Pietro Vannucci, called Perugino

Private photo] [Cerqueto

To this interesting figure, the earliest known work of the master, a reference will be made later on when consideration is given to other representations of the same saint, but a record must here be made to the Foligno, and to the Signorelli influence that this figure betrays. In direct truth the figure might well be the work of Niccolò Liberatore, and is conceived on the lines of his school. In nervous, tense muscular representation, and in the movement of the limbs, it is strikingly Signorellesque, and the realism of its wounds bespeaks the same characteristic; but the silky treatment of the skin, the roundness of the limbs, the upturned piteous face, the locks of hair, the extraordinarily exaggerated size of the great toe, and, above all, the intricate puckered folds of the drapery, are Perugino's and Perugino's alone.

The painting of the drapery which becomes a mannerism, and one of the most accurate of tests here in the very early days of the artist, takes certain definite forms, and the dark hollows and curious hook-like folds are to be seen in this "San Sebastian," not certainly as freely but quite as definitely, as they appear in later days. The picture is but a fragment of what must have been an important fresco, but it is eloquent of better work to come, and shows promise of masterly execution that only three years afterwards was to be revealed at Rome in the Sistine Chapel. No other work exists to bridge over the time between Perugino's early training in Umbria, his sojourn in Florence, and his return as a well-known artist to the town and neighbourhood of Perugia, although there is said to be a picture near Naples dated 1460, but the date is probably apocryphal.

In Florence the artist would probably have met Leonardo da Vinci and Lorenzo di Credi. If he attended at Verrocchio's studio he certainly would have met them. In Florence also, Resta tells us, he studied Masaccio's work, and we may be quite sure he used every endeavour to perfect himself in his art; and it is to this period of residence that Giovanni Santi refers in his oft quoted lines:

-"Two youths alike in age and love Leonardo di Vinci and the Perugian Peter of Pieve." He is mentioned in Florence in 1490 in one of the books relating to the Cathedral, and there is a story of his having been fined for fighting in Florence in 1488.

In the only picture that remains to us of the series executed by Perugino in Rome for Sixtus IV. we see the result of all this Florence training, but we are also confronted at once by the great characteristic of the Umbrian school-free open space.

In considering this great feature, the most noteworthy characteristic of Umbrian art, it is impossible to avoid reference to Mr. Bernhard Berenson's pages and to his definition of what he terms "space composition," which he defines in this way: "Space composition differs from ordinary composition in the first place most obviously in that it is not an arrangement to be judged as extending only laterally, or up and down, on a flat surface, but as extending inwards in depth as well. It is composition in three dimensions and not in two, in the cube and not merely on the surface."[E]

Farther on he remarks: "This art comes into existence only when we get a sense of space not as a void, as something merely negative such as we customarily have, but on the contrary as something very positive and definite, able to confirm our consciousness of being, to heighten our feeling of vitality."

It is the wonderful art of space compositions which so distinguishes Perugino from his Sistine Chapel days down to the end of his life.

The power is so well expressed by Mr. Berenson that nothing is needed to further define it but he still further emphasises "space composition" when he states that it is an "intrinsically religious art" capable of "communicating the religious emotion" and able to "awaken in those who looked at the pictures a consciousness of preference for a life holy and refined."

In this first great picture "Christ giving the Keys to St. Peter," all the power of this marvellous capability is at once apparent.

It produces a sense of vastness, of spaciousness, of broad, free, open air enclosed only by the blue arch of Heaven, and therefore gathers up and retains all the higher emotions of the spectator.

There are the grand figures in the foreground, majestic and wonderful in their dignity; beyond them are others in the receding distance, smaller and smaller as the eye notes the vast distance expressed in the picture. In the centre rises the wonderful temple. Bramantesque and stately, and beyond it, disappearing away into the horizon are the everlasting hills that bound and yet seem to extend the broad space of the Umbrian landscape the utmost distance of which is lost in the blue haze of the sky.

The two triumphal arches at the sides serve to emphasise the great space that the picture embraces and the effect is that of gazing through an open window in Perugia or at Montefalco.

There is no sense of crowding, the space is so vast that the populace of a country could not crowd it, and the air circulates in and around every group and serves to give the greater plein-air charm.

There is a soothing quiet about the whole, a self-restraint and a stillness, and even though figure stands apart from figure and each one hardly notices the other, yet there is a fine thread of common interest to be seen connecting the whole of the foreground group and linking the spectators to the two central persons, Christ and the Foundation of His Church.

Alinari photo] [Sistine Chapel, Rome

It is well when mentioning this great picture to state as a personal opinion that it is not possible to appreciate Perugino adequately, or even to understand him properly, without a visit to Umbria itself.

The country differs so much from other parts of Italy that mere comparison with parts better known is useless, but when once the student has sojourned in the country the charm of its landscape is felt and understood. There is a vastness about its open spaces, an immensity of view, boundless and yet enclosed, that must be seen to be understood.

To linger on the fortifications of Montefalco, to look out from the public square of Trevi, to wander along the road that divides San Girolamo from Spello, to drive along the plains of Foligno, to stay at Nervi, Deruta, or Bettona, to gaze out over the plains around Assisi, or to appreciate the wonderland that is mapped out around lofty Perugia-all these are so many lessons to the right understanding of Perugino. Away and away in the rolling distance are those vast plains, not flat surfaces, but a luxuriant country-side, irregularly marked by the contours of hills and valleys, dotted with tiny fortified towns crowning each its own hill and looking down upon its neighbour. Great white winding roads meander hither and thither, single trees stand out in sharp tall silhouette against the intense blue of the sky, and around as far as eye can reach stretch the half-hidden, half-revealed mountains clothed in a purple haze while the golden glare of sunlight bathes all the intervening space in its mystic light, tinging with gold the very grass of the fields, the grey drab of the roads, the ruddy brown of the buildings, and the radiance of the distant towers and houses.

All the Umbrian artists felt the charm of this scenery, but no one save Perugino so fully and so consistently expressed it.

It is in all his works, and as one gazes out upon this "buoyant spaciousness" of view, the wondrous creatures of his conceptions, holy women, saints, prophets, apostles, religious guilds, praying populace, seem once more to people the earth, and away in the eternal immeasurable sky can be seen the Assumption, the angels, the mandorla of cherub faces, the comforting seraphim and the glowing cherubim, as Perugino saw them, and the sky is again the scene of the glories which faith enabled Perugino to visualise and depict.

It is the knowledge of his own country and the wonderful power of space composition that marks Perugino's pictures so emphatically as to enable us to determine that the "Delivery of the Keys to St. Peter" is the only fresco from the master's hand in the Sistine Chapel. It was Morelli who first pointed out that Crowe and Cavalcaselle were in error in attributing "Moses and Zipporah" and the "Baptism of Christ" to Perugino, and I accept his teaching in this matter quite readily. A careful study of the Sistine frescoes has convinced me that Morelli was right and Crowe and Cavalcaselle wrong. Even the two central figures in the disputed "Baptism," those of Christ and St. John, which are compared with the two similar figures in the predella at Rouen, which is undoubtedly authentic, and with the same scene in the National Gallery, which I consider a copy only of the master's work, betray the hand of Pinturicchio rather than that of Perugino.

In the fresco at Rome, the two figures are crowded closely together; the arm of Our Lord almost rests on St. John's head, the face of the saint is weak and feeble, the limbs are skinny and badly drawn, there is no sense of security in the feet, the hands are out of proportion and the draperies entirely lack the hook folds of Perugino, and are loose and inadequate. Above all,...