ANDREA VICENTINO

(Vicenza, 1542 - Venice, 1617) Preaching Oil on canvas, 120X120 cm In 1981 Rodolfo Pallucchini pointed out that the Vicentino was still a little-known artist; The critical outline at a distance of thirty years does not differ from the assertions of the scholar, who in turn proceeds on the indications provided by the 'seven manners' of Boschini in which our master is placed side by side with Palma il Giovane and Leonardo Corona, in the wake of the late Titian examples of Tintoretto and Paolo Veronese. Educated in Vicenza with Giovanni Antonio Fasolo (1530-1572) and Giambattista Zelotti (1526-1578), in 1648 Ridolfi praised his qualities as a colourist, admitting: 'that if he had been more regular in drawing...he could have claimed his place among the best painters of his time'. Towards the middle of the eighth decade he is documented in Venice while establishing himself as a painter of history, specialising in works of a celebratory and documentary nature. Our work seems to belong to his early maturity, moving away from the manner of the sixteenth century, perceptible for example in the Lamentation in the Weitzner Collection in New York, but it seems nostalgic for the Veronese models modernized by the 'ante litteram darkness' of Palma. These aspects of style are also expressed in the canvas presented here, which is beautifully preserved and allows us to observe the technical and pictorial preciousness of the artist, who reveals himself to be one of the most interesting figures in Venetian art of his time. Bibliography of reference: R. Pallucchini, La Pittura veneziana del Seicento, Milan 1993, I, pp. 37 ; 41