Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/237

Rh the centre of the church,, he painted a fresco, representing the saint supported in the air by two angels, who might be taken for living and breathing forms. St. Clara is restoring a child from the dead, while many female figures stand around, all full of astonishment. The faces of these women are extremely beautiful; their vestments and head-dresses, which are those of the period, are also very graceful and effective. In the same city of Assisi, and over the gate which leads to the cathedral, in an arch on the inside of the gate, Giottino painted a Virgin with the Child in her arms, and that with such truth and life, that she seems to be alive. Our Lady is attended by St. Francis and another saint, the whole exquisitely beautiful. These two works, although the story of Santa Clara remains unfinished (the master having fallen sick, and being compelled to return to Florence), are yet admirable productions, and worthy of the highest praise. Tommaso is said to have been of a melancholy temperament, and a lover of solitude; but profoundly devoted to art, and extremely studious. Some proof of this last assertion, we have in the church of San Romeo, in Florence, where there is a picture in distemper, by this master, which is executed with such earnest love and care, that no better work on panel is known to have proceeded from his hand. The picture is in the cross-aisle of the church, on the north side. It represents the Dead Christ, with the Maries and Nicodemus, accompanied by other figures. These all bewail the death of the departed, some bitterly weeping and wringing their hands, others more subdued in the expression of their grief; but all, both in countenance and attitude, evincing the most profound sorrow, as they look on the sacrifice that has been made for our sins. The most astonishing circumstance respecting this work is not so much that the master has been able to attain so high a region of thought, as that he has found means to realize his conceptions so admirably with the pencil. The painting is, moreover, highly worthy of praise, not only for the invention and composition, but also for the beauty of the heads; for although the artist in depicting all these weeping faces, has necessarily distorted the lines of the brow, eyes, mouth, and every other feature,