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

Chap. V. BRERA ALTARPIECE 125
of his angels at the neck and wrists. This is a characteristic met with in the
Savona altarpiece and in other works, as well as in numerous examples
of his school.
The grey flesh tints which, as already observed, are so distinctive of
Foppa, and through him became the heritage of the early Lombard school,
are everywhere present ; but in some of the heads, more especially in those
of the angels in the central panel, the colours have so deteriorated as to
be unpleasant in tone. This curious and unnatural hue in the colour of the
flesh is met with in a few other works by Foppa, for instance, in the St.
Sebastian of the Castello Museum, and may perhaps be ascribed to the fact
that the unusually delicate glazes used by the master have not always been
proof against external injuries, but have succumbed to the numerous processes
of severe overcleaning to which his works have been subjected ; in
the case of these angels scarcely anything beyond the underpainting now
remains.'
The predella, though showing many indications of the co-operation of
assistants, was undoubtedly produced from the master's designs ;
the charming
compositions of the Nativity and Flight into Egypt ^
are his in conception,
if not in execution, and certain figures show unmistakable traces of his
own hand, such as the two angels holding the instruments of the Passion,
and more especially the angel of the Annunciation, which is so strikingly
Foppesque in character as to be tantamount to a signature.
On the whole, therefore, this altarpiece is certainly the most notable and
representative existing example of Foppa's art, being one of the few complete
works of the kind by him at present known. In general character it represents
the principles laid down by the master towards the close of what we may
term his early middle period, when, having achieved success in copying
nature—though from the standpoint of character rather than of beauty—with
the utmost truth and fidelity, he now sought to idealize his types and to
endow his figures with a larger measure of outward attractiveness. The
innate feeling for grace and beauty so apparent in his earliest works, but
1 As this deterioration of the flesh tints is seen to a greater extent in the works of
Foppa than in those of any of his followers, it might perhaps be due in certain cases to
some inherent defect in the quality of the mediums used by the master, with which he
may have been experimenting in painting flesh. This may have caused the flesh tints
to decay more rapidly than other parts of the work, than the colours of the draperies,
for instance, which are on the whole fairly well preserved and have retained their
original character.
- Foppa's composition of the Flight into Egypt appears to have been the prototype
for many later versions of the subject. See especially the compositions of Bramantino
and Gaudenzio Ferrari, reproduced by Dr. Suida {Jahrbiich, etc., des Allerhochsten
Kaiserhauses, Vol. XXVI).