Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Most Excellent Painters… (1850)
“ When Duccio ultimately died, what relations, disciples, or property he left, are circumstances alike unknown, but the fact that he bequeathed the invention of “chiaro-scuro” pictures in marble, as a legacy to the art of painting, would of itself be sufficient to secure him infinite praise and glory; he must assuredly be numbered among those benefactors who have adorned our art and promoted its progress ”
Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Most Excellent Painters… (1850)
“ Duccio of Siena, therefore, a painter much esteemed, deservedly appropriated a large amount of the fame which fell to the lot of those who succeeded him for many years after, he being the first to commence the decoration of the pavement of the Sienese cathedral with those figures in “chiaroscuro”, wherein the artists of later times have performed the marvellous works that we now see. ”
Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Most Excellent Painters… (1850)
“ Nor is this without reason, seeing that if none made a beginning, there would be no place for the gradual amelioration which brings us to the middle point, and none for those last improvements by which the thing invented attains to the perfection of its beauty. ”
