Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects/Galasso Galassi

by Giorgio Vasari

 

GALASSO GALASSI, PAINTER, OF FERRARA.^[1]

[born about 1438—died 1488.]

When foreigners execute works of art in a city wherein there are no native artists of eminence, this circumstance constantly awakens the genius of some one among the citizens, who afterwards labours, by the study of that art, to make such progress that his native city shall no longer require to invite strangers (who afterwards bear away the wealth of the place,) for the execution of embellishments. These I say, then, strive to secure to themselves, by the exercise of their talents, those riches which appear to them so desirable, when they see them lavished on foreigners. The truth of this remark was rendered clearly manifest by Galasso of Ferrara, who, seeing Pietro of Borgo a San Sepolcro remunerated by the Duke for the works which he executed, besides being honourably entertained in Ferrara on the same account, was excited by this example to devote himself to the study of painting, on the departure of Pietro, with so much zeal, that in his native city he acquired the reputation of being a good and even excellent master.

Galasso was all the more favourably considered in Ferrara from the fact that by a journey made to Venice he had acquired the method of painting in oil, which he had carried to Ferrara,^[2] where he afterwards executed numerous figures in that manner, which are scattered about in the different churches throughout Ferrara.^[3] Flaving, at a later period, repaired to Bologna, whither he had been invited by certain Dominican monks, Galasso painted a chapel in oil for the church of San Domenico, and this extended the renown and increased the credit of the artist. He was consequently soon afterwards appointed to execute certain works in Santa Maria del Monte, a monastery of Black Friars,^[4] outside the city of Bologna, and likewise painted various pictures in fresco without the gate of San Mammolo. At the Casa di Mezzo,^[5] moreover, which is situate on the same road, the Church was painted in fresco by his hand with stories from the Old Testament. Galasso always lived in a very creditable manner, and constantly proved himself courteous and obliging, which perhaps proceeded from his having been more accustomed to work in other and foreign cities than in his own. It is true that, from not being very regular in his mode of life, he did not attain to a much advanced age, departing in his fiftieth year, or thereabouts, to the life that has no end. He was honoured after his death by the following epitaph which was written by a friend.

galassus ferrarien.
Sum tanto studio naturam imitatus et arte
 Dum pingo rerum quae creat illa parens;
Haec ut saepe quidem non picta putaverit a me,
 A se crediderit sed generata magis.

At the same period, and also in Ferrara, lived Cosmè, by whom a chapel, painted for the church of San Domenico in that city, may still be seen. This artist designed better than he painted; nor, as far as I have been able to discover, did he execute many paintings.^[6]

1. This life does not appear in all the editions of Vasari, but the later Italian commentators have restored it to the place which it occupied in the first edition, and we follow their example.
2. Many authors affirm that the practice of oil-painting was first taught in Ferrara by Roger of Bruges, from whom Galasso, among other artists, acquired it.
3. The reader, who may desire minute details respecting the works of this artist, will find them in Baruffaldi, Vite degli Artefici Ferraresi, edited by Boschini.—Ferrara, 1844-8.
4. See the Annotationa to the Vite of BarufFaldi,before cited.
5. Now called the Madonna di Mezzaratta. The Florentine commentators affirm, that the painter called Galasso, who painted there, cannot be Galasso of Ferrara. The frescoes having been executed at too early a period (1390 and 1404) for him to have taken part in them.
6. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, reproaches Vasari for not having said more of Galasso, and Cosmè, or Cosimo Tura; but “has not,” remarks Bottari, “himself supplied what he accuses Vasari of omitting.” The justification of the latter will be found in the Life of Vittore Scarpaccia which follows.