Il Perugino "The best master of Italy "
Exhibition of Panels on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Death of Pietro Vannucci known as Il Perugino (1445/52 – 1523)
The Exhibition consists of 15 panels realized by Stefano Baldi on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Death of Pietro Vannucci known as Il Perugino (1445/52 – 1523).
The Exhibition has been set up in 16 countries in 4 continents of the world.
* Definition used by Agostino Chigi in a letter to his father Mariano, dated 7 November 1500
Pietro Vannucci, better known as Il Perugino, was born between 1445 and 1452 in Castel della Pieve (now Città della Pieve) in Umbria into a wealthy local family. Considered to be one of the protagonists of Renaissance Art, he was among the most famous and influential painters of his time, at the end of the 1400s. He was especially active in Perugia, Florence and Rome. Most of his works can be found in Umbria, Tuscany and the Marches. He died of the plague in 1523 in Fontignano, near Città della Pieve.
“Pietro Perugino, the distinguished painter, has restored the art of painting. If it had not yet been invented anywhere, he himself has invented it.”
(Latin epigram by Francesco Maturanzio)
After 1470, Perugino’s main activity took place in Florence, mainly in the workshop of Andrea de Verrocchio, alongside other great artists of the Italian Renaissance such as Leonardo, Lorenzo di Credi and Luca Signorelli. His encounter with Piero della Francesca and his probable contacts with the workshops of Pollaiolo and Ghirlandaio were also important during this period of his artistic education.
San Rocco, San Sebastiano and San Pietro (Church of Santa Maria Assunta of Cerqueto) – Fresco, 1478 (133 × 90)
Pietà Gonfalon (Originally in the Franciscan monastery at Farneto now in the Galleria Nazionale dell’Umbria in Perugia) – Tempera on canvas, 1472 (128×165 cm)
”Two young men, equal in age and equal in love, Leonardo da Vinci and Perugino, Pier della Pieve, who are divine painters.” (Giovanni Santi, Raphael’s father, cronaca rimata, 1485)
Città della Pieve (at the time called Castel della Pieve) is the place where Pietro Vannucci was born, between 1445 and 1452, and which still preserves some of his most significant works, especially for the late period of his artistic production. In fact, it was not until the early 1500s that the painter worked in his hometown.
”Pietro descended from an established and wealthy family, one of the first and most notable in the town.”
(Fiorenzo Canuti, Il Perugino, Editrice d’arte “La Diana”, 1931)
Florence plays a very important role in Perugino’s life. It is the city where he was a pupil of Andrea Verrocchio and came into contact with other promising young artists. In Florence, he was called by Lorenzo the Magnificent in 1489 to work in an environment that stimulated him to break away from the religious repertoire and create such works as Apollo and Daphnis. Also in Florence, in 1493, he married Chiara Fancelli, daughter of the architect Luca Fancelli, best known for the Pitti Palace.
”In just a few years, he became so popular that his works filled not only Florence and Italy, but also France, Spain and many other countries, where they were sent.”
(Giorgio Vasari in Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects – 1568 )
Perugino stayed in Rome on several occasions where he was called upon to execute some important works, by Pope Sixtus IV, who in 1478 commissioned him to fresco the chapel of the Conception at St. Peter’s. This work helped to increase his fame, and in 1481 he was called by the same pontiff to execute, along with Ghirlandaio and Botticelli, some of the frescoes in the Sistine Chapel.
Perugino worked in the Umbrian city throughout his life, producing some of his most important works. These include, in 1500, the cycle celebrating the harmony between classical culture and the Christian faith in the Sala delle Udienze in the Collegio del Cambio. In 1501, he also opened a workshop in Perugia and from that date, the main part of his activity took place in Perugia and Umbria. During this same period, he held numerous public offices.
“This work, which was very beautiful and more highly extolled than any other that was executed by Pietro in Perugia, is now held in great value by the men of that city in memory of so famous a craftsman of their own country.” (Giorgio Vasari referring to Perugino’s works in the Collegio del Cambio)
The region Umbria is home to several works that Perugino painted during his lifetime. Many of these are located in towns other than Perugia, even then the main centre of the region, as well as Città della Pieve, the town where the painter was born. These paintings, later works, can be found in Cerqueto, Deruta, Corciano, Foligno, Fontignano, Panicale, Montefalco, Spello and Trevi.
Perugino also executed several half-length portraits. These are often in profile depicted against a shaded landscape or a dark background. In these works, Perugino also demonstrates his great skills as an artist by adopting a fine and precise painting style that, especially in the small-scale paintings, enhances his mastery.
Pietro Perugino was an excellent painter (as can be judged today by the works he did) to be counted among those singular painters described by Pliny.
(Fra Leandro Alberti In Descrittione di tuta Italia – c. 1530)
In the early 1500s, Perugino left Florence, where his style and figurative formulas were beginning to decline, and preferred to concentrate his activities in Umbria, his native region, where commissions continued to be numerous. In addition to Perugia, he also worked in numerous centres in the Umbrian territory where he repeated his traditional patterns and models, but renewed his style through an almost impressionist technique that characterised his last period of activity.
The period in which Perugino worked, between 1400 and 1500, was rich in great Italian artists who made the Italian Renaissance great and appreciated. Perugino frequented the workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence, where Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio and Leonardo da Vinci also worked. In the Sistine Chapel, he had Pinturicchio as a collaborator, and it was Luca Signorelli who took over the ongoing project from Perugino.
Raphael was Perugino’s most important pupil, having already entered his workshop before 1494. Especially at first, Raphael drew inspiration from his master’s works, but soon revealed a more modern and appreciated sensibility and style. It was Raphael who in 1508 was called upon by Julius II to realise a project that had initially also been commissioned to Perugino.
“Many masters in his own manner, and one among them, who was truly most excellent, devoted himself heart and soul to the honorable studies of painting, and surpassed his master by a great measure; and this was the miraculous Raffaello Sanzio of Urbino.”
(Giorgio Vasari in Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects – 1568)
What characterises Perugino’s painting is the grace and purity of drawing that is combined with the splendour of the color, the elegance of the architecture, and the harmony of the attitudes and movements of his figures. His innovative style in religious painting was greatly appreciated for the call to prayer and meditation that he was able to inspire with the rarefied and motionless atmosphere that distinguishes them. Following a widespread practice at the time, on several occasions Perugino repeated his previously used and appreciated patterns and models.
Perugino’s activity was mainly concentrated in Central Italy. The map reproducing the political divisions of the late 15th century shows the places where works by the Umbrian master are to be found. Some places where there are numerous works by the painter are shown in a lighter color.
Italy about 1494 (Historical Atlas by William Shepherd from the Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection, University of Texas at Austin)
Perugino’s art has often been celebrated through the issue of individual postage stamps or even in series. Some of his famous works have been depicted in philatelic issues especially from Italy, Vatican City and the Sovereign Military Order of Malta.
This selection is one of the many ways that demonstrate the popularity enjoyed by Perugino and his painting.
Il Perugino "The best master of Italy " 