The fame and success of Cimabue and Giotto, brought forth painters in
abundance, and created schools all over Italy. The church increasing in
power and riches, called on the arts of painting and sculpture, to add
to the beauty and magnificence of her sanctuaries; riches and honors
were showered on men whose genius added a new ray of grace to the
Madonna, or conferred a diviner air on St. Peter or St. Paul; and as
much of the wealth of Christendom found its way to Rome, the successors
of the apostles were enabled to distribute their patronage over all the
schools of Italy. Lanzi reckons fourteen schools of painting in Italy,
each of which is distinguished by some peculiar characteristics, as
follows: 1, the Florentine school; 2, the Sienese school; 3, the Roman
school; 4, the Neapolitan school; 5, the Venetian school; 6, the Mantuan
school; 7, the Modenese school; 8, the school of Parma; 9, the school of
Cremona; 10, the school of Milan; 11, the school of Bologna; 12, the
school of Ferrara; 13, the school of Genoa; 14, the school of Piedmont.
Of these, the Florentine, the Roman, and the Bolognese are celebrated
for their epic grandeur of composition; that of Siena for its poetic
taste; that of Naples for its fire; and that of Venice for the splendor
of its coloring.
Other writers make different divisions, according to style or country;
thus, Correggio, being by birth a Lombard, and the originator of a new
style, the name of the Lombard school has been conferred by many upon
the followers of his maxims, the characteristics of which are contours
drawn round and full, the countenances warm and smiling, the union of
the colors clear and strong, and the foreshortenings frequent, with a
particular attention to the chiaro-scuro. Others again, rank the artists
of Milan, Mantua Parma, Modena, and Cremona, under the one head of the
Lombard school; but Lanzi justly makes the distinctions before
mentioned, because their manners are very different. Writers of other
nations rank all these subdivisions under one head--the Italian school.
Lanzi again divides these schools into epochs, as they rose from their
infancy, to their greatest perfection, and again declined into
mannerism, or servile imitation, or as eminent artists rose who formed
an era in art. Thus writers speak of the schools of Lionardo da Vinci,
of Michael Angelo, of Raffaelle, of Correggio, of Titian, of the
Caracci, and of every artist who acquired a distinguished reputation,
and had many followers. Several great artists formed such a marked era
in their schools, that their names and those of their schools are often
used synonymously by many writers; thus, when they speak of the Roman
school, they mean that of Raffaelle; of the Florentine, that of Michael
Angelo; of Parma or Lombardy, that of Correggio; of Bologna, that of the
Caracci; but not so of the Venetian and Neapolitan schools, because the
Venetian school produced several splendid colorists, and that of Naples
as many, distinguished by other peculiarities. These distinctions should
be borne in mind in order rightly to understand writers, especially
foreigners, on Italian art.