Pietro Vannucci

“ It is most probable that owing to the plague and to the war, which at the time were raging in Perugia, the removal of Perugino's body was delayed, and so eventually quite forgotten. No man, therefore, knows where the great artist was buried, and the burial-place he bought at SS. Annunziata in Florence, was unoccupied. Mariotti states that his only descendant was a grandson, one John Battista Vannucci, whose name appeared as a scholar in the University of Città della Pieve. ”

“ On the mid-pilaster of the hall Perugino placed his own portrait in bust-form. It is probable that Raphael, who in boyhood, towards 1496, had been placed by his uncles under the tuition of Perugino, bore a 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 young and beautiful wife, the object of his fond affection; he loved to see her handsomely dressed, and would often deck her out with his own hands. He was made one of the priors of Perugia in 1501. ”

“ In the distance are the servants with horses and camels, and away beyond are the blue hills, the river, and the sky.
Certainly it is degenerate work; but which of the men of his time could do such work? No one else could so present the continuous space of nature, the spaciousness and vastness of the distance, or bathe his pictures in the dreamy sunlight of summer. I lingered long before this fresco, loth to leave it, its tranquillity is so marked, its airiness is so impressive.
It was while completing this picture that the message as to the San Agostino ancona reached Pietro. ”

“ The flattering request of his adopted townsmen was well pleasing to Perugino; the terms offered him were satisfactory; and early in 1499 he left Florence and commenced in Perugia what I consider to be the most important work of his life.
The scenes in the decoration of what is still called in Perugia the "Noble Cambio," are not the most beautiful that Pietro painted, nor are they the finest of his works in the way of drawing, composition, or colouring. ”

“ One scene is practically unique. On but one other occasion, as far as I am aware, did Perugino paint the "Transfiguration," and then he carried out but little of the picture himself. Vasari incorrectly styles it the "Resurrection." This latter scene Pietro represented many times, and even Crowe and Cavalcaselle, careful as they usually were, have confused the "Transfiguration" with the "Resurrection" when they refer to the Fano altar-piece. The three disciples in the Cambio fresco are group [Pg 79] ed very much in the way in which Pietro grouped the sleeping disciples in the Accademia picture. ”

“ The name of Perugino came to him from Perugia, the chief city of the neighbourhood. P1etro was one of several children born to Cristoforo Vannucci, a member of a respectable family settled at Città della Pieve. Though respectable, they seem to have been poor, or else, for some reason or other, to have left P1etro uncared for at the opening of his career. Before he had completed his ninth year the boy was articled to a 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 great things in his art. ”

“ The Cardinal, very desirous of retaining his services for himself, protected the artist, and when the Orvieto authorities determined to cancel the contract, he wrote to the Priori an exceedingly strong letter, telling them to await the convenience of the artist and himself. This letter of June 2, 1492, was in reply to one sent to Perugino stating that the Priori would appoint some one else in his stead. ”

“ In the works of this artist we are at once struck by the aloofness that distinguished Perugino. Single figures stand apart one from the other, each slightly connected as by a thread of thought, and similarly each with the central feature of the picture, but in every other way self-contained. Here again are the placid Umbrian landscapes with which later on we shall become so familiar, and the tall slender youths and sweet women full of tender grace, that make their first appearance in Umbrian art. ”

“ Bettona, 103, 104; Città della Pieve, 104, 105; Spello, 106; completion of Raphael's fresco in San Severo, Perugia, 107; works at Montefalco, and Trevi, 108; later pictures, 109, 110; death, 110; his burial-place unknown, 111; his wife, 112; his scholars, 112; characteristics, 112-114 Piero della Francesca, his influence on Perugino, 3, 6, 26, 30 Pietà (Accademia) , 9, 24, 26, 140, ill. 26 Pinturicchio, the "Baptism" in the Sistine Chapel by, 16, 18; work in Orvieto Cathedral, 29 ”

“ I do not pretend to have touched more than the fringe of this subject, but my opinion is that Perugino did many of his pictures wholly in tempera, and that with others he used tempera for the under-painting and oil for t [Pg 36] he glazes, and that there are also pictures where size has been used as a medium for the draperies when great solidity and heavy cordy outline was desired. The question of oil colours cannot be dismissed in a sentence. ”

“ Great white winding roads meander hither and thither, single trees stand out in sharp tall silhouette against the intense blue of the sky, and around as far as eye can reach stretch the half-hidden, half-revealed mountains clothed in a purple haze while the golden glare of sunlight bathes all the intervening space in its mystic light, tinging with gold the very grass of the fields, the grey drab of the roads, the ruddy brown of the buildings, and the radiance of the distant towers and houses. ”

“ Vanucci excused him. "I heard him say he had forgotten to provide himself with a fardingale. Comrades, the good lad is hunting [488] for a beauty fit to take rank among these peerless dames. Consider the difficulty, ladies, and be patient!"
At last Gerard was seen at some distance with a female in his hand.
"She is long enough," said one of her sex; criticizing her from afar.
"Gemini! what step she takes," said another; "Oh! it is wise to hurry into good company," was Pietro's excuse. ”

“ There are the long sweeping outlines of the Umbrian Hills, the distant towns with their churches and castles, the pleasant waters winding in and out of the hills and gleaming in the evening light, and the delicate larch and olive trees crowning the hills and standing out so clearly and daintily against the sky, while above and filling nearly half of the archway space is the blue and purple sky, flecked with white gossamer clouds and reaching far up in its hollow dome beyond the range of sight. ”

“ In that city he formed his early friendship with Leonardo da Vinci, which Sanzi says was cemented by parity of age as of affection; and it is singular how little such sympathy can be traced in their genius or works. When, on the other hand, we contrast the placid features which Vannucci uniformly limned, rarely ruffled by sorrow, never clouded by sin, with the furious mien and restless energy of Michael Angelo's creations, we may well credit Vasari's story of their quarrel, and can account for the scrimp justice accorded to the painter of Città della Pieve by his-200- Florentine biographer. ”

“ Four months passed only too quickly. One day the surgeon gave the invalid his liberty. “But what am I to do?” thought Missirilli. “Am I to remain in hiding under the roof of one of the handsomest women in Rome? And the vile tyrants who kept me thirteen months in prison without letting me see the light of day will think they have broken my spirit! Italy, thou art unfortunate indeed, if thy children abandon thee for so little!”
[Pg 207]
Vanina never doubted that Pietro’s greatest happiness would be to remain attached to her for ever; he seemed only too happy ”

“ There were many children, and life was a struggle for bread in the small boy’s home. When he was about eight, his father, Christoforo Vannucci, decided to educate him as a painter, and so he brought him to the city of Perugia, and there, as Vasari says, “this child, who had been reared in penury and want, was given as a shop drudge to a painter who was not particularly distinguished in his calling, but who held the art in great veneration, and highly honoured the men who excelled therein.” ”

“ We must limit ourselves here to a brief mention of the closest of the followers of Vanni in those later years in which chiefly we have been studying him, a painter less known even than himself, Paolo di Giovanni Fei. An apparently early work by him, the Madonna del Rosario of S. Domenico, suggests that he was actually the pupil of Vanni. By him, also, are three pictures in the Siena gallery, one in the chapel of S. Bernardino just outside the Porta Camollia, another in the Saraceni collection, and yet another in the Minutolo chapel of Naples cathedral. ”

“ Professor Arrighi defended Pietro Vanucci of Perugia.
“He was,” he said, “an honest man. And the prior of the Gesuati of Florence was wrong to mistrust him. That monk practised the art of manufacturing ultramarine blue by crushing stones of burned lapis-lazuli. Ultramarine was then worth its weight in gold; and the prior, who doubtless had a secret, esteemed it more precious than rubies or sapphires. He asked Pietro Vanucci to decorate the two cloisters of his convent, and he expected marvels, less from the skilfulness of the master than from the beauty of that ultramarine in the skies. ”

“ Confound ye all. I might puzzle my brains till doomsday, I should ne'er find it out. Also, where is my sword?
Gerard's lady. “Ask Tiber! Your best way, signor, will be to do it over again; and, in a word, keep pricking of Afric's beef, till your mind receives light. So shall you comprehend the matter by degrees, as lawyers mount heaven, and buffaloes Tiber.”
Here a chevalier remarked that the last speaker transcended the sons of Adam as much in wit as she did the daughters of Eve in beauty.
At which, and indeed at all their compliments, the conduct of Pietro Vanucci was peculiar. ”

“ Vasari informs us, that before executing these two pictures, he had already painted in Perugia an Assumption in the church of the Conventuals, with three subjects from the life of Christ in the grado; which may however be doubted, as it is a more perfect work. This picture possesses all the best parts of the style of Vannucci; but the varied expressions which the apostles discover on finding the sepulchre void, are beyond the reach of that artist's powers. Raffaello still further excelled his master, as Vasari observes, in the third picture painted for Città di Castello. ”

“ Pietro threw himself at her feet; Vanina was radiant with joy.
“I love you passionately,” he said; “but I am a poor servant of my country; and, the unhappier Italy is, the more faithful I must be to her. To obtain Don Asdrubale’s consent, I should have to play a sorry part for many years. Vanina, I refuse you.”
Missirilli was in a hurry to commit himself by this speech. His courage threatened to fail him.
“My misfortune,” he exclaimed, “is that I love you more than life, that to leave Rome is the worst of tortures for me. Ah! why is Italy not delivered from the barbarians? ”

“ Vanina wept copiously, and it was settled that he should not leave Rome for another two days yet.
“Pietro,” she said to him next day, “you have often told me that a well-known man, a Roman prince for example, who had command of plenty of money, could render great service to the cause of liberty, if ever Austria should be involved in any great war at a distance from us.”
“Undoubtedly,” said Pietro in astonishment.
“Well then, you have courage; all you lack is position: I am going to offer you my hand and two hundred [Pg 208] thousand livres a year. ”

“ Aha! I have it; 'tis Peter Brandt's grave you would fain see, not Margaret's. He does lie here; hard by the west door. There; I'll show you.” And he laid down his spade, and put on his doublet and jerkin to go with the friar.
He did not know there was anybody sitting on Peter's tomb. Still less that she was watching for this holy friar.
Pietro Vanucci and Andrea did not recognize him without his beard. The fact is, that the beard which has never known a razor grows in a very picturesque and characteristic form, and becomes a feature in the face ”

“ Vanni then turned his horse's head, slightly answering the salute of Euthanasia, which she had involuntarily made at parting for ever with one who had been her intimate acquaintance. A countryman was waiting on horseback outside the gate: "You are our guide?" said Castruccio. "Lead on then."
It was a frosty, cloudless night; there was no moon, but the stars shone intensely above; the bright assemblage seemed to congregate from the far wastes of heaven, and to press in innumerable clusters upon the edge of the visible atmosphere, to gaze upon the strange earth beneath. ”

“ Petersburg, and seek death in the first corner of Russia where war may break out, in order not to repay my patron’s kindness by some infamous baseness?”
“You are a fool,” said Vaninka, with a mixed smile of triumph and contempt; for from that moment she felt her superiority over Foedor, and saw that she would rule him like a queen for the rest of her life.
“Then order me—am I not your slave?” cried the young soldier.
“You must stay here,” said Vaninka.
“Stay here?”
“Yes; only women and children will thus confess themselves beaten at the first blow: a man, if he be worthy of the name, fights.” ”

“ Oh, my God! my God!”
“Help me, my lady,” said Annouschka; “I am not strong enough alone.”
Vaninka turned deadly pale, but, spurred on by the danger, she went resolutely up to the body of her lover; then, lifting it by the shoulders, while her maid raised it by the legs, she laid it once more in the chest. Then Annouschka shut down the lid, locked the chest, and put the key into her breast. Then both threw back the linen which had hidden it from the eyes of the general. Day dawned, as might be expected, ere sleep visited the eyes of Vaninka. ”