Luccano-Pisa School of Painting

Value

It is impossible to understand the origins of the Proto-Renaissance , and in particular where the art of Cimabue , Duccio, and Giotto came from, without the leaning, or the Luccano-leaning, school of painting. These artists did not appear from scratch.

Start

Extant works of painting of the XII - XIII centuries are few. Over the past centuries, churches were rebuilt, murals were rewritten, and the tree, which was then used for the easel painting, was destroyed.

From the works of art and documents available today, it follows that the first large art workshop in Tuscany appeared in Lucca at the beginning of the 13th century , and belonged to Berlingiero di Milanese . This workshop met the needs of not only Lucca, but also the surrounding cities. Despite the fact that Lucca was often at enmity with Pisa, this had little influence on the artistic process, and artists from these republican cities willingly exchanged ideas.

The paintings of Lucca and Pisa of the XII century are represented in very small artifacts. These are several altar images written on boards, painted crosses, and miniatures in manuscripts. Stylistically, in the first half of the XII century, the painting was dominated by humbro-Roman features, and in the second half of the century, an increase in Byzantine influence was visible (“Cross” No. 15 from the San Matteo Museum in Pisa; miniatures of “Calci Bible”, ibid.)

Despite the fact that in modern works, the Luccan and Pisa schools are usually separated, the creative techniques, finds and ideas of the early artists of these two cities are so closely intertwined that it is sometimes impossible to determine which school an artifact belongs to.

Background of occurrence. Byzantine influence

For XIII century painting, on the one hand, an increase in Byzantine influence was characteristic, on the other, an increase in searches leading away from this influence. This creative contradiction is the main essence of the Luccan-Pisa school in the 13th century.

Pisa at the end of the XI - beginning of the XII century reached its greatest power. This republic essentially became a world maritime power, its ships plowed almost the entire Mediterranean Sea, and its merchants traded from Baghdad to Spain.

Pisa had very close commercial ties with the Byzantine Empire . The Byzantine Emperor Alexei I Komnin granted the Pisans special trading privileges. And after almost a hundred years, in 1192 , another Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angel confirmed these privileges, leaving, however, the 4% taxation of all trading operations of the Pisans, which they were very unhappy with. In Constantinople, the Pisans had a whole trading quarter, where they lived, traded, and kept warehouses. Trade with Byzantium was very active, and Byzantine goods, especially luxury goods in the capital: ivory, bronze jewelry, books decorated with jewelers and church utensils, and, of course, Byzantine icons, constantly arrived at the port of Pisa, and dispersed throughout Tuscany and the whole Italy.

With a high degree of certainty, it can be assumed that Byzantine artists came to Italy with Pisan merchants, and Pisan artists were able to visit Constantinople and the countries of the Levant - all this happened despite the split between Orthodoxy and Catholicism. Thanks to these products and these artists, Byzantine painting spread to Tuscany, becoming dominant. The predominance of Byzantine painting can have a number of explanations. Firstly, then they believed that Byzantium , as the keeper of ancient antiquities, preserved the true images of Christ and other gospel characters with miraculous powers, and that Byzantine icons were painted almost from nature. Secondly, the Byzantines had a much more developed iconography. Thirdly, Byzantine artists were much more skilled than the then artists of Italy.

The medieval Pisa claimed a lot, it wanted to become almost new Rome, its noble townspeople preferred the luxurious ancient Roman sarcophagi found during excavation for their burial. To the central cemetery of Camposanto in the holds of 50 leaning ships of Palestine from Palestine, from the sacred hill on which Christ was crucified, the land was brought - the leaners wanted to be buried only in the holy land. Thanks to successful wars, and the successful activities of merchants, during the heyday of Pisa, the treasury had enough money to start up grandiose construction projects.

In the 11th – 12th centuries, a magnificent architectural ensemble was built in Pisa, consisting of a cathedral, a baptistery and the famous leaning tower. The cathedral in Pisa has become a model for architects from other cities, and the sculptures of Niccolo Pisano in the Leaning Baptistery of Pisa - an object of inspiration for many artists in Tuscany. Against this brilliant background, it seems strange that in painting Pisan masters could not make an equally impressive breakthrough. However, this is not the case, a breakthrough was. Pisan masters own at least two important innovations in the art of the first half of the 13th century:

1. The transition from the image of the "triumphant Christ" to the image of the "suffering Christ".

2. The creation by the artist Junta Pisano of a new image of Christ, more material, more human, experiencing torment, understandable to ordinary people.

Church Influence

By the 13th century, Italian art had become formal, frozen, and devoid of emotion. It was significantly inferior to Byzantine art, which was experiencing at that time a revival of interest in the classical antique past. However, at the beginning of the 13th century, an important event for the future art took place in Italy - a church reformer, St. Francis of Assisi , with his calls "to pray with reason, not lips," that is, to take faith with all your heart, and not mechanically repeat church dogmas. The popularity of his ideas could not but affect the tastes and preferences of customers of fine art.

The most popular painting formats in the XII - the first half of the XIII century were the altar painting and the painted cross . Over the course of two centuries, the altar picture did not undergo any structural changes - in the center a large figure of a saint or gospel character was depicted, and on the sides of it scenes associated with the activities of this character. With painted crosses, the situation was different. Until the beginning of the XIII century, Christ on these crosses was depicted in the form of the “triumphant Christ” ( Latin Christus triumphans ) - overcoming death, and with wide eyes. However, from the first decade of the 13th century, another form of his image began to spread - “Christ the suffering” ( Christus patiens ), with his head falling to one side, and his lifeless body hanging; on the sides of Christ began to paint images of the Mother of God and John the Baptist, experiencing the painful moment of his death. So, prompting church parishioners to deep empathy, the artists responded to the calls of St. Francis And although it is known that the iconography of Christ the Suffering already existed in Byzantium, and the first painted cross of Pisa with such an iconography (the so-called Cross No. 20 from the Museum of San Matteo in Pisa), apparently, was created by the one who fled from Constantinople from the Crusaders by the Byzantine artist, the very idea of ​​this innovation was in demand in the art market, in which one of the main customers was Franciscans, who built and decorated many churches at that time.

A major reformer of painting in the first half of the 13th century was the leaner Junta Pisano . On his painted crosses, the body of Christ sags under its own weight, and the face is distorted by the grimace of mortal suffering. The Junta tradition was continued and developed by several anonymous masters of Pisa, as well as Enrico di Tediche and his brother Ugolino di Tediche , whose only signed work is in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg . The type of painted cross invented by Junta Pisano remained popular in the 14th century.

The highest point of Pisa painting of the XIII century is the work of the Master of San Martino , who should justifiably be considered one of the direct predecessors of Cimabue . In the years 1301-1302 Cimabue lived and worked in Pisa. Among all his works, the only documented work is a mosaic in the Leaning Cathedral of Pisa. In the same period, he created one of his “Madonnas” for the church of Santa Maria del Carmine, now stored in the Louvre, Paris . In this work, the composition and characteristics of the throne demonstrate the clear influence of the Madonna of the Master of San Martino.

Sunset

The power of Pisa lasted 200 years. In the XIV century, the republic began to decline. The treasury was empty, the construction froze, the need for artists was reduced. The last major Pisan artist was Francesco Traini, however, he already worked in the Siena style popular in the 14th century. The Leaning School of Pisa in the 14th century ceased to exist. But for almost the entire 13th century, the Leaning and Leaning School of Pisa was the leading school in Italy, and the fruits of its evolution served the heyday of Italian painting in other art centers.

A large role in the spread of Byzantine painting in Italy was played by Ilya Kortonsky, an associate of St. Francis of Assisi, and the head of the Franciscan Order after his death. In 1217, Francis of Assisi appointed Ilya his viceroy on Terra Sancta, the Holy Land, which included Greece, Constantinople (by then captured by the Crusaders), Armenia, Syria, Palestine and Egypt. Ilya Kortonsky possessed such vast knowledge of the dogma of Orthodoxy that the pope turned to him for consultations. He was a staunch supporter of the fact that the ancient Byzantine icons represented true images of Christ, the Mother of God, etc., possessing miraculous power. It was he who in 1236 ordered Dzhunta Pisano the first painted cross for the Lower Church in Assisi (now lost) with the image of the dead Christ, at the feet of which Ilya Kortonsky himself was kneeling, an impudence at that time was unheard of. For more details see “History of the Italian Renaissance. Edited by Rolf Thoman. ”Konemann. 2000.

• The art of the Italian Renaissance. Edited by Rolf Thoman. Konemann 2000.
• Ferdinando Bologna. Early Italian Painting. VEB Verlag der Kunst. Dresden. 1964.
• Miklos Boskovits. The Origins of Florentine Painting. 1100-1270. Giunti 2001.
• Burresi Mariagiulia. Caleca Antonio. La Pittura Pisana del Duecento da Giunta e Giotto. Editore Pacini. 2005.

• Byzantine master crucifix from Pisa
• Berlingiero di Milanese
• Bonaventure Berlingieri
• Marco Berlingieri
• Junta Pisano (Junta di Capitino)
• Michele di Baldovino
• Ugolino di Tedice
• Enrico di Tedice
• Ranieri di Ugolino
• Master San Martino
• Deodato Orlandi
• Traini, Francesco
• Cecco di Pietro
• Giovanni di Nicola
• Puccinelli, Angelo