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FERRARI, GAUDENZIO (1484-1549)

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Originally appearing in Volume V10, Page 285 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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FERRARI, GAUDENZIO (1484-1549) , See also:Italian painter and sculptor, of the Milanese, or more strictly the Piedmontese, school, was See also:born at Valduggia, See also:Piedmont, and is said (very dubiously) to have learned the elements of See also:painting at See also:Vercelli from See also:Girolamo Giovenone. He next studied in See also:Milan, in the school of Scotto, and some say of See also:Luini; towards 1504 he proceeded to See also:Florence, and afterwards (it used to be alleged) to See also:Rome. His pictorial See also:style may be considered as derived mainly from the old Milanese school, with a considerable tinge of the See also:influence of Da See also:Vinci, and later on of See also:Raphael; in his See also:personal manner there was something of the See also:demonstrative and fantastic. The gentler qualities diminished, and the stronger intensified, as he progressed. By 1524 he was at Varallo in Piedmont, and here, in the See also:chapel of the Sacro See also:Monte, the See also:sanctuary"of the Piedmontese pilgrims, he executed his most memorable See also:work. This is a See also:fresco of the Crucifixion, with a multitude of figures, no less than twenty-six of them being modelled in actual See also:relief, and coloured; on the vaulted See also:ceiling are eighteen lamenting angels, powerful in expression. Other leading examples are the following. In the Royal See also:Gallery, See also:Turin, a " Pieta," an able See also:early work. In the Brera Gallery, Milan, " St Katharine miraculously preserved from the See also:Torture of the See also:Wheel," a very characteristic example, hard and forcible in See also:colour, thronged in See also:composition, turbulent in emotion; also several frescoes, chiefly from the See also:church of See also:Santa Maria della See also:Pace, three of them being from the See also:history of See also:Joachim and See also:Anna. In the See also:cathedral of Vercelli, the See also:choir, the " Virgin with Angels and See also:Saints under an See also:Orange See also:Tree." In the See also:refectory of See also:San See also:Paolo, the " Last Supper." In the church of San Cristoforo, the See also:transept (in 1532-1535), a See also:series of paintings in which Ferrari's See also:scholar Lanini assisted him; by Ferrari himself are the " See also:Birth of the Virgin," the " See also:Annunciation," the " Visitation," the " See also:Adoration of the Shepherds and See also:Kings," the " Crucifixion," the " See also:Assumption of the Virgin," all full of See also:life and decided See also:character, though somewhat mannered, In tie Louvre, " St See also:Paul Meditating." In Varallo, See also:convent of the Minorites (1507), a " Presentation in the See also:Temple," and " See also:Christ .among the Doctors," and (after 1510) the " History of Christ," in twenty-one subjects; also an See also:ancona in six compartments, named the " Ancona di San Gaudenzio." In Santa Maria di See also:Loreto, near Varallo (after 1527), an " Adoration." In the church of See also:Saronno, near Milan, the See also:cupola (1535), a " See also:Glory of Angels," in which the beauty of the school of Da Vinci alternates with bravura of foreshortenings in the mode of See also:Correggio. In Milan, Santa Maria delle Grazie (1542) , the " Scourging of Christ," an " Ecce Homo " and a " Crucifixion." The " Scourging," or else a " Last Supper," in the Passione of Milan (unfinished), is regarded as Ferrari's latest work. He was a very prolific painter, distinguished by strong expression, animation and fulness of composition, and abundant invention; he was skilful in painting horses, and his decisive rather hard colour is marked by a partiality for shot tints in drapery.

In See also:

general character, his work appertains more to the 15th than the 16th See also:century. His subjects were always of the sacred See also:order. Ferrari's See also:death took See also:place in Milan. Besides Lanini, already mentioned, See also:Andrea See also:Solario, Giambattista della Cerva and See also:Fermo Stella were three of his See also:principal scholars. He is represented to us as a See also:good See also:man, attached to his See also:country and his See also:art, jovial and sometimes facetious, but an enemy of See also:scandal. The reputation which he enjoyed soon after his death was very See also:great, but it has not fully stood the test of See also:time. Lomazzo went so far as to place him seventh among the seven See also:prime painters of See also:Italy. See G. Bordiga, two See also:works concerning Gaudenzio Ferrari (1821 and 1835); G. See also:Colombo, Vita ed opere di Gaudenzio Ferrari (1881); Ethel Halsey, Gaudenzio Ferrari (in the series Great Masters, 1904). There was another painter nearly contemporary with Gaudenzio, Difendente Ferrari, also of the Lombard school. His celebrity is by no means equal to that of Gaudenzio; but Kugler (1887, as edited by See also:Layard) pronounced him to be " a good and See also:original colourist, and the best artist that Piedmont has produced." (W.

M.

End of Article: FERRARI, GAUDENZIO (1484-1549)

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