An Acute Freshness of Observation

Lorenzo Lotto - Angel Annunciating - 1527 - Oil on wood, 75 x 55 cm (30 x 22 in.) - Church of Sts Vincent and Alexander, Ponteranica (click photo for larger image)According to the first art historian (and painter) Giorgio Vasari, Lorenzo Lotto ( 1480-c. 1556) trained with Giorgione and Titian, in the studio of Giovanni Bellini. But he worked in many places apart from Venice, had an idiosyncratic style, and stands somewhat apart from the central Venetian tradition. His rootless existence reflects his anxious, difficult temperament and his work is extremely uneven. It draws on a wide variety of sources, from Northern Europe as well as Italy, but at the same time shows acute freshness of observation. This work is an outstanding example of how original, poetic, and simultaneously strange his work could be.

Highly Charged Emotionalism

Rosso - Moses Defending the Daughter of Jethro - c. 1523 - Oil on canvas, 160 x 117 cm (64 x 46.8 in.) - Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence“Il Rosso” (c. 1495-1540) (called so for his red hair) was an exponent of the expressive style that is often called early, or Florentine, Mannerism, and was also one of the founders of the Fontainebleau school. Vasari says that he 'would not bind himself to any master' (a story that fits in with his individuality of temperament). But in his youth he learned the most from Andrea del Sarto, and together with Andrea's pupil Pontormo (Rosso's friend and close contemporary) he was one of the leading figures in the early development of Mannerism. The earliest works of Rosso and Pontormo combined influences from Michelangelo and from northern Gothic engravings in a novel style, which departed from the tenets of High Renaissance art and was characterized by its highly charged emotionalism. Rosso's work was quite sophisticated and varied in mood. At the end of 1523, Rosso moved to Rome, where his exposure to Michelangelo's Sistine ceiling, the late art of Raphael, and the work of Parmigianino resulted in an even more radical realignment of his style.

“Il Mecherino"

Beccafumi - Tanaquil - 1519 – Siena - Oil on wood, 92 x 53 cm (36.8 x 21.2 in.) - National Gallery, LondonDomenico Beccafumi (c. 1486-1551) was a Sienese Mannerist painter. Originally named Domenico di Pace, and also called “Il Mecherino", he took the name Beccafumi from his patron, a wealthy Sienese who sent him to study in Siena and Rome. He was, with Parmigianino, the most interesting of the non-Florentine Mannerist painters, and the last of the great Sienese painters. A member of the High Renaissance generation, his years in Rome (1510-12) saw the painting of Raphael's Stanze and Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling, both of which influenced him.

The Nativity

Lorenzo Lotto - “Nativity” - 1523 - Oil on wood, 46 x 36 cm - National Gallery of Art, Washington (click photo for larger image)Lorenzo Lotto was an Italian painter well known for his elegant and mystical paintings of religious subjects. He represents one of the best examples of a fruitful relationship between the Venetian and Central Italian Schools. In this work, “[t]he pastoral mood, asymmetrical design, and complex spatial arrangements are typical Venetian variants on a traditional theme. Most unusual are the crucifix behind, and the mousetrap, on which the artist has signed his name, in the lower right corner.” The crucifix was added later by the artist, and represents a Venetian tendency to combine the Birth of Christ and the final moment of the Redemption into one image.

Michelangelo’s Revenge

Michelangelo - Last Judgment - 1537-41 - Fresco, 1370 x 1220 cm - Cappella Sistina, Vatican

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (6 March 1475 – 18 February 1564). When discussing Michelangelo’s “Last Judgment” fresco, the Vatican’s Master of Ceremonies, Biagio da Cesena, said, “it was mostly disgraceful that in so sacred a place there should have been depicted all those nude figures, exposing themselves so shamefully, and that it was no work for a papal chapel but rather for the public baths and taverns.”

Detail (click photo for larger image)Taking his revenge, Michelangelo painted him into the lower right corner of the painting as Minos, the mythological king of Crete who, after death, became one of the three judges of hell, with a snake coiled around him. The artist said,“What spirit is so empty and blind, that it cannot recognize the fact that the foot is more noble than the shoe, and skin more beautiful than the garment with which it is clothed?” 

Detail (click photo for larger image)Despite his point of view, however, at Trent, a month before Michelangelo’s death, it was decided that the fresco should be “amended” by Daniele da Volterra, to paint loincloths and veils onto all of the figures in the Last Judgment, earning him the nickname “Il Braghetonne”, literally meaning “the breeches maker”. Some of those have since been removed.