Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 3.djvu/855

 CILICIA

771

CIMABUE

liy the works of Correggio. His first important work was the ornamentation for Cardinal Farnese of the great salon of his palace at Bologna. In the same city he painted scenes in the style of Correggio represent- ing events in Bologna at the time of the plague. They are in the church of San Michele in Boseo, and each picture is supported by two angels of remarkable beauty. He executed a fine piece of interior decora- tion in t he palace of the Duke of Parma and for it re- ceived the honour of knighthood. His great achieve- ment is the painting of the "Assumption of the Virgin" in the cupola of Fori! cathedral. On this immense work lie was engaged from 1681 to 1706, and on its completion was elected to high office in that town and appointed by Clement XI president of the Academy of Bologna. There is a grandeur and profundity about his work hardly warranted hy its actual ex- ecution. His colouring is suave, his draw ing on the whole accurate but not devoid of clever trickery, and his paintings were executed with extraordinary facility. There are three of his works at Copenhagen, several in Vienna, his own portrait at Florence, and others at Berlin and Munich. He died at Forli in 1719.

(2) Felice, his son, suc- ceeded to the ample fortune left l>y his father, and prac- tised his art rather from in- clination than as an actual professional artist. He was born in 1660 and died in 1724; m Bologna in two oi the churches are clever, dex- terous, and well-coloured paintings which arc his work.

(3) Paolo waa another pupil

of the elder artist and his nephew. He was born at Bologna in 1709 and died in 1764. His style is effec- tive, refined, and highly fin- ished, but only three of his paintings are known to pres- ent -day critics.

L \N7i, Storia Pittorica QBassano

1801 Bl Ml. 1/v !",//.•> ,m Bologn-

ese Painters; Zahottx, V.

George Charles

Williamson.

Cilicia. See Asia Minor.

Cilicia, Patriarch of. See Armenia.

Cimabue, Cenni i>i Pepo, Florentine painter, b. 1240; d. after 1301: the legendary founder of Italian painting and the reputed master of Giotto, Vasari begins his biography with these words: "In I lie II. i. »l ..I disasters which had overwhelmed unfor- tunate Italy not only all monuments of art worthy oe but also all artists had disappeared, when, in 121(1. Cimabue was born in the city of Florence, of the noble Cimabue family of the period, to illumine, as it were, the way towards the art of painting." Then follows the story of the painter's childhood. According to Vasari some ( 1 reeks who had settled in Florence were his masters but he soi d them, and his reputation

became so great that Charles of Anjou i visit him in hi-- studio. When he completed his famous " Madonna'', the people bore it in triumph to Santa Maria Novella, with such jubilation that the section where the painter lived was afterwards called the Borgo Allegri.

All this has since been proved untrue, and is attributed to the zeal of Vasari, the Italian historian

of art, for the glory of Florence, his native city. The so-called barbarism of the thirteenth century is no longer credited. This was, on the contrary, the age of the true Renaissance. The cathedrals of Pisa, Lucca, and Pistoia had been built; the basilica of Assisi and the Abbey of S. Galgano were already in the course of construction. In Rome this was the era of the great Cosmati family, of Torriti, and Cavallini, in Sicily of those wonderful sculptors, Ravelloand Capone. At Pisa (1260) it was marked by the completion of the famous pulpit of the baptistery, the work of Nieolo Pisano, and the first classical work of art in Italy. Yet this is what Vasari called the "barbarism of the thirteenth century". The story of Cimabue is a curious example of false historical data. It frequently happened among the ancients that the victorious race stole even the past laurels of the vanquished, appropriating their gods, their legends, and their myths. Similarly a rivalry existed in the Mid- dle Ages between the Republics of Siena and Florence. Florence could never pardon Siena for its great victory of Monta- perti (1260), and this was the cause of much trouble between the two. The fif- teenth and sixteenth cen- tum-, the most brilliant era of Florence, marked Siena's downfall. Florence alone possessed artists and writ- ers. By means of the print- ing press the Florentines spread broadcast boasting accounts of themselves, and these errors became fixed.

Nothing availed against such a lea— of official falsehoods. It needed all the patience of the modern critic to right these wrongs. It is now es tablished that the famous "Madonna" of Santa Maria Novella, called the "Ma- donna Hueecllai", is the work of the great artist of Siena, Duccio di Buonin- segna, who painted it in 1285 for the altar of the Brotherhood of the Blessed Virgin. These facts are proved by the discovery of a contract preserved in the records of Florence, and also from the evident re- lationship between this immortal work of art and other works of Duccio. Again it has been discovered that the triumphal procession to which Vasari re- fers in his account of Cimabue was held not in Florence, but in Siena (9 June, 1311), in honour of another masterpiece of this same Duccio, the great Mtirsli'i, or "Madonna of Majesty", which may now be seen at the Opera del Duomo in Siena. Thai day, writes an eyewitness, : i public feast was • ■nl lined in Siena. All the shops were closed. The bishop, i he clergy, the Council of Nine, with a multi- tude "t people, went to seek the masterpiece in the house of the painter, near the Porta Stalloreggi, and accompanied it as far as the cathedral, bear- ing torches and singing eantieles. Thenceforward Siena took, in all public acts, the name of < Virginia.

It is evident that these comprise all the elements

of the assumed biography of Cimabue. Tradition

contented with a change of name. Duccio was

forgotten, and the memory of his triumphs remained