DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61670#0453
OSPEDALE DEL CEPPO, PISTOJA 249
The large figures of the Virtues placed between each scene
have all the characteristics of the Filippinesque assistant, although
they are, probably by reason of their greater prominence in the
decorative scheme, less carelessly modelled. The attribution
of these clumsy, ill-posed, flaccid figures, with their vacant
faces and pillow-like limbs, to Giovanni who has shown him-
self to be so vigorous in the main scenes, would be a gross
injustice. Careless and theatrical Giovanni often is, but his
figures are never boneless nor tottering. These Virtues have
precisely the same defects noticed in the inferior parts of the
foregoing scenes. In the Charity moreover, the child who
stands at her feet is an almost exact counterpart of that to the
extreme right in the first scene, The Clothing of the Naked. The
influence of the Filippino school is apparent in all the feeble
figures, its peculiarities exaggerated to caricature. Giovanni
imitated several Masters, but he seems to have confined himself
to the Donatellesque energetic school, and no suggestion is to
be found in any of his works of the influence of Botticelli or of
Filippino.
Between each pillar of the Loggia, as in the Florence
hospitals, is a medallion, four containing the different shields
of the hospital and city, viz.: the blossoming tree-stump
(ceppo\ the stemma of the hospital from which it takes its
name, the Medici arms, and the chequers of Pistoja itself.
On the other three are represented the Annunciation, the
Assumption of the Virgin, and the Visitation, executed by
one of the poorest, most trivial of Giovanni’s imitators, one
whose handiwork we have met with often enough in the vapid
angels and subordinate figures of his polychromatic altarpieces.
They are mere artisans’ copies of his weakest style, and accen-
tuate his most glaring faults. Each of the foregoing medallions
is surrounded by a garland composed of ponderous and
brightly-coloured fruits.
Beneath the Annunciation is inscribed the date 1525, and
beneath the Visitation the letters m-a-m-d-b-i-m-e-f-v-t,
2 1
The large figures of the Virtues placed between each scene
have all the characteristics of the Filippinesque assistant, although
they are, probably by reason of their greater prominence in the
decorative scheme, less carelessly modelled. The attribution
of these clumsy, ill-posed, flaccid figures, with their vacant
faces and pillow-like limbs, to Giovanni who has shown him-
self to be so vigorous in the main scenes, would be a gross
injustice. Careless and theatrical Giovanni often is, but his
figures are never boneless nor tottering. These Virtues have
precisely the same defects noticed in the inferior parts of the
foregoing scenes. In the Charity moreover, the child who
stands at her feet is an almost exact counterpart of that to the
extreme right in the first scene, The Clothing of the Naked. The
influence of the Filippino school is apparent in all the feeble
figures, its peculiarities exaggerated to caricature. Giovanni
imitated several Masters, but he seems to have confined himself
to the Donatellesque energetic school, and no suggestion is to
be found in any of his works of the influence of Botticelli or of
Filippino.
Between each pillar of the Loggia, as in the Florence
hospitals, is a medallion, four containing the different shields
of the hospital and city, viz.: the blossoming tree-stump
(ceppo\ the stemma of the hospital from which it takes its
name, the Medici arms, and the chequers of Pistoja itself.
On the other three are represented the Annunciation, the
Assumption of the Virgin, and the Visitation, executed by
one of the poorest, most trivial of Giovanni’s imitators, one
whose handiwork we have met with often enough in the vapid
angels and subordinate figures of his polychromatic altarpieces.
They are mere artisans’ copies of his weakest style, and accen-
tuate his most glaring faults. Each of the foregoing medallions
is surrounded by a garland composed of ponderous and
brightly-coloured fruits.
Beneath the Annunciation is inscribed the date 1525, and
beneath the Visitation the letters m-a-m-d-b-i-m-e-f-v-t,
2 1