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GAUDENZIO FERRARI (1484-1549)

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Originally appearing in Volume V10, Page 285 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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GAUDENZIO See also:

FERRARI (1484-1549)  , See also:Italian painter and sculptor, of the Milanese, or more strictly the Piedmontese, school, was See also:born at Valduggia, See also:Piedmont, and is said (very dubiously) to have learned the elements of See also:painting at See also:Vercelli from See also:Girolamo Giovenone . He next studied in See also:Milan, in the school of Scotto, and some say of See also:Luini; towards 1504 he proceeded to See also:Florence, and afterwards (it used to be alleged) to See also:Rome . His pictorial See also:style may be considered as derived mainly from the old Milanese school, with a considerable tinge of the See also:influence of Da See also:Vinci, and later on of See also:Raphael; in his See also:personal manner there was something of the See also:demonstrative and fantastic . The gentler qualities diminished, and the stronger intensified, as he progressed . By 1524 he was at Varallo in Piedmont, and here, in the See also:chapel of the Sacro See also:Monte, the See also:sanctuary"of the Piedmontese pilgrims, he executed his most memorable See also:work . This is a See also:fresco of the Crucifixion, with a multitude of figures, no less than twenty-six of them being modelled in actual See also:relief, and coloured; on the vaulted See also:ceiling are eighteen lamenting angels, powerful in expression . Other leading examples are the following . In the Royal See also:Gallery, See also:Turin, a " Pieta," an able See also:early work . In the Brera Gallery, Milan, " St Katharine miraculously preserved from the See also:Torture of the See also:Wheel," a very characteristic example, hard and forcible in See also:colour, thronged in See also:composition, turbulent in emotion; also several frescoes, chiefly from the See also:church of See also:Santa Maria della See also:Pace, three of them being from the See also:history of See also:Joachim and See also:Anna . In the See also:cathedral of Vercelli, the See also:choir, the " Virgin with Angels and See also:Saints under an See also:Orange See also:Tree." In the See also:refectory of See also:San See also:Paolo, the " Last Supper." In the church of San Cristoforo, the See also:transept (in 1532-1535), a See also:series of paintings in which See also:Ferrari's See also:scholar Lanini assisted him; by Ferrari himself are the " See also:Birth of the Virgin," the " See also:Annunciation," the " Visitation," the " See also:Adoration of the Shepherds and See also:Kings," the " Crucifixion," the " See also:Assumption of the Virgin," all full of See also:life and decided See also:character, though somewhat mannered, In tie Louvre, " St See also:Paul Meditating." In Varallo, See also:convent of the Minorites (1507), a " Presentation in the See also:Temple," and " See also:Christ .among the Doctors," and (after 1510) the " History of Christ," in twenty-one subjects; also an See also:ancona in six compartments, named the " Ancona di San Gaudenzio." In Santa Maria di See also:Loreto, near Varallo (after 1527), an " Adoration." In the church of See also:Saronno, near Milan, the See also:cupola (1535), a " See also:Glory of Angels," in which the beauty of the school of Da Vinci alternates with bravura of foreshortenings in the mode of See also:Correggio . In Milan, Santa Maria delle Grazie (1542) , the " Scourging of Christ," an " Ecce Homo " and a " Crucifixion." The " Scourging," or else a " Last Supper," in the Passione of Milan (unfinished), is regarded as Ferrari's latest work . He was a very prolific painter, distinguished by strong expression, animation and fulness of composition, and abundant invention; he was skilful in painting horses, and his decisive rather hard colour is marked by a partiality for shot tints in drapery .

In See also:

general character, his work appertains more to the 15th than the 16th See also:century . His subjects were always of the sacred See also:order . Ferrari's See also:death took See also:place in Milan . Besides Lanini, already mentioned, See also:Andrea See also:Solario, Giambattista della Cerva and See also:Fermo Stella were three of his See also:principal scholars . He is represented to us as a See also:good See also:man, attached to his See also:country and his See also:art, jovial and sometimes facetious, but an enemy of See also:scandal . The reputation which he enjoyed soon after his death was very See also:great, but it has not fully stood the test of See also:time . Lomazzo went so far as to place him seventh among the seven See also:prime painters of See also:Italy . See G . Bordiga, two See also:works concerning Gaudenzio Ferrari (1821 and 1835); G . See also:Colombo, Vita ed opere di Gaudenzio Ferrari (1881); Ethel Halsey, Gaudenzio Ferrari (in the series Great Masters, 1904) . There was another painter nearly contemporary with Gaudenzio, Difendente Ferrari, also of the Lombard school . His celebrity is by no means equal to that of Gaudenzio; but Kugler (1887, as edited by See also:Layard) pronounced him to be " a good and See also:original colourist, and the best artist that Piedmont has produced." (W .

M .

End of Article: GAUDENZIO FERRARI (1484-1549)
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