Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 3.djvu/276

268 menacing the arm of one of her assailants with a lighted torch, which she holds in her hands.

At Spelimburgo, a large place fifteen miles above Udine, Giovanni Antonio painted the desk and the folds of the doors which close the organ in the principal church. On the outer part he depicted an Assumption of Our Lady, while on the inner side he represented, on the one fold the appearance of San Pietro and San Paolo before the Emperor Nero, who are looking upwards at Simon Magus, seen in the air above; and on the other, the Conversion of St. Paul. On the desk is depicted the Nativity of Christ.

These paintings and others having secured to Pordenone a very great name, he was invited to Piacenza, from which city, after having executed certain works, he departed to Mantua, where he painted a fa9ade in fresco for Messer Paris, a nobleman of that city. This performance displays the most admirable grace and loveliness, and among other beautiful and ingenious inventions to be remarked therein, is a frieze on the upper part, and immediately beneath the cornice, which is formed of letters after the antique manner, and one braccio and a half high. Through these letters, beautiful Children, in various attitudes, are passing, clambering and intertwining themselves throughout the same in all directions. Having completed this work to his great honour, Pordenone returned to Piacenza; and here, in addition to many other labours, he painted the whole of the Tribune in the Church of Santa Maria di Campagna, although there was indeed one part which remained incomplete at his departure, and was afterwards finished by Maestro Bernardo da Vercelli, who accomplished his task with great care.