Page:Bryan's dictionary of painters and engravers, volume 1.djvu/445

 and children, in which to something of the grace of Albani, he added a more elevated character.

CIGNANI, Felice, the son and scholar of Carlo Cignani, was born at Bologna in 1660. Under the able instruction of his father, and endowed with a natural disposition for the art, he became a painter of considerable abilitj'. Enriched by an ample fortune left him by his father, he appears to have exercised the art rather as his inclination prompted him, than as a regular professor. In the Church of the Carit4 at Bologna is a picture by him of the ' Virgin and Infant Jesus, with St. Joseph, and St. Anthony of Padua;' and at the Cappuccini, a much-admired picture of ' St. Frincis receiving the Stigmata.' He died in 1724.

CIGNANI, Paolo, the nephew and scholar of Carlo Cignani, was born at Bologna in 1709. Lanzi mentions in favourable terms a picture by this painter at Savignano, ' St. Francis appearing to St. Joseph of Copertino.' The subject is represented by candle-light with a fine effect ; the figures are well designed in the style of the antique. He died in 1764.

CIGNAROLI, GlAMBETTiNO, was bom at Salo, near Verona, in 1706. He first studied under Santo Prunato at Venice, but gained further improve- ment by travelling -in the Venetian States and Lombardy, and by copying the works of Paolo Veronese and Correggio. He may be ranked among the best painters of the modern Venetian school. Although he was invited to several of the courts in Italy, he preferred a residence at Venice. At Pontreraoli is an admirable picture by him of 'St. Francis receiving the Stigmata.' Lanzi extols as one of his finest pictures the ' Flight into Egypt,' in Sant' Antonio Abbate, at Parma. The grave and dignified beauty of the Virgin, and the angelic character of the cherubs that are their guides, partake of the charming ex- pression of Carlo Maratti, although unequal to that master in unity of effect and harmony of colouring. His backgrounds are ingeniously composed of well-chosen architecture and pleasing landscape, and his subjects, usually devout, are enlivened by groups of cherubs and angels, which he introduced with the happiest effect. He was the founder, and in 1769 the director, of the Academy at Verona. He died at Verona, in 1770. Among his principal works are:

Madrid. Museum. Assumption of the Virgin. Venice. Gallery. The Death of Rachel {a replica U in the Lille Jfuseum). Verona. Museum. The Triumph of Pomponius. „ Cathedral. The Transfiguration. Vienna. Gallery. Madonna and Child, with SS. Ottilia and Peter Martyr.

CIGNAROLI, iLA.KTlNO, was bom at Verona in 1649, and studied in the school of Carpioni, under whom he became an able artist in landscapes of an easel size. He died at Milan in 1726.

His brother, Pieteo Cignaroli, who was also a painter, was bom at Verona in 1665, and died at Milan in 1720.

CIGNAROLI, SciPiONE, the son of Martino, re- ceived his first instruction from his father, and afterwards went to Rome, where he became a scholar of Tempesta. He was a successful imitator of the style of his master, and of the works of G. Poussin and Salvator Rosa. His pictures are chiefly at Milan and Turin.

CIGOLI. See Cardi.

CIUA DA COSEGLIANO. See CONEGLIANO.

CIMABUE, Giovanni, who was of a noble family, was born at Florence in 1240. He is extolled by Vasari as having shed the first light on the art of painting, and the title of the ' Father of Modem Painting ' has been bestowed upon him. Most writers, however, now agree in regarding him as the last of the old, rather than the first of the new, line of painters in Italy; for although he undoubtedly infused a certain amount of new life into the old wom-out types, he never quite rid himself of the dismal asceticism of the Byzantine School, and therefore can scarcely be placed on a level with his great contemporary Niocolo Pisano, who really gave the new impulse that art received at this time, an impulse that was carried on by Cimabue's pupil Giotto, and transmitted by him through all the great line of Italian artists.

Vasari states that he was educated in the Convent of Santa Maria Novella, and was trained in art by certain Greek masters who had been invited to Florence to paint the chapel of the Gondi in Santa Maria Novella ; but as this church was not built until Cimabue was about forty years of age, this could not well have been the case. There were, however, many native painters in Italy at this time, and from some of these he probably received instruction. Of Cimabue's works by far the most important is the famous colossal Madonna still preserved in the church for which it was painted — Santa Maria Novella. This Madonna was so admired by Cimabue's contemporaries that they carried it, according to Vasari, in festive procession through the streets. It was the largest altar-piece that had as yet been painted, and in many respects is important in the history of art. The expression of the Virgin, though doleful, is different from the hard staring grief depicted by preceding artists, and the Child stretches out his two fingers in benediction in quite a natural manner. The little medalions of apostles and saints on the frame are especially worthy of notice. In this work indeed distinct progress is visible, but this was a late work of the artist ; a Madonna in the Florentine Academy, and others in the Louvre at Paris and in the National Gallery, scarcely attain to the same degree of improvement.

Besides his Madonnas and other altar-pieces, Cimabue was doubtless the master who executed many of the wall-paintings in the church of St. Francis, at Assisi. "Of Cimabue's presence at Assisi," Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle pronounce that " there is not the slightest reason to doubt," but it is very difScult to assign precisely his portion of the artistic work accomplished there. This church has a peculiar interest in the history of Art, for the whole progress of painting in the 13th and 14th centuries may be studied on its walls. It was built as an Upper and Lower Church during the first half of the 13th centurj', when the worship of St. Francis, the Patron Saint of Poverty, had grown to be second only to that of Christ. It was first decorated by the rude artists of that early day, and probably, amongst others, by Giuiito Pisano : but Cimabue appears to have had the superintendence of all the paintings executed there in his time. Vasari indeed assigns the whole of the paintings of the walls and the vaulted roof of the Lower Church to him and "certain Greek masters " whom he "greatly surpassed ; " but it is more probable that he merely painted the south transept. All his paintings in the Lower Church have perished, but some still remain in the Upper Church that ar»