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

Chap. VII. FOPPA'S CONTRACT WITH GRIFFI 165
summer of 1489, and no doubt used his
best endeavours to gain the approbation
of the authorities ; for he must then have been contemplating a return to
his old home, where he was held in high honour, and where he wished to end
his days in peace. But if he returned to Brescia it was essential that he
should obtain employment there at a fixed salary. He therefore enlisted the
support of two of the members of the Council, Giov. Cristoforo da Cazzago
and Emmanuele de Lanis, and obtained from them a promise that his desire
to repatriate and his petition to be allowed to open a school at Brescia should
be brought before the Council at the earliest opportunity ;
their recommendation,
combined with the excellence of his specimen painting in the Loggetta,
would, he had every reason to hope, obtain for him the coveted appointment
of official painter to the Brescian Government.
Towards the end of September the Ducal letter already referred to' (Doc.
No. 46), was sent from Pavia to the Governors of Brescia, begging them to
urge Vincenzo to return to Milan in order to begin the paintings which two
years before he had agreed to execute for Ambrogio Griffi, "our well-beloved
Councillor." As the painter is here spoken of as "Vincenzo of Pavia," some
writers have thrown doubts upon the letter having reference to Foppa ;
but it
seems perfectly plain that it can refer to no one else.
The painter was, as we know, a citizen of Pavia and had been domiciled
there since 1456 or 1458; the Duke would therefore naturally describe him as of
that city when writing to the authorities at Brescia, and it seems strangely
far-fetched to identify him, as has been done, with Vincenzo da Pavia called
il Romano, who worked at Palermo in 1518 and died in 1557. What possible
'^
connection would this painter have had with the Brescian Government? and
is it likely that Griffi would have waited patiently for two years, in the hope of
obtaining the services of one who, at that date, must have been at the very
beginning of his career? Many writers must have felt that such a conclusion
was untenable, but the first who expressed the opinion that the painter referred
to must be Vincenzo Foppa was, we believe, Senatore Beltrami in the Perscvcranza
of May, 1901, and he also takes the only reasonable view that the
chapel was the one known as the Griffi Chapel in S. Pietro in Gessate, and not
a separate oratory, as some have assumed.'
1877 the fresco had been removed from the wall of Casa Borgondio, the purchaser,
according to Crowe and Cavalcaselle (II, 365), being an Englishman. These writers
were apparently unable to trace it further ;
but there can be no doubt, we think, that it
is
identical with the composition now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, which though
transferred to canvas and modernized by repainting, is nevertheless of great interest
from a topographical point of view (see illustration).
' Chap, vi, p. 153.
2
For Vincenzo da Pavia il Romano, see Archivio S/or. Sici/iatio, 1880, and Di
Marzo, La Pitlum in Palermo, I, 16, 379, and II, 409-11.
^ Magenta, I, 418, etc.