Home	Piero della Francesca: The Life of Piero della Francesca, Painter from Borgo San Sepolcro [c.1420-1492]
	FRANCESCA, PIERO DELLA (c. 1416-1492), from Borgo San Sepolcro, was always regarded as the head of the Umbrian School but has only recently been recognised as one of the greatest of all Italian painters. He succeeded in solving all the representational problems of his time and in particular in uniquely synthesizing the pictorial vision of the Venetians and the plastic sense of the Florentines. There is no doubt that he was aided by his stay in Florence and by his teacher, Domenico Veneziano, who made him familiar with the way in which light reveals form. But Piero went far beyond his master by observing the effect of sunlight and painting it in bright, cool colours (the 'Baptism of Christ' in London; the 'Resurrection', Borgo San Sepolcro) -- particularly in the lightly indicated landscapes of the background (portraits of Duke Federigo da Montefeltro and his wife in the Uffizi). This ability is also evident in his frescoes in S. Francesco in Rimini, and particularly so in the great cycle of St Francis in Arezzo, where in his 'Constantine's Dream', he for the first time produces in a fresco a credible version of nocturnal illumination. He was a great master of perspective, on which subject he published a book. He chose compositions of masterly simplicity. His figures, with their statuesque bearing, are both serious and dignified and have therefore the same true monumentality that we find at an earlier date in Masaccio and -- earlier still -- in Giotto . When Giotto, the greatest master of Gothic painting in Italy, introduced 'space' into his pictures, he took the first step towards a fundamental change in the artist's mode of expression. A century later, Masaccio painted figures that stand out almost three-dimensionally from a background which has 'depth' and actuality. Masaccio's Northern contemporaries, the brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck, on their famous Ghent altar, set the 'Adoration of the Lamb' against an extensive landscape. The new realism of the Renaissance, then, found expression in painting in two quite separate areas -in Florence and in the Flemish cities. Masaccio continued in the tradition of the Italian fresco painting, the brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck  drew their inspiration mainly from Burgundian miniature painting. The new flourishing art of panel painting in the Netherlands owed its intensely glowing colours to illuminated manuscripts. The colours are mixed with oil and applied to oak panels -- these having previously been covered with chalk -- in several layers and thus acquire their warm glow. This technique also enables the most delicate nuances of colour to be lent to the smallest detail. Such selfless devotion to the most insignificant features and a close relationship with nature are characteristic of the painters of the Netherlands. Their way of using colour led to the discovery of atmospheric perspective, in which the colours, from the dark brown in the foreground, by way of green, to misty blue in the distance, lead the eye into the picture and thereby create an illusion of depth. Italian painting since Masaccio achieved these effects above all through Brunelleschi's linear perspective. Masaccio's figures, recalling Giotto in their powerful monumentality, stand out with great clarity in front of the recession of the scenery. While Giotto's figures still resemble those in a relief, Masaccio's seem about to step out of their frames as do Donatello's statues from their niches. They create such a powerful impression, even to-day still, that we can understand Vasari's claim that 'everything made before Masaccio looked as if it was painted, but that everything made by him was alive, true and natural.' Masaccio's emphasis on the representation of the human figure resulted, in the case of his successors, in pictures of an increasingly secular character. Renaissance artists rejoiced in the beauty and abundance of the earth and paid more and more attention to the landscape in the background. Saints become human beings who, like St Jerome in his cell, were now shown in their home surroundings. Figures are no longer shown in varying sizes -- as was the custom of medieval artists -- according to their rank. All are now equally important and appear in correct size in relation to each other. The saints in 'Santa Conversazione' are no longer grouped according to iconographic rules, but in natural attitudes, indeed informally conversing. The Coronation of the Virgin becomes a festive spectacle in the delightful and almost gay paintings of the artist-monk Filippo Lippi. The procession of the Three Kings is turned into a gaily-coloured picture of a hunting trip of the Medici family, in the hands of Benozzo Gozzoli. These painters of 'narrative' pictures used Masaccio's discoveries, without however developing them any further. This was left to another group of artists. Amongst them was Paolo Uccello, who tried to solve the problems of perspective foreshortening; Andrea del Castagno, who translated Donatello's energetic gesture and dramatic realism from sculpture into painting, which hitherto had been characterized by calm precision; and Domenico Veneziano, who experimented with new techniques, such as the use of oil to bind his colours and with the effect of light on his compositions. The Umbrian artist Piero della Francesca carried the experiments of these three Florentine innovators further and, above all, elaborated on Domenico's discoveries of light. Light seems to suffuse his almost transparent colours -- although no source of light is indicated -- and bridges the gap between the picture's foreground and background. The figures are no longer crowded together in the foreground as if they were on a stage, but are distributed in groups extending well into the background which is seen as a continuous landscape. Here the influence of Dutch oil painting is already very noticeable. The fame of the artists of the Netherlands had already reached Florence, the brothers van Eyck and their generation having been followed by Rogier van der Weyden, who no longer paid loving attention to detail but concentrated on expression in his figures and on dramatic composition. He visited Italy in 1450 and probably painted several pictures there. So deep an impression did they make that Francesco Sforza, the Duke of Milan, sent the painter Bugatti to Brussels as much as ten years later to serve as van der Weyden's apprentice. Italian merchants now ordered altar-pieces from Bruges through their agents. Tommaso Portinari, the representative of the Medici family, commissioned Hugo van der Goes in 1472 to paint a large altar with an Adoration, which caused a great stir in Florence. Hans Memlinc's altar-piece, 'The Last Judgment', was 'captured' on its journey to Italy by Paul Beneke, a native of Danzig (the picture hung in the Marienkirche there until the end of the last war). But patrons were not content merely to order paintings, they induced the Dutch and Flemish painters to come South. In 1468, Joos van Wassenhove of Ghent, called by the Italians Justus of Ghent, came to the court of the Dukes of Urbino, where he painted the frescoes in the Duke's palace together with Melozzo da Forli. The art of the Netherlands also reached Italy in another way. Sicily and southern Italy having been under the rule of the House of Aragon since 1442, Spanish painting, like that of the rest of Europe, was greatly influenced by the art of the Netherlands. Rogier van der Weyden was entrusted with many important commissions by the Spanish Court. The Sicilian master Antonello da Messina now also learned how to apply the Northern technique of oil painting; this knowledge he brought to Venice in 1475. The brothers Bellini combined Northern mastery of colours with Italian vision and technique and thus laid the foundation for the great flowering of Venetian art. The painters of the second half of the century completed the early Quattrocento's 'discovery of the World and of Man'. Careful anatomical studies lent authenticity to representations of the human body. The Florentine painter Pollaiuolo was the first artist to dissect corpses in order to acquaint himself with the human organism. Painting from the nude model was the logical outcome of such anatomical studies. Allegorical themes from classical mythology -- introduced by the Humanists -- provided welcome subjects. Such pictures now began to appear upon walls of private houses, and their popularity grew. Sandro Botticelli, the court painter of the Medici, invested the figures of legend and mythology with a dreamlike life in his harmonious compositions. Signorelli was bold enough to introduce nude figures into his frescoes, which were characterised by a dramatic intensity in their execution. Like Andrea Mantegna, Signorelli was a master of perspective, which both painters used for the most daring foreshortening effects. The delineation of space in depth had been mastered completely by the end of the century and a representation of the human form was no longer a problem. The Flemish painters of the second half of the century, too, sought in practice to make the most of the discoveries of their predecessors. Many of these painters were not Flemings, but went to settle in Bruges. Dirk Bouts came from Haarlem, Hans Memlinc from the region of Frankfurt-am-Main, Gerard David from Oudewater. For them, as for Hugo van der Goes, the smallest detail needs to be portrayed with a loving care and a pious devotion that recognises the hand of the Creator even in the smallest and most insignificant object; nor does this entail -- especially in the case of David -- any sacrifice of over-all dramatic effect. But the work of the great individualist Hieronymus Bosch shows that this world of medieval piety was already overshadowed and convulsed by fears and doubts. Bosch gives free rein to a daring and bizarre imagination and a profound pessimism, so that his pictures evoke a veritable witches' sabbath. The Quattrocento's down-to-earth search for truth was transfigured during the High Renaissance and found expression in a new idealism. Masaccio's saints, it will be recalled, looked like honest peasants or small traders, while Filippo Lippi even used simple women from among the common people as models for his Madonnas. These were now no longer considered adequate. Raphael wrote to Count Castiglione in 1516, 'To paint a beautiful woman, I would have to see more beautiful women . . . but since there are so few beautiful women and competent judges of beauty, I use the ideal picture of a woman that I carry in my mind'. The 'realistic model' is replaced by the 'certa idea', a figure of the imagination representing a timeless ideal of beauty. Since artists have by now learned precisely how to paint or draw the human body in motion, slavish copying of nature is no longer necessary. The painter can adapt reality to his concept of a perfect picture. The Quattrocento saw the human figure either clearly and sharply outlined in an attitude of calm and repose (Masaccio, Piero della Francesca), or advancing in a lively manner ( Mantegna, Signorelli). The High Renaissance sought a harmonious balance between the two attitudes. Each movement is offset by another movement, all straight and hard outlines merged into the curved, flowing lines of the human body. The figures no longer stand by themselves but are arranged in the form of a pyramid, the 'Figura Piramidale', the base of which extends well into the picture. But larger groups, too, are arranged in geometric patterns. Leonardo's famous fresco of the 'Last Supper' in the convent of Maria delle Grazie in Milan shows the Apostles in four groups of three, each set of three occupying a fifth of the length of one side of the table, while the fifth in the middle is filled by the figure of Christ. 'Sfumato', the veil-like merging of from and colour, gave Leonardo a means to link the different background bases: 'Between light and shade there is an intermediate state, something twofold, belonging to both, resembling a light shadow or a dark light. This it is that you must seek, for it holds the secret of perfect beauty.' The light in the pictures of the Quattrocento was evenly distributed. Leonardo set brightly illuminated planes and points of light against sections that are bathed in deep shadow. He thereby achieved a loosening of the all too rigid character of the perspective. The landscapes in the background also no longer comprise an assortment of individual features, but are treated as an entity. The composition is studied in many sketches, until every object accurately fits into a predetermined plan based on spacial and surface diagonals. Even the colours are now balanced to fit into the concept of the picture, the 'certa idea'. Leonardo's and Raphael's paintings have attained that complete interpenetration of reality and imagination, that balance of parts demanded by Alberti when he wrote, 'the state of perfection has been reached when not the smallest part can be changed without destroying the beauty of the whole.' Michelangelo regarded such a complete balance as no more than a transition stage. This sculptor amongst painters, who held that 'the more relief there is in painting, the better,' was above all concerned with man and his strivings and his passions. Unlike Leonardo, he was not interested in uniting man and nature through his art. His tremendous frescoes in the Sistine Chapel, particularly 'The Last Judgment' and the scenes from the Old Testament, such as the 'Creation of Adam,' break through the newly-found harmonious balance of Renaissance art. These works already show the power and movement of the Baroque, and Michelangelo has for this reason been called the 'Father of Baroque'.