Vincenzo Foppa of Brescia, founder of the Lombard school, his life ...

Chap. III. THE PORTINARI CHAPEL 63
and the angel are unsatisfactory ;
the forms beneath the draperies are defective
in drawing, and in type, pose, and other particulars, the composition
seems far removed from him. This angel, according to the testimony of
the restorer, the late Agostino Caironi, was the best preserved of all the
figures in the building. In many parts of the chapel he found that the colour
had entirely disappeared (for instance, in the robes of some of the angels in
the drum) ; many figures (as in the Assumption) had vanished altogether,
leaving only the contours visible ; but this angel, he stated, was absolutely
intact. Yet, judging from the colouring as we see it now, it may be
doubted whether all that Caironi found intact was actually original, and a
certain feeling of disappointment which many will perhaps experience on
entering the building, is doubtless due to the fact that the frescoes had already
been repainted in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries prior to their being
whitewashed in 1630; for we know that the chapel was several times
"restored," notably in 1583.^ The four medallions containing the compositions
of the Fathers of the Church recall the similar motives on the ceiling of
the Eremitani Chapel at Padua. The frescoes in that chapel are by different
hands, but the most important part was the work of Niccolo Pizolo (the pupil
of Donatello) and Mantegna, on whom Pizolo appears to have exercised a
powerful influence," and the date of the execution of these paintings is placed
between 1448 and 1455.^
Foppa, during his years of apprenticeship with Jacopo Bellini, may therefore
have seen the designs for the decoration of the chapel, even if he did not
see the whole work completed. But it is extremely probable, during the years
arch above the entrance to the inner chapel, recall similar motives used by Foppa in the
Bergamo Crucifixion and in other works. On the arch above the entrance to the
chapel : (6) The Assumption with angels, and the apostles on the earth below. In the
pendentives below the cupola, the Four Fathers of the Church ; and beneath these in
the spandrels, four angels standing on consoles holding a shield with the arms of the
Portinari family. Above the frieze of terra-cotta angels in the drum, the busts of eight
apostles in rounds of black and white marble, alternating with circular windows.
sections of the cupola, sixteen in all, are filled with an imbricated design ; the colour
scheme is very effective, passing from deep red through shades of yellow and green to
a delicate azure as it approaches the lantern. The painting of the lower portion of the
walls and of the altar chapel is modern. A good idea of the chapel may be formed
from the model in the Victoria and Albert Museum made by Adolfo Consolani, of
Rome (of which we give an illustration), the paintings being executed by Professor D.
Gnoli.
Similar models are in Edinburgh and in Dublin.
' Caffi, Chiesa di S. Eustorgio, etc., 1841, and Cappella di S. Pietro Martire, 1873.
2 See N. Arch. Veneto, N. Ser., Anno VI, T. XII, pt. i, p. 161 and foil.
« Kristeller, op. cit., p. 63. Cf. also Berenson, N. Ital. Painters, p. 255, who
extends the period to 1459.
The