Guglielmo greatly desired to paint in oil likewise, and, in the Church of San Francesco in Arezzo, he executed a picture for the Chapel of the Conception, wherein there are certain vestments which are very well done, with several heads of great animation, and so beautiful, that the master was always much esteemed for this work, seeing that it was the first he had ever executed in oil.
The Prior Guglielmo was a man of most honourable and upright life; he delighted greatly in useful occupation, and would have all about him in good order: wherefore, having purchased a very handsome house, he made great improvements and changes in every part, enriching and beautifying all. As a man of religion, his habits were ever strictly regular, and the remorse of conscience which he suffered from having abandoned the Brotherhood in which he had taken orders, oppressed him greatly. Moved by this cause, he constructed a most beautiful window for the chapel of the High Altar in San Domenico, the Convent of his Order in Arezzo: on this he painted a Vine, which he figured as proceeding from the body of San Domenico, and whereon he depicted a vast number of monks, renowned for their sanctity: so that the whole represents the Tree of Religion. At the summit is Our Lady, with Christ, who espouses Santa Caterina of Siena, a work of masterly excellence, and which has been very highly extolled; yet Guglielmo would accept no reward for the exeeution thereof, considering himself to be greatly indebted to that Order. To Perugia he despatched a very beautiful window for the Church of San Lorenzo, and sent many others to several other places around Arezzo.
This master took great pleasure in architecture, and made designs for numerous fabrics erected by the citizens of his adopted country, with ornamental structures of various kinds for many cities of the Aretine territory; the two stone doors of SanRocco, for example, with the decorations in macigno,[1] which were added to the picture of Maestro Luca in San Girolamo, are from his designs; he likewise executed certain embellishments in the Abbey of Cipriano d’Anghiari, and constructed an ornamental framework for the Chapel of the Crucifix which belongs to the Brotherhood of the Santa Trinita. The exceedingly rich lavatory in the sacristy of that church was
- ↑ The stone so called.
