MANTEGNA: AN ARTIST FOR THREE CITIES
Picture from the official site of Mantegna's exhibition
Mantegna's exhibitions: Padua, Verona and Mantua
The Ministry for Cultural Property and Activities has created a National Committee spanding the most prestigious painters of the early Italian Renaissance in order to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Andrea Mantegna's death.
The Committee has organised a completely new kind of exhibition which takes place in each of the three cities where Mantegna lived and worked as an artist: in Padua, at Eremitani Museum, Verona, at Palazzo della Gran Guardia, and Mantova, at Palazzo Te.
The works of Mantegna are presented together with those of his followers and other masters. All these artists played a crucial role in the renewal of figurative language in 15th-century northern Italy.
Andrea Mantegna (Isola di Carturo, 1431 – Mantova, 13th September 1506), was a painter and an engraver of Veneto.
Mantegna is considered the initiator of the Renaissance in Veneto and the renewer of northern Italy painting. He was educated in Squarcione’s workshop in Padua, where he developed a taste for archaeology.
Mantegna's passion for Classical antiquity came from different factors: the humanistic atmosphere conveyed by the famous university of Padua - the second oldest university in Italy after Bologna - and the large number of Roman remains discovered in the North of Italy, together with the archaeological interests of his master Squarcione.
Moreover, when Mantegna came into contact with the novelties brought by the Tuscan artists such as Filippo Lippi, Paolo Uccello, Andrea del Castagno and in particular Donatello, he matured his stylistic stance that was characterised by a perfect sense of perspective, a taste for the clearly sketched drawing and the monumental size of his drawn figures.
The contact Mantegna had with Piero della Francesca’s works in Ferrara led to a significant result in his perspective study, with an illusionist painting that became the typical feature of northern Italy painting. For this reason Mantegna was given the credit of having invented the techniques of foreshortening and spatial illusionism.
However, only through the acquaintance with Giovanni Bellini, the shapes of his characters would soften without loosing their great monumentality. Mantegna was born in 1431. The date is obtained from a latin inscription which says “Andreas Mantinea Pat. an. septem et decem natus sua manu pinxit M.CCCC.XLVIII” and which was found in a lost altar piece of Saint Sophia Church in Padua.
When Mantegna was about 10 years old, he left his town to reach Padua, where he trained in Squarcione’s workshop.
In 1447 Mantegna was in Venice with his master Squarcione and only one year later - at the age of 17 - the artist finished his apprenticeship and would be no longer under his master protection .
In 1455 Mantegna began his earliest independent commission: the fresco decoration of the Ovetari Chapel of the Eremitani Church in Padua, dedicated to the Saints James and Christopher.
The Empress Ovetari commissioned the painting of the Chapel from the artist. She was, in fact, the widow of an important notary, who left part of his inheritance to the decoration of Ovetari Chapel.
Mantegna painted the chapel with all the Stories of St. James and St. Christopher, but the Chapel was almost all bombed out on 11th March 1944 during the Second World War.
Introduction
Biography
Picture: Assumption
In 1457 Mantegna was commissioned by the abbot Gregorio Corner to paint the Altarpiece of Saint Zeno for the homonymous church in Verona. This is considered one of his most successful masterpieces. The main scene, the holy conversation, is represented inside a classical four-sided portico, while in the altar-step there are the Passion Scenes paintings, with the Crucifixion, retained at Louvre Museum and Tours Museum.
Picture: Altarpiece of Saint Zeno
In 1460 Mantegna was invited by Ludovico Gonzaga in Mantua, who nominated the painter court artist and also artistic adviser until his death. Here he threw all his energy into the decoration of Camera degli Sposi (literally “Wedding Chamber”) in the Doge’s Palace of Mantua.
On 13th September 1506 he died in Mantua.
Major Works
Picture: Madonna with Sleeping Child
- Altarpiece of San Zeno - San Zeno, Verona.
- St. Sebastian (c. 1457-1459)- Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.
- St. Sebastian - Louvre, Paris.
- Portrait of Carlo de Medici (1467) - Uffizi, Florence.
- The Madonna of the Cherubim (1485) - Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan.
- Triumph of Caesar (1486) - Hampton Court Palace, England.
- The Lamentation over the Dead Christ (1490) - Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan.
- Madonna of the Caves (1489-1490)) - Uffizi, Florence.
- St. Sebastian (1490) - Ca' d'Oro, Venice.
- Madonna della Vittoria (1495) - Louvre, Paris.
- Holy Family (1495-1500) - The Dresden Gallery, Dresden.
- Judith and Holofernes (1495) - National Gallery of Art, Washington.
- Minerva Chases the Vices from the Garden of Virtue (1502) and Parnassus (Mars and Venus) (1497), two mythological toiles painted for Isabella d’Este’s small study.
Where to find Mantegna's works
Bibliography
Information and pictures taken from:
- The English Wikipedia. (2006) Andrea Mantegna. Retrieved December, 11, 2006 from http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Mantegna|http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Mantegna
- Sgarbi V., (2006) MANTEGNA - Padova, Eremitani - Verona, Gran Guardia - Mantova, Palazzo Te. Un artista per tre città. Retrieved December, 11, 2006 from http://www.andreamantegna2006.it/ita/home.html
- Farace E., (2006) Storia dell'arte. Andrea Mantegna. Retrieved December, 11, 2006 from http://www.storiadellarte.com/biografie/mantegna/vitamantegna.htm
Listen to a short presentation of Mantegna in English:
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