Perugino
Italian Painter
Città della Pieve, Italy
Fontignano, Italy
Summary of Perugino
By the late 15th century, the Umbrian artist Perugino had established himself as one of the most prolific and influential of all Renaissance masters. At the height of his fame, Perugino was even being hailed as "the best painter in Italy". By the early years of the 16th century, however, Perugino was judged to have slipped into a pattern of formulaic repetition. He was replaced on a Papal commission by his star apprentice, Raphael, and he was also accused by Michelangelo of being a "clumsy fool". Yet Perugino's reputation was fully restored in the mid-19th century, through the intervention of the famous critic John Ruskin, and key members of England's famous Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood movement. Ruskin, the Brotherhood, and the pioneering Victorian portrait photographer, Julia Margaret Cameron, were united in their admiration of the elegance of this neglected master's brushwork; his compositional economy; the balance of his brilliant colors; and the understated way in which he depicted his figures.
Accomplishments
- Of the 175 works attributed to him, perhaps the best-known of Perugino's works is the magnificent biblical tableau, Delivery of the Keys (c. 1481). Through his naturalistic arrangement of figures, and his control of deep linear perspective, Perugino's fresco set the standard of harmony and balance that would come to define the period of High Renaissance.
- Perugino's mastery of portraiture led to high demand by merchants and aristocrats who had learned of his skill at capturing the relaxed elegance of his subjects. But for many historians and critics, it is the way Perugino created a seamless balance between the warm soft tones of his sitters' flesh and clothing, and the subdued natural colors of the landscapes against which they were placed, that singled him out as an exemplary Renaissance portraitist.
- Coming from a generation of artists who valued craft over originality, Perugino had an astute business brain, establishing two large and profitable workshops in Florence and Perugia. Working from his superlative preparatory drawings (of details such as heads, torsos, and postures) Perugino's fleet of assistants recreated his designs on altarpieces and frescoes on a scale that dwarfed the studio outputs of other leading contemporaries such as Botticelli, Ghirlandaio and Filippino Lippi.
- Perugino's fame is largely overshadowed by that of his most famous apprentice, and one of the three great High Renaissance painters, Raphael. The latter is credited with being more versatile and innovative than his master (it is thought that Perugino felt gratified rather that threatened by his pupil's accomplishments). But Raphael took forward much of Perugino's sophisticated style, including his delicate figuration and his rendering of deep open landscapes.
The Life of Perugino
The great 16th century biographer, Giorgio Vasari wrote: "How great a benefit poverty may be to men of genius, and how potent a force it may be to make them become excellent - nay, perfect - in the exercise of any faculty whatsoever, can be seen clearly enough in the actions of Pietro Perugino".
Progression of Art
Delivery of the Keys to Saint Peter
Delivery of the Keys to Saint Peter is one of the three narrative scenes Perugino painted in the Sistine Chapel. Commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV, the others two works were later removed to make way for Michelangelo's Last Judgment. Perugino's fresco illustrates the New Testament's Gospel of Matthew in which Christ presents Saint Peter with the gold and silver keys to the kingdom of heaven. In the center foreground Peter kneels before Christ with his left hand on his heart (apparently overwhelmed to be chosen for such an honor) as Christ hands him the keys. Two groups of figures, which include the apostles and contemporary Florentines (recognizable by their clothing) and a self-portrait of the artist, make up the gathering of onlookers. In the middle distance we see several other figures, and two further scenarios from the life of Christ: the Tribute Money, and the Stoning of Christ. Beyond them is a central octagonal temple flanked by arches, with hills and trees visible in the far distance. Art historian Peter J. Murray writes that the work "anticipated High Renaissance ideals in its compositional clarity, sense of spaciousness, and economy of formal elements". Indeed, Perugino's outlines of the large tiles of the floor perfectly reproduce the model of linear perspective as espoused by Leon Battista Alberti in his seminal, Della pittura (On Painting) (1436). Perugino is also believed to have learned principles of perspective and color from Piero della Francesca (with whom he is thought to have studied in in Arezzo). Art historian Shannon Pritchard observes that "blue, yellow, and green are repeated throughout the group in a way that draws the viewer's eye back and forth across the foreground". Art historian Mark Cartwright notes that, "this masterpiece has another interesting facet, the accompanying texts chosen by the artist. Above the fresco and its counterpart on the right (Cosimo Rosselli's Last Supper), an inscription reads in a single line across the wall: 'Challenge to Jesus Christ, bearer of the law'. Then, in a reminder of the subservient relationship of Renaissance artists to their illustrious patrons, the two triumphal arches in the fresco carry the following extravagant line of praise: 'You, Sixtus IV, unequal in riches, but superior in wisdom to Solomon, have consecrated this vast temple'".
Fresco - Sistine Chapel, Vatican City
Pietà
Pietà was originally painted for the church of the convent of San Giusto alle Mura, with Agony in the Garden (c.1493) and Crucifixion (1495). Produced during the most prolific period of his career, Murray considers it "among the finest of his works". Perugino presents a typical pietà scene (in which Mary holds a lifeless Jesus after his deposition from the cross). As in German pietà images, and sculptures from the Middle Ages (also known as vesperbild), Perugino, who is known to have looked to Northern artists for inspiration, represented Christ as rather stiff and rigid, with a distraught John the Evangelist supporting his upper body on the left, and, to the viewer's right, a crying and praying Mary Magdalene supporting his lower legs upon her lap. It appears, moreover, that Perugino was influenced by his peer, Luca Signorelli, in the selection of pale tones in the rendering of Mary Magdalene. On the far sides are two more figures, a young Nicodemus on the left, with his hands folded in prayer and his eyes looking upwards, and an elderly Joseph of Arimathea on the right, looking downward. The scene is set centrally in front of a receding arcade, with a rolling landscape just visible beyond. Florence's Uffizi Gallery describes how "the scene, which is suspended in an intimate meditative atmosphere, and pervaded by a deep sense of sorrow, is set under a Renaissance portico with pillars in pietra serena. The architecture, thanks to its essential structure and perspective articulation, represents the visual link between the hilly landscape in the background and the protagonists of this sacred drama". The Uffizi adds that many of Perugino's works from 1490-1500, "are characterised by plastically defined figures and airy, linear architectural settings". Art historian Pietro Scarpellini also recognized that Perugino's works from this period (including Pietà and Mary Magdalene (1500)) were characterized by a "dark and secretly sensual climate", revealing the influence of Giovanni Bellini and Antonello da Messina, both fifteenth-century pioneers of oil painting. Perugino produced another, similar, yet morfe vibrantly-colored Pietà around 1495 (now held in the collection of the National Gallery of Ireland).
Oil on panel - Uffizi Gallery, Florence
Portrait of Francesco delle Opere
This painting is Perugino's best-known portrait (illustrating the fact that he was a highly sought-after portraitist who painted many distinguished sitters). The painting was first recorded in the inventory of Cardinal Leopoldo de' Medici as a "Second Manner Raphael" (meaning it "strongly resembles" a Raphael) before the Spanish nobleman, Antonio Ramirez de Montalvo, discovered an inscription in the rear of the panel carrying Perugino's signature. For many years (from 1883, and even though the sitter's true identity was revealed two years earlier), it was assumed to be a self-portrait on grounds that it was exhibited in the gallery of self-portraits in Florence's Vasarian Corridor. The subject is, in fact, Francesco di Piero di Lorenzo delle Opere, a Florentine citizen who was a weaver of fine drapes, and a carver of precious stones. In this three-quarter length portrait, delle Opere is shown wearing a black beret and mantle, and a red blouse over a white shirt. The cartouche in his hands bears the words Timete Devm ("Beware of God"), which was a well-known slogan attributed to the radical Dominican friar and preacher Girolamo Savonarola. (The friar had convinced local Florentines that the plague was punishment from God for their sins, and that they had to burn their material possessions and commit acts of self-flagellation in repentance to avoid death). The Uffizi states that "it is possible that Perugino has realized the portrait in Venice, where Francesco had moved and where the painter, in July 1494, went to arrange a fresco in the Council Room, in the Palazzo Ducale, which he never realized". The portrait shows the influence of the meticulous attention to detail associated with the Flemish painter, Hans Memling. Moreover, the placement of the subject's hand atop a flat surface, corresponding with the painting's lower edge, creates a sense of depth and dimension that mirrors Memling's, Portrait of a Man with a Letter (1485-89). And, like Man with a Letter, Perugino hints at the presence of a small city (through pointed towers) in the far distance (on the right of the frame). Perugino also incorporates a rolling landscape background that features the presence of small shrubs and a lake view which was typical of the Umbrian School of painters.
Tempera on wood - Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy
Vallombrosa Altarpiece
The Vallambrosa Altarpiece, also known as The Virgin Enthroned, with Angels and Saints, created at the apex of Perugino's career, was commissioned for the high altar of the Vallombrosa Abbey in Reggello, Tuscany by Don Biagio Milanesi, Father General of the Order of the Vallombrosan friars. Art historian George Charles Williamson called the work "one of the finest that Perugino ever produced". As in Perugino's (now-lost) Assumption painted at the Sistine Chapel, two scenes appear in this work. Above, God offers a blessing, surrounded by angels with musical instruments, to the Virgin Mary beneath him, inside a mandorla. Below, four saints (from left to right we find Bernard degli Uberti, John Gualbert, who founded the Vallambrosa monastery, Saint Benedict, and the Archangel Michael) stand on a nondescript, rolling, grassy landscape. Although the work was disassembled by Napoleon, this painting was originally part of a complete altarpiece which included other images, including portraits of Milanesi and of the monk Baldassarre to the sides. It can thus be surmised that, when complete, it would appear as though Saints Benedict and Michael were looking at these narrative interlopers. Perugino's student, Raphael, assisted with the production of this piece, and its influence can be found in Raphael's early Baronci Altarpiece at the Church of St. Nicholas of Tolentine in Città di Castello, Perugia. Perugino would repeat several of the motifs found here (such as the inclusion of angels with instruments, and the mandorla) in later works, including, Assumption of the Virgin (1506) in Florence's Basilica della Santissima Annunziata, and his Sansepolcro Altarpiece (1510). Williamson wrote that "The general scheme of the picture is the one which Pietro made somewhat hackneyed, but there are certain special features that must not be overlooked. The Virgin is seated in the skies within a glowing radiance of pure white light, and this of itself is an unusual feature. Never has Perugino painted the Madonna so finely. There is a celestial beauty upon her face, and her hands and robe are depicted with the utmost skill and care". The nineteenth-century historian Joseph Archer Crowe, and art critic Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle, (cited by Williamson) "speak of the four attendant saints as 'magnificent as isolated creations,' and the words are none too strong. The four figures are superb; they are well-balanced and stand firmly on their feet; their draperies are in easy folds, and are painted with unusual care, especially in their delicate gradations of colour; the pose is in each instance suitable and sufficient, and there is tender, reverent beauty in the faces, and the utmost dexterity and feeling in the painting of the hands".
Oil on Panel - Galleria dell'Accademia di Firenze
Battle between Love and Chastity
This large painting was commissioned by Isabella d'Este, Marchesa of Mantua, wife of Gianfrancesco II Gonzaga (then-ruler of Mantua) for her study in the Castello di San Giorgio. Cartwright explains that "as with other artists who created paintings for Isabella, Perugino was obliged to follow very precise instructions on the subject matter (a long letter from Isabella survives) and this, also like other artists, resulted in him producing something quite different from his usual work". The subject of the work was in fact suggested by Isabella's court poet, Paride da Ceresara. The Greek goddess of the hunt Artemis (comparable to the Roman goddess Diana), and Athena, goddess of wisdom (or Minerva in the Roman pantheon), and both of whom represent chastity, are shown battling and defeating Aphrodite (or the Roman goddess Venus), and Cupid, who represent love and lust. Also present are nymphs, fauns, satyrs and other figures. In the background a number of other related mythological scenes are presented, including battles between Apollo and Daphne, Jupiter and Europa, Mercury and Glaucera, Polyphemus and Galatea, and Pluto and Proserpina. Isabella precisely specified the positions, attitudes, and attributes that all of these figures were to have, leaving Perugino little opportunity for creative embellishment. Cartwright writes "The scene still has Perugino's preference for a line of characters in the foreground and there is the usual abundance of space behind them but the figures are much more whimsical than previously seen in his work. There is also a noticeable absence of any architecture, Perugino not even being tempted to cross Isabella and add a picturesque ruin to the scene". Perugino also planned to portray Venus naked, but the Marchesa protested vehemently and he was forced to partially clothe the figure. Upon receiving the completed work, Isabella was not particularly thrilled with the outcome and was further disappointed that it had been produced in tempera rather than oil. Apparently disheartened by the entire experience, it was around this time that Perugino left Florence to return to Umbria, where his clientele were much more appreciative of his talents.
Tempera on canvas - Louvre Museum, Paris
Marriage of the Virgin
This work (originally commissioned to Pinturicchio before being taken over by Perugino), shows the marriage of Mary and Joseph, with attendants to either side of the couple in the foreground. As the work was painted for the Perugia Cathedral, Cartwright explains that the subject matter "was an entirely appropriate choice as the cathedral's most precious relic was a ring said to have been the very one given to Mary". Typical of artistic representations of this scene, Joseph is shown with a blossoming branch, while Mary's other suitors (positioned behind Joseph) angrily break the flowerless sticks they hold. Beyond the main scene are smaller groups of figures (similarly divided between men on the left and women on the right) in the mid-ground, and an octagonal temple dominating the background. A grassy, hilly landscape and trees completes the scene. The symmetrical, balanced, and spacious composition is one seen before in Perugino's work (in his Christ Giving the Keys to St. Peter at the Sistine Chapel), and indeed, it was around this time that he was facing accusations of being formulaic. In fact, Marriage of the Virgin bears the influence of a similarly (though less centrally) composed treatment of the same subject from 1492 for the church of San Girolamo in Spello, Perugia, whose artist is not confirmed, but believed to be Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, possibly one of Perugino's early teachers. Perugino's illustrious pupil, Raphael, is also believed to have assisted in the creation of this work. Indeed, Raphael painted a nearly-identical Marriage of the Virgin in 1504 for the church of San Francesco, Città di Castello, Perugia. Arts writer Arianna Richetti observes that comparisons between Perugino's and Raphael's versions of this painting evidences the way in which Raphael "represented a bridge between the Renaissance and Mannerism". (Raphael is credited with developing a style (Mannerism) that had started to move away from the idealized naturalism of the High Renaissance, towards a more decorative and elaborate style that was characterized by elongated figures, peculiar facial distortions, and irregularities in natural color and perspective.) Perugino, she goes on to explain, "arranges the characters in static and pacific poses. They seem unperturbed and quiet; even the one suitor who is breaking his stick in anger. The artist didn't make preparatory sketches of the figures altogether but portrayed them separately; that's why each one of them seems to exist independently from the others".
Oil on wood - Musée des Beaux-Arts, Caen, France
The Nativity: The Virgin, St. Joseph and the Shepherds Adoring the Infant Christ
This fresco (unfinished due to the artist's death) was executed for the Oratory of the Confraternity of the Annunciation in Fontignano near Perugia. It is a traditional nativity scene featuring the baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph, a donkey and an ox, floating angels, praying shepherds, and an enclosure featuring a sparse wooden structure. Perugino's landscape represents the mountainous Umbrian terrain. The Nativity features many of the artist's hallmarks (and underlines his tendency to repeat compositions) including his gently posed figures, his eye for blending of colors, and his ability to master the illusion of real spatial depth. London's Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) describes how the "Nativity's provincial location meant that it received relatively little attention from art historians in the following centuries [and for] a period at the start of the 19th century [it] was whitewashed over". Having been restored in 1843, the fresco was then removed from the Oratory's wall. (It was transferred to a canvas in a process that involves gluing the canvas to the wall, creating a "negative" that is then transferred to a new canvas creating a "positive" of the original painting.) The V&A, which was responding to a revaluation of the artist's reputation (The British Museum had acquired some of his drawings around the same time), acquired the work for its collection in 1862. On seeing The Nativity displayed on the wall of one of its galleries, the renowned art critic John Ruskin called the work "the finest thing of his I've ever seen out of Italy". His passionate views were shared by members of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, especially Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones. The V&A writes, "The popularity of Perugino's works [was] also evident in reproductions, not only as prints, but also early photographs, including those by the British photographer Francis Frith and the Italian firm Fratelli Alinari. These black and white images made the artist's elegant compositions accessible to a wider audience, but they could not convey his subtle colour palette". The photographer Julia Margaret Cameron, certainly one of the most important portraitist of the 19th century, found inspiration in Perugino's compositional skill. As the V&A states, "In Cameron's 1865 photograph After Perugino / The Annunciation, Mary Ryan poses with the same downward gaze and delicately crossed arms as Joseph in Perugino's Nativity. The same year this photograph was taken, Cameron had her first museum exhibition at the V&A, in the same building where Ruskin admired Perugino's fresco".
Fresco transferred to canvas - Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Biography of Perugino
Childhood
Pietro di Cristoforo Vannucci, better known simply as Perugino (adopted from Perugia, the capital city of central Italian state of Umbria), was the son of Cristoforo Maria Vannucci. The economic status of the family has been disputed by scholars. Many, including the famous biographer Giorgio Vasari, maintain that he found his way out of poverty via his innate artistic genius; others believe his family was among the most important and wealthy in Città della Pieve (a province of Perugia) based on the fact that his father was known to have held public office as a prior in 1459 (by which time young Pietro would have been apprenticed). Vasari states that Perugino died in 1523 aged 78, putting his year of birth as 1445 or 1446 (these dates are generally agreed by historians). Nothing else is known of his first years.
Education and Early Training
Details of Perugino's early training are also sketchy. Perugino's training as an artist probably started in the workshop of Niccolò di Bonifazi, a painter from Siena (Tuscany). The art historian Peter J. Murray believes that it is most likely he then trained with a minor painter in Perugia named Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, and then, from around 1460, in Arezzo, with the more accomplished Umbrian painter, Piero della Francesca. Comparisons of their work strongly suggest that Perugino learned the principles of perspective and color from della Francesca. It is known that Luca Signorelli and Perugino were acquainted since, as Murray observes, "an occasional influence from Signorelli is visible in Perugino's work, notably in the direction of an increased hardness of drawing (e.g., Crucifixion and Saints, c. 1480-1500)". It has been suggested, too, that he studied under Bartolomeo Caporali, head of one of the most important workshops in Perugia.
Around the late 1460s, Perugino arrived in Florence, where he joined at the workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio. His fellow understudies included Leonardo da Vinci, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Lorenzo di Credi, and Filippino Lippi. By 1472, Perugino, having completed his apprenticeship, was enrolled as a master in the Guild of St Luke (at the same time as Leonardo). In 1475 the Perugia Commune commissioned Perugino to decorate the Great Hall in the Palace of Priors. His first significant fresco, featuring the life of Saint Sebastian, was completed between 1476 and 1478 for the church of Santa Maria Assunta in Cerqueto. Perugino also executed an extensive series of frescoes, as well as acclaimed cartoons for stained glass window designs, for the convent of the Ingessati fathers (which was destroyed during the Siege of Florence (1529-30)).
Evidence that Perugino had earned an impressive reputation came when he was employed by Pope Sixtus IV in Rome between 1478 and 1479. He created frescoes for the apse of the Cappella della Concatenazione in the former St. Peter's Basilica (demolished in 1609). He worked again for the Pope between 1481 and 1482 on frescoes in the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican Palace. His painted Moses and Zipporah (which was initially misattributed to Signorelli), as well as scenes of the Assumption, the Nativity, and Moses in the Bulrushes. Historian Mark Cartwright suggests that Perugino's standing was such that he was possibly tasked with the overall decorative design plan for the Chapel, and oversaw the efforts of other artists working there including Signorelli, Botticelli, Ghirlandaio and Piero di Cosimo. Perugino opened his first workshop in Florence in 1486, a move that earned him the nickname "imprenditore pittore" ("painter-entrepreneur").
Mature Period
Once back in Florence, Perugino was commissioned to work in the Palazzo della Signoria and, in 1491, was invited to sit on the committee charged with completing the Florence Cathedral project. In September of 1493 he married architect Luca Fancelli's daughter, Chiara, a beautiful woman, and mother to his three sons, who would become his muse and modeled for him for paintings of the Virgin Mary. The 1490s were in fact Perugino's most productive and successful period. He took on a number of important commissions, including a fresco for the church of Santa Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi in Florence, several altarpieces, and a glut of portraits for wealthy patrons in Florence, Mantua, Naples, Orvieto, and Siena. He also made trips to Venice in 1494, 1495, and possibly 1497.
Murray notes that Perugino appears to have been familiar with the work of the Flemish masters of the time, as their influence, and especially Hans Memling, is evident in his portraits of this period. Around 1496-99, Raphael began apprenticing with Perugino, assisting him on the production of a fresco cycle for the bankers' guild in the Sala dell'Udienza, Perugia. Says Cartwright, "Raphael would adopt his master's interest in creating a sense of space in his paintings and frescoes [as seen, for example, in] his 1504 CE Marriage of the Virgin".
Late Period and Death
In 1500 Agostino Chigi, the Pope's banker and patron of the arts, declared that Perugino was "il meglio maestro d'Italia" ("Italy's best master"). The following year Perugino opened his second workshop in Perugia. It trained a whole new generation of painters who helped spread Perugino's signature style across central Italy. Perugino was made a prior of Perugia also in 1501. He replaced Filippino Lippi on a project for the high altar of the Basilica dell'Annunziata in Genoa in 1504 but the finished work was criticized for a lack of invention. Indeed, Perugino was starting to attract significant criticism. As Cartwright explains, "Altarpieces showing the Virgin Mary and saints were [an] ever-popular product of Perugino's workshops where he and his assistants produced drawings from real-life models. These drawings - of heads, torsos, various postures, etc. - would then be combined to create a unique set of individuals for each altarpiece design. This efficiency was not so appreciated by art critics, especially [the] Florentines who made fun of Perugino's recycling of the artistic ideas that had brought him so much success earlier in his career. Michelangelo was not impressed with Perugino's work either and called it primitive. The sting was enough for Perugino to go before a magistrate over the matter, but this did nothing to improve his reputation".
Disheartened by the criticism, Perugino left Florence for Perugia. Two years later he was in Rome. Pope Julius II summoned him to paint the Stanza of the Incendio del Borgo in the Vatican City. Unfortunately for Perugino Raphael, had begun to outshine him, and Perugino found himself being replaced on the Vatican project by his own apprentice. In 1512 Perugino returned to Perugia for good.
Addressing his critics, Perugino stated, "I employed the figures that on other occasions earned your praise and your endless appreciation. If you no longer like them now and do not praise them, what can I do?". However, he overturned these charges with a magnificent polyptych altarpiece, painted between 1502 and 1512, and 1513 and 1523, for the church of San Agostino in Perugia. He completed other frescoes for the church of the Madonna delle Lacrime in Trevi (1521), the monastery of Sant'Agnese in Perugia (1522), and the church of Castello di Fontignano (1522), as well as at San Severo in Perugia (finishing frescoes begun by Raphael). Although never completed (due to his death) his final fresco, The Nativity: The Virgin, St. Joseph and the Shepherds Adoring the Infant Christ (1522-23) was created for the Oratory of the Confraternity of the Annunciation in Fontignano (near Perugia).
Perugino died of the plague while still working in Fontignano. As was common at the time for plague victims, he was hastily buried (under a tree). In 1911, his remains were identified and transferred into a memorial in the Church of the Annunziata where he had once painted a fresco of the Adoration of the Shepherds. In 1923, Perugino was commemorated in Perugia with a monument built by sculptor Enrico Quattrini in the Carducci Gardens. One hundred years later, and exactly 500 years after his passing, the city of Perugia declared 2023 "the year of Perugino", with a major exhibition of his work held at the National Gallery of Umbria.
The Legacy of Perugino
Perugino is remembered today as one of the foremost painters of the Umbrian school. Yet despite being hailed as the "best master in Italy", and "equal in his gifts" to Leonardo, his achievements are sometimes ignored because he was foremost considered the teacher of the incredibly talented and successful Raphael. Perugino also exerted his influence over other former pupils, including Pompeo Cocchi, Eusebio da San Giorgio, Mariano di Eusterio, and Giovanni di Pietro (lo Spagna). But as Vasari was happy to point out, "not one out of all these disciples ever equaled Pietro's diligence, or the grace of colouring that he showed in that manner of his own, which pleased his time so much, that many came from France, from Spain, from Germany, and from other lands, to learn it".
Although he faced criticism for resting on his laurels (unlike "progressives" such as Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael) interest in Perugino was rekindled in the second half of the nineteenth century. As London's Victoria & Albert Museum explains, "The presence of Perugino's works in Britain, and the popularity of [newly-available prints and early photographs of his works], allowed a new generation of British artists to discover him. Inspired by Perugino and other painters preceding Raphael, this group called themselves the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. [...] The influence of painters like Perugino are found in elements such as linear arrangements of figures, architectural backgrounds and swirling drapery. These are all apparent in [Edward] Burne-Jones' The Mill: Girls Dancing to Music by a River, painted in 1870. [...] Julia Margaret Cameron, a pioneering photographer, also found inspiration in Perugino. [...] In Cameron's 1865 photograph After Perugino / The Annunciation, Mary Ryan poses with the same downward gaze and delicately crossed arms as Joseph in Perugino's Nativity".