Carlo Crivelli (painter)
Carlo Crivelli (* between 1430 and 1435 in Venice ; † before August 7, 1500, probably in Ascoli Piceno ) was an Italian painter .
Life
Originally from Venice, he continued his education in Padua and then worked in the southern part of the Italian region of Marche . In fact, he became the most important active artist in the Adriatic region, with the exception of the Venetian lagoon. Influenced by Donatello in his youth , his art always balanced between perspective novelty and a strong expressionism , with his drawings reproducing an accurate, accurate representation. On the other hand, his works are characterized by a late Gothic decoratism , represented by means of colored marble , precious robes, fruits, animals and golden arabesques , with the frequent use of pastel colors. Indeed, Crivelli remained excluded from the great currents of Italian Renaissance art. Nevertheless, he never lingered in his provincial work, but constantly reinvented himself through originality and the search for formal perfection: "He does not remain calm and is never satisfied with his creative talent. He does not bother to find new compositions, Instead, he is constantly on the lookout for new formal solutions, almost obsessed with the need for an impossible perfection. " (Zampetti, 1986) His research was different from that of his contemporaries, but no less extensive: He was not looking for the atmospheric breath of Giovanni Bellini , but rather tried to insert moments of sharp truth into a context of abstract rigidity.
biography
The knowledge about the life of Carlo Crivelli is based on a few documents concerning him and on numerous signatures that he put on his works. Even if these are often destroyed and lost, they still allow us to look into his private life.
Origin and education
A document dated October 13, 1444 certifies that Carlo Crivelli is the son of the painter Iachobus de Chriveris , who lives in Venice in the parish of San Moisè . He has a younger brother named Vittore . Another brother, named Ridolfo dal Ricci in 1834, probably never existed. Not a single work of art is known of his father's painting: he was probably one of the followers of Jacobello del Fiore or Michele di Giambono . No document gives us the exact date of birth of the painter, which is assumed to be between the years 1430-1435, since he must have been of legal age on March 7, 1457, otherwise he would not have been sentenced to six months in prison and a fine of 200 lire . The following is reported: "Because he fell in love with Tarsia, the wife of the Venetian sailor Franceso Cortese, and therefore kidnapped her from the house of his brother and kept her hidden for many months. He had carnal contact with her, in which he disdained the sacrament the marriage polluted. " The adultery that was committed was such a scandal and probably one of the reasons why Crivelli left his hometown Venice and never went back there.
Despite the lack of documents, it is believed that Carlo Crivelli must have been an apprentice to Antonio Vivarini , Giovanni d'Alemagna and Bartolomeo Vivarini . The latter was well informed about contemporary Paduan painting based on the school of Francesco Squarcione . The young Carlo was influenced by her, especially by the Dalmatian contemporaneous Giorgio Čulinovič , who is called Giorgio Schiavone , as well as Andrea Mantegna , Marco Zoppo and the Fiorentines Filippo Lippi and Donatello , who happened to be passing through Padua. It is not known whether the artist was in direct contact with the Paduan school before his conviction, or through Vivarini.
Regarding the first years in Venice, no work of art can be traced back to Crivelli with certainty. The works that were written in his hometown and mentioned by the historian Carlo Ridolfi (1648) are all lost, namely: San Fabiano and Nozze mistiche di Santa Caterina , which were in the church of San Sebastiano . Furthermore: Storie di San Leone Bembo from the chapel of San Sebastiano near San Lorenzo . The same fate befell the works mentioned by name by Moischini in 1664. A couple of Madonnas Madonna Huldschinsky in San Diego and Madonna col Bambino e putti in Verona , which were originally in Venetian monasteries, can be traced back to the 1460s and show the influence of the Paduan school, even if Bottari has a connection with Domenico Veneziano wanted to recognize. According to Zampetti , the Madonna Speyer , which is in the Fondazione Giorgio Cini, is even older. In it you can see a touch of pre-Renaissance, based on Jacopo Bellini .
In Zara
After his arrest in 1457, the artist ended up in Padua, where he befriended Giorgio Schiavone . He then followed this to Zara , a city that was under Venetian rule at the time. Here Crivelli is mentioned in two notarial documents. One, from June 23, 1463 and the other from September 11, 1465. He is described as a master of painting, resident and citizen of the Dalmatian city.
We are not aware of any work from this period. Two Madonne col Bambino e due angeli are now in New York , which Prijatelj wrongly attributed to the painter. However, these show a certain weakness in the drawing, so that one must assume that his younger brother Vittore, who was also in the city during these years, must have made them. It is possible that the Madonnas that are now in Verona and San Diego were not made in his hometown, but in Zara.
Arrival in the Marche
Both the reasons for his departure from Zara and the timing of the crossing of the Adriatic are completely in the dark. In any case, he signed the altarpiece Polittico di Massa Fermana in 1468 and was already in Ascoli Piceno in 1469 , where, according to documents, he came into conflict with a citizen. In fact, on February 16, 1469, he was involved in a trial against a certain Savino di mastro Giovani d'Ascoli. To this end, he authorized Ulisse di ser Antonio from Venice and Corradino Pasqualucci from Ascoli with his case. In addition, the first works of his artistic career in the Marche all come from the vicinity of Fermo . Among them is the altarpiece Polittico di Porto San Giorgio (1470), designed for the church of San Giorgio, on behalf of a certain Giorgio, an Albanian who emigrated to the Marches as a result of the Turkish conquests.
Lives in Ascoli
Documents indicate that the artist settled permanently in Ascoli from 1473 onwards. The altarpiece Polittico di Sant'Emidio was also created there in a chapel of the cathedral . The stay in the city is also confirmed by the purchase of a house for ten ducats in the Sestiere di San Biagio on June 17, 1478. At a time unknown to us, he married a certain Iolanda in Ascoli. That may have come from Atri in Abruzzo . She gave him a daughter named Diana and a young boy who died in August 1487. The couple also adopted a girl named Biasiola. It is believed that the artist visited Tuscany or the city of Ferrara in those years where works by Rogier van der Weyden existed. However, no documents prove these stays. Much more seems to have been the life of Crivelli, without interruption, until his death in the vicinity of Ascoli. His fame or his entrepreneurial spirit led him to visit numerous places in the area to paint and sign a number of altarpieces.
Stays in Camerino
Some stays in Camerino , a city that was under the rule of the Varano family and was in full bloom in culture, are particularly noteworthy . Various painters were also active there, including Girolamo di Giovanni and Giovanni Broccati , whom Crivelli knew from the school of Squarcione in Padua. In addition, some foreign masters were present, such as Nicolò Alunno , who must have had a certain influence on his Venetian colleague, although he was not artistically inferior to him.
In 1482 Crivelli signed the altarpiece Polittico di San Domenico di Camerino . More or less demanding commissions followed, in Ascoli and Camerino, which is why it is assumed that the artist stayed alternately in both cities throughout the 1980s, the stays in the latter being longer, according to a document from 1488. It is recorded that he had a permanent residence in the city of Varano. In those years the ducal palace was decorated and it seems to be the case that Crivelli also worked there, although it is impossible to find a trace in the few fragmentary documents.
At an advanced age he adopted some novelties from other artists, such as the new structure of the altarpiece opposite the repetitive polittico. A special example of this is L'Annunciazione di Ascoli from 1486. The peculiarity of this work, which was originally located in the church of the Santissima Annunziata in Ascoli Piceno, shows that the artist mastered the new techniques of Renaissance painting perfectly. If it is true that Crivelli is characterized by his antique-looking painting technique, which is based on the line of Venetian tradition from before Bellini, then this is not due to a lack of knowledge of the techniques of Renaissance painting, but to the artist's deliberately chosen archaism .
The last few years
For the year 1488 the death of his only son is documented in Ascoli, of whom neither the age nor the name is known. He must have been quite young, however, because on the occasion of his funeral the city's accounting records a donation of two pounds of wax from the artist. This is the artist's last known sign of life in the city, while the orders from outside increased. May 10th. In 1488 he was commissioned with the altarpiece Polittico del Duomo di Camerino , an impressive work intended for the high altar of the Cathedral of Camerino.
In the last years of his life, Crivelli was constantly on the move between Camerino, Matelica , Fabriano and Pergola . An important event in the artist's life reached into this period, namely the award of the title "miles" (1490) by Ferdinando di Aragona , Prince of Capua and future King of Naples . In a difficult period of his state, Ferdinando maintained good relations with Ascoli, but he was in a latent conflict with the Papal States , so the prince in September 1491 crossed the river Tronto and occupied large areas of Fermo and Ascoli, who were under papal jurisdiction . Ascoli was therefore excommunicated by Cardinal Balue since August of the same year because of too close ties to Ferdinando and his churches were also banned. While Pope Sixtus IV was looking for allies to stop the enemy, the latter withdrew his own troops, leaving the residents of Ascoli alone with their problems, "so that they suffered many humiliations." Since then, the title that the painter had received has assumed an ambiguous relationship with the surrounding states of the time.
Since that document Crivelli has belonged to the prince's family and is mentioned neither as a Venetian nor as a painter, but as a citizen of the city of Ascoli and a loyal supporter of the Neapolitan monarchy. After all, Ferdinando was the grandson of Francesco Sforza , who was the ruler of the city for a long time. The awarding of the title to the painter must be understood as thanksgiving for the Ascolans' loyalty in their dispute with the Pope. Since then Crivelli has always signed his works with the title miles. After the prince left, this honorary title caused him difficulties, which may have been the reason for his departure from the city. In the last few years his stays in different places increased. A final document, dated August 7, 1494, proves his presence in Fabriano, where he placed an altarpiece.
The death
The date of death of the painter between the completion of the altarpiece Pala di San Francesco a Fabriano and September 7, 1495, when the younger brother Vittore from Fermo wanted to assert his universal heir claim. This stated that he did not know anything about Carlo's family situation. He also said he knew nothing about children or marriage. The years of total lack of contact between the two brothers were to blame for this. In the same document, however, Vittore admitted that he had neglected his brother in life and owed him thanks, probably in the artistic field. Local history tells us that Carlo Crivelli died in Fermo and was buried in the church of San Francesco . A letter from Vittore to the Ascoli magistrate refutes this note; it is not even certain whether he died in Ascoli. It is more likely that he blessed the temporal during his stays in Pergola, Matelica or Fabriano.
The painter's family situation can only be inferred from documents that were created after his death. All of them relate to the complicated question of inheritance. The name of his wife Iolanda appears for the first time in a document from 1500, after Carlo had been dead five years. His wife must have been much younger than himself if she is still mentioned as living in 1524 after the succession proceedings ended in 1511. After her daughter Diana died, she had arguments with her son-in-law as she tried to exclude him from the inheritance. Not even Carlo, the son of her stepdaughter Biasiola, had given her a will, even though he bore the name of his adoptive grandfather.
style
Carlo Crivelli was one of those Venetian painters who, through the work of Francesco Squarcione and Andrea Mantegna , were encouraged to adopt their style and thus establish the formal language of the Renaissance in their sphere of activity, but at the same time in a certain way he remained in the established traditions faithful to the Gothic. As a result, he developed a completely independent, unmistakable type of pictorial language that was completely independent of the other painters in Veneto . At first glance, his characters usually appear tough and strict, but if you get involved in them, they have such a haunting effect that you can hardly escape their fascination. He developed a very special predilection for decorations and splendid ornaments, with which he often overloaded his pictures. This also includes the cucumbers present in many paintings, which have an almost surrealistic effect. In some cases, he applied plaster of paris to individual elements of his pictures, so that the works look like a relief in individual sections. Crivelli remained true to this style until the end of his life.
Aftermath
Carlo Crivelli's work was deeply rooted in the Marche area. He particularly influenced his younger brother Vittore, as well as the painters Pietro Alemanno , the young Cola dell'Amatrice , and many others, including Lorenzo d'Alessandro and Stefano Folchetti . Vincenzo Pagani switched from Crivelli's influence to that of Lorenzo Lotto , that is, between the two great Venetians of the art of the Mark.
Works
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literature
- Carlo Ridolfi , Le maraviglie dell'arte, overo le vite de gl'illustri pittori veneti, e dello Stato. Ove sono raccolte le opere insigni, i costumi & i ritratti loro , Venezia 1648.
- Marco Boschini , Le miniere della pittura veneziana , Venezia 1664.
- Luigi Lanzi , Storia pittorica dell'Italia , Bassano 1789; edizione critica, Firenze 1968.
- Amico Ricci , Memorie storiche delle arti e degli artisti della Marca di Ancona , Macerata 1834.
- Bernard Berenson , The Venetian Painters of the Renaissance , Londra 1906.
- Lionello Venturi , A traverso le Marche , in "L'Arte", XVIII, 1915.
- Bernard Berenson , I pittori italiani del Rinascimento , Milano 1936.
- Pietro Zampetti, Il polittico di Carlo Crivelli nel Duomo di Ascoli Piceno , in "Emporium", 1951.
- Pietro Zampetti, Carlo Crivelli , Milano 1961.
- Pietro Zampetti, Crivelli e Crivelleschi , catalogo della Mostra di Venezia I e II ediz, 1961.
- Stefano Bottari , Le mostre del Mantegna e del Crivelli , in "Arte Veneta", 1961.
- Pietro Zampetti, Carlo Crivelli , Nardini Editore, Firenze 1986.
- Ronald Lightbown, Carlo Crivelli , Yale University Press, New Haven - London 2004. ISBN 0-300-10286-0
- Emanuela Daffra (a cura di), Crivelli e Brera , Catalogo della mostra (Milano, Pinacoteca di Brera, 2009-10) Electa, Milano 2009. ISBN 978-88-370-7297-1 .
Web links
- Crivelli at the Web Gallery of Art
- The Annunciation with Saint Emidius in the National Gallery
- Pietà in the Vatican Pinacoteca
Individual evidence
- ↑ Stefano Zuffi , Il Quattrocento, Electa, Milano 2004, p. 260. ISBN 88-370-2315-4
- ↑ cit., P. 42.
- ↑ a b Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 43.
- ↑ a b c d e Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 11.
- ↑ a b c Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 15th
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 12.
- ↑ a b c d Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 14th
- ↑ a b c d e f g h Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 13.
- ↑ Fabiani, cit. in Zampetti, 1986, p. 13.
- ↑ Zampetti, 1986, cit., P. 46.
- ↑ Attribuzione proposta da Cesare Verani, Rieti e il suo territorio , Milano, 1976, pp. 239-276
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Crivelli, Carlo |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Italian painter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | between 1430 and 1435 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Venice |
| DATE OF DEATH | before August 7, 1500 |
| Place of death | uncertain: Ascoli Piceno |