Vasari:
Lives of the painters |
AMONG THE OLD PAINTERS who
were much alarmed by the praises rightly given by men to Cimabue and to
his disciple Giotto, whose good work in painting was making their glory
shine throughout all Italy, was one Margaritone, painter of Arezzo, who,
with the others who in that unhappy century were holding the highest
rank in painting, recognized that their works were little less than
wholly obscuring his own fame. Margaritone, then, being held excellent
among the other painters of these times who were working after the Greek
manner, wrought many panels in distemper at Arezzo, and he painted in
fresco in even more pictures, but in a long time and with much fatigue
almost the whole Church of S. Clemente, Abbey of the Order of Camaldoli,
which is today all in ruins and thrown down, together with many other
buildings and a strong fortress called S. Chimenti, for the reason that
Duke Cosimo de' Medici, not only on that spot but right round that city,
pulled down many buildings and the old walls (which were restored by
Guido Pietramalesco, formerly Bishop and Patron of that city); in order
to rebuild the latter with connecting wings and bastions, much stronger
and smaller than they were, and in consequence more easy to guard and
with few men. There were, in the said pictures, many figures both small
and great, and although they were wrought after the Greek manner, it was
recognized, none the less, that they had been made with good judgment
and lovingly; to which witness is borne by works by the same man's hand
which have survived in that city, and above all a panel that is now in
S. Francesco, in the Chapel of the Conception, with a modern frame,
wherein is a Madonna held by these friars in great veneration. He made in
the same church, also after the Greek manner, a great crucifix which is
now placed in that chapel where there is the Office of the Wardens of
Works; this is wrought on the planking, with the Cross outlined, and of
this sort he made many in that city. For the Nuns of S. Margherita he
wrought a work that is today set up against the tramezzo of the church
namely, a canvas fixed on a panel, wherein are scenes with small figures
from the life of Our Lady and of S. John the Baptist, in considerably
better manner than the large, and executed with more diligence and
grace. This work is notable, not only because the said small figures are
so well made that they look like miniatures, but also because it is a
marvel to see that a work on canvas has been preserved for three hundred
years. He made throughout the whole city an infinity of pictures, and at
Sargiano, a convent of the Frati de' Zoccoli, a S. Francis portrayed
from nature on a panel, whereon he placed his name, as on a work, in his
judgment, wrought better than was his wont. Next, having made a large
Crucifix on wood, painted after the Greek manner, he sent it to Florence
to Messer Farinata degli Uberti, a most famous citizen, for the reason
that he had, among other noble deeds, freed his country from imminent
ruin and peril. This Crucifix is today in S. Croce, between the Chapel
of the Peruzzi and that of the Giugni. In S. Domenico in Arezzo, a
church and convent built by the Lords of Pietramala in the year 1275, as
their arms still prove, he wrought many works, and then returned to Rome
(where he had already been held very dear by Pope Urban IV), to the end
that he might do certain works in fresco at his commission in the
portico of S. Pietro; these were in the Greek manner, and passing good
for those times. Next,
having made a S . Francis on a panel at Ganghereto, a place above Terra
Nuova in Valdarno, his spirit grew exalted and he gave himself to
sculpture, and that with so much zeal that he succeeded much better than
he had done in painting, because, although his first sculptures were in
Greek manner, as four wooden figures show that are in a Deposition from
the Cross in the Prieve, and some other figures in the round placed in
the Chapel of S. Francesco over the baptismal font, none the less he
adopted a better manner after he had seen in Florence the works of
Arnolfo and of the other then most famous sculptors. Wherefore, having
returned to Arezzo in the year 1275, in the wake of the Court of Pope
Gregory, who passed through Florence on his return from Avignon to Rome,
there came to him opportunity to make himself more known, for the reason
that this Pope died in Arezzo, after having presented thirty thousand
crowns to the Commune to the end that there might be finished the
building of the Vescovado, formerly begun by Maestro Lapo and little
advanced, and the Aretines, besides making the Chapel of S. Gregorio
(where Margaritone afterwards made a panel) in the Vescovado, in memory
of the said Pontiff, also ordained that a tomb of marble should be made
for him by the same man in the said Vescovado. Putting his hand to the
work, he brought it to completion, including therein the portrait of the
Pope from nature, done both in marble and in painting, in a manner that
it was held the best work that he had ever yet made. Next, work being
resumed on the building of the Vescovado, Margaritone carried it very
far on, following the design of Lapo; but he did not, however, deliver
it finished, because a few years later, in the year 1289, the wars
between the Florentines and the Aretines were renewed, by the fault of
Guglielmino Ubertini, Bishop and Lord of Arezzo, assisted by the Tarlati
da Pietramala and by the Pazzi di Valdarno, although evil came to them
thereby, for they were routed and slain at Campaldino; and there was
spent in that war all the money left by the Pope for the building of the
Vescovado. And therefore the Aretines ordained that in place of this
there should serve the impost paid by the district (thus do they call a
tax), as a particular revenue for that work; which impost has lasted up
to our own day, and continues to last. Now
returning to Margaritone: from what is seen in his works, as regards
painting, he was the first who considered what a man must do when he
works on panels of wood, to the end that they may stay firm in the
joinings, and that they may not show fissures and cracks opening out
after they have been painted; for he was used to put over the whole
surface of the panels a canvas of linen cloth, attached with a strong
glue made from shreds of parchment and boiled over a fire and then over
the said canvas he spread gesso, as is seen in many panels by him and by
others. He wrought, besides, on gesso mingled with the same glue,
friezes and diadems in relief and other ornaments in the round; and he
was the inventor of the method of applying Armenian bole, and of
spreading gold-leaf thereon and burnishing it. All these things, never
seen before, are seen in many of his works, and in particular in the
Pieve of Arezzo, in an altar front wherein are stories of S. Donatus,
and in S. Agnesa and S. Niccolo in the same city. Finally,
he wrought many works in his own country, which went abroad; some of
which are at Rome, in S. Giovanni and in S. Pietro, and some at Pisa, in
S. Caterina, where, in the tramezzo of the church, there is set up over
an altar a panel with S. Catherine on it, and many scenes from her life
with little figures, and a S. Francis with many scenes on a panel, on a
ground of gold. And in the upper Church of S. Francesco d' Assisi there
is a Crucifix by his hand, painted in the Greek manner, on a beam that
crosses the church. All which works were in great esteem among the
people of that age, although today by us they are not esteemed save as
old things, good when art was not, as it is today, at its height. And
seeing that Margaritone applied himself also to architecture, although I
have not made mention of any buildings made with his design, because
they are not of importance, I will yet not forbear to say that he,
according to what I find, made the design and model of the Palazzo de'
Governatori in the city of Ancona, after the Greek manner, in the year
1270; and what is more, he made in sculpture, on the principal front,
eight windows, whereof each one has, in the space in the middle, two
columns that support in the middle two arches, over which each window
has a scene in half-relief that reaches from the said small arches up to
the top of the window; a scene, I say, from the Old Testament, carved in
a kind of stone that is found in that district. Under the said windows,
on the fagade, there are certain words that are understood rather at
discretion than because they are either in good form or rightly written,
wherein there is read the date and in whose time this work was made. By
the hand of the same man, also, was the design of the Church of S.
Ciriaco in Ancona. Margaritone died at the age of seventy-seven,
disgusted, so it is said, to have lived so long, seeing the age changed
and the honors with the new craftsmen. He was buried in the Duomo
Vecchio without Arezzo, in a tomb of travertine, now gone to ruin in the
destruction of that church; and there was made for him this epitaph: HIC JACET
ILLE BONUS PICTURA MARGARITONUS, CUI
REQUIEM DOMINUS TRADAT UBIQUE PIUS. The
portrait of Margaritone, by the hand of Spinello, is in the Story of the
Magi, in the said Duomo, and was copied by me before that church was
pulled down.
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