VITALE DA BOLOGNA

This busy and crowded composition is filled with anecdotal detail. In the soldiers’ uniforms and the caparison worn by the horse to the left of the cross, we see the artist taking pleasure in the decorative elements of the clothing. The composition also seeks to bring together all the components making up the Crucifixion episode: the Virgin and the three Marys; the Magdalene kneeling at the foot of the cross; the soldiers playing dice in the foreground; the Good Centurion giving Christ the sponge with the vinegar; the Good Thief (on the left, his soul being carried off by an angel); and the Bad Thief (on the right, his soul being carried off by a devil); and finally, the skeleton of Adam.

A large number of figures crowd into the heterogeneous lower part of the composition with no space between them. In the upper part, however, the composition has been emptied in order to emphasize the figure of Christ, creating spatial depth through the positioning of the two thieves in foreshortening and on a lower level.

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Gregorian chants

Pomposa Abbey, dedicated to St Mary, is a Benedictine monastery in Codigoro near Ferrara, Italy. It was one of the most important in northern Italy, famous for the Carolingian manuscripts preserved in its rich library, one of the wealthiest of Carolingian repositories, and for the Romanesque buildings. The church is an example of a triple-nave Ravennan basilica with arcaded aisles and carpentry rafters, originating in the 7th-9th centuries.

The church received an extensive fresco decoration in 1351 by Vitale da Bologna and his workshop. It included an apse with Christ enthroned in a mandorla among angels and saints, the evangelists, and the church fathers, as well as scenes from the life of St Eustace; nave walls with scenes from the Old and New Testaments, including numerous motifs from the Apocalypse; and on the entrance wall a Last Judgment. Besides a similarly comprehensive pictorial program encountered later (c. 1378) in the baptistery of Padua by Giusto de’ Menabuoi, there are no other parallels in this period. The complete decoration of a church remained an exception in the fourteenth century, despite the example of San Francesco in Assisi, which is a special case.

One of the important works of the Bolognese Trecento, the panel - originally part of a triptych - was executed for the small Oratorio della Madonna dei Denti near Mezzarate.

The lively nature of the Bolognese paintings of the fourteenth century is easily perceived in the narrative scenes of fresco cycles (nearly all of which, however, are in a poor state of conservation) and in the illuminated miniatures. Vitale managed to convey this nature in his images, not through the action, but through the looks and gestures of his characters. To this he adds a whole range of highly decorative elements and an expressively rich use of colour.

This Madonna of Humility is one of the masterpieces of Bolognese 14th century painting. It was painted around 1353 by Vitale da Bologna, one of the most appreciated painters of his day. The originality of his work lies mainly in his singular ability to express human feeling with warmth and sincerity.

In this domestic representation of the Virgin, she is sitting beside the Christ Child, and she is embroidering with silk and gold thread. The baby Jesus helps her with her embroidery, by holding up a needle he has just taken from the needle-case he’s holding in his other hand. And, with a gesture of maternal tenderness, Mary reaches out to touch her son’s face.

Vitale da Bologna (real name Vitale d’Aimo de’Cavalli) was a Bolognese painter. This picture is one of the three signed paintings of the painter, originally it belonged to the altarpiece of the church of San Giorgio in Bologna. It represents a very dramatic scene, the final moment of the battle between St George and the dragon.

The picture is crippled on all sides, the decorative cosmata ornamentics is now lacking.