Castelfranco Madonna
The Madonna and Child between St. Francis and Nicaise, also known as Castelfranco Madonna, is a painting by the Italian Renaissance, one of the few works of Giorgione built in 1503, which already died at age 32 from the effects of the plague. It is located in the Cathedral of Castelfranco, Giorgione's birthplace, in Veneto, northern Italy.
History
The contract for the altarpiece was the longtime Caterina Cornaro Condottiere Tuzio Costanzo in memory of his son Matteo, 1503 /4 or 1500, died in the service of the Republic of Venice in Ravenna at the age of 23 years at a fever. Tuzio passed on the order to build a family chapel for the grave monuments of Matteo and for himself on the walls on either side of the painting. In the following years the church was demolished and in its place in 1724 the Cathedral of Castelfranco. The new church, which persists to this day, has a small chapel where the painting and immediately below Matteo's grave located. The coat of arms Costanzo, three pairs of ribs, can be seen on the grave monument at the foot of the throne of the Madonna. (Some pupils Giorgione's alleged St. Nicaise is a portrait of Matteo ).
In recent centuries, made poor restorations and on 10 December 1972, the painting was stolen. After its rediscovery, it was 2002-2003 in the workshops of the Accademia (Venice) carefully restored and displayed in the exhibition Le maraviglie dell'arte, before returning to Castelfranco in December 2005.
Description
The painting is a Sacra Conversazione, which is here reduced to three figures, which do not form a closed group. It shows the enthroned Madonna and Child with Saint Francis of Assisi (right) and Nicaise (left). The Holy in armor was formerly regarded as sacred or holy Liberalis George, patron saint of Castel Franco. Matteo and his brother gross Muzio were members of the Order of Malta, whose standard of the holy Nicasius carries ( a holy martyrs, who also belonged to the Order of Malta ). These is the omission of any reference to religious motive conventions. The throne of Mary rises, the central axis of the image emphasizing high up on the St. Francis and Nicasius allocated space in the landscape, which occupies a good part of the background. Giorgione dissolves so from the traditional image array. The three figures are formally separated from each other, each lost in thought. The linear perspective construction space of the early Renaissance is given here, but is still in the perspective arrangement of the floor to the application. The colors of the throne building with the green stands out well from the dark red background, increase in small increments. The lighter green landscape adapts to the brighter red and dark green of Mary's robe ( instead of the traditional blue) and can be a spatial unit of interior and landscape emerge.
The imaging is an example of what Vasari called the pittura senza disegno (paintings without design ). This new set of Mala revolutionized Venetian painting school and was with the image of La tempesta ( The thunderstorm ) famous. Titian, Giorgione's a student, later became the most famous exponent of this style. The figure of Saint Francis of Assisi in San Giovanni Bellini Giobbi altarpiece ( c. 1487 ) are very similar.