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In short, all sorts of works used to be executed in his shop, so that many young men frequented it, each learning that which pleased him best. Thus Antonio del Ceraiolo, having been with Lorenzo di Credi, was then with Ridolfo, and afterwards, having withdrawn by himself, executed many works and portraits from life.
But we must first glance at the pretty little Lorenzo di Credi, No. 1160, the Annunciation, an artificial work full of nice thoughts and touches, with the prettiest little blue Virgin imaginable, a heavenly landscape, and a predella in monochrome, in one scene of which Eve rises from the side of the sleeping Adam with extraordinary realism.
The Virgin kneels in a niche, facing the spectator, adoring the Christ-child, who sits on the steps below her, turning to the little Baptist, who kneels at one side on a still lower step. Passing from the sculpture of Florence to its painting, it is fitting that we mention first of all the friend and fellow-pupil of the Umbrian Perugino, Lorenzo di Credi. The two had much in common.
Bernardo offered only eighty ducats; the Frati were indignant, and called in the Abbot of the Badia as umpire; he being unable to move Bernardo, retired from office; then a council of friends was resolved on, in which Mariotto was for the painter, and Lorenzo de Credi for the purchaser; but this also failed.
Among those who studied the arts of design in that garden, the following all became very excellent masters; Michelagnolo, the son of Lodovico Buonarroti; Giovan Francesco Rustici; Torrigiano Torrigiani; Francesco Granacci; Niccolò, the son of Jacopo Soggi; Lorenzo di Credi, and Giuliano Bugiardini; and, among the foreigners, Baccio da Montelupo, Andrea Contucci of Monte Sansovino, and others, of whom mention will be made in the proper places.
Among the older pictures which I recall are a Holy Family by Lorenzo di Credi in Room III and a Martyrdom of San Sebastian by Annibale Caracci in Room IV. A Judith boldly labelled Giorgione is not good. But although no very wonderful work of art is here, the house should be visited for its scenes of Venetian life, which bring the Venice of the past very vividly before one.
In him are almost comprised Masaccio, Lorenzo di Credi, Leonardo, Buonarroti, and Andrea del Sarto." The first, Fra Angelico, "sets himself to contemplate in God the fount and architype of the beautiful, and, as much as is possible to mortal hands, reproduces and stamps it in those works which a sensual mind cannot understand, but which to the heavenly soul speak an eloquent language.
The mere fact that he numbered Lionardo da Vinci, Lorenzo di Credi, and Pietro Perugino among his scholars, proves the esteem of his contemporaries; and when we have observed that the type of face selected by Lionardo and transmitted to his followers, appears also in the pictures of Lorenzo di Credi and is first found in the "David" of Verocchio, we have a right to affirm that the master of these men was an artist of creative genius as well as a careful workman.
And that this is true is proved by the fact that all the most celebrated sculptors and painters, who have lived from his day to our own, have become excellent and famous by exercising themselves and studying in this chapel namely, Fra Giovanni da Fiesole, Fra Filippo, Filippino, who finished it, Alesso Baldovinetti, Andrea dal Castagno, Andrea del Verrocchio, Domenico del Ghirlandajo, Sandro di Botticello, Leonardo da Vinci, Pietro Perugino, Fra Bartolommeo di San Marco, Mariotto Albertinelli, and the most divine Michelagnolo Buonarroti; likewise Raffaello da Urbino, who owed to this chapel the beginning of his beautiful manner, Granaccio, Lorenzo di Credi, Ridolfo del Ghirlandajo, Andrea del Sarto, Rosso, Franciabigio, Baccio Bandinelli, Alonso Spagnuolo, Jacopo da Pontormo, Pierino del Vaga, and Toto del Nunziata; and in short, all those who have sought to learn that art have ever gone to this chapel to learn and to grasp the precepts and the rules for good work from the figures of Masaccio.
In the studio of the latter he had probably worked with Leonardo and Lorenzo di Credi, so that in estimating the influences which went to form the art of Raphael we need not insist too strongly on the distinction between "Umbrian" and "Florentine." They bear the general stamp of the Umbrian School, but in its highest beauty.
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