Venice and its Story Part 9

They were reinforcements for Tunis, where the last of the great Venetians, Angelo Emo, was fighting the Algerian pirates. Emo humbled the Bey of Tunis, cleared the seas, and died at Malta in 1792. Five years later Napoleon marched his battalions towards the lagoons and before the mere breath of his coming the Republic of Venice crumbled into dust. On May 16, 1797, for the first time in a thousand years the Realtine islands were trodden by the foot of a conqueror, and the hundred and twentieth Doge of Venice, handing his biretta to an attendant, said: "Take it away, we shall not want it again."

CHAPTER XII

THE FINE ARTS AT VENICE

_Masons--Painters--Gla.s.s-workers--Printers_

Some prefer the pure design: Give me my gorge of colour, glut of gold In a glory round the Virgin made for me!

t.i.tian's the man, not monk Angelico Who traces you some timid chalky ghost That turns the church into a charnel.

--_Browning._

Owing to the absorption of her energies in commerce and the eastern trend of her interests and activities Venice lagged behind the Tuscan masters in the practice of the finer arts. Her earliest craftsmen were Byzantines, and St Mark's was modelled on the Church of the Holy Apostles at Constantinople and adorned by mosaicists from the same city.

They were artists, rich in invention, and endowed with a perfect sense of beauty in design. The reliefs imbedded in the facades of St Mark's and in scores of houses about the city of Venice bear ample testimony to their greatness. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries Byzantine art had become degenerate, and traces of native Venetian sculpture as early as the twelfth century have been argued from the rude carvings on the pillars which support the tabernacle of the high altar of St Mark's.

But it is not till we reach the masters of the characteristic Gothic, Transitional, and early Renaissance styles, that the important place due to Venice in the history of the mason's craft is made clear. It is doubtful whether any of the Pisani actually worked at Venice, though their influence is beyond dispute. But Nicolo Lamberti, a Tuscan sculptor, worked on the decorations of the main archivolt of St Mark's, Florentine artists carved some of the best figures and capitals in the facades of the Ducal Palace, and wrought one of the finest tombs in S.

Zanipolo; Michelozzo is said to have built the Medici library at the monastery of St Giorgio Maggiore; and the design so often met with in monumental sculpture in Venice, two angels, one at either end of the tomb drawing aside a curtain to display the rec.u.mbent effigy of the dead was invented by a Florentine, Arnolfo di Cambio. Of the earliest Venetian masters it may be truly said that their works live after them, for little beyond their works is known of the Ma.s.segne and the Buoni who reached a comparatively higher stage of excellence in sculpture than their contemporaries did in painting. Jacobello and Piero delle Ma.s.segne (_dei Macigni_[62]), thus called because of their craft, were working in Venice towards the close of the fourteenth century. The statues of the apostles, the Virgin, and St Mark over the choir-screen, and others in the choir chapels of St Mark's, the main portal of S. Stefano, the beautiful lunette over the Friar's door at the Frari, and the tomb of Simone Dandolo in the same church are excellent examples of the style of these great artists. How much of the sculpture on the facades of the Ducal Palace was due to the Buoni it is difficult to say. The Buoni seem to have been Giovanni, the father, his son, Bartolomeo, and a certain Pantaleone Buon, once believed to be another son, but actually of no kinship with him. To Bartolomeo, sometimes known as Bartolomeo della Madonna dell'Orto, is ascribed the Porta della Carta of the Ducal Palace (1439) on the strength of an inscription _opera Bartholomei_. The reliefs of the Lion and of Doge Foscari are modern reproductions, but the original head of Foscari, preserved in the palace still, bears witness to the genius of this great craftsman.[63] He must not be confounded with another Bartolomeo Buon, known as Master Bartolomeo of Bergamo, also claimed as a native of Venice, who in 1493 superintended the painters in the Ducal Palace, and in 1500 presided over the works designed by Pietro Lombardo for the Procuratie Vecchie.

Certain craftsmen dubbed Riccio or Rizzo (Curly pate) now claim attention. Their ident.i.ty is much canva.s.sed by Italian authorities.

Before the use of surnames became common it was the custom to refer to contemporaries by their Christian or nicknames to the confusion of biographers and critics. We meet with three Ricci who are stated to have worked at Venice, (1) Andrea Riccio of Padua living about 1400, who is said by Vasari to have executed the statues of Adam and Eve to be referred to presently. (2) Antonio Riccio or Rizzo, sometimes called Briosco, of Verona, who, according to Zanotto[64] was employed by the Republic to a.s.sist Antonio Loredan at the siege of Scutari.[65] He returned, after most effective service, covered with wounds, and the grateful Senate voted him and his sons in 1483 a pension for twenty years, and appointed him architect of the Ducal Palace after the fire in the same year, authorising him to draw for funds on the salt office. To him, and not to Andrea, are ascribed by Zanotto the masterly statues of Adam and Eve in the niches opposite the Scala dei Giganti, the Scala itself and the adjoining facade in the cortile and the rio facade. These on Francesco Sansovino's authority are more commonly attributed to Antonio Bregno (also called Il Riccio or Rizzo). He is said to have been a contemporary of Scarpagnino (Antonio Scarpagni), who, in 1514, submitted designs for the new stone Rialto Bridge, and succeeded Sante Lombardo in the erection of the Scuola di S. Rocco. Bregno, however, is a mysterious figure who, so Zanotto declares, either never existed or was none other than Riccio the Veronese. It is clear, however, from the annals of Malipiero that in 1498, one Antonio Riccio or Rizzo, architect of the Ducal Palace, after spending 80,000 ducats left the work not half done, that he had by forged vouchers defrauded the Salt Office to the extent of 12,000 ducats, and bolted to Foligno, where he soon died.[66]

To the family of Venetian masters (or, according to some authorities, Lombard immigrants from Carona on Lake Lugano), known as the Lombardi, are due the most beautiful and original of the early renaissance architecture and sculpture in Venice. Pietro Lombardo, said to have been the son of a mason named Martino, was working in Venice in 1462. In 1481 his design for the Church of the Miracoli was chosen, and the building was erected under his superintendence. When Ant. Riccio fled from Venice, Pietro succeeded him at the Ducal Palace, with a salary of 120 ducats, and for twelve years was the official architect of the Republic.

Among his works in Venice are the fine statues of St Anthony and three other saints in S. Stefano. The altars of St James and St Paul in St Mark's are also attributed to him. He is probably best known as the sculptor of the Dante Memorial at Ravenna. Antonio Lombardi, born before 1453, a.s.sisted his father at the Miracoli and on the tomb of Doge Pietro Mocenigo at S. Zanipolo. He collaborated with Aless. Leopardi on the bronze work in the Cappella Zen at St Mark's. The statue of St Thomas Aquinas in S. Zanipolo is attributed to him. Martino Lombardo, whose relationship is unknown, was architect of the Scuola di San Marco after 1485, and was believed by Temanza to have built S. Zaccaria.[67] Moro Lombardo, probably a son of Martino, a.s.sisted his father in the Scuola di S. Marco. In 1524-7, Giulio Lombardo, probably son of Pietro, was acting in an advisory capacity to Sante or Zante Lombardo, a son of Pietro, born 1504, in the works at the Scuola di S. Rocco. The Church of S. Giorgio dei Greci ascribed to Sansovino is now attributed to Sante and one named Chiona.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PONTE DI RIALTO, FROM THE MARKET.]

Tullio Lombardi (1453-1537) was the son of Pietro, and the best sculptor of the family. Beside his work in the interior of the Miracoli, he executed the reliefs on the facade of the Scuola di S. Marco and the monument to Giov. Mocenigo in S. Zanipolo. He also collaborated with Leopardi on the Vendramin tomb in the same church. To the Lombardi school we owe the beautiful Cappella Giustiniano at S. Francesco della Vigna, and a fine relief in S. Giov. Grisostomo (Coronation of the Virgin and the Twelve Apostles).

Aless. Leopardi (1450-1521) raised Venetian sculpture to its highest plane of technical perfection. The Venetian artist was peculiarly privileged. Unlike the Pisani and other Tuscans who drew their inspiration from Roman antiques, he was able to draw from the fountain-head. The lands of h.e.l.las were subject to the Republic, and, doubtless, many a young apprentice spent his _Wanderjahre_ there.

Enthusiasm gave insight, and both in technique and design we seem to trace in Tullio Lombardo and Aless. Leopardi the influence of Greek originals. To Leopardi are due the Vendramin tomb in S. Zanipolo, the finest of renaissance sepulchral monuments, and the completion of the Colleoni statue. He modelled the Six Virtues and the Madonna Della Scarpa in the Cappella Zen. The three magnificent bronze bases for the flagstaffs in front of St Mark's were wrought by him. But soon aversion from the study of nature, and the growing pomp of private and public life reacted on the renaissance artists; their work became mannered and feeble; they lost individuality and character. They found in Venice a rich field for exploitation. She was not only the wealthiest, she was the most tranquil of European states. Imperial in policy, oligarchical in government, she sought by the splendour of the arts and by magnificent pageantry to feed the pride of her n.o.bles, and lay any spirit of political freedom that might have survived in her people.

A giant among the sixteenth century masters who were attracted to Venice was Jacopo Tatti (1477-1570) of Florence, the bosom friend and colleague of Andrea del Sarto, known as Sansovino, from his intimate a.s.sociation with his master, Andrea Contucci, of Monte Sansovino. Jacopo, while sketching from the antique at Rome, attracted the notice of Bramante, who was charmed by a wax model of the Laoc.o.o.n executed by the young student, and judged by Raphael to be the best of four others. It was cast in bronze, and subsequently found its way to the Signory of Venice.

In 1527, after the sack of Rome, he came to Venice, and was employed by Doge Gritti to strengthen the domes of St Mark's. He did his work so amazingly well (_fece stupire Venezia_, says Vasari) that he was appointed in 1529 chief architect, with a house and a salary of 80 ducats, afterwards increased to 180. In 1536 the Senate decreed the erection of a library to contain the books left to the Republic by Petrarch and Cardinal Ba.s.sarione. Sansovino was charged with the building, now known as the _Libreria Vecchia_, and esteemed by Palladio to be probably the richest and most ornate edifice erected since the time of the ancients. The Signory were royal pay-masters, but intolerant of bad work; and when, on December 18, 1545, part of the vaulting fell, Sansovino was imprisoned, fined a thousand crowns, and deprived of his office. He succeeded, however, in proving his innocence, and was released and compensated by a solatium of 900 crowns, and restored to his former position. Sansovino's work, however, ends at the sixteenth arch from the Campanile corner. Twelve years after his death it was finished by Scamozzi. He was a most lovable artist, ever ready with help and counsel to those who entreated him; the friend of every great man of his time; in youth a most winning personality; in age venerable and alert. At ninety-three, if we may trust Vasari, his eyes were undimmed, and he bore himself erect as ever. Among other works by him at Venice may be specified the beautiful loggia destroyed by the collapse of the Campanile, in July 1902, and the bronze doors leading to the sacristy, St Mark's, on which he is said to have worked during a period of twenty years; the six bronze reliefs in the choir of the same church; the colossal statues of Mars and Neptune at the top of the giants'

staircase, and the Scala d'Oro in the Ducal Palace, and many mansions and churches, the choicest of which, S. Geminiano, no longer exists.

Of all his followers, Girolamo Campagna is the most talented. Good examples of his works are the bronze statues of St Mark and St Francis in the Redentore, the small statues of St Francis and St Clare in the Miracoli, and the reclining figure of Doge Cicogna (1595) in the Gesuiti. Aless. Vittoria of Trent (1525-1603) was a facile artist. Among his works are the statue of St Sebastian in S. Salvatore, the fine bust of Cardinal Gasparo in the Madonna dell' Orto, the ruined chapel of the Rosary in S. Zanipolo, and his own tomb in S. Zaccaria. Michele Sammichele (1484-1559), the great Veronese master and famous military engineer, was employed by the Republic between 1530 and 1550, and designed the great fortifications in the mainland provinces, on the Dalmatian coast, at Corfu, Cyprus and Romania, many of which remain to this day. On his return to Venice, he constructed the magnificent fortress of S. Andrea del Lido, a stupendous work, now threatened with ruin, owing to erosion by currents set up by the new d.y.k.es near the Lido. The Palazzo Grimani on the Grand Ca.n.a.l, the Ponte del Bucintoro at the a.r.s.enal are by this master, whose architecture so dominates Verona.

He was an earnest, G.o.d-fearing man, of grave, subdued, yet cheerful disposition, generous and tender-hearted.

The once famous, but now depreciated, Andrea Palladio of Vicenza (1518-80), came to Venice about 1550, where he designed, among other edifices, the n.o.ble cloister of the Carita; the refectory, cloister and church[68] of S. Giorgio Maggiore (1556-79); and the Redentore, the greatest of his ecclesiastical buildings (1578-80). The interiors of Palladio's churches, by their austere beauty, their symmetry and proportion, are among the greatest achievements of the later Renaissance. He had an extraordinary vogue in Venice, and designed many patrician villas on the mainland.

Vicenzo Scamozzi of Vicenza (1552-1616) was attracted to Venice by the fame of Sansovino and Palladio, under whom he studied; like his masters he spent much time at Rome. On returning to Venice he was employed to complete the Libreria Vecchia in 1582, and two years later carried on the Procuratie Nuove, spoiling Sansovino's beautiful design by adding a storey. The _porta dell' anticollegio_ and other works on the Ducal Palace are by him. He, too, was in much demand as a designer of palaces in Venice and on the mainland.

Greatest of the seventeenth-century masters, and one who laid the most monstrous burdens of stone on the patient Venetian soil, was Balda.s.sari Longhena (1600-82), a native of Venice and pupil of Scamozzi. He helped to complete the Procuratie Nuove in 1638, and in 1640 was appointed the official architect of the Republic. The foundation-stone of his most famous work, S. Maria della Salute, was laid in 1631. The church was still unfinished in 1660. The curious will find the design of this edifice to have been suggested by the section and ground-plan of a temple described by Poliphilus and ill.u.s.trated in the Hypnerotomachia[69]--that treasure-house of design so often looted by Renaissance and modern artists. Two ma.s.sive edifices on the Grand Ca.n.a.l, the Pesaro and Rezzonico Palaces (1650); the high altars of S.

Francesca della Vigna and S. Pietro di Castello; the interior of the Scalzi, "that pandemonium of details surpa.s.sed only by the greater delirium of Pozzo's high altar," were all designed by this master, whose heavy hand may also be seen in the masonry erected to Doge Pesaro in the Frari.

[Ill.u.s.tration: IN THE PROCURATIE NUOVE.]

More completely than her masons were Venetian painters dominated by rigid Byzantine formalism. It seems barely credible that Jacobello del Fiore, who for twenty-one years was head of the painters' guild in Venice, and Michele Giambono should have been the contemporaries of Masaccio and Fra Angelico. The emanc.i.p.ation of Venetian painting from the numbing tradition of the East did not begin until the employment of the Umbrian masters, Gentile da Fabriano and Vittore Pisano, to decorate the Ducal Palace in 1419, and the rise of the Vivarini in Murano in 1440-1500. The marked German character of the earliest work of the Vivarini is due to the a.s.sociation of Antonio Vivarini with Giovanni Alemano (John the German), who was trained in the Cologne school, and by some authorities is believed to be a Vivarini. Later, Antonio collaborated with his younger brother, Bartolomeo. Then the brothers separated, and each worked alone. Bartolomeo, by far the greater personality, was much influenced by Mantegna and the Paduan school, and under him Venetian painting takes a big step towards naturalism. The sacred altar-picture becomes less conventional, the figures are less cramped, the colours brighten, the decoration is richer. When Antonello da Messina, about 1473, brought the perfected Flemish method of painting in oils to Venice, Bartolomeo was not slow to adopt the new medium.

Alvise Vivarini, his younger kinsman, made further use of Antonello's innovation, and touched, moreover, by the spirit of the Bellini, the young painter, whose works cover the period between 1464-1502, begins to foreshadow the future glories of Venetian painting. The earnest, severe, almost harsh features become softened, a strange grace and gentleness comes like a breath of springtime and promise over the whole field of Venetian art.

Besides several paintings by the Vivarini in the Accademia there are in Venice fine examples of Bartolomeo's work, the St Augustine, in S.

Zanipolo; a Coronation of the Virgin by Giovanni Alemano and Antonio Vivarini, with marked German traits, in S. Pantaleone; three altar-pieces by the same two painters in S. Zaccaria; an early work (1473) in three compartments by Bartolomeo, the Meeting of Joachim and Anna, the Birth of the Virgin, and Mary as the Mater Misericordiae in S.

Maria Formosa; a Virgin between St Andrew and St John (1478), in S.

Giovanni in Bragora, where are also two works by Alvise, one, the Resurrection, a masterpiece. In the Frari are two altar-pieces by Bartolomeo (1474 and 1478), and a fine example of Alvise's work, St Ambrose Enthroned, finished after his death in 1502 by his pupil Basaiti. The beautiful Virgin and Child with two angels in the Redentore, formerly attributed to Giovanni Bellini, is now generally given to Alvise. The striking and n.o.ble figure of St Clare (No. 393) in the Accademia is by this master, to whom modern criticism a.s.signs a very high place[70] in the history of Venetian painting. Many portraits formerly ascribed to Antonello da Messina are now recognised as Alvise's work.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Alinari, Florence_

PALAZZO LAYARD--PORTRAIT OF SULTAN MAHOMET II

BY GENTILE BELLINI]

But it is to the paintings of Gentile, and Giovanni, sons of Jacopo Bellini, that the traveller will turn again and again with increasing admiration and reverence. In 1421 Jacopo, who had worked under the Umbrian masters in the Ducal Palace, went with Gentile da Fabriano to Florence, and there for several years was his pupil in the very centre of the renaissance of art. In 1430 he set up a workshop in Venice, and about 1450, having moved with his two sons to Padua, came under the powerful influence of Mantegna, who married his daughter Nicolosa.

Venice possesses but two examples of his work, No. 582 in the Accademia and a Crucifixion in Room XV. of the Correr Museum. Only from the master's sketches in the British Museum and in the Louvre can an adequate conception of his genius be obtained. Gentile, the elder of the sons, whose name was given him in memory of Jacopo's beloved master Gentile da Fabriano, was born in 1429, Giovanni about 1430. Vasari tells of the affectionate rivalry of the artist family; the father's joy as the growing excellence of his sons already eclipsed his own fame; the sons, after separating each to his own workshop, holding one another, and both, the father, in great reverence, each praising his brother's work and depreciating his own, seeking modestly to excel in kindness and courtesy as well as in the practice of his art. In 1464 Gentile painted the shutters of the organ in St Mark's with the figures of Saints Mark, Jerome, Theodore and Francis. They still exist, but almost ruined, in the Office of Works. No. 570 in the Accademia, a faded painting, the Apotheosis of the Patriarch S. Lorenzo, is an early work, refined and dignified. In 1479 the Doge, being asked by Sultan Mahomet II. to recommend a good painter of portraits from Venice, sent Gentile and two a.s.sistants to Constantinople and appointed Giovanni to continue his brother's work in the Ducal Palace. His remarkable portrait of the Sultan is now in the Layard Collection in Venice. Gentile returned, after a comparatively short stay, loaded with presents and honours, to rejoin his brother at the Ducal Palace. In 1487 t.i.tian is said to have entered his workshop as an apprentice. Later, the master painted for the guild of St John the Evangelist the three scenes ill.u.s.trating the miracles of the Holy Cross, now in the Accademia. Towards the end of his life he began the Preaching of St Mark, now in the Brera at Milan, and, falling sick, left his sketch-book to his brother on condition that he completed the picture. Gentile was a good draughtsman, a brilliant colourist, an alert observer, boldly making use of his Eastern experiences to add local colour to his subjects. His compositions, however, are rather crowded and wanting in central emphasis; his treatment is flat and hard. His death, February 23, 1507, is noted by Sanudo.

Giovanni, his more gifted brother, is the tenderest and n.o.blest of Venetian painters. He gave more attention to individual figures than Gentile, uniting grace and firmness of outline with warmth and splendour of colouring; dignity and strength with variety and beauty of form. His creations, once seen, haunt us like memories of beloved friends. In early life Giovanni was much dominated by the personality of his brother-in-law Mantegna, to whom some of his works[71] have been attributed. A good example painted in _tempera_ of his early Madonnas may be seen (No. 583) in the Accademia. An apocryphal story is told of the artist going to Antonello to have his portrait painted in order to learn the secret of painting in oils. But the new method must have been too well known to have made the trick necessary. Venice possesses several altar-pieces by Giovanni, besides the collection in the Accademia, now conveniently placed in Room XVIII. The altar-piece in the Frari and that in S. Zaccaria are the finest examples of the master's art in Europe, painted in the maturity of his genius--1488 and 1505.

They are held by Ruskin to be the two finest pictures in the world. In S. Pietro Martire at Murano is another of the same period. In 1474, says the annalist Malipiero, Zuano and Zentil Bellini, brothers, were employed at the Ducal Palace to restore the pictures of the meeting of Pope Alexander and the Emperor Barbarossa, which had fallen from the walls because of damp and old age. The brothers promised that their work should last two hundred years. They reckoned without the demon of fire, for a hundred years later it was devoured by the conflagration of 1577.

An altar-piece in S. Giovanni Grisostomo, painted when Giovanni was eighty-seven years of age, proves that the old craftsman was ever a learner. Albert Durer, when in Venice, was profoundly impressed by the veteran painter and wrote that although very old, he was still the best in his art. He died in 1516, full of years and rich in fame. Durer was well treated at Venice. The Doge and the Patriarch came to see his paintings. Bellini praised him highly and offered to buy one of his works. His only complaint was that the Painters' Guild summoned him three times before the magistrates, who ordered him to pay four ducats to the guild for permission to practise his art.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Alinari, Florence_

S. ZACCARIA--MADONNA ENTHRONED AND FOUR SAINTS

BY GIOVANNI BELLINI]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Alinari, Florence_

S. GIORGIO MAGGIORE--ST GEORGE AND THE DRAGON

BY CARPACCIO]

Vittore Carpaccio is the chief of the newer generation of painters trained under the influence of the Bellini. His talent for telling a story with richness of detail and quaint simplicity has never been surpa.s.sed. The series painted for the Guild of S. Ursula (1490-95) are admirable examples of his power, and of capital importance for the study of contemporary Venetian costume and architecture. Smaller in scale but equally charming and naive are the St George and the Dragon, and St Jerome series of paintings in the lower hall of S. Giorgio degli Schiavoni and the St George and the Dragon in the Sala del Conclave at the Salute. The well-known Presentation at the Temple, a n.o.ble work, No.

44 in the Accademia (1510), is obviously inspired by Giovanni Bellini.

The altar-piece in S. Vitale (1514) and three paintings in the Accademia, Nos. 89, 90, 91, painted in 1515, are later works telling all too plainly of declining power. Little is known of Carpaccio's life. He travelled in the East, was working at Venice in 1479, and died in 1525.

Sebastiani (Lazzaro Bastiani), his contemporary, worked with Gentile Bellini, Benedetto Diana and Mansueti in the decoration of the Guild of St John the Evangelist. The Offering of the Relic to the Brotherhood, No. 561 in the Accademia is by his hand. His works are rare. Three pictures in the Accademia; a Pieta in S. Antonino, much influenced by Squarcione; a more pleasing work, the S. Donato, at Murano--are all that Venice can show by this not greatly inspired artist. He was chosen by Giovanni Bellini, 1508, to value Giorgione's frescoes on the facade of the Fondaco dei Tedeschi, and died in 1512.

To Mansueti are due two of the Guild of St John pictures, rich in examples of Venetian costume and architecture, and two scenes from the life of St Mark painted for the guild of that name, now placed in the apse of Room XV. in the Accademia. He and his colleague Benedetto Diana, who painted one of the legends of the Holy Cross for the Guild of St John, were influenced by Gentile Bellini and Carpaccio. Benedetto's masterpiece, the Virgin Enthroned, an early work, is in the Accademia, No. 82. The much-disputed Christ at Emmaus in S. Salvatore has been attributed to him. Only sc.r.a.ps of the biographies of these two artists are known. The former was lame, and died in 1530; the latter once competed successfully with Carpaccio for the painting of a gonfalone for the Guild of Charity, of which he was a member, and died in 1525. Marco Marziale, a follower of Carpaccio, was much influenced by Albert Durer during his stay at Venice, as may be seen in the Supper at Emmaus, No.

76, the only work by him in the Accademia. Little is known of his life.

He was painting in the Ducal Palace in 1492, and still living in 1507.

Cima, Giovanni Battista, da Conegliano, son of a cloth-dresser (_Cimatore di panni_), a pupil of Alvise Vivarini, and one of the many painters from the mainland to whom Venetian art owes so much, is a great typical colourist of the Bellini School. To a feeling for colour he brings the expression of his love for natural scenery. The beautiful background of mountain landscape, the dignity and warmth of the saintly figures, the romantic architecture with tufts of the _erba della Madonna_[72] growing from its crevices, in his altar-piece in the Madonna dell' Orto, make it, though technically immature, one of the most delightful examples of Venetian art. Other maturer works by him are in S. Giovanni in Bragora and the Carmine. The Accademia possesses seven of his paintings. He was born in 1460, settled in Venice in 1490, and died about 1517. His Virgin and Child, with St Michael and St Andrew, now in the Parma Gallery, was long admired as a masterpiece by Da Vinci.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MADONNA DELL' ORTO--THE BAPTIST AND FOUR SAINTS

BY CIMA]