The earliest of the great fifteenth-century painters belongs in the
character of his works rather to the preceding century. The monk Guido
di Pietro of Fiesole, commonly called Fra Angelico from the holiness and
purity which were as conspicuous in his life as in his works, was born
in 1387 at Vicchio, in the province of Mugello. At the age of twenty he
entered the order of the Predicants at Fiesole, and took the name of
Giovanni, by which he was afterward known. His first art work was the
illumination of manuscripts. Quitting the monastery in 1409, he practiced
as a fresco-painter in various places until 1418, when he returned to
Fiesole, and continued to reside there for the next eighteen years. In
1436 he again quitted his retreat, to paint a series of frescoes on the
history of the Passion for the convent of San Marco in Florence. This
work occupied nine years, and on its completion Angelico was invited to
Rome. The chief work which he undertook there was the decoration of a
chapel in the Vatican for Pope Nicholas V. In 1447 he went to Orvieto to
undertake a similar task, but returned in the same year, having done only
three compartments of the ceiling, and leaving the rest to be afterward
completed by Luca Signorelli. He then continued to reside in Rome, where
he died and was buried in 1455. The most striking characteristics of
Angelico’s art spring from the temper of religious fervor with which he
practiced it. He worked without payment; he prayed before beginning any
work for the Divine guidance in its conception; and believing himself
to be so assisted, he regarded each picture as a revelation, and could
never be persuaded to alter any part of it. His works on panel are very
numerous, and are to be found in many public and private galleries;
of the finest of these are, a “Last Judgment,” belonging to the Earl
of Dudley, and the “Coronation of the Virgin” in the gallery of the
Louvre. After his death he was “beatified” by the church he had served
so devotedly—a solemnity which ranks next to canonization; and Il Beato
Angelico is the name by which Fra Giovanni was and is most fondly and
reverently remembered. His style survived only in one pupil who assisted
him at Orvieto.