Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 3.djvu/218

210 this also is painted in fresco, and is very beautiful. There is besides another Pieta, a small picture in oil, by the same master, in a room formerly inhabited by Angelo of Arezzo, General of the Order, in the monastery in question, where there is moreover a Birth of Christ by Andrea del Sarto.

The same artist painted a picture of Our Lady, for one of the apartments in the house of Zanobi Bracci, who greatly desired to possess a work by his hand. The Madonna is in a kneeling position, and is leaning against a mass of rock, while fixedly contemplating the Infant Christ, who is lying on a heap of drapery, and looks smilingly up at the Virgin Mother. San Giovanni, who stands near, is making a sign to the Madonna as in allusion to the Saviour, and as one who would say, ‘‘ This is truly the Son of God.” Behind them is St. Joseph, leaning his head on his hands, which are supported by a rock, and seeming to be in a state of beatitude as he beholds the human race, rendered divine by that birth.

Pope Leo having commissioned the Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici to cause the ceiling of the Great Hall in the Poggio a Cajano, a palace and villa of the house of Medici, which is situate between Pistoja and Florence, to be decorated with stucco work and paintings, the charge of that business was committed to the illustrious Ottaviano de’ Medici, as was also that of paying the monies for the same; he being a person who, not degenerating from his ancestors, was well acquainted with matters of the kind. He was besides the friendly protector of our artists, and the promoter of all our arts, having more pleasure than most men in adorning his house with the works of the most eminent masters. The whole undertaking had been made over to Franciabigio, but Ottaviano now commanded that he should have one-third only, the other two-thirds being divided, and one of them being given to Andrea del Sarto, while the one still remaining was entrusted to Jacopo da Pontormo.