stipulated price; when Battista painted three stories between the windows of that Library, to which he added two figures of Philosophers; and in these works he acquitted himself exceedingly well, although he did not obtain the prize of honour, as we have before related.[1]
These works being all completed, Battista received from the Patriarch Grimani a commission to paint a Chapel in San Francesco della Yigna, the first on the right hand namely as you enter into that Church; and Battista set hand to the work accordingly; he began by preparing very rich compartments of stucco, by means of which he divided the whole of the vaulting, which he then filled with stories and figures in fresco; over all these he laboured with extraordinary diligence, but whether it were that some precaution needful to his health had been neglected, or that Battista worked too much at frescoes, perhaps upon very fresh walls— for the villas of certain among the nobles, as I have heard say, before he had completed the above-mentioned chapel, our artist died, and the paintings, remaining unfinished, were afterwards brought to conclusion by Federigo Zuccaro, of Sant’ Agnolo-in-Yado, a young painter of great excellence; he is indeed considered to be one of the best in Rome.[2]
On the walls of this chapel then, Federigo painted a story in fresco, the subject chosen being Santa Maria Maddalena converted by the preaching of Christ, as he did also another representing the Resurrection of her brother Lazarus;[3] both are very graceful pictures: he then, having finished the walls, depicted the Adoration of the Magi on the Altar-piece, a work which was highly commended. Battista Franco died in the year 1561, and many of his designs, which are truly worthy of praise, having been engraved, he has derived from them a very great name and reputation.[4]
- ↑ In the Life of San Michele; see vol. iv. p. 450.
- ↑ Vasari names him again in the Life of Taddeo Zucehero, buft the ambition of Federigo was not satisfied with the praises bestowed on him, and in certain annotations which he has affixed to a copy of these Lives which was in his own possession, he has attacked our author in the bitterest manner.— Masselli.
- ↑ Zanetti, Pittura Veneziana, declares that he can find no trace of the manner of Zuccaro in the picture of Lazarus.
- ↑ Bartsch, Le Peintre-Graveur, enumerates nearly a hundred engravings from the works of Battista Franco.
