Andrea del Sarto

“ The expressions of his heads, both in children and in women, are gracious and natural, and those of men, both young and old, admirable in their vivacity and animation; his draperies are beautiful to a marvel, and his nudes very well conceived. And although his drawing is simple, all that he coloured is rare and truly divine.
Andrea was born in Florence, in the year 1478, to a father who was all his life a tailor; whence he was always called Andrea del Sarto by everyone. ”

“ Andrea del Sarto more particularly had received from nature so graceful and soft a manner in design, with a mode of colouring so life-like and easy, as well in fresco as in oil, that all were firmly persuaded of the success that must have attended him had he remained in Rome ”

“ Wake, “but to be pushed beyond strength and to be whined at continually is quite a different thing. . . . In this case it proved to be the killing of the golden goose, for Andrea del Sarto did not live to a great age—he died at forty-five—and his wife lived on alone without her beauty and the love of Andrea, and lived long beyond him. . . . It is said that one day, many years after Andrea died, an artist who was copying that moon shaped picture up there was startled by a touch on his shoulder, and he looked up to see an old, browned, shriveled hag, who smiled down at him a little bitterly. ”

“ It was for the cloisters of the church of the Servi at Florence that Andrea del Sarto painted the Riposo. His Nativity of the B.V. Mary is a grand fresco, the characters are noble and dignified, and “draped in the magnificent taste which distinguished Andrea.” The following account of the artist’s life is summarised from the article on Del Sarto by Mr. W. M. Rossetti in the Encyc. Brit. He was an easy-going plebeian, to whom a modest position in life and scanty gains were no grievances. As an artist he must have known his own value ”

“ John, which hangs behind the Venus in the Tribunes, is a wonderful picture; and there are two charming Madonnas in the Borghese Palace at Rome. In the first we are struck by the grouping and colouring; in the last, by a certain graceful lengthiness of the limbs and [Pg 147] fine animated drawing in the attitudes. But we look in vain for the "sacred and the sweet," for heart, for soul, for countenance.
Andrea del Sarto had, in his profession, great talents rather than genius and enthusiasm. He was weak, dissipated, unprincipled; without elevation of mind or generosity of temper ”

“ Andrea del Sarto, the tailor's son who loved not wisely but too well, is the last of a noble line of heroic craftsmen. Although his work lacks all inspiration, he is one of the greatest of colourists. "Andrea del Sarto," writes Mr Berenson, "approached, perhaps, as closely to a Giorgione or a Titian as could a Florentine, ill at ease in the neighbourhood of Leonardo and Michelangelo." He entirely belongs to these closing days of the Republic; his earliest frescoes were painted during Soderini's gonfalonierate; his latest just before the great siege. ”

“ He is a man, I verily believe, who has no rival in his art, and will hereafter shed as much lustre on my reign as Andrea del Sarto, Titian, and Leonardo da Vinci. You know how I love my artists, dearest duchess, so be complaisant and indulgent to him, I beg you. Mon Dieu! an April shower, a woman's caprice, and an artist's whim have more of fascination than of ennui for me. ”

“ On Fra Bartolommeo the spirituality of Fra Angelico still lingered, while the perfection of Raphael illumined him. Andrea del Sarto, on the other side, had gathered into his hands the gleams of genius from all the great artists who were his elder contemporaries, and so blending them as to form seemingly a style of his own, distinct from any, has left on our walls and in our galleries hundreds of masterpieces of colour, as gay and varied as the tints the orientals weave into their wondrous fabrics. ”

“ In such poems as "Abt Vogler," "Fra Lippo Lippi," "Andrea del Sarto," we are conscious not so much of music and pictures as of the secret springs of failure, the divine despairs and discontents, the aspirations, the creative ecstasies, of the men who wrought in these realms. Andrea del Sarto's art is not the real theme of the poem bearing his name. It is, rather, his character, of which his art is an expression. ”

“ What they meant by this must have been that in all the technical requirements of art, in drawing, composition, handling of fresco and oils, disposition of draperies, and feeling for light and shadow, he was above criticism. As a colourist he went further and produced more beautiful effects than any Florentine before him. His silver-grey harmonies and liquid blendings of hues cool, yet lustrous, have a charm peculiar to himself alone. We find the like nowhere else in Italy. And yet Andrea del Sarto cannot take rank among the greatest Renaissance painters. ”

“ It is refreshing to turn from the epigoni of the so-called Roman school to masters in whom the flame of the Renaissance still burned brightly. Andrea del Sarto, the pupil of Piero di Cosimo, but more nearly related in style to Fra Bartolommeo than to any other of the elder masters, was himself a contemporary of Raphael and Correggio. Yet he must be noticed here; because he gave new qualities to the art of Tuscany, and formed a tradition decisive for the subsequent history of Florentine painting. To make a just estimate of his achievement is a task of no small difficulty. ”

“ Often the portfolios of a great technician are more thrilling than his major works. This is the case with Andrea del Sarto. His numerous sketches in red chalk, have an athletic charm which his painting lacks. Others have drawn differently in this medium, but no one has drawn better.
When Andrea died in 1531, “full of glory and domestic trials,” as Vasari recounts, the normal development of Florentine painting ended, and Florence had already seen her artistic star dimmed by the rising splendors of Venice and Rome. ”

“ Now if he had devoted himself not so much to the pleasures of the world, as he did, and more to the labours of art, there is no doubt that he would have made great proficience in painting, and especially as Andrea del Sarto, who was much his friend, assisted him on many occasions both with advice and with drawings; for which reason many of his works reveal a draughtsmanship as fine as the good and beautiful manner of the colouring. ”

“ Having finished this work, which is certainly worthy of all praise, Andrea del Sarto painted a picture for the General of Vallombrosa, depicting therein four singularly beautiful figures, San Giovanni Battista namely, San Giovanni Gualberto, founder of the order, San Michele the archangel, and the Cardinal San Bernardo, who was a monk of their order; in the midst of these are certain children, which could not be more life-like nor more beautiful than they are. ”

“ From thence we went to the small cloister called dello Scalzo, where are the exquisite monochromes of Andrea del Sarto. Would that this cloister had been roofed in long ago, for the weather has made sad havoc of these precious things. Being in monochrome and much washed out, they have a faded look indeed; but how the drawing tells! What a master of anatomy was he, and yet how unexaggerated, how true: he was content to limit himself to Nature; knew where to draw the line, had, in fact, the reticence which Michael Angelo couldn’t recognise ”

“ They all paint better than Giotto and Cimabue,—in some respects better than Perugino; but they paint in vain, probably because they were not nearly so much in earnest, and meant far less, though possessing the dexterity to express far more. Andrea del Sarto appears to have been a good painter, yet I always turn away readily from his pictures. I looked again, and for a good while, at Carlo Dolce's portrait of the Eternal Father, for it is a miracle and masterpiece of absurdity, and almost equally a miracle of pictorial art. ”

“ Andrea del Sarto was called the "faultless painter." His execution was as easy as it was perfect; and Michael Angelo is reported to have said to Raphael, of the insignificant little personage Andrea then was: that he would bring the sweat to his (Raphael's) brow, if urged on in like manner by popes and kings. But he lacked strength and loftiness of purpose; and as Mr. Browning depicts him, is painfully conscious of these deficiencies. He feels that even an ill-drawn picture of Raphael's—and he has such a one before him—has qualities of strength and inspiration which he cannot attain. ”

“ In a tabernacle which is outside the Pinti gate, at the corner where the road to the Ingesuati turns otF, there is a figure of the Virgin painted in fresco by Andrea del Sarto. Our Lady is seated with the Infant Christ in her arms: San Giovanni is in this work depicted as a child; he is smiling, and the figure is painted with admirable art, being finished so perfectly, that it has been greatly extolled for its beauty and animation. The head of Our Lady is a portrait taken from that of the artist’s wife ”

“ Mr. Browning was unable to get the copy made with any promise of satisfaction, and so wrote the exquisite poem of Andrea del Sarto—and sent it to Kenyon!" For another literary presentation of Andrea del Sarto see Andre del Sarto, a play by Alfred de Musset.
15. Fiesole. A town on a hill above the Arno about three miles northwest of Florence. See Pippa Passes.
40. We are in God's hand. Andrea's fatalistic view of life aids him in escaping the poignancy of remorse.
[414] 65. The Legate's talk. The representative of the Pope praised Andrea's work. ”

“ In those days, the elder Bartolommeo Panciatichi carried on a large extent of traffic in France, and being desirous of leaving a memorial of himself in the French city of Lyons, he gave a commission to Baccio d’ Agnolo, to the intent that he should cause Andrea del Sarto to paint a picture for him, which Baccio was then to send to Lyons, where Bartolommeo Panciatichi then was; the subject chosen was the Assumption of Our Lady, with the Apostles standing around the tomb. ”

“ But with the decadence we have happily nothing to do; the artists of whom we speak first, Fra Bartolommeo and Albertinelli, belong to the culmination of art on its rising side, while Andrea del Sarto stands as near to the greatest artists on the other side, and is the last of the group before the decline. ”

“ STORIES, MUSIC AND TEA That afternoon was pleasant, but I don’t think that’s the reason I remember it so clearly. A good many pleasant sight-seeing walks followed that have grown a little dim, even now. I think it fastened itself by my beginning to see Viola, and a side of her through which she was soon to hurt herself so cruelly. I discovered the side through a little comment of hers on a painting made by Andrea del Sarto, an artist who painted in Florence a good deal in the fourteen hundreds. ”

“ In the court also, where Andrea del Sarto had painted the stories of San Filippo, with those from the life of Our Lady, he executed an exceedingly beautiful Escutcheon of Pope Leo X., when that Pontiff, made his visit to Florence. Moreover, Andrea di Cosimo painted many beautiful ornaments of arabesque work for the front of Santa Maria del Fiore, receiving his commission for the same from Jacopo Sansovino, who gave him a sister of his own to wife. ”

“ Attention is concentrated upon Jesus who seems to be learning from his young cousin. The left hand, resting upon Mary's arm is badly drawn and in character does not seem to belong to the figure of the child. A full, overhanging upper lip is a dominant feature in each face.
Other works of Andrea del Sarto are "Charity," which is in the Louvre; "Madonna dell' Arpie," "A Head of Christ," "The Dead Christ," "Four Saints," "Joseph in Egypt," his own portrait, and "Joseph's Dream." ”

“ These various labours secured so great a name for Andrea in his native city, that among the many artists, old and young, who were then painting, he was accounted one of the best that handled pencil and colours. Our artist then found himself to be not only honoured and admired, but also in a condition, notwithstanding the really mean price that he accepted for his labours, which permitted him to render assistance to his family, while he still remained unoppressed for his own part, by those cares and anxieties which beset those who are compelled to live in poverty. ”

“ The master, looking as if to say, “I told you so,” gives me a whack on the head. Which hurts a little. “I expect it proved somewhat farcical. He’s rather that way inclined.” Clearly, he has suddenly remembered that business with Andrea del Sarto. ”

“ It happened about this time that Andrea del Sarto had finished a picture of the Annunciation, for the church of that name, which belongs to the monks of San Gallo, which church has since been destroyed, [4] as we have related in the life of Andrea; and the predella of this work he gave to Jacopo, whom he directed to paint it in oil. ”

“ Titian's Bella (18) , a rather stolid rejuvenation of Eleonora Gonzaga, is chiefly valuable for its magnificent representation of a wonderful Venetian costume. Here are three works of Andrea del Sarto–the Annunciation (124) , the Madonna in Glory, with four Saints (123) , and St John the Baptist (272) ; the first is one of his most beautiful paintings. The picture supposed to [384] represent Andrea and his wife (118) is not by the master himself. ”