Memoirs of the early Italian painters / by Anna Jameson; thoroughly revised and in part rewritten by Estelle M. Hurll.
- Anna Brownell Jameson
- Date:
- 1899
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Memoirs of the early Italian painters / by Anna Jameson; thoroughly revised and in part rewritten by Estelle M. Hurll. Source: Wellcome Collection.
280/335 page 236
![GIORGIONE Born 1478,1 Dikd 3511 This painter was another great inventor; one of those who stamped his own individuality on his art. He was essentially a poet, and a subjective poet, who fused his own being with all he performed and created: if Raphael he the Shakespeare, then Giorgione may he styled the Byron, of painting. He was horn at Castel Franco, a small town in the territory of Treviso, and his proper name was Giorgio Barbarelli. Nothing is known of his family or of his younger years, ex- cept that, having shown a strong disposition to Art, he was brought, when a boy, to Venice, and placed under the tuition of Gian Bellini. As he grew up he was distinguished by his tall noble figure and the dignity of his deportment; and his companions called him Giorgione, or George the Great, by which nickname he has, after the Italian fashion, descended to posterity. Giorgione appears to have been endowed by nature with an intense love of beauty and a sense of harmony which pervaded his whole being. He was famous as a player and composer on the lute, to which he sung his own verses. In his works two characteristics prevail, sentiment and color ; both tinged by the peculiar temperament of the man : the sentiment is noble, but melancholy, and the color decided, intense, and glowing. His execution had a freedom, a careless mastery of hand, or, to borrow the untranslatable Italian word, a sprezxa- tura, unknown before his time. The idea that he founded his style on that of Leonardo da Vinci cannot be entertained by those who have studied the works of both ; nothing can be more distinct in character and feeling. It is to be regretted that of one so interesting in his charac- ter and his works we know so little ; yet more to be regretted i [Crowe and Cavalcaselle say that Giorgione was born before 1477, but authorities usually follow Vasari, who says 1478.]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24877888_0280.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
