BERNARDINO

LUINI (?1465-?154o)  , the most celebrated master of the Lombard school of painting founded upon the style of Leonardo da Vinci, was born at Luino, a village on Lago Maggiore . He wrote his name as " Bernardin Lovino," but the spelling " Luini " is now generally adopted . Few facts are known regarding his life, and until a comparatively recent date many even of his works had, in the lapse of years and laxity of attribution, got assigned to Leonardo da Vinci . It appears that Luini studied painting at Vercelli under Giovenone, or perhaps under Stephano Scotto . He reached Milan either after the departure of Da Vinci in 15oo, or shortly before that event; it is thus uncertain whether or not the two artists had any personal acquaintance, but Luini was at any rate in the painting-school established in Milan by the great Florentine . In the later works of Luini a certain influence from the style of Raphael is superadded to that, far more prominent and fundamental, from the style of Leonardo; but there is nothing to show that he ever visited Rome . His two sons are the only pupils who have with confidence been assigned to him; and even this can scarcely be true of the younger, who was born in 1530, when Bernardino was well advanced in years . Guadenzio Ferrari has also been termed his disciple . One of the sons, EN angelista, has left little which can now be identified; the other, Aurelio, was accomplished in perspective and landscape work . There was likewise a brother of Bernardino, named Ambrogio, a competent painter . Bernardino, who hardly ever left Lombardy, had some merit as a poet, and is said to have composed a treatise on painting . The precise date of his death is unknown; he may perhaps have survived till about 1540 .

A serene, contented and happy mind, naturally expressing itself in forms of

grace and beauty, seems stamped upon all the works of Luini . The same character is traceable in his portrait, painted in an upper group in his fresco of " Christ crowned with Thorns " in the Ambrosian library in Milan —a venerable bearded personage . The only anecdote which has been preserved of him tells a similar tale . It is said that for the single figures of saints in the church at Saronno he received a sum equal to 22 francs per day, along with wine, bread and lodging; and he was so well satisfied with this remuneration that, in completing the commission, he painted a Nativity for nothing . A dignified suavity is the most marked characteristic of Luini's works . They are constantly beautiful, with a beauty which depends at least as much upon the loving self-withdrawn expression as upon the mere refinement and attractiveness of form . This quality of expression appears in all Luini's productions, whether secular or sacred, and imbues the latter with a peculiarly religious grace—not ecclesiastical unction, but the devoutness of the heart . His heads, while extremely like those painted by Leonardo, have less subtlety and involution and less variety of expression, but fully as much amenity . He began indeed with a somewhat dry style, as in the " Pieta " in the church of the Passione; but this soon developed into the quality which distinguishes all his most renowned works; although his execution, especially as regards modelling, was never absolutely equal to that of Leonardo . Luini's paintings do not exhibit an impetuous style of execution, and certainly not a negligent one; yet it appears that he was in fact a very rapid worker, as his picture of the " Crowning with Thorns," painted for the College del S . Sepolcro, and containing a large number of figures, is recorded to have occupied him only thirty-eight days, to which an assistant added eleven . His method was simple and expeditious, the shadows being painted with the pure colour laid on thick, while the lights are of the same colour thinly used, and mixed with a little white .

The frescoes exhibit more freedom of

hand than the oil pictures; and they are on the whole less like the work of Da Vinci, having at an early date a certain resem- Luini's colouring is mostly rich, and his light and shade forcible . Among his principal works the following are to be mentioned . At Saronno are frescoes painted towards 1525, representing the life of the Madonna—her " Marriage," the " Presentation of the Infant Saviour in the Temple," the Adoration of the Magi " and other incidents . His own portrait appears in the subject of the youthful " Jesus with the Doctors in the Temple." This series—in which some comparatively archaic details occur, such as gilded nimbuses—was partly repeated from one which Luini had executed towards 1520 in S . Croce . In the Brera Gallery, Milan, are frescoes from the suppressed church of La Pace and the Convent della Pelucca—the former treating subjects from the life of the Virgin, the latter, of a classic kind, more decorative in manner . The subject of girls playing at the game of " hot-cockles," and that of three angels depositing St Catherine in her sepulchre, are particularly memorable, each of them a work of perfect charm and grace in its way . In the Casa Silva, Milan, are frescoes from Ovid's Metamorphoses . The Monastero Maggiore of Milan (or church of S . Maurizio) is a noble treasure-house of Luini's art—including a large Crucifixion, with about one hundred and forty figures; " Christ bound to the Column," between figures of Saints Catherine and Stephen, and the founder of the chapel kneeling before Catherine; the martyrdom of this saint; the " Entombment of Christ," and a large number of other subjects . In the Ambrosian library is the fresco (already mentioned), covering one entire wall of the Sala della S . Corona, of " Christ crowned with Thorns," with two executioners, and on each side six members of a confraternity; in the same building the " Infant Baptist playing with a Lamb "; in ,the Brera, the " Virgin Enthroned, with Saints (dated 1521); in the Louvre, the " Daughter of Herodias receiving the Head of the Baptist " i in the Esterhazy Gallery, Vienna, the " Virgin between .

Saints Catherine and

Barbara "; in the National Gallery, London, " Christ disputing with the Doctors " (or rather, perhaps, the Pharisees) . Many or most of these gallery pictures used to pass for the handiwork of Da Vinci . The same is the case with the highly celebrated " Vanity and Modesty " in the Sciarra Palace, Rome, which also may nevertheless in all probability be assigned to Luini . Another singularly beautiful picture by him is in the Royal Palace in Milan—a large composition of " Women Bathing." That Luini was also pre-eminent as a decorative artist is shown by his works in the Certosa of Pavia . A good account of Luini by Dr G . C . Williamson was published in 1900 . (W . M .