finished therefore, he gave a commission to Jacopo Puntormo for certain pictures in fresco to be executed in the chapel where his Holiness was to hear mass every morning. Putting hand to the work accordingly, Jacopo painted a figure of God the Father surrounded by numerous Children, with another representing Santa Yeronica, who has the portrait of Jesus Christ, impressed on the handkerchief; a work which, though performed by Jacopo in so much haste, was nevertheless greatly extolled.
In a chapel of the church of San Raffello,nota which is situate behind the archiepiscopal palace in Florence, Jacopo then painted a fresco, the subject of which is Our Lady with the Divine Child in her arms; she has the archangel Michael on one side, and Santa Lucia,nota with two other Saints, kneeling, on the other. In the lunette of the chapel Puntormo furthermore depicted a figure of the Almighty Father, with Seraphim around him.
Having then received a commission which he had long desired, from the Servite monk, Maestro Jacopo, that oi painting a portion of the court of the Servites namely, Andrea del Sarto having then gone into France, and left that work unfinished, Puntormo set himself with great care and zeal to the preparation of the cartoons; as he was however very poorly provided with all things, and while working for the acquirement of honour had also to live, he undertook at the same time to paint two figures for the Nuns of Santa Caterina of Siena, who desired to have such executed in chiaro-scuro, over the door of the Hospital for Women, which is situate behind the church of the Hospital for Priests, between the Piazza di San Marco, and the Via di Sangallo, exactly opposite that is to say, to the convent wall of those Nuns of Santa Caterina.
The subject of this work, which is an exceedingly beautiful one, is Our Saviour Christ, in the guise of a pilgrim, awaiting the arrival of a certain poor woman, to whom he is about to offer hospitality, the [1]
- ↑ San Raffaello that is to say, hut popularly called San Ruffillo, or Ruffello. The church has been demolished, and the picture was some years since removed to the Chapel of the Painters in the Church of the Annunciation.
- ↑ The English reader will find the legend of this Saint very agreeably related in the Sacred and Legendary Art of Mrs. Jameson.
