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

14 VINCENZO FOPPA
phases of emotion with startling reality, of seizing a psychological moment and
depicting it with a truth that is wholly convincing, is a very remarkable
achievement at this early date, and proves that the tendency of the new
school of naturalism inaugurated in North Italy by Pisanello and Jacopo
Bellini had found in Vincenzo one of its ablest and most enthusiastic exponents.
Sincerity, the keynote of his art from his earliest to his latest
works, led him to develop these tendencies on different lines from those of his
predecessors. The conception here is as unusual as it is poetical and impressive.
The sombre sky flecked with lines of light towards the horizon forms a
most appropriate background to the three figures and throws them into strong
relief. On them Vincenzo has concentrated all his power ;
he has conceived
of them as forsaken by all, set in the midst of a dark and hilly landscape
without the city over which the hush of a profound and awful stillness broods.
Not a living thing disturbs the infinite solitude ; not an insect stirs ; not a bird
flits across the sky ; and in the midst of this deep silence of nature one note of
intensely human anguish is struck in the conception of the impenitent thief.
By excluding all mortal witnesses and banishing from his panel every disturbing
element and trivial accessory, the painter has increased tenfold the
significance and solemn dignity of his composition.' It is not surprising that
the author of a work so original and spontaneous should at once have sprung
into the first rank among his contemporaries.
The picture is not well preserved throughout and in parts has suffered
irreparable injury. The flesh tones in the body of the impenitent thief have
lost their original character, and the bushes on the right and all
the architectural
and decorative details have been unmercifully repainted ; but injured
though it be, and marred in many parts by the trivial and lifeless touch of the
restorer, the composition as a whole remains to us as one of the most
impressive and striking examples of the ideal representation of the Crucifixion
ever produced, in contradistinction to the historical treatment, with its
crowded groups of figures and many accessories.
etc.) makes the interesting observation that in
feeling and an all-
He instances, among other
compositions, the impressive drawing in the Paris sketch-book representing the moment
after the Crucifixion when all had been accomplished and the three empty crosses are
' Professor Ricci {op. cit., pp. 21, 44,
Jacopo Bellini's drawings we constantly meet with a strain of lyrical
pervading sense of profound and awe-inspiring solitude.
seen in the wild landscape with one solitary figure passing by (No. 62). As the
qualities here alluded to are precisely those which we have for many years regarded
as distinctive also of the art of Foppa, we look upon Professor Ricci's words as a most
striking indirect proof of the bond of union between the two painters, and as a further
confirmation of our view that Jacopo Bellini was, in all probability, the master of
Vincenzo Foppa.