Perugino part deux; Adoration of the Magi

Perugino traveled pretty frequently from Perugia to Florence and back again, and the influences of one town always showed in the work he created in the other.

A good example of his Florentine influence shows in his depiction of The Adoration of the Magi.

The layout of the scene is fairly standard again, with the Virgin and lil baby Jesus hanging out on the right and the visitors' procession developing on the left. One of the really cool elements we see Perugino developing in this piece is the use of aerial perspective in the landscape behind the nonsense in the front. Aerial perspective, for those of you not in the know, is the effect that atmosphere has on objects viewed at different distances. Trees from thirty feet away would look less saturated, and tend to gravitate towards the blue tonalities of the sky, as opposed to a tree right next to you, which would look crisp and clear and contrast more clearly with the background. You'll see da Vinci utilize aerial perspective quite a bit in paintings like The Mona Lisa and the Last Supper. This is a technique that Perugino utilizes very successfully, in my mind. 

FUN FACT! The man on the extreme left is a portrait of Perugino himself. neat.

Anyways, the posturing of the procession of visitors on the left is very robust, echoing Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, Perugino's first painting master. Around this time, he was commissioned to paint some of the walls of the Sistine Chapel, all of which were later destroyed to make room for Michelangelo's Last Judgement. (Which INFURIATES me, but okay. It seems like such a devaluing of a master's work.)

Pietro Perugino! Some Research and stuff

Okay, so Perugino is really cool. He's a sort of precursory painter to the High Renaissance movement. He most likely began studying painting in Perugia, in local workshops around the town. He was apparently one of the first Italian practitioners of oil painting, though he also dabbled in cartooning, oddly enough. He is known to have excelled in perspective painting, which he learned from

An excellent example of some of his very early work is the piece Madonna with Child Enthroned Between Saints, painted early in his career in 1493, I believe.

This piece is interesting because we see Perugino pushing the "Holy Conversion" style that was sweeping Venice at the time. We see the Virgin Mary on an elevated platform above the saints, sort of elevating her status and cementing that holy iconography as the mother of Christ. Bellini does the same thing his his depictions of Mary and Christ on the throne, albeit in a stronger manner (I think, at least.) 

There's a pyramidal development of the composition overall, centering on Mary and creating a strong triangle with her as the focus. There is also an element of severity to Mary; she's been stripped of a bit of her elegance, and she is no longer portrayed as a delicate little maiden. She looks much more mature and somber, befitting her elevated status above John the Baptist and Saint Sebastian. The depiction of Saint Sebastian is fairly standard, showing him being martyred by arrows. 

We also see fairly standard depictions of the architecture echoing Gothic detail, with a pretty serene and detached landscape behind them. 

So yeah, early Perugino. More posts to come soon!