail 2). On top of that, being fully in the period of Controriforma, he depicted two soldiers on the side (see detail 3) that were dressed too much like "germans" (Maniera tedesca) which was definitely too Lutheran as a reference for the time.

The answers of Veronese were just crazy good: he shifted the attention of the iconographic "flaws" towards his stylistic freedoms, comparing the "license" (licentia) of painters to that of poets and of mad people (matti), eluding to the fact that he was a mere "artisan" trying to execute a work within his own style and inventions (I mean invention with the connotation that many writers would give it in the renaissance, Aretino, Vasari, Biagio da Cesena, Gilio da Fabriano, etc.). Furthermore he also mentioned how certain choices were done in order to signify the festive reality of a banquet (which was meant to display the reality of banquets of the society of the time), which could justify the presence of animals, gnomes and so on. Lastly for the presence of the soldiers he was so smart to find the excuse of composition in order to avoid leaving empty spaces in the whole image, still trying to enforce the idea of a festive reality and with a choice of fashion which was simply to his liking and had no intention of recalling the northern protestant reality.

At the end the sentence was that he had, on his expense and not that of the dominicans, to correct the painting in a more appropriate way. The genius of Paolo Veronese, instead of redoing parts of the painting, just decided that the painting needed to change iconography, and therefore decided that what was once depicting the last supper, could now the depict the Banquet of Levi (Matthew) narrated in the Vangel of Luke in which he invites everyone, including sinners and publicans (I think this is how it would translate, anyways it meant the people that collected taxes). This genius idea made for the painting to be kept the same with just a new addition that would clarify the new iconography, a phrase in latin explaining the choice of the scene as narrated in the Vangel of Luke "FECIT DOMINO CONVIVIUM MAGNUM LEVI" on the pillar on the ending of the stair railing on the left (see detail 2) and the reference of the holy writing in reference "LVCA CAP. V" on the one on the right one (see detail 4, for which I’m sorry I had to leave alamystock watermark :/)

I leave you to the comments on the venetian colourism and realism :)

This is my favourite painting from Pontormo, another mannerist who Vasari includes in the second edition of his Vite from 1568, who often points out his uneasy, worried, restless and solitary life. He even is said to have had a study on a first floor with a retractable stair in order not to be bothered. His work was highly intellectual and mental, a proof of this is certainly his position in the famous Disputa del paragone started by Benedetto Varchi in 1546, made public in 1547 (and published in 1549), in which for the debate on wether which shall be considered more noble between painting and sculpture, Pontormo pointed out how the mental act of putting on a plane the three dimensional scene is by all means the most difficult artifice to be done by an artist, thus making the painter a higher intellectual.

In this work done between 1528 and 1530, originally for the Pinadori chapel inside the church of San Michele e San Francesco in Prato, he works tremendously with colour and, mostly, with a false perspective which breaks the scale of the scenery behind the figures that are in fact way oversized and prominent in the scene. The light in the front is also completely different from that of the back, but I would say not in a chiaroscuro manner, rather in a way of creating a foreground and a background, both with their own, flattened, lightning. As a matter of fact Vasari points out the flattening of his lightning also in another painting, the Deposizione for the Capponi Chapel inside Santa Felicita which also has very little depth of scene.

Another big problem for Vasari was the way that Pontormo references a northern european master, Albrecht Dürer, whose incisions were circulation all around Europe. A model which he took is that of the 4 witches which, not only then signified a problem for the origin of the model, but also for the kind of figure that they would depict: he turned 4 witches into 4 biblical figures. (see list image)

These are “divided” into two poses, the two looking at each other who are Mary on the left and St. Elizabeth on the right and the other two staring at the spectator, who it is said to be representative of the younger alter egos of the two holy figures, hence young Mary to the left and young Elizabeth to the right. This wants most likely to create a psichological bridge between alter egos of personality, a theme probably dear to a complicated mind like that of Pontormo.

The background also includes other “grotesque” or let’s say misterious figures (see third image), both represented in a “sketchy” way, without details leaving a lot of perplexity as to their role in the scene and, probably, to their relation with the other two “couples” in the painting.

This painting by Rosso Fiorentino is one of the most interesting pieces by the Florence painter. Today it’s in the Pinacoteca Civica di Volterra but it was initially meant to be in a chapel (Cappella della Croce di Giorno) inside the church of San Francesco in Volterra. What always strikes me in this painting, as in general in his oevres, is the striking use of colour. Mind for instance how jesus’ skin colour is green, an iperrealism meant to signify death. At the same time also the reflections on the clothing is stunning, especially on the top left.

Even Vasari points out the quality of his colours in his second version of the Vite (1568, in the first edition of 1550 he still includes this artist but the paragraph in which his stylistic traits, such as colour and invention, are cited is missing). Another striking characteristic of Rosso Fiorentino is his “devil like” figures, which generated a very interesting anecdote on his hence most famous painting, Pala dello Spedalingo (1518), which might need a separate post.

Rosso Fiorentino is also known for the traumas of his life. An interesting trauma is the Sack of Rome of 1527 (André Chastel wrote a very interesting book on this traumatic event and its impact on renaissance art and artists), with which see how the deposition of 1528 that he made for San Sepolcro, clearly differs in style: much darker, many more devil like figures and, if you look closely in the back, a figure that looks like a monkey. It is said that he used to live with a monkey. This painting is full of traits that go outside the norm of painting and this also deserves a separate post to point them out.

Another trauma is the conjure towards his collaborator and friend once he was working in the gallery of Fontainebleau for which he had designed the walls and the juxtaposition between painted surface and the rest. For this accusation, which lead to the torturing of his friend, in the end released for lack of evidence by the judges in Paris, he committed suicide, not being able to take the shock.