Set up with the intention of showing the public some of the most important works of the master of Raffaello Sanzio, in the Sale del Castellare di Urbino and entitled “Perugino. The master of Raphael “, the exhibition presents a total of twenty paintings, some of which even belonging to painters contemporary to Perugino, coming from that artistic crossroads that were – especially in the Renaissance period – the Marche, Umbria and Tuscany. Curated by Vittorio Sgarbi with the collaboration of the Marche Region and the National Gallery of the Marche, it can be visited until 17 October.
Born in Città della Pieve (Umbria) around 1450, Perugino (whose real name was Pietro Vannucci) soon moved to Florence, where he was able to learn the artistic work in the workshop of Andrea Verrocchio, a real “school of the world ”Frequented at that time by other promising Florentine artists, including Sandro Botticelli and Leonardo da Vinci. However, it was the meeting with Piero della Francesca that struck him: the use of perspective (prospectiva pingendi) in a completely new way as well as the compositional atmospheres that are well suited to it represent the non plus ultra for the young Umbrian painter, who will come equally fascinated by the Flemish masters – then in vogue in the cultural circles of late fifteenth-century Florence – and by their luminous and enameled landscapes, so much so that he wanted to emulate their deeds at all costs and succeeded fully.
Master of Raphael
In addition to being Raphael’s teacher, Perugino also had many pupils, as can be clearly seen from the following statement that the great artist from Urbino did not spare himself: “none of so many disciples ever compared the diligence of Peter, nor the grace that he had in coloring in that way, which pleased him so much in his time, that many came from France, Spain, Alemagna and other provinces to learn it ”.
The pupils of the school of Perugino – all active in Umbria at the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries -, which Roberto Longhi once classified as belonging to the “Peruginesque editorial”, their witnesses more than ever as well as real spokespersons of the art of the painter from Città della Pieve, of which he they include the most prestigious names of Berto di Giovanni and Giovanni di Pietro known as Spain.
But they are ascribed, above all, to emulate from other regions such as Francesco Francia, coming from “Bentivolesque” Bologna, and Antoniazzo Romano, a leading exponent of the early Lazio Renaissance, both fascinated by that “diligence” and that “grace” in painting that they also made Perugino known outside the princely courts of central Italy.