Although we possess very detailed records of Antonello da Messina
(1430-1479), his movements and his life’s work, it is only in recent
years that they have been studied with any care. This Sicilian-born
artist obviously cannot have set out for Flanders and there have learnt
from Jan van Eyck (who died in 1441) the “discovery” of oil as a
medium in painting, as Vasari tells us. But he may have seen in Italy
a picture by the great Northern artist and from it have acquired some
facility in the use of oil and in finishing with glazes of oil panels
which had been begun in tempera. He was certainly in Venice in 1475-76,
if not earlier, and his _Portrait of a Condottiere_ (No. 1134, Plate
IX.), which is characteristically signed and dated
_1474
Antonellus Messaneus me
pinxit_
belongs to that period of his full maturity. It was
purchased at the Pourtalès-Gorgier sale in 1865 for £4767. In any case,
the discoveries with which Antonello is credited within a few years
completely revolutionised the methods of painting throughout Italy, and
prepare us for the wonderful achievements of the later Venetians, who
followed and improved upon the Bellini tradition.
Vittore Carpaccio (1455?-1526) was, like Gentile Bellini, a painter of
Venetian fêtes, pageantry, and religious pictures on an imposing scale.
Nothing is known of Carpaccio’s artistic descent, but his work shows
traces of the influence of Jacopo Bellini and of Lazzaro Bastiani, who
was the head of a group of artists whose art was based on the tradition
of such early painters as Jacobello del Fiore. Carpaccio’s _Preaching
of St. Stephen at Jerusalem_ (No. 1211) is one of the series of five
incidents from the _Life of St. Stephen_ which were painted by this
artist between 1511 and 1520 for the Scuola di S. Stefano at Milan. The
others of the series are now in the Milan Gallery (No. 170—signed and
dated 1513), at Berlin (No. 23), and at Stuttgart. The Louvre obtained
this canvas, which varies from the others in size, from the Milan
Gallery in 1813, when together with Boltraffio’s _Madonna of the Casio
Family_ (No. 1169) and other pictures it was exchanged for works by
Rembrandt, Rubens, Van Dyck, and Jordaens.
To Vincenzo Catena (14..?-1531?) may be assigned, on stylistic grounds,
the _Reception of a Venetian Ambassador at Cairo in 1512_ (No. 1157).
In any case, it cannot have been executed by Gentile Bellini, as
alleged in the Catalogue, as the audience here depicted did not take
place until five years after that master’s death!
Another Bellinesque painter was Bartolommeo Veneto (fl. 1505-1555). We
shall, following the suggestion of Venturi, assign to him the excellent
but officially unattributed _Portrait of a Lady_ (No. 1673) which hangs
to the right of Raphael’s _La Belle Jardinière_.