Vittorio, Mi Yo Interior (Spanish Edition)

Stormy Weather

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It is he, crazed and determined, who prowls the swath of the storm and forever changes the lives of Max, Bonnie, Edie and the others. Their paths—tangled before they even know it—come together in a novel that continues the hilarious and scathing muckraking tradition that Carl Hiaasen has so mercilessly made his own. In Stormy Weather, there is no calm eye. Read on your iOS and Android devices Get more info. Capabilities Text to speech. Publisher Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Seller name Penguin Random House. Content protection This content is DRM protected.

Additional terms Terms of transaction. Publishers Weekly Hiaasen's latest madcap romp across southern Florida presents an apocalyptic panorama of the region in the wake of a storm much like Hurricane Andrew. From the intricate network of families and names it was not easy to trace the line from which the painter himself descended. It was therefore imperative to exhume every possible document dealing with the Scarpazza, or as they were subsequently called the Carpaccio, family ; and the search resulted in the discovery that the principal branch lived in the diocese of Torcello upon the now comparatively deserted island of Mazzorbo, which in the fourteenth century was a flourishing and populous community.

As early as December 2nd, we find that a certain Bartolomeo Scarpazzo of Mazzorbo and a certain Marino di Prison, wardens of the church of San Piero at Mazzorbo, promised to pay to Rovino, a stonecutter, eleven lire di piccoli for stones and columns bought for that church. They were wealthy folk, allied to a bishop, and they occupied the highest offices in the district. But neither from this, nor from another branch of the Carpaccio family settled at Chioggia, does our Vittore descend ; and to re- construct his genealogical tree, we must first become acquainted with those collateral branches that in the fourteenth century had already migrated from Mazzorbo to Venice.

In a certain Lodovico Scarpazza has commercial relations with the island of Majorca. Of him we know neither the de- scendants nor the collaterals ; but sjjice it was customary for the members of the same family to exercise the same trade, it is not improbable that Lodovico belonged to the stock of one Martino Scarpazza, who in was engaged in business with certain Genoese.

Six years later the same Genoese merchants have dealings with one Marinus Scarpazza, who must be the above-mentioned Martino, changed by an easy mistake in transcription to Marino. Toma, where in dwelt also one 1 Lanzi, Storia pitt. Milesi, 1 a Moschini, Guida per f Isola di Murano, p. From the Will, undated but probably executed in , of Cristina, wife of Marino, we gather that of the marriage there were two daughters, Cattaruzza and Franceschina, and that Cristina went to live near Santa Maria Formosa.

Here at a later period other Scarpazza of wealthy substance had their dwelling, and they charged their family name with a coat of arms, which may be seen cut upon a tomb, erected in the seventeenth century in SS. Giovanni e Paolo by a certain Giovanni Antonio Carpaccio. But we have failed to connect this branch with that of the quarter of S. Gervasio speaks of Ser Giovanni Scarpazo of S. Raffaele as his paterno that is, the brother of his father.

From Francesco descends Maffeo Scarpazo varoter a furrier , already dead in leaving a son Giovanni whose issue we are unable to follow. United in name and blood to this branch was the principal one from which descends our painter. This family of Carpaccio also had during the fourteenth century their dwelling in S. Raffaele, where they exercised their calling of fishermen and possessed a ship-yard like their ancestors of Mazzorbo. It is worth noting that S.

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Raffaele is the quarter adjoining S. Niccold, the farthest point of Venice towards the mainland, and that S. Niccold was also the home of the ancestors of the Bellini. These two wards formed 1 Cecchetti, Saggio di cognomi ed auf. Giovanni e Paolo Museo Civico. Cicogna, , N p. The Nicolotti were mariners, descended from that strong and ancient stock of Adriatic fishermen who were the sinews of the Venetian power at its vigorous outset ; and it is noteworthy that from this lusty race of sailors who, alike in body and in spirit laid the foundation of the civil fame of Venice, came also those men who were the first to confer upon their country the glory of the Arts.

Of these seafaring Carpaccio the earliest record goes back to , in which year one Pietro Scarpazza lived in the parish of S. But in we find Pietro already settled near S. Raffaele and making a trust-deed cart a sicnritatis by which he secures the dowry of his wife Zanetta, daughter of Vettore di Lazzaro.

Zanetta died and Pietro contracted a second marriage with a certain Beruzza, by whom he became the father of Antonio or Antolino, still a minor in Antonio who made his Will in , alluding therein to his mother Beruzza, married a certain Maria who in a deed expressing her last wishes dated mentions a son of hers named Vittore, whom we for greater clearness will style Vittore I. Another Will of Maria's dated informs us that in that year her husband Antonio was already dead and that her son Vittore I.

In this Vittore had already passed away, leaving a daughter and six sons, all expressly named in three Wills of Lucia his widow. The daughter, married to Andrea Rayneri of Brescia, was called Antonia. The two last became monks: Zuane assumed the name of Ilario, whilst Antonio, who took the habit late in life, when a widower with an only daughter Maria, was called Fra Luca. Among all these six brothers we are principally concerned with the issue of the eldest, called after his paternal grandfather Pietro, and whom we shall style Pietro II.

He cut himself off and lived at a distance from the family of fishermen of S.

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Raffaele, so that in one of the Wills of his mother Lucia he is rebuked for his cruelty crndelta. We have been able to find two different signatures, one in and the other in , of this Pietro II. Marco, to pay the rent for which he used to send his son, called Vittore like his grandfather, whom we shall indicate as Vittore II. After this date the name of Pietro disappears from the Account-Book of the Procurators.

It is therefore probable that he had removed to another residence or was no longer living.

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It also gives us the earliest information that we possess about Vittore II. He is named as one of the heirs of his uncle, the monk, and must therefore have been more than fifteen years old, since no one was permitted by law to enter into an inheritance before that age. It is therefore reasonable to place his birth between the years and The Will of Frate Ilario states, moreover, that another of his brothers, Sante, had three sons, the first of whom likewise bore his grandfather's name ; him we will call Vittore III.

Some writers believe that Vittore III. It is true that to establish his identity we can only proceed by a method of elimination, since the autograph dated , the only existing signature of the artist apart from his painting, does not bear the name of his father: Jo veor Carpazio pictor fui testimonjo pregado et zurado. In not one single document is Vittore III.

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Now we know on the other hand of two other Carpaccio, who signed themselves, one in the year as Pietro Carpaccio pit tor ael quondam Vet tore, and another in as Benedetto Carpaccio di Messer Vettor. These could not have been the sons of Vittore III. We therefore believe ourselves justified in affirming that Vittore II. This conjecture is also strengthened by the names, which, as may be seen from the Genea- logical Tree, alternate regularly from grandfather to grandson down to Vittore II.

And that this Vittore II. But not a single trustworthy document has ever been produced by Canon Stancovich, nor by any of those able writers, Tedeschi, De Francheschi, De Castro, Luciani, etc. But these arguments have none of the force of proof, any more than to hold that the Istrian origin of our painter can be proved by the fact that for a long series of generations the first-born son of the Carpaccio family bore the name of Vittore out of devotion to the Saint of that name who from very early times enjoyed a special veneration in Capodistria.

That a family of Carpaccio did exist in Istria in the sixteenth century and became extinct in the nineteenth no one has ever denied ; but Canon Stancovich, without taking the trouble to ascertain when and how this family became established in that country, published a genealogical tree extracted from the Cathedral Archives of Capodistria, and extending over three successive generations, commencing with Vittore the father and Benedetto the son without, however, pointing out the native country or year of birth of these craftsmen.

Some more recent Istrian writers, supporting the opinion of Canon Stancovich, affirm that Vittore's son, Benedetto Carpaccio several pictures by whom are still to be found in Istria , was living at Capodistria in , as may be gathered from a notarial act with the following heading: Tonello de Gallo cum m ro. Benedicto Scar- paccio coram sp. Joane de Vida hon. It is indeed true that the inhabitants of Capodistria point out as the painter's dwelling an old two-storeyed house in the Largo di Porta S.

Martino where tradition has it that Carpaccio was born. Popular tradition, which inspires the soul of the poet, does not generally enjoy the authority of history ; but in this case it is confirmed by documentary evidence, since from the Register of Assessments in the Communal Archives of Capodistria we learn that as early as net there stood in the Largo di Porta S. Martino a house occupied by the Scarpazza family, and that the same family at an earlier period possessed in the neighbourhood of the city a small agricultural property podere in a locality called S.

Now we do not deny we even affirm that in the fifteenth century a painter named Scarpazza, Benedetto in fact, had taken up his abode in Capodistria and eventually became the founder of a family whose representatives were living in the last century ; but we do not believe that either Vittore or Benedetto was born there. This could not be considered as proved, even if the assertion were true and we cannot accept it in the absence of any documentary confirmation that a family of Scarpazza was established in Istria in the first half of the fourteenth century.

This nameless authority writes as follows: He is said moreover to have come as a " carpenter. The anonymous writer, though unable to quote documents, obtains at any rate profit without acknowledgment from printed books, whence he draws the information which he submits to his own ends.

The romance becomes downright fantastic when he describes the life of the painter. As a matter of fact, in when the artist is supposed to have been in Istria, he painted for the church of Pozzale in Cadore a panel in five divisions, which would have had to be conveyed somehow into the midst of the Cadorine Alps by a much more difficult land-and-sea journey than that from Venice to Istria.

And to Chioggia he would also have had to send from Istria another altar-piece, representing vS.

Paul, painted in Transport could not have been difficult when in those days or even earlier we find Venetian pictures conveyed to far distant places: Lattanzio da Rimini during his residence in Venice painted various pictures for Piazza Brembana in the Bergamasque ; and Cima da Conegliano executed a large altarpiece for the church of Sant' Anna at Capodistria, although we have no record that he ever left the Lagoons for the opposite shore of the Adriatic.

Nor has the observation that the paintings now to be seen in Lazzaro Bastiani, where he remained until about the end of , ' n which year leaving the workshop of that artist he entered that of Bellini? The painter, he says, was born in But no one knows whence he has obtained this most precious piece of information and we anxiously await an indication of its origin. Another valuable scrap offered to us by this Anonimo is the statement that Carpaccio, sent to Venice at an early age, entered the studio of Lazzaro Bastiani, where he remained until about the year To the curiosity of the historian in our case is added the pleasure of the critic, since it was ourselves who first put forward the hypothesis that Carpaccio had learned the secrets of his Art from Lazzaro Bastiani.

Up till that time it had always been believed that Bastiani was Carpaccio's pupil. Ararat, and their date is This hypothesis of ours " thus continues our unknown, who here at least abandons affirmations and enters the less dangerous region of hypothesis " finds confirmation in the fact that among the works executed by Vittore Carpaccio after , the pictures extant in Capodistria, authenticated by his signature and date, show in their backgrounds local landscapes, reproduced with a singular fidelity that could not possibly have been inserted except by close study on the spot.

Giorgio at Portole, should be reckoned as his last works ; which it is impossible to deny were painted by our artist in the city of Capodistria itself. In a word, it cannot be admitted that Carpaccio in painted in Istria for the church of S. Giorgio in the village of Portole the picture of the Trinity, nor that he spent the last years of his life in that country, when documents which cannot be gainsaid prove that he was in Venice after Here in a certain lady Marieta uxor Dominici de Confinio Sancti Mauritii made her Will and appointed as executor thereof ser Victorem Scarpasium pictorem.

As we do not know the precise date of Carpaccio's birth so also is that of his death unknown to us ; but in the painter Pietro Carpaccio styles himself son of " quondam VettoreT We have a deed of dated at Venice and executed by his widow Laura relicta dal pittor JSettore , an instrument that alludes to an earlier one of , which, however, does not prove that Laura was already a widow in that year.

Hence we can conclude that the painter was certainly dead in That he had closed his eyes for ever between the dates of these deeds of and at Capodistria far from his lifelong companion, who had stayed on in Venice, can by no manner of means be credited.

Concerning Benedetto, Vettore's son, we also have documents which prove his presence in Venice long before the above-quoted Capodistrian documents of In two Wills, one of the i8th and the other of the 23rd of September , declaring the last wishes of Maria filia quondam domini Francisci de cha Massario abitatrix in contracta Sancta Marina, Benedetto signs himself thus: Io Benedetto Carpaco fo de Messer Vetor testimonio pregado e zurado. It is true, of course, that the connection of the Carpaccio family with Istria dates back many years prior to , as may be learnt at Capodistria from certain pictures signed by Vettore.

But these paintings do not reveal the force or the delicacy of the great painter's touch, and it is probable that he, having designed the composition, sketched it out and even having put his name to the work, afterwards left the completion of the undertaking, under 1 It is unnecessary to repeat that the reader will find the proof of every statement and every date in the documents published in the Appendix.

His father's great reputation and his own undoubted gifts enabled Benedetto to spread his work abroad in Istria.

Indeed, the first landmark in Benedetto Carpaccio's artistic life appears on a painting representing the Coronation of the Virgin preserved in the Town Hall of Capodistria. In what year Benedetto Carpaccio removed from Venice to Capodistria we are unable to determine, nor does any document refute the conjecture that he was there in when he completed the Coronation of the Virgin. It is certain that in he was still in Venice. We have seen that in Maria dei Canali appointed the painter Vettor Carpaccio as executor to her Will.

Now we know that in Vettor Carpaccio was dead and on July 8th we find that Benedetto Carpaccio had for some time past been replacing his father as executor to this Will of the said Donna Maria dei Canali. By another Will, executed in Venice in , Benedetto is appointed testamentary commissary for his cousin Caterina, " daughter of the late Messer Antonio de Martini and wife of Messer Antonio Sonica, notary to the Office of the Syndics, dwelling in Venice in the district of San Felice " " fia del quondam niesser Antonio di Martini et consorte di mes.

Antonio Sonica, nodaro all nfficio de signori Syndici habitante qul a Venetia in contra de San Felise ". It is true that this document does not prove the presence of Benedetto in Venice, since, even if he had been far away from the Lagoons, he could still equally well have been nominated as commissary and testamentary executor for his cousin Caterina. The only document which has come down to us to authenticate the residence of Benedetto in Istria is that of ; although it is quite certain that the painter founded a family from whom are descended those Istrian Scarpazi who became extinct in the last century at the death of Antonio Carpaccio, a man of letters, which occurred in Trieste in January Concerning Pietro, Vettor Carpaccio's other son, we have also been able to trace some information hitherto unknown.

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Pietro who bore the name of his grandfather was probably the elder son. In the records of the Podesta of Murano for the month of February M. In the records of the notary Matteo Clapiceo it is recorded that on June 26th, Maria, son of the late Master Bartolomeo of Brescia, aged 14, on an agreement that he will serve him faithfully for four years in return for board and clothes.

Vittore, pittore Veneto, prende al suo sermzio Gio. Having dwelt at great length, and perhaps not without profit, on the birthplace and family of Vittore Carpaccio, we will proceed to gather together once more and complete the information which may be drawn from the documents concerning the life of this great craftsman. In September 2ist , being then qualified to enter into his share of his uncle Fra Ilario's inheritance, Vettore must have been at least fifteen years old ; whence we cannot be far wrong in placing the date of his birth about the year In August 8th he was sent by his father to pay to the Procurators of S.

Mark's the rent of a house or shop. In the reputation of Vittore had reached its height, since we see how the rulers of the Republic desired him to enhance with his paintings the magnificence of their Palace. Of the commissions given to the painter in the Hall of the " Pregadi " we have more than one record and it is curious to note how those "grave and reverent signiors " displayed the minutest interest even in the colours and the canvas.

Under it was written: Veneta di Star, patr. In he was summoned to assist Giovanni Bellini to complete the decoration of the apartments of the Greater Council. It is curious to note how in this same year, Feb. Some years afterwards the Palace of the Doges was to witness the serene ideals of Carpaccio and Bellini set side by side with the powerful creations of the youthful Titian. We find the following notice under date of May 3ist, , in the Diaries of Sanudo: Of Carpaccio's paintings in the Ducal Palace nothing unfortu- nately remains but the remembrance preserved in old documents ; since on December 2oth, , the Eve of St.

Thomas the Apostle, a fire broke out in the Office of the Water Department and spreading rapidly destroyed the ceiling of the Hall of the " Scrntinio " and consumed in the Hall of the Great Council all the portraits of the Doges, "and those paintings round the room painted by Zuan " Bell'ino, Pordenon, Titian, Vivarin, and the other famous and " most excellent painters of the ancient history of the Venetians in " the time of the Doge Sebastiano Ziani and the Emperor Frederic " Barbarossa in defence of Pope Alexander the III. Sansovino in his Venetia lib.

Mark's, grants Perpetual Indulgence on Ascension Day to all who visit the said church. This painting was executed by Vittore Scarpaccia, an able man in that Art. Whilst Carpaccio and the most famous painters of the Republic were on their scaffolding decorating the Hall of the Great Council they received a visit from the Marquess of Mantua, Francesco Gonzaga, who like his wife, Isabella d' Este was an intelligent admirer and patron of the Arts.

An account of this visit is given by Carpaccio himself in a letter addressed to the Marquess: The letter dated from Venice on August i5th, is most important on account of the additional curious information that it contains. The anxious painter set himself to find out the stranger's name and eventually learned that he was Maistro Laurentio, otherwise Lorenzo Leonbruno, painter to the Marquess of Mantua. And without more ado he writes to the Marquess "to inform him of my name as also of my work.

My name is the said Victor Carpatio " per dargli notitia si del nome mio come anche de la opera. II name mio e dicto Victor Carpatio continues the painter, and as for the work, the fate of which is unknown to him, he candidly states that in our days agli tempi nostri] there is no other like it for excellence and complete perfection as well as for size simile si de bonta et integra perfectione come anche de grandezd.

Ingenuous words, which give us a glimpse of the craftsman's mind, confident of his own value and therefore disdaining alike that modesty which at times is but a cloak for hypocrisy and that pride which is too often synonymous with vanity. We like to imagine Carpaccio with the smiling serenity of a great soul undisturbed by painful vicissitudes, unshaken by extraordinary adventures, chaste in his life as in his art, measured alike in his speech and in his sentiments, good, affable, courteous, free from envy, beloved and respected.

So at least he appears to us from the honest sincerity of his 1 Both the Marquess Francesco and the Marchioness Isabella at the beginning of the sixteenth century spared no effort to secure drawings of cities in order to reproduce them in fresco on the walls of their vast saloons, as indeed was done in the Palace at Marmirolo, now destroyed.

The Jerusalem of Carpaccio would have served a similar purpose It does not appear in the records in the Mantuan Archives that the correspondence was continued, nor do we believe that Carpaccio had, as Giambellino and Titian certainly did, any other relations with the Court of Mantua.

To the amiability of his character and of his art and to the graciousness of his reputation a harsh contrast is created by the very vulgar name of Scarpazza, which is not as Milanesi supposes in his Notes to Vasari " a corruption of Carpaccio, his true surname" Nor, as others assert, was his real name that of Scarpa, a common appellation even to this day among the Venetians and the inhabitants of Chioggia ; since the family of our painter is in the earliest documents called always Scarpazza. The painter would be obliged to follow the fashion set by Humanism and give his name a Latin form and savour.

To translate the name into Latin, as was frequently done, was in this case impossible: The only alternative was to give the name a mere semblance of Latinity: In this way the artist could unite his own name with that of distant countries and places. But the spelling of the name continued, as at first, to vary considerably.

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Just as the name in the documents appears variously as Scarpazza, Scharpaza, Scarpazzo, Scarpazo, Scarpatia, Scarpatio, so in our artist's paintings we find the name written in these different forms: Carpatio, Charpatio, Carpatitis, Carpathiiis, Carpacio. The form most frequently used in pictures of greater importance is Carpathius. In the only autograph that remains to us Vittore subscribes himself Carpazio. His son Benedetto writes Carpaco, without the cedilla 9 so frequently met with in Venetian documents. Among writers on Art also the form of the name of our painter varies.

Ridolfi and Boschini were the first to use the form Carpaccio, which was then adopted without further alterations. If the data are few concerning Vettore's life we are provided even less with anything in the shape of an authentic bodily likeness. Not a painting, not a drawing, not an engraving exists: Vasari states that he had succeeded in finding portraits of Carpaccio, but it is not known where, and no dependence can be placed on the portraits published by the biographer of Arezzo. Nor is the portrait in Ridolfi's work any more trustworthy. This writer, though able to give true likenesses of the painters more nearly contemporary with himself, was compelled for the earlier ones to trust to the imagination of his draughtsmen.

His work up to , Zanetti. On the portrait that he painted himself, and which is in the possession of the heirs of the Giustiniani family on the Zattere, he inscribed the date Sue opere fino al , Zanetti. Nel ritratto che fece di se medesinio ed e presso gli Rredi Giustiniani alle Zattere scrisse per data This portrait and date have been often cited, notably by Federici ;!

The Gallery of the Palazzo Giustiniani Recanati on the Zattere is a surviving example of those ancient picture-galleries that belonged to the Venetian patricians. The pictures are let into the walls in stucco frames exactly as we may suppose that they were when Padre Lanzi saw them ; and the alleged portrait of Carpaccio bears the number It is painted on a panel and measures 21 by 27 centimetres. It represents a man of about forty years of age with fair hair but darker beard, wearing a round black cap and a white shirt just showing against his black dress.

The left hand rests upon a book, and our attention is caught by a Greek inscription which runs: And if the style did not betray another hand we could not possibly suppose that Carpaccio would have painted this youthful figure as: It would also be very strange that the painter, even if reviving his youthful lineaments in a painting, should have written his name and the date in Greek. It is obvious, on the other hand, that the true author of the painting was writing Greek as his native language. The portrait is unquestionably that of the painter Vittore di Giovanni, a Greek, who was enrolled in the Scuola di S.

Giovanni Evangelista, and must also have been skilled in the art of singing, since documents record that he sang in the processions of that Scuola. Nor did the gentler arts prevent his offering his arm in defence of his native place and the land of his adoption, since he asked leave of the Republic to embark in a galley that went to fight against the Turks. He came back safe and turned once more to the painting of Greek Madonnas, the cult of which had not ceased among the Venetians.

The unimpeachable authority of documents dispelling the dreams of the romance, separating truth from error, proves that no portrait of Carpaccio exists and that the portrait which many have believed to be his own picture painted by himself is neither of him nor by him. No genius, however original, stands altogether isolated from common life. Rather does he live and develope in correspondence with the customs and the culture of his period ; and the work of art considered by itself is a living organism, like a plant which only flourishes under certain conditions, outside which it withers and dies.

For this reason the natural attitude of a people variously disposed towards aesthetics by diversity of race, climate and time exercises a mighty influence upon its works of art. Thus in Tuscany the aesthetic sense, tempered by the grace, simplicity and harmonious unison of its scenery, creates an Art whose typical features are refinement of characteristic and delicate outline, and spiritual distinction of form.

In Venice the luminous atmosphere that floods the mirror of the Lagoons, robbing the outlines of all distinctness, and kindling and uniting the most varied colouring in wondrous harmony, necessarily evolved a style of painting that would reflect in the brilliant fusion of its tints the splendour and sensuousness alike of the scenery and of the civilization that surrounded it. From the earliest period of Venetian Art the painters, yet timid and inex- perienced, but born and living amid the opalescence of sky and waters, the effulgence of Byzantine mosaic and the gorgeous hues of Oriental stuffs, one and all manifest a taste for colour and a sense of decorative effect which are as the reflection of a joyous spirit and of a life instinct with pomp and pageant.

We may assert without fear of exaggeration that the ancient City of the Islands is nowhere revealed more completely than in the drawings of Carpaccio and the Diaries of Marino Sanudo. In the paintings of the one and the pages of the other the most homely and curious particulars abound to such a degree as actually to produce in us the illusion of living those joyous days over again. No other city could bear comparison with her for the wisdom of her laws, her military power and her commercial wealth: The struggle Venice maintained against rival states and against the Turks, her rapid conquests on the mainland, proved no hindrance to the loving care bestowed by her citizens on all that pertained to her internal improvement: Stately palaces arose on the Grand Canal, swift boats skimmed the Lagoons: Then the City of the Lagoons began to wax triumphant in sumptuous apparel, gems and golden raiment, and from that time onwards jousts, tournaments and the processions of the trades followed one another as in a fantastic dream.

It was, moreover, those days that saw the formation of the famous Compagnie della Calza which set upon Venice the stamp of a refinement hitherto unknown. The Dogeship of Tommaso Mocenigo marked the zenith of Venetian power, and the discourse uttered by this grand Doge to his Ministers standing around his death-bed testifies to that sovereign opulence which was publicly displayed in the triumphant progresses of the Doges and their wives, in the solemn reception of kings, princes and ambassadors, in the magnificence of the pageants and in the luxury of the banquets.

The entire social system in which Carpaccio lived and moved concurred to form the artist. He needed but to paint what went on under his eyes to give life in his pictures to the aspect and 5 34 THE TIMES colour of that existence illumined by the soft serene light of the Venetian sky ; and his eyes were accustomed by daily experience to the shimmer of silk, to the intense brilliance of purple, to the thousand varieties and the thousand aspects of every kind of attire.

Carpaccio with his brush was the most truthful chronicler of a people living in the full meridian of their glory, and some of his pictures illustrate in a marvellous manner those splendid ceremonies the fame of which remains, though in less lifelike and telling fashion, in ancient records at the Archives. Venice was wont to display a special magnificence in her receptions of the princes and ambassadors of great nations ; the better to proclaim her wealth and power. Whenever any exalted personage announced his arrival a deputation of thirty noblemen, robed in silk, chosen from among the senior or junior members of their order, according to the rank of the expected guest, were sent to welcome him.

If however a King, a Sovereign Prince or an Ecclesiastic of high rank were expected the Doge himself would go forth to meet him on board his gilded Bucentaiir. Guests of greatest dignity were usually brought to the city in triumph by way of the sea ; this being the most beautiful and stately approach. Sometimes they would land at one of the convents built upon the islands that encircled Venice: Maria delle Grazie, for example, at S. Clemente or at S. Spirito ; and thither the Doge would repair, or the Patricians deputed ' to attend their guest to Venice.

The Kings and Princes honoured by these state receptions were many during these two most brilliant centuries of Venetian history. In the Emperor, after his visit to Rome, approached Venice by way of Chioggia. The Procuratori di San Marco and thirteen of the Senators went forth to pay their respects to him at the Augustinian Convent on the island of S.

Spirito, where the Emperor spent the night. The next morning the Doge attended by the Senate appeared before Frederic, and after mutual embraces post mntuos amplexus] they proceeded together to the neighbouring island of S. Clemente, where the Bucentaur awaited them, having failed, owing to the shallowness of the water, to approach the island of S. On board the Ducal barge the Emperor seated himself on a chair of state cathedra honore dtspositd and a procession was formed of galleys, boats and rafts, draped with cloth of gold ; besides " other vessels with wonderful 1 Archivio di Stato.

Public proclamation forbade the wearing of mourning during the stay of their illustrious guests ; the bells of S. Marco rang festal chimes ; and amid the blare of trumpets and musical instruments of every kind the people shouted applause. In the church of S. Marco a throne ablaze with gold had been prepared for Frederic, and on another, two steps lower, was seated the Doge. The State Rooms of the Palace were magnificently furnished, and in the Hall of the Great Council a sumptuous banquet was served, at which a bevy of noble ladies were present resplendent with jewels.

Frederic, who stayed several days in Venice, usually wore black, but on the day of his entry he was clad in " a very precious golden mantle " veste aurea preciosissimd] presented to him in Rome by Pope Paul II. The meeting between the Doge and the Duke of Ferrara is depicted in the painting which, as we have said, was probably executed in the workshop of Lazzaro Bastiani, and from possible participation in which we do not exclude Carpaccio.

As a delineator of contemporary spectacles no other Italian craftsman can be compared to Carpaccio except Pinturicchio, who, though like him inadequate in the expression of stirring or dramatic ideas, yet understood equally how to produce a faithful repre- sentation of the luxury which displays itself in the streets and public places and to set before us, as in a delightful romance, the beautiful and spacious life of Italy with the facile ingenuousness and nai've grace peculiar to the Umbrian nature uninfluenced, however, by the artificial suavity of Perugino.

From the public shows in street and square Carpaccio intro- duces us to the interiors of houses and revives for us the home life of the Venetians. Suites of rooms are portrayed with wonder- ful effects of light such as no other Italian artist before him succeeded in achieving. The severe but elegant furniture, chairs of restrained design and gorgeous bed draperies are reproduced in their minutest detail ; although the fidelity exhibited in copying minor details is never allowed to diminish the importance of the principal objects.

No trifles seem to escape this acute observer from the heads so admirably drawn and painted to the sumptuous robes; from the architecture rich in marbles to the gracefully 1 Ibid. All is here rendered with restraint of touch and delicacy in draughtsmanship and colour; with an art of such refinement that, if it is not always capable of avoiding a certain tendency to rigidity, is yet far removed from those disagreeably affected methods which distort reality.

The dry-as-dust Inventories of the Archives are, as it were, illustrated by Carpaccio's paintings, and he is a unique example in Italian Art for the care with which he reproduces all the familial- details of domestic life. In this respect no rival can be found to him except in the Transalpine, notably the Flemish, Schools. Indeed the study of the Western ponentini painters, like Van Eyck, Van der Weyden and Memling, enabled him to assimilate certain of the realistic merits of Northern Art.

His pictures have no need of explanatory comment to enable us to grasp at once the subject of the incident, the momentary motion expressed in the figures and the intended characteristic of the period, even if the event represented does not rise to the solemnity of an historical occurrence, but is limited to the humbler proportions of a domestic episode: Directness of purpose, intuition and clearness of vision assist him in finding the gestures and movements appropriate to the figures, and the sense of reality that he imparts to the scene by causing the main action to stand out devoid of idle or disturbing accompaniment is a merit that we seek for in vain in Gentile Bellini, whose pictures need a long commentary on account of the secondary episodes which distract the eye from the principal subject and too often occasion bewilder- ment.

Carpaccio represents what he sees: Neither does the diligence displayed by the painter in copying surrounding objects with all their manifest detail, which might appear tedious to the superficial observer, exclude an intimate and profound feeling for nature. In many of Carpaccio's paintings around the massive and stately architecture of the Quattrocento the palaces, porticoes and towers: In the Picture of " The Dismissal of the Ambassadors. In this respect Carpaccio really was an innovator. But his was not the intense idealism nor the far-reaching imagination of other contemporary craftsmen such as Giambcllino and Mantegna.

He was not student enough to reconstruct for us the life of past ages like Mantegna, who lays before us so power- fully the world of Ancient Rome ; neither did he possess the spontaneous vivacity of a ready and inventive fancy, nor that faculty of intense emotional expression the absence of which in some of his paintings conveys an impression of somewhat prosaic aridity. His scenes impress us in a totally different manner: In his eagerness to relate them Carpaccio multiplies the episodes, as though fearful lest any portion of the lovely scenes around him might escape his notice.

His aim above all is truth, alike in gesture and in expression, regardless of their bearing upon the dignity of Biblical events ; attiring his Saints and their legends in contemporary Venetian garb and imbuing them with all the gladness that he has himself experienced in contemplating the sights around him. This nai've realism animates his most sacred subjects: Giobbe where the high priest Simeon in his episcopal robes stands behind the altar between two cardinals.

So far was Carpaccio from conceiving or depicting anything that he had not actually witnessed. As regards anachronism in costume he enjoyed, be it observed, the coun- tenance of other painters, more especially among the Venetians. Gentile Bellini represents S.

Mark amid women in Turkish and men in Albanian costume ; whilst Paul Veronese later on shows us the beautiful daughter of Agenor garbed in the sumptuous vesture of a Venetian gentlewoman. Reality alone inspired these great men, less critical but more truly artistic than ourselves. Little recked they of historic fact or accuracy in costume. All that they strove for was life, expression, movement, grouping and combination of colour.

Amid the very improbabilities of the details, and indeed in spite of them, shine out the eternal truths of nature.

And we must likewise take into account another most important factor in the development of Carpaccio's artistic conception, observing how he seems at times to arrive at a visual perception of the mystic East, the motherland of peoples, of religions and of sciences. Which brings us to our first major job: So far several topics have been raised, around which new principles and benchmarks could be developed.

While everyone is talking about social media, not everyone knows what it is, how it works, or what can be achieved through using social media for the betterment of museums and galleries. How can social media be used to engage audiences and present collections—and importantly, how can its use be sustained and maintained over time? The importance of dealing with the many issues around copyright has also been brought to our attention.

Clarifying copyright conditions for loan objects and exhibitions, and ensuring the copyright on your own assets is observed, is critical. Digitisation and digital engagement strategies have also been talked about. We could explore the processes around digitisation in terms of preservation and access, as well as think about how to develop some standards around how digital assets can be used to enhance and bolster audiences. One of the important challenges we all face is ensuring our organisations are environmentally sustainable.

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