Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) was born in a small, very ancient Tuscan town of Arezzo, which was located near Florence. He remained for centuries as an architect and as a person who laid the foundation for art history.
Studying and getting started
Born into a potter's family, the bright and capable teenager at the age of 12 became the apprentice of a French artist who made stained glass windows in a church in Arezzo, Guillaume de Marsiglia. The growth of the future artist took place against the backdrop of constant wars in Italy. City-states existed in it, and no one claimed its lands. And the Germans, and the Spaniards, and the French. But in the country there was a formation of a national idea, the formation of the Italian language from numerous dialects, it was proud of the great painters and sculptors that educated Europe knew. Masterpieces by Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael have already been created. The great Michelangelo also worked. Already two hundred years before the birth of Giorgio Vasari, Italy was brought up on the ideals of humanism. Such a "seething" in the country affected the formation of a young man, eagerly absorbing all the latest trends that appeared in the country, and the spirit of love of freedom.
Meeting withMichelangelo
A capable thirteen-year-old teenager was noticed. Thanks to Michelangelo, who noticed him, Giorgio Vasari was sent to the famous artist Andrea del Sarto. This artist was influenced primarily by Leonardo, he was friends with Titian and Raphael. He had a wonderful sense of color and color and worked extremely skillfully with chiaroscuro. From other teachers, Giorgio will gain experience in drawing and building composition and perspective. Giorgio Vasari would later criticize his teacher. He believed that Andrea lacked inspiration to create great creations. Describing his life, Vasari will tell about the grumpy wife of his teacher, who poisoned life well for him and his students. He will also tell you that del Sarto will die during a plague. However, Vasari himself, having mastered the drawing, will not be able to perceive from his teacher the ability to use color. Architecture and sculpture Vasari will learn from the fifty-year-old Michelangelo. Vasari would become a biographer and friend of the great artist. In any case, a very withdrawn and gloomy artist will tell his young friend that his formation as a creator was influenced by the rarefied air of Tuscany and the clay with which he began working in the early years of his apprenticeship.
Wandering
The young Vasari Giorgio is patronized by the Medici, but in 1529 they are expelled from Florence, and the seventeen-year-old artist returns to his native city. And what awaits him? The father died, it is necessary to take care of the family, of younger brothers and sisters. Here he receives orders for frescoes and paintings. Need for moneyforces him to leave Arezzo, head to Pisa and then wander around Italy in search of work. Fortune smiled on the young artist - he met Ippolito de' Medici, one of his patrons in Florence, and the duke took Vasari with him to Rome.
Return to Florence
Here he works under the auspices of Alessandro de' Medici and in 1534 paints his portrait.
It is in this portrait that the coloristic weakness of the painter is visible. High Renaissance artists, as a rule, used three colors - scarlet, blue, gold (yellow). And Giorgio Vasari has a knight in armor sitting on a brown stool covered with scarlet drapery. The sky in the depths of the picture is rather grayish, covered with gloomy clouds. The background on which the figure is depicted is uniformly dark. The hair completely merges with it, there are not enough soft transitions of the shadows. The armor shines the brightest. The drawing is magnificent, virtuoso, but it has a self-contained meaning. Yes, it is clear that this is a determined knight who spends his life in the saddle and battles, but on the whole the portrait is gloomy and dark, imbued with tragedy. But this is how the painter sees his patron. In general, Vasari does not follow nature, does not seek harmony, but puts everything into the accuracy of lines that give volume, and into exaggerated expressiveness. Vasari Giorgio constantly uses these techniques. Paintings among contemporaries are popular. But they have not stood the test of time and are now of historical rather than artistic interest.
After deathAlessandro de' Medici Vasari already in Bologna creates one of his best paintings "The Meal of St. George", which depicts portraits of his contemporaries. They will be included in his Biography.
Vasari's great creation in Florence
Cosimo I Medici ordered Vasari to build a palace that will unite many services of the city with the embankment of the Arno River. Since 1560, construction began on the building that we know as the Uffizi Gallery.
The building has a monumental colonnade and is modular with blocks separated by pilasters. During the life of Vasari, construction took fourteen years. It was completed seven years after his death.
Art History
Vasari Giorgio's books were the most valuable for posterity. This is a huge five-volume work.
It is divided into parts devoted to architecture, painting, sculpture and is a treatise on the technical methods used in various arts, and the actual biographies of the creators. The first edition was published in Florence in 1550. It begins with a dedication to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Cosimo I de' Medici. In this book, Vasari is the first to introduce the concept of "Renaissance", as well as "Early, Middle and High Renaissance" and their origins - "Antiquity, the Middle Ages".
How Giorgio Vasari built a biography
Based on the novel, already well known to the contemporary reader, Vasari writes biographies of artists representing the pride of the Italiannation. He reports the biography of the sculptor, artist or architect and gives an analysis and features of his work. All works of the creator must be indicated. Since Giorgio Vasari is an artist himself, acting as an art historian, he expertly analyzes the drawing, the school, the manner of execution. For each short story, the writer carefully collected the smallest facts from the life of the artist. Each article contains a portrait, sometimes made by Vasari himself. The life writer tried to trace the connection of each artist with the people. If he describes the images of biblical characters created by one or another master, then Giorgio Vasari seeks to connect these images with the daily life of the artist. The book opens with the biography and work of Giotto, and ends with Michelangelo. But the second edition, which came out eighteen years later, is supplemented by corrections, clarifications, and new biographies. In total, about two hundred of them have been published. This work of Messire Vasari determined the path of art history as a science for many centuries. His view of art has not lost its relevance even today.
The master died in Florence in 1574.
