Fra Bartolommeo

Fra Bartolommeo (re-edited by
Horace Shipp and Flora
Kendrick) [with accents]

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Fra Bartolommeo
by Leader Scott (Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora Kendrick)
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Title: Fra Bartolommeo
Author: Leader Scott (Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora
Kendrick)

Release Date: January, 2005 [EBook #7222] [Yes, we are more than
one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on March 27,
2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FRA
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FRA BARTOLOMMEO
By Leader Scott
Author Of "A Nook In The Apennines"
Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora Kendrick, A.R.B.S.

_The reproductions in this series are from official photographs of the
National Collections, or from photographs by Messrs. Andersen,
Alinari or Braun._

FOREWORD
Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael: the three great names of the noblest
period of the Renaissance take our minds from the host of fine artists
who worked alongside them. Nevertheless beside these giants a whole
host of exquisite artists have place, and not least among them the three
painters with whom Mr. Leader Scott has dealt in these pages. Fra
Bartolommeo linking up with the religious art of the preceding period,
with that of Masaccio, of Piero de Cosimo, his senior student in the
studio of Cosimo Roselli, and at last with that of the definitely
"modern" painters of the Renaissance, Raphael, Leonardo and
Michelangelo himself, is a transition painter in this supreme period.

Technique and the work of hand and brain are rapidly taking the place
of inspiration and the desire to convey a message. The aesthetic
sensation is becoming an end in itself. The scientific painters,
perfecting their studies of anatomy and of perspective, having a
conscious mastery over their tools and their mediums, are taking the
place of such men as Fra Angelico.
As a painter at this end of a period of transition--a painter whose
spiritual leanings would undoubtedly have been with the earlier men,
but whose period was too strong for him--Fra Bartolommeo is of
particular interest; and Albertinelli, for all the fiery surface difference
of his outlook is too closely bound by the ties of his friendship for the
Frate to have any other viewpoint.
Andrea del Sarto presents yet another phenomenon: that of the artist
endowed with all the powers of craftsmanship yet serving an end
neither basically spiritual nor basically aesthetic, but definitely
professional. We have George Vasari's word for it; and Vasari's blame
upon the extravagant and too-well-beloved Lucrezia. To-day we are so
accustomed to the idea of the professional attitude to art that we can
accept it in Andrea without concern. Not that other and earlier artists
were unconcerned with the aspect of payments. The history of Italian
art is full of quarrels and bickerings about prices, the calling in of
referees to decide between patron and painter, demands and refusals of
payment. Even the unworldly Fra Bartolommeo was the centre of such
quarrels, and although his vow of poverty forbade him to receive
money for his work, the order to which he belonged stood out firmly
for the scudi which the Frate's pictures brought them. In justice to
Andrea it must be added that this was not the only motive for his
activities; it was not without cause that the men of his time called him
"_senza errori_," the faultless painter; and the production of a vast
quantity of his work rather than good prices for individual pictures
made his art pay to the extent it did. A pot-boiler in masterpieces, his
works have place in every gallery of importance, and he himself stands
very close to the three greatest; men of the Renaissance.
Both Fra Bartolommeo and Albertinelli are little known in this country.
Practically nothing has been written about them and very few of their
works are in either public galleries or