Andrea Mantegna

Andrea Mantegna (v. 1431, Insulated di Carturo - September 13rd 1506, Mantoue) is a Italian painter of the Renaissance.

Biography

Mantegna, second wire of a poor logger named Biagio, is born with Isola di Carturo, close to Vicence in République of Venice. At the ten years age it enters like apprentice at Francesco Squarcione, with the head of an important workshop with Padoue. Like Pétrarque, its famous compatriot, Squarcione is impassioned by the ancient Rome: he travels in Italy (what is not difficult because he lived Padoue) and perhaps in Greece, and forms a collection of statues, Bas-relief S, vases, etc that he then opens with which wanted to study it and from which he makes him even drawings. Its pupils, as much as him, take part in works which are ordered to him. Not less than 137 painters and apprentices pass by his school, founded towards 1440, and which becomes famous in all Italy. Mantegna is its preferred disciple. Squarcione teaches him Latin and gives him to study fragments of Roman sculpture. It controls the Perspective.

At the 17 years age, Mantegna leaves Squarcione. Later, he will affirm that its former Master had used his work without paying it with his right measurement. Padoue attracts artists of Venezia but also of Tuscany and the early works of Mantegna are very marked by painters florentins such as Paolo Ucello, FRA Filippo Lippi or Donatello

Its first work, now lost, is a retable, intended for the church Santa Sofia (1448). The same year it is called with Nicolò Pizolo and two painters Venetian, Antonio Vivarini and Giovanni d' Alemagna, to work with the decoration of the Chapelle of Ovetari in the Abside of the church of Eremitani. A series of unforeseeable occurrences makes that Mantegna finishes only most of the work (which was almost entirely destroyed in the bombardments of Padoue in 1944). The most spectacular part of the cycle represented on the fresco is that where one saw, in prospect for bottom, holy Jacques led to the torment. The draft of this fresco survived. It is preliminary work with the oldest fresco which reached us and which we can compare with final work. In spite of the authentic aspect of this monument, it is not the copy of any known Roman structure. To equip its characters, Mantegna also adopts the models of Draperie wet Romans, which comes itself from a Greek invention, although the tended attitudes and the interactions are inspired by Donatello. The diagram shows obviously that naked figures are employed in the design of works at the beginning of the Rebirth. In the preparatory sketch, the prospect is however worked out and nearer from an average point of view. The prospect by below, allowing an implementation vaster and more effective also finds in the Holy Trinity with the Vierge, holy Jean and two givers. Ansuino, which collaborates with Mantegna for the vault of Ovetari, introduced its style into the school of painting of Forlì. Whereas the young man progresses in his studies, it is subject to the influence of Jacopo Bellini, father of the famous painters Giovanni and Gentile, and whose Nicolosia girl marries Mantegna in 1453. Among the other frescos of the Mantegna young person the two saints are who surmount the porch of entry of the church Sant' Antonio in Padoue (1452) and a retable showing holy Luc and other saints for the church of S. Giustina, maintaining with the Brera gallery Milan (1453). It is probable, however, that before this time some of the pupils of Squarcione, including Mantegna, already began this series of frescos in the vault S. Cristoforo of the church of the Ermite S of Saint-Augustin, now looked at like his chief of work. Squarcione, now carried to criticize, trouvae to be repeated on the first achievements of this series which illustrated the life of Jacques saint; he claims that the characters resemble stone men, and that it would have better been to give them the color of the stone.

Andrea seems to be influenced by the old precepts of its Masters; in the later subjects, legend of holy Christophe, it combines with its other promptness and natural nature qualities more. Accustomed as it is it to be studied the Marbre S and the severity of the ancient style, and recognizing openly that it regards ancient works as higher than nature, it makes an effort now with the precision of the feature, with the dignity of the idea and the character, which makes it tend towards a certain rigidity, and towards an austerity integrates rather than towards a pleasant sensitivity of the expression. Its draperies present powerful and narrow folds, being studied (one) on models draped out of paper and stuck fabrics say. Thin characters, any muscles and any bone, an impetuous action but with energy contained, a landscape with the colors deer, sand fact and where Galet S trail, here are which raises its style and gives him an athletic majesty. Never it changed this manner that it had adopted in Padoue; its coloring, at the neutral and undecided beginning, is reinforced and matures. There is in all its work more balance in the colors than of smoothness in the tonality. One of its broad objectives is the optical illusion, founded on the control of the prospect; and it reaches that point all alone, thanks to a hard work, even if on this point it does not reach the perfection and if it does not exceed absolutely only one makes then best. But the illusion of reality remains astonishing.

In spite of its success and the admiration whose it is the object, Mantegna leaves its native Padoue early and never returned there. One saw there the result of the hostility of Squarcione. It passes the remainder of its life to Vérone, Mantoue and Rome; one could not establish if it also resided at Venice and Florence. In Vérone, about 1459, it paints a large retable for the church San Zeno Maggiore, a Madone and angels, with four saints on each side.

Its life with Mantoue

For some time already, the marquis Louis III Gonzague, marquis de Mantoue Mantegna press to enter to its service; also the following year, in 1460, it is appointed artist of court. At the beginning it resides of time with other at Goito, but, as from December 1466, it even settles with its family with Mantoue. It receives wages of 75 liras per month, nap considerable for the time and which clearly indicates the high regard in which one holds his Article It is in fact the first painter among all those which were domiciled in Mantoue.

Its masterpiece carried out in this city is painted in the part of the castle of the city, now known under the name of Camera degli Sposi (Chambre of the Husbands) : a series of compositions including/understanding only frescos in only one part and showing various representations of the Gonzague family in their daily life. The decoration of the room is probably finished in 1474. The ten years which follow are not happy for Mantegna nor for Mantoue: its character becomes irritable, his/her Bernardino son dies, and also the marquis Louis III in 1478, his wife Barbara in 1481 as his successor Frederic I {{er}} '' Uneven the '' in 1484 (that which had made Mantegna knight). It is only with the advent of François II that the artistic orders for Mantoue begin again. It builds an imposing house in the vicinity of the church San Sebastiano, and decorates it with a multitude of paintings. One can still see this house today, but paintings disappeared. At that time, it starts to join together some ancient busts of Rome (which were given to Laurent de Médicis when the Florentin chief visited Mantoue in 1483), painted some architectural and decorative fragments, and completes its impressive saint Sebastien, now visible with the Louvre.

In 1488, Mantegna is called by the pope Innocent VIII to decorate with frescos the view-point of a vault to the the Vatican. This series of frescos, including a remarkable baptism of Christ, will be destroyed by Pie VI in 1780. The pope treats Mantegna less liberally than it was it at the court of Mantoue; but, with all to take, their agreement, which ceases in 1500, was by no means unfavorable for any of the two parts. Mantegna also meets celebrates it Turkish hostage Jem and studies the ancient monuments attentively, but the impression which the city leaves him is as a whole disappointing. Turned over to Mantoue in 1490, it takes again with force its more literary and bitterer vision of Antiquity, and binds closely with the new marchioness, Isabelle d' Este, cultivated and intelligent.

In what now is its city, it continues its work with nine paintings has moderated triumph of Jules César, which it probably began before his departure for Rome, and which it finishes around 1492. These compositions, superbly invented and carried out, radiant of all splendor of the main subject and the accessories, thanks to the traditional formation and with the enthusiasm of one of the great minds of its time, were always put in the forefront among work of Mantegna. Regarded as its work more completed, they are sold in 1628 with the major part of the treasures of art of Mantoue, and they will not be, like one generally says it, catch at the time of the bag of Mantoue in 1630, but today they remain extremely damaged by awkward coolings.

In spite of a declining health, Mantegna remains active. Among other work of the same period one finds the Madonna of the caves, holy Sebastien and Lamentation above Christ celebrates it dead , which it probably painted for his personal funerary vault. Another work of the last years of Mantegna is what is called the Madonna of the Victoire, maintaining in Louvre. She is painted with Tempera about 1495, in remembering the Bataille of Fornoue whose exit is debatable but that François II wished to show like a victory of the Italian league; the church which in the beginning sheltered this table was built according to the plans even of Mantegna. ] The Madonna is represented here in company of several saints, the holy archangel Michel and Maurice saint which holds his coat to him, under the prolongation of which François II is held with knees, in a rich person profusion garlands and other ornaments. Independently of its perfection in the execution, this work counts obviously among most beautiful and more attaching works of Mantegna where qualities of beauty and seduction are often excluded, with the profit of the rigorous continuation of these other ideals more appropriate to its serious genius: the tension of energy expressing itself in a passion hagarde.

Starting from 1497 Mantegna is charged by Isabelle d' Este with transposing the mythological topics sung by the poet of court Paride Ceresara in the paintings intended for its private apartment (studiolo) with the Ducal Palate. These paintings are dispersed during the following years: one of them, the legend of Comus God, was left unfinished by Mantegna and was finished by Costa de Lorenzo, which succeeded to him as painter of court with Mantoue.

After the death of his wife, Mantegna has at a advanced age a natural son, Giovanni Andrea; and towards the end, although it continues to launch out in all kinds of expenditure, it knows serious troubles, like the exile of Mantoue of his Francesco son, who had attracted himself the ire of the marquis. It is possible that the old Master, lit expert, regarded as hardly less tragic lasts it required to separate from an ancient bust of Faustina than it liked much.

Very little time after this sale, it dies in Mantoue, the September 13rd 1506. In 1516, a superb monument is placed in its honor by its sons in the church Sant' Andrea, where it had painted the retable of the funeral vault. The dome was decorated by Corrège.

The engraver

Mantegna less not shone as engraver, even if it is a question rather difficult to study, partly because it forever did not sign nor gone back any to its plates, except only once, in 1472, and the fact is disputed. The list which reached us would show that Mantegna began the Gravure in Rome, encouraged to do it by engravings which the Florentin Baccio Baldini had carried out after Sandro Botticelli; one can nothing oppose to this list if it is not that it would date engravings that Mantegna made, many and worked out, of the sixteen or seventeen last years of its life, which seems well little of time, without counting that the oldest engravings point out the beginnings of its artistic style. It was suggested that it would have started to engrave whereas it was always in Padoue, by receiving the teaching of a distinguished goldsmith, Niccolò. It engraved approximately fifty plates, according to the usual account; some thirty of them are generally regarded as indisputable, they often large, are filled characters and remarkably studied. Certain experts, however, recently asked to limit to seven the number of its authentic engravings, which seems not very reasonable. Among the principal examples one quotes Roman triumphs, a orgiaque festival, Hercules and Antée, the marine gods, Judith with the head of Holopherne, the Deposition, the Setting with the Tomb, Resurrection, the Man of Pains, the Virgin in a cave. Mantegna was sometimes credited with the important invention of engraving on copper to the graver. This attribution is difficult to support if account of the dates is taken, but in any case it is him which introduced this technique in septentrional Italy. It is supposed that several of its engravings were carried out using a metal less hard than copper. Its own technique and that of its pupils are characterized by the strongly marked shapes of the drawing, and by the hatchings of oblique form to mark the shades. One often finds the tests in two different editions. In the first case the tests were carried out with the roller, or even by manual pressure, and they are slightly tinted; in the second case one used the press, and ink is marked.

Place de Mantegna and heritage

Giorgio Vasari, in its work Quickly the , speaks in praise of Mantegna, in spite of some reserves on the man. He is very of course with his comrades when he learns the trade with Padoue and preserves solid bonds of friendship with two of them: Dario da Trevigi and Marco Zoppo. Mantegna takes practices of what causes him sometimes financial problems and it must sometimes take advantage of its rights near the marquis.

By the solidity of its taste for Antiquity, Mantegna exceeds all its contemporaries. Though it is limited essentially to the 15th century, the influence of Mantegna is very clear on the style and the tendencies of all the Italian art of its time. It is obvious on the first works of Giovanni Bellini, her brother-in-law. Albrecht Dürer was subject to the influence of its style during its two voyages in Italy. Léonard de Vinci took of Mantegna the decorative reasons with festoons and fruits.

One considers that the principal contribution of Mantegna is the introduction of the space illusionnism, so much in the frescos than in paintings of “ Sacra Conversazione ”: its influence in the decoration of the ceilings continued during almost three centuries. Starting from the ceiling in Trompe-l'oeil of the Room of the Husbands , Corrège developed the searchs for that which had been its Master and his collaborator in the development of prospects, leading to the masterpiece which is the dome of the cathedral of Parma.

Principal works

the worship of the shepherds (about 1415-1453) - Moderated on fabric transferred starting from wood, 40 cm X 55.6 cm, Metropolitan Museum off Art, New York
Crucifixion on wood (1457-1459) -, 67 cm X 93 cm, Musée of Louvre, Paris
Agonie with the Garden of the Olive-trees (about 1459) - Moderated on wood, 63 cm X 80 cm, National Gallery, London
Portrait of the cardinal Lodovico Trevisano, (about 1459-1469) - Moderated on wood, 44 cm X 33 cm, Staatliche Museen, Berlin
Retable of San Luca (1453) - Panel, 177 cm X 230 cm, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
Dormition (about 1461) - Panel, 54 cm X 42 cm, Museum of Prado, Madrid
Portrait of a man (about 1460) - Wood, National Gallery off Art, Washington
Presentation with the Temple (about 1460-1466) - Moderated on wood, 67 cm X 86 cm, Staatliche Museen, Berlin
Madone with the child deadened (about 1465-1470) - oil on fabric, 43cm X 32 cm, Staatliche Museen, Berlin
Holy Georges (about 1460) - Moderated on panel, 66 cm X 32 cm, Galerie of the Academy, Venice
Retable of San Zeno (1457-1460) - Panel, 480 cm X 450 cm, San Zeno, Vérone
Saint Sebastien (about 1457-1459) - wood, 68 cm X 30 cm, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
Saint Sebastien - Panel, 255 cm X 140 cm, Louvre, Paris
Portrait of Charles de Médicis (about 1467) - Moderated on panel, 40.6 cm X 29.5 cm, Uffizi, Florence
the Madonna with Chérubin (about 1485) - panel, 88 cm X 70 cm, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
Triumphs of César (about 1486) - Hampton Court De luxe hotel, England
Lamentation on Christ dead (about 1490) - Moderated on fabric, 68 cm X 81 cm, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
Madone of the caves (1489-1490) - Uffizi, Florence
Saint Sebastien (1490) - Ca of Oro, Venice
Madone of the Victoire (1495) - softening, 285 cm X 168 cm, Louvre, Paris
Holy Family (about 1495-1500) - Moderated on fabric, 75.5 cm X 61,5 cm, Galerie of Dresden.
Judith and Holopherne (1495) - Moderated with egg on wood, National Gallery off Art, Washington, D.C
Minerve driving out the Defects of the garden of the Virtue (about 1502) - Oil on fabric, 160cm X 192 cm, Louvre, Paris
Parnassus (Mars and Venus) (1497) - Fabric, 160 cm X 192 cm, Louvre, Paris
the Descent in the limbs was allocated to the biddings, in January 2003 in New York, for 28 million $.

See also the Ovetari vault and the Room of the Husbands of Mantoue. See also the article on its representations of St Sebastien.

Reference

Janson, H.W., Janson, Anthony F. History off Art . Harry NR. Abrams, Inc., Publishers. 6th edition. January 1st, 2005. ISBN 0131828959

Sources

See too

the signature of Mantegna in its tables and its evolution. Daniel Arasse: Chapter Signed mantegna in the subject in the table - Tests of analytical iconography , Flammarion (1997)

Internal bonds

Giorgio Vasari quotes it and describes its biography in Quickly the
Mural
Fresque
Trompe-l'oeil

External bonds

educational on Mantegna and the St-Sebastien of Louvre (site with nonlucrative goal)

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