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

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Caimi,
;
Chap. II. CANVASES ONCE ASCRIBED TO POPPA 41
canvas, and were identical with two pictures which in his day hung in the
church of the hospital ;
in this view he was followed by Fenaroli,' though
Calvi had already pointed out' that these could not possibly be Foppa's
works. The pictures seen by De Pagave are still in existence in the council
chamber of the hospital, and in their present condition can only be regarded
as very late productions. One represents Francesco Sforza and his wife
kneeling before Pope Pius II, who promulgated a Bull, authorizing the
erection of the hospital ; the other, the Duke and Duchess with their family
and attendants kneeling before the altar of the Annunciation under the protection
of St. Ambrose and presenting offerings for the building.
What the true history of these pictures is, we cannot say, but they are
most certainly not the works mentioned by Filarete, Vasari, and others
nor can they be copies of these, for Foppa, as we have just stated, painted
the laying of the stone and the ceremonies attending it.
Equally impossible
is it that they could be the works of a contemporary of Foppa, an otherwise
unknown painter Francesco de' Vico, whose name appears several times on
the books of the hospital in 1472. On September 4 of that year Vico, who
had painted the Duke and Duchess on a canvas placed in the chapel,' is
ordered to restore these heads after the manner of those over an altar in the
cathedral. On another occasion, payments are recorded to Vico for two
pictures with the Pope and rulers of Milan.* Canvases answering to these
descriptions are known to have been for centuries exhibited every 25th of
March on the occasion of the dedication festival and of the Festa del
Perdono,' which was instituted in 1460 for the purpose of collecting alms for
the building of the hospital and of the cathedral. Doubtless in course of
time the originals perished, as the chapel erected for the celebration of the
Festa has also long since been destroyed,* all that remains of this building
^ Dizionario degli Artisti Bresciani, p. 133, ed. 1877.
^ Op. cit., p. 62, ed. 1865.
^ In 1464 it had been resolved by the Chapter of the Hospital that, as a lasting
memorial of the good deeds of Francesco Sforza, his portrait and that of the Duchess
should be painted (Canetta, Elenco, p. 9).
* These notices are in the Archives of the Hospital, and were kindly communicated
by the President of the Committee ; see Ordinazione Capitolare, Settembre 4, 1472, and
Stralcio dal Mastro dell' anno 1472, foglio 63 v. and 132 v. The entries would lead us
to infer that the two paintings there mentioned were on the curtain which protected
the altarpiece, since in both cases the payments are "pro pictura duarum copertinarum
" (see chap, viii, p. 192 and foil, for decorative paintings of this description). They
could not therefore have been identical with the canvases mentioned above, though
the compositions were similar in all.
Notizie, etc., del Grande Ospedale, p. 35.
* Octt., Filarete, p. 31 and note 49.