CONVENT PARTNERSHIP. A.D. 1510--1513.
We now come to the studio of S. Marco, where the two friends, who had
dreamed together as boys, and worked together as youths, now laboured
jointly as men, bringing to light some of the finest works of art that
remain to us. During these three years Albertinelli's star seems merged
in that of his senior, his hand is to be recognised in the lower parts
of a few altarpieces; but it is always difficult to distinguish the two
styles.
It was a very busy atelier, for they had many patrons. Bugiardini was
still Mariotto's head assistant, and Fra Paolino, and one or two other
monks, worked under Fra Bartolommeo, besides pupils of both, among whom
were Gabriele Rustici and Benedetto Cianfanini.
The studio was on the part of the convent between the cloister and Via
del Maglio, [Footnote: Padre Marchese, _Memorie_, vol. ii. p. 69.] and
we can quite picture its interior. There stands the lay figure on which
Fra Bartolommeo draped the garments that take such majestic folds in his
works; [Footnote: Fra Bartolommeo was the inventor of the jointed lay
figure.] there are several casts and models in different parts of the
room; grand cartoons in charcoal hang on the walls, like those we see
to this day in the Uffizi and Belle Arti. So many of these masterly
sketches are the Frate's and so few are Mariotto's that we may presume
the former was in most instances the designer. And to what perfection he
carried design! Not a figure was drawn except its lines harmonised with
the geometric rhythm in the artist's mind. His groups fall by nature
into kaleidoscopic figures of circles, triangles, ellipses, crosses, &c.
Not a cartoon was sketched in which the lights and shadows were not as
gradated and finished as a painting, although they were merely drawn
with charcoal. The following was the method of work in the "bottega."
The panels were prepared with a coating of plaster of Paris, over
which, when dry, a coat of under colour, ground in oil, was passed. The
preparing of the panels fell to the work of one of the monk scholars,
Fra Andrea.[Footnote: The books of the convent have a note of payment to
Fra Bartolommeo for 20th March, 1512, "per parte di lavoro di Fra Andrea
converse per mettere d'oro, et ingessare alle tavole nella bottega in
diversi lavori" (Padre Marchese, _Memorie_, lib. ii. chap. in. p. 70).]
Then the master made his sketch in white, or "sgraffito" (i.e. graven
on the plaster), as in the architectural lines of the pictures of patron
saints in the Uffizi, and the _Marriage of S. Catherine_ in the Pitti
Palace; he also put in the shadows in monochrome. But the assistants,
who were skilled artists, were called to put broad level tints of local
colour on the buildings, &c., the master himself finishing the faces. No
doubt Albertinelli was often deputed to the study of the lay figure and
its drapery. Where he assisted, the monogram, a cross with two rings and
the joint names, marked the work, as en a panel of 1510 in Vienna, and
another at Geneva.
Fra Bartolommeo only imitated Leonardo in his intense force and soft
gradations; the general thinness of colour is opposed to his system. He
followed him, however, in his method of painting his shadows with the
brush, instead of "hatching" them; he used the same yellowish ground,
and "sfumato," [Footnote: Eastlake's _Materials for a History of Oil
Painting_, vol. ii. chap. iv.] _i.e._ the imperceptible softening of the
transition in half-lights and shadows; it was effected by glazes, and is
not adapted to a thin substance. The great mistake in Fra Bartolommeo's
system was the preparing his paintings like cartoons, and using
asphaltum or lamp-black for outlines and shadows; this in process of
time destroys the super-colour, and gives a general blackness to the
painting.
The same kind of talk went on here as in modern studios. When the
frame-maker came, Fra Bartolommeo would be vexed to see how much of his
work was hidden beneath the massive cornice, and would vow to dispense
with frames altogether, which he did in his _S. Sebastian_ and _S.
Mark_, by painting an architectural niche round the subject like a
carving in relief.
The first work begun at the convent studio was the picture for Father
Dalgano of Venice, the subject of which is the _Eternal Father in
Heaven_, surrounded by seraphs and angels. Perhaps in this we have the
source of the motive of Albertinelli's _Annunciation_. The colouring is
more brilliant than any of the Frate's works before his visit to Venice.
Vasari says that in this picture Giorgione himself could not have
surpassed him in brilliancy. The saints, although nearly level with the
ground, are given celestial rank by the cherubs and clouds below them.
Fra Bartolommeo was dissatisfied with his angels, which seemed merely
lovely children, and seeking other forms, he thought to picture them
better under shapes which at a distance seem only clouds, but nearer are
full of angels' faces, as in the _S. Bernard_. But this idea, not having
aesthetic beauty, was also abandoned. [Footnote: Padre Marchese, _I
Puristi ed Accademici_.]
The monks of S. Pietro at Murano did not hasten to claim their picture,
but sent two friars to negotiate about the price; they failed to agree,
and the work is now in the Church of S. Romano in Lucca.
Lucca has another exquisite picture of the same year in the Cathedral
of S. Martino, a _Madonna and Child_--a lovely ideal of joyful
infancy--beneath a veil suspended above her head by two angels. S. John
Baptist and S. Stephen support this airy composition like pillars, their
figures showing in strong relief against the dark shades; the whole
picture is intensely soft, and yet the outlines are perfectly clear.
This is valued at sixty ducats in the Libri di San Marco.
Next followed the _Virgin and Child with four Saints_, in S. Marco,
which is so fine that it has been taken for a Raphael, although, owing
to the use of lamp-black, it has now become very much darkened.
The _Holy Family_ which he painted for Filippo di Averardo Salviati,
and which is now in Earl Cowper's collection at Panshanger, is an almost
Raphaelesque work, and attains the greatest excellence in art. The
composition is his favourite triangle, touched in with the flowing lines
of the mother seated on the ground with the two children before her. S.
Joseph is in the background. The greatest softness of flesh tints must
have been perceptible when new, for, "in spite of the abrasions produced
by time, the delicate tones brought out by transparent glazes fused one
over another are apparent." The landscape with an echo subject of
the flight into Egypt is thought by Crowe and Cavalcaselle to be by
Albertinelli.
In 1510 the partners had a large order from Giuliano da Gagliano, who,
on the 2nd November, 1510, and 14th January, 1511, paid, in two rates,
the sum of 154 ducats. The picture, which is Fra Bartolommeo's own
painting, unfortunately cannot be traced.
In 1511 a long list of works are enumerated--a _Nativity_, valued two
ducats, a _Christ bearing the Cross_, and an _Annunciation_, sold to the
Gonfaloniere for six ducats--pictures which are dispersed in England,
Pavia, &c.; but the masterpiece of the time is the _Marriage of S.
Catherine_, now in the Louvre. The Florentine government bought it for
300 ducats in 1512, to present to Jacques Hurault, Bishop of Autun, who
came to Florence as envoy of Louis XII. He left it to his cathedral
at Autun, from whence, at the Revolution, it passed to the Louvre.
[Footnote: Padre Marchese, _Memorie_, lib. iii. ch. iv. p. 77. Crowe
and Cavalcaselle, _History of Painting_, vol. iii. chap. xiii. p. 452.]
Before it was sent away, Fra Bartolommeo made a replica of it, which
is now in the Pitti Palace. There is his favourite canopy supported by
angels; in this case they are beautifully foreshortened. The Virgin is
seated on a pedestal, holding by one arm an exquisitely moulded child
Jesus of about four years old, who is espousing S. Catherine of Siena,
kneeling at His feet on the left. A semicircle of saints group on each
side of the Virgin, and two angels, with musical instruments, are at
her feet; the upturned face of one is exquisitely foreshortened. The
S. George in armour is a powerful figure; and in S. Bartholomew, on
the left, is the same grand feeling which he afterwards brought to
perfection in S. Mark. The grace of the Virgin's figure is not to be
surpassed; if Raphael's Madonnas have more sentiment, this has more
dignified grace. He has remembered Leonardo's precept, "that the two
figures of a group should not look the same way"; the contrast of the
flowing lines in these two forms is very lovely. The same contrast of
lines, and yet balance of form, is carried out in the two S. Catherines
who form the pyramid on each side of her, and in the varied characters
of the encircling group of saints. The deleterious use of lampblack has
spoiled the colouring; it, moreover, hangs in a bad light at the Pitti
Palace.
The original subject at the Louvre differs only in a few particulars
from this--the Virgin's hand is on the child's head instead of his arm,
and there are trifling differences in the grouping of the saints,
the semicircle being more rigidly kept. In this the flesh is thin
and uncracked, seeming imbedded in the surrounding colours; the lake
draperies are laid so thinly on the light ground, that the sketch can be
seen through the colour. [Footnote: Eastlake, _Materials for a History
of Oil Painting_, vol. ii. chap. iv. Crowe and Cavalcaselle speak of the
two paintings as unconnected with each other, and mention the Pitti one
as having unaccountably returned there after having been given to some
bishop. Is it not possible that the gift to a bishop refers to the
painting in the Louvre, and that the other is the replica spoken of by
Vasari, vol. ii. p. 452?]
There is a fine painting in the church of S. Caterina of Pisa, in
the chapel of the Mastiani family, Michele Mastiani having given the
commission, and paid thirty ducats, in October, 1511. It represents
the _Madonna and Child_ seated on a base; the action is quiet and
yet vivacious; she is supported on each side by S. Peter and S. Paul,
figures as large as life, and even more noble than the ones in Rome. The
colouring has been much injured by a fire in the seventeenth century,
but is robust and harmonious. It is dated 1511.
On the 26th of November, 1510, Fra Bartolommeo had a commission from
Pier Soderini, then Gonfaloniere, to paint a picture for the Council
Hall. This was an unfortunate order; for Michelangelo and Leonardo da
Vinci had both been commissioned, neither of them finishing the works.
Fra Bartolommeo's forms the third uncompleted painting; it exists still
in the form of a half prepared picture, the design being only shadowed
in monochrome, and this in spite of the payment on account of 100 gold
ducats in October, 1513. [Footnote: See Padre Marchese, _Memorie_,
documenti 5 and 6, vol ii. p. 603.] The reason of this is difficult
to assign, but it might lie in the fact that in 1512 Pier Soderini was
deposed and exiled by Giuliano de' Medici, who assumed the government.
Another reason may have been the failure of Fra Bartolommeo's health
after his journey to Rome.
In 1512 Santi Pagnini came back from Siena as prior of S. Marco, and he
having no love for Albertinelli, and perhaps a too jealous affection
for the artist Monk, caused the partnership to be dissolved, much to
Mariotto's sorrow. The stock, of which a full list is given by Padre
Marchese, was divided, each taking the pictures in which they had most
to do. The properties--amongst which were the lay figures, easels,
casts, sketches, blocks of porphyry to grind colours on, &c. [Footnote:
Padre Marchese, vol. ii. pp. 184, 185.]--were to be left for Fra
Bartolommeo's use till his death, when they were to be divided between
his heirs and Albertinelli.
Mariotto returned disheartened to paint in his solitary studio. A
specimen of this period is the _Adam and Eve_, now at Castle Howard,
which is said to have been sketched in by Fra Bartolommeo. Eve stands
beneath the serpent-entwined tree, hesitating between the demon's
temptations and Adam's persuasions; the feeling and action are perfectly
expressed, the landscape is minute, but has plenty of atmosphere and
good colouring. In the same collection is a _Sacrifice of Abraham_, in
his best style. The drawing of the father, reluctantly holding his knife
to the throat of the boy, is extremely true. Munich possesses a fine
_Annunciation_. Characteristic saints support the composition on each
side, the nude S. Sebastian being a markworthy study; an angel at his
side presents the palm of martyrdom. The picture has suffered much from
bad cleaning.
In March, 1513, Albertinelli was commissioned by the Medici to paint
their arms, in honour of Leo X.'s elevation to the papacy. He made a
fine allegorical circular picture, in which the arms were supported by
the figures of Faith, Hope, and Charity.