Page:The painters of Florence from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century (1915).djvu/367

1531] four smaller figures of Virtues, for which he was to be paid 21 lire. Six of these were painted between 1514 and 1517, after which the series was interrupted and never finished until 1526. It is only within the last few years that the Scalzo cloister has been roofed in and glazed, but in spite of the damage which Andrea's frescoes have suffered from exposure to weather and ill-judged restoration, they reveal his wonderful powers in all their fulness. The figures are admirably drawn and modelled, the grouping and action are singularly fine, and the ornamental framework of the subject is remarkably decorative. Above all, the transparency of the shadows and the luminous tones of the monochrome produce an effect scarcely inferior to colour in richness and variety. The second subject of the Preaching of the Baptist, which the painter finished in 1515, is an especially striking composition, in which the earnest and impassioned gestures of the Saint, and the eager faces of his listeners are given with dramatic force. Several of the figures in this and the other frescoes are, as Vasari remarks, borrowed from Albert Dürer's engraving, and bear witness to the popularity which the Nürnberg masters were fast gaining in Italy. But, even in the early subjects, we see that fatal tendency to overload the figures with draperies, which Andrea adopted in imitation of Michelangelo, and which grew upon him with the lapse of years, until it completely destroyed the charm of his art.

This unfortunate practice is still more apparent in the later frescoes of the Scalzo, as well as in the lunette of the Madonna del Sacco, which Andrea