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PERUGINO, PIETRO (1446-1524)

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Originally appearing in Volume V21, Page 280 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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PERUGINO, PIETRO (1446-1524) , whose correct See also:family name was VANNUCCI, See also:Italian painter, was See also:born in 1446 at Citta della Pieve in See also:Umbria, and belongs to the Umbrian school ofpainting. The name of Perugino came to him from See also:Perugia, the See also:chief See also:city of the neighbourhood. Pietro was one of several See also:children born to Cristoforo Vannucci, a member of a respectable family settled at Citta della Pieve. Though respectable, they seem to have been poor, or else, for some See also:reason or other, to have See also:left Pietro uncared for at the opening of his career. Before he had completed his ninth See also:year the boy was articled to a See also:master, a painter at Perugia. Who this may have been is very uncertain; the painter is spoken of as wholly mediocre, but sympathetic for the See also:great things in his See also:art. Benedetto See also:Bonfigli is generally surmised; if he is rejected as being above mediocrity, either Fiorenzo di Lorenzo or Niccolo da See also:Foligno may possibly have been the See also:man. Pietro painted a little at See also:Arezzo; thence he went to the headquarters of art, See also:Florence, and frequented the famous Brancacci See also:Chapel in the See also:church of the See also:Carmine. It appears to be sufficiently established that he studied in the atelier of See also:Andrea del Verrocchio, where Leonardo de See also:Vinci was also a See also:pupil. He may have learned See also:perspective, in which he particularly excelled for that See also:period of art, from See also:Piero de' See also:Franceschi. The date of this first Florentine sojourn is by no means settled; some authorities incline to make it as See also:early as 1470. while others, with perhaps better reason, postpone it till 1479. Pietro at this See also:time was extremely poor; he had no See also:bed, but slept on a See also:chest for many months, and, See also:bent upon making his way, resolutely denied himself every creature comfort.

Gradually Perugino See also:

rose into See also:notice, and became famous not only throughout See also:Italy but even beyond. He was one of the earliest Italian painters to practise oil-See also:painting, in which he evinced a See also:depth and smoothness of tint, which elicited much remark; and in perspective he applied the novel See also:rule of two centres of See also:vision. Some of his early See also:works were extensive frescoes for the Ingesati fathers in their See also:convent, which was destroyed not many years afterwards in the course of the See also:siege of Florence; he produced for them also many cartoons, which they executed with brilliant effect in stained See also:glass. Though greedy for gain, his integrity was See also:proof against temptation; and an amusing See also:anecdote has survived of how the See also:prior of the Ingesati doled out to him the costly See also:colour of See also:ultramarine, and how Perugino, constantly washing his brushes, obtained a surreptitious hoard of the pigment, which he finally restored to the prior to shame his stingy suspiciousness. A See also:good specimen of his early See also:style in See also:tempera is the circular picture in the Louvre of the " Virgin and See also:Child enthroned between See also:Saints." Perugino returned from Florence to Perugia, and thence, towards 1483, he went to See also:Rome. The painting of that See also:part of the Sixtine Chapel which is now immortalized by See also:Michelangelo's " Last See also:Judgment " was assigned to him by the See also:pope; he covered it with frescoes of the "See also:Assumption," the " Nativity," and "See also:Moses in the Bulrushes." These works were ruthlessly destroyed to make a space for his successor's more See also:colossal See also:genius, but other works by Perugino still remain in the Sixtine Chapel; " Moses and Zipporah " (often attributed to See also:Signorelli), the " See also:Baptism of See also:Christ," and " Christ giving the Keys to See also:Peter." See also:Pinturicchio accompanied the greater Umbrian to Rome, and was made his partner, receiving a third of the profits; he may probably have done some of the Zipporah subject. Pietro, now aged See also:forty, must have left Rome after the completion of the Sixtine paintings in 1486, and in the autumn of that year he was in Florence. Here he figures by no means advantageously in a criminal See also:court. In See also:July 1487 he and another Perugian painter named Aulista di Angelo were convicted, on their own See also:confession, of having in See also:December waylaid with staves some one (the name does not appear) in the See also:street near S. Pietro See also:Maggiore. Perugino limited himself, in intention, to See also:assault and See also:battery, but Aulista had made up his mind for See also:murder. The See also:minor and more illustrious See also:culprit was fined ten See also:gold florins, and the See also:major one exiled for See also:life.

Between 1486 and 1499 Perugino resided chiefly in Florence, making one See also:

journey to Rome and several to Perugia. He was in many other parts of Italy from time to time. He had a See also:regular See also:shop in Florence, received a great number of commissions, and continued developing his practice as an oil-painter, his See also:system of superposed layers of colour being essentially the same as that of the See also:Van Eycks. One of his most celebrated pictures, the " Pieta " in the Pitti See also:Gallery, belongs to the year 1495. From about 1498 he became increasingly keen after See also:money, frequently repeating his See also:groups from picture to picture, and leaving much of his See also:work to journeymen. In 1499 the gild of the cambio (money-changers or bankers) of Perugia asked him to undertake the decoration of their See also:audience-See also:hall, and he accepted the invitation. This extensive See also:scheme of work, which may have been finished within the year 1500, comprised the painting of the vault with the seven See also:planets and the signs of the See also:zodiac (Perugino doing the designs and his pupils most probably the executive work) and the See also:representation on the walls of two sacred subjects—the " Nativity " and " Transfiguration " —the Eternal See also:Father, the four virtues of See also:Justice, Prudence, See also:Temperance and Fortitude, See also:Cato as the See also:emblem of See also:wisdom, and (in life See also:size) numerous figures of classic worthies, prophets and sibyls. On the See also:mid-See also:pilaster of the hall Perugino placed his own portrait in bust-See also:form. It is probable that See also:Raphael, who in boyhood, towards 1496, had been placed by his uncles under the tuition of Perugino, See also:bore a See also:hand in the work of the vaulting. It may have been about this time (though some accounts date the event a few years later) that Vannucci married a See also:young and beautiful wife, the See also:object of his fond See also:affection; he loved to see her handsomely dressed, and would often See also:deck her out with his own hands. He was made one of the priors of Perugia in 1501. While Perugino, though by no means stationary or unprogressive as an executive artist, was working contentedly upon the old lines and carrying out the See also:ancient conceptions, a mighty See also:wave of new art flooded Florence with its See also:rush and Italy with its rumour.

Michelangelo, twenty-five years of See also:

age in 15oo, following after and distancing Leonardo da Vinci, was opening men's eyes and minds to possibilities of achievement as yet unsurmised. Vannucci in Perugia heard Buonarroti bruited abroad, and was impatient to see with his own eyes what the stir was all about. In 1504 he allowed his apprentices and assistants to disperse, and returned to Florence. Though not openly detracting, he viewed with See also:jealousy and some grudging the advances made by Michelangelo; and Michelangelo on his part replied, with the intolerance which pertains to superiority, to the faint praise or covert dispraise of his See also:senior and junior in the art. On one occasion, in See also:company, he told Perugino to his See also:face that he was " a bungler in art " (go fo nell' ante). Vannucci brought, with equal_ indiscretion and See also:ill success, an See also:action for See also:defamation of See also:character. Put on his mettle by this mortifying transaction, he determined to show what he could do, and he produced the chef-d'oeuvre of the Madonna and Saints " for the Certosa of See also:Pavia. The constituent parts of this See also:noble work have now been sundered. The only portion which remains in the Certosa is a. figure of See also:God the Father with See also:cherubim. An " See also:Annunciation " has disappeared from cognisance; three compartments—the Virgin adoring the See also:infant Christ, St See also:Michael, and St Raphael with Tobias—are among the choicer treasures of the See also:National Gallery, See also:London. The current See also:story that Raphael bore a hand in the work is not likely to be true. This was succeeded in 15os by an " Assumption," in the Cappella dei Rabatta, in the church of the Servi in Florence.

The painting may have been executed chiefly by a pupil, and was at any See also:

rate a failure: it was much decried; Perugino lost his scholars; and towards 1506 he once more and finally abandoned Florence, going to Perugia, and thence in a year or two to Rome. Pope See also:Julius II. had summoned Perugino to paint the See also:Stanza in the Vatican, now called that of the Incendio del Borgo; but he soon preferred a younger competitor, that very Raphael who had been trained by the aged master of Perugia; and Vannucci, after painting the See also:ceiling with figures of God the Father in different glories, in five medallion-subjects, found his occupation gone; he retired from Rome, and was once more in Perugia from 1512. Among his latest works one of the best is the extensive See also:altar-piece (painted between 1512 and 1517) of S. See also:Agostino in Perugia; the component parts of it are now dispersed in various galleries. Perugino's last frescoes were painted for the monastery of S. Agnese in Perugia, and in 1522 for the church of See also:Castello di Fortignano hard by. Both See also:series have disappeared from their places, the second being now in the See also:Victoria and See also:Albert Museum. He was still at Fontignano in 1524 when the See also:plague See also:broke out, and he died. He was buried in unconsecrated ground in a See also:field, the precise spot now unknown. The reason for so obscure and unwonted a mode of See also:burial has been discussed, and religious See also:scepticism on the, painter's own part has been assigned as the cause; the fact, however, appears to be that, on the sudden and widespread outbreak of the plague, the panic-struck See also:local authorities ordained that all victims of the disorder should be at once interred without any waiting for religious See also:rites. This leads us to speak of Perugino's opinions on See also:religion. See also:Vasari is our chief, but not our See also:sole, authority for saying that Vannucci had very little religion, and was an open and obdurate disbeliever in the See also:immortality of the soul.

For a reader of the See also:

present See also:day it is easier than it was for Vasari to suppose that Perugino may have been a materialist, and yet just as good and laudable a man as his orthodox See also:Catholic neighbours or See also:brother-artists; still there is a strong discrepancy between the quality of his art, in which all is throughout See also:Christian, Catholic, devotional, and even pietistic, and the character of an See also:anti-Christian contemner of the See also:doctrine of immortality. It is difficult to reconcile this discrepancy, and certainly not a little difficult also to suppose that Vasari was totally mistaken in his assertion; he was born twenty years before Perugino's See also:death, and must have talked with scores of See also:people to whom the Umbrian painter had been well known. We have to remark that Perugino in 1494 painted his own portrait, now in the Uffizi Gallery of Florence, and into this he introduced a See also:scroll lettered " Timete Deum." That an open disbeliever should inscribe himself with " Timete Deum " seems See also:odd. The portrait in question shows a plump face, with small dark eyes, a See also:short but well-cut See also:nose, and See also:sens:lous lips; the See also:neck is thick, the See also:hair bushy and frizzled, and the See also:general See also:air imposing. The later portrait in the Cambio of Perugia shows the same face with traces of added years. Perugino died possessed of considerable See also:property, leaving three sons. Among the very numerous works of Perugino a few not already named require mention. Towards 1496 he painted the Crucifixion," in S. Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi, Florence. The attribution to him of the picture of the See also:marriage of See also:Joseph and the Virgin See also:Mary (the " Sposalizio ") now in the museum of See also:Caen, which served indisputably as the See also:original, to a great extent, of the still more famous " Sposalizio" which was painted by Raphael in 1504, and which forms a leading attraction of the Brera Gallery in See also:Milan, is now questioned, and it is assigned to Lo See also:Spagna. A vastly finer work of Perugino's is the " See also:Ascension of Christ," which, painted a littler earlier for S. Pietro of Perugia, has for years past been in the museum of See also:Lyons; the other portions of the same altar-piece are dispersed in other galleries.

In the chapel of the Disciplinati of Citta della Pieve is an " See also:

Adoration of the Magi," a square of 21 ft. containing about See also:thirty life-sized figures; this was executed, with scarcely credible celerity, from the 1st to the 25th of See also:March (or thereabouts) in 1505, and must no doubt be in great part the work of Vannucci's pupils. In 1507, when the master's work had for years been in a course of decline and his performances were generally weak, he produced. nevertheless, one of his best pictures—the " Virgin between St See also:Jerome and St See also:Francis," now in the Palazzo Penna. In S. Onofrio of Florence is a much lauded and much-debated See also:fresco of the " Last Supper," a careful and blandly correct but not inspired work; it has been ascribed to Perugino by some connoisseurs, by others to Raphael; it may more probably be by some different pupil of the Umbrian master. See also:AUT'110RITIES.—In addition to See also:Crowe and Cavalcaselle, see Di Pietro Perugino e degli scolari (1804) ; Mezzanotte, Vita, &c., di Pietro Vannucci (1836) ; Mariotti, Lettere pittoriche Perugine (1788); See also:Claude See also:Phillips (in The See also:Portfolio) (1893) ; G. C. See also:Williamson, Perugino (1900 and 1903). , (W. M.

End of Article: PERUGINO, PIETRO (1446-1524)

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