Scenes from a Legend

probably c. 1515/1520

Giovanni Larciani (Master of the Kress Landscapes)

Associated Names
Giovanni Larciani (Master of the Kress Landscapes)

Painter, Florentine, 1484 - 1527

This painting depicts a long, horizontal landscape viewed from an elevated angle. On the left, by a group of green trees and bushes, several people stand around one person who is on the back of a white horse. They wear garments in shades of light red, dark green, and pale yellow. In the distance behind them, a gray castle is visible, and farther away boats sail across green water near tree-covered hills. In the center of the painting is a collection of massive gray rocks. A small yellow tent is at the bottom of the rocks, with a group of small people sitting or standing around it. To the right of them, two deer drink from a small blue pool while a person in a gray shirt rests nearby, wrapped in a green cloth. On the right side of the painting, people walk down a long path that ends in a large gray castle or city in the top right corner. Some of the people hold long poles or weapons. The color palette is mostly earthy browns and greens, with dark green trees filling much of the background. The sky is visible in the left and right sections of the painting; it is a greenish blue near the top that fades into a light pink when it meets the distant green hills.

Media Options

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On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery M19

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 27.9 x 88.9 cm (11 x 35 in.)
    framed (lower canvas, framed with 1939.1.344.b and .c): 86.52 x 114.3 x 9.21 cm (34 1/16 x 45 x 3 5/8 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1939.1.344.a

Associated Artworks

Two pairs of people and a group line a rocky path that stretches away from us in this hilly, horizontal landscape painting. We look slightly down on the path as it travels steeply from the bottom center of the canvas to about the center of the composition. Dark trees and bushes are tucked on top of and between knolls and mounds rising to each side of the path. A pink-stone building with a crenelated walled area and a tower is to the left of center, and a second building is tucked in a shallow valley to the right. The hills pile up as they reach the horizon, which comes almost to the top of the composition. The narrow strip of sky above is muted aqua-blue. The pair of people nearest to us stand close to and facing each other, perhaps holding hands. They both have pale skin and wear voluminous robes. The person on the left has short blond hair and wears cardinal red. The companion wears a black cloak and may wear a turban, but details around the faces and heads of this pair are difficult to make out. A short distance farther along the path is a pair of men wearing gray, hooded monks’ robes. They also have pale skin. The person on the left appears to be cleanshaven and blond, and the man on the right has a beard. The man on the left reaches for the other man’s arm or shoulder, and they face each other. Tiny in scale within the composition, four people by the building with the tower may have pale or brown skin, and they wear clothing painted in tan, pale yellow, and soft red. Two stand facing each other, and one appears to hold a staff. They both gesture or point to a man riding a donkey to our right. Another man hunches over, perhaps pushing or pulling something, close to the building, and a fifth person peeks out an open door there.

Scenes from a Legend

Giovanni Larciani (Master of the Kress Landscapes)

1515

A person walks across a rocky path with a fortified, wall-enclosed town in the distance in this horizontal painting. The person wears a dark green robe and pink hood or cap, carries a yellow sack slung over one shoulder, and uses a walking stick. Boulders surge to either side of the path, and leafy green trees grow up the right side of the composition. Several swans float on a lake just beyond the trees. Painted in shades of gray, a person rides a camel just beyond a boulder to the left. Other forms painted with thin strokes of red or black could be people walking through the landscape in the distance. A city gate, the walls, and some of the buildings have crenelations. Trees nestle between hills that roll back to hazy, sage-green mountains along the horizon, which almost reaches the top edge of the painting. The sky above is muted blue.

Scenes from a Legend

Giovanni Larciani (Master of the Kress Landscapes)

1515

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Niccolini, Florence. (Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Florence and Rome); sold 1936 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[1] gift 1939 to NGA.
[1] See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1923.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1996

  • L'officina della maniera. Varietà e fierezza nell'arte fiorentina del Cinquecento fra le due repubbliche 1494-1530, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, 1996-1997, no. 116, repro.

2010

  • I grandi bronzi del Battistero: Giovanfrancesco Rustici e Leonardo, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Florence, 2010-2011, no. 10, repro.

Bibliography

1941

  • Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 91, no. 437, as by Francesco Granacci.

1942

  • Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 248, repro. 122, as by Francesco Granacci.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 105, repro., as by Francesco Granacci.

1962

  • Zeri, Federico. “Eccentrici fiorentini – parte I.” Bollettino d’arte 4 (1962): 218-220, fig. 3.

1963

  • Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Florentine School, 2 vols. London, 1963: 1:100, as Attributed to Francesco Granacci.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 62, as by Francesco Granacci.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 54, repro., as by Francesco Granacci.

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XV-XVI Century. London, 1968: 124-125, fig. 300-302.

1973

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XVI-XVIII Century. London, 1973: 392.

1974

  • Holst, Christian von. Francesco Granacci. Munich, 1974: 206-207, cat. 211.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 222, repro.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1979: 1:315; 2:pl. 226A.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 254, repro.

1991

  • Natale, Mauro, ed. Pittura italiana dal '300 al '500. Milan, 1991: 158.

1998

  • Waldman, Louis Alexander. "The 'Master of the Kress Landscapes' unmasked: Giovanni Larciani and the Fucecchio altar-piece." The Burlington Magazine 140 no. 1144 (July 1988):457, 465, fig. 1.

2001

  • Franklin, David. Painting in Renaissance Florence 1500-1550. New Haven and London, 2001: 176.

  • Waldman, Louis A. “The Rank and File of Renaissance Painting: Giovanni Larciani and the ‘Florentine Eccentrics’.” In Annemarie Sawkins, ed. Italian Renaissance Masters. Exh. cat. Milwaukee, 2001: 25, 34, fig. 18.

2013

  • Aquino, Lucia. "Vita e opere di Giovanni di Lorenzo Larciani, un tempo Maestro dei Paesaggi Kress." In Lucia Aquino and Simone Giordano, eds. Francesco Granacci e Giovanni Larciani all'Oratorio di Santa Caterina all'Antella. Exh. cat. Oratorio di Santa Caterina all'Antella, Ponte a Ema (Bagno a Ripoli), 2013: 64-65, 67, fig. 6.

Wikidata ID

Q20175417

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