ملف:Giotto - Legend of St Francis - -07- - Confirmation of the Rule.jpg

(b. 1267, Vespignano, d. 1337, Firenze)

Legend of St Francis: 7. Confirmation of the Rule 1297-99 Fresco, 270 x 230 cm Upper Church, San Francesco, Assisi

This is the seventh of the twenty-eight scenes (twenty-five of which were painted by Giotto) of Legend of Saint Francis.

However unsatisfactory the execution of the figures may be, the Confirmation of the Rule and the St Francis preaching before Honorius III have the most organic spatial constructions of all the Upper Church frescoes. These scenes, which have a perfectly centralized view point, are two of the most outstanding examples of Giotto's conception of space as a cubic box open at the front. Notice how cleverly this space has been contrived. Our attention appears to be drawn to the upper part of each fresco, occupied by a series of protruding arches supported by sturdy consoles in the Confirmation of the Rule, and by the first surviving depiction of a cross vault in the history of Italian painting in the St Francis preacbing before Honorius III. Such perfection of spatial construction is found only in the frescoes in the Arena Chapel, Padua, and the Bardi Chapel in Santa Croce, and those in the right transept of the Lower Church at Assisi, all of which are by Giotto.

Another noteworthy feature of the Confirmation of the Rule is the arrangement in depth of rows of kneeling friars behind St Francis. Duccio preferred to arrange the saints in horizontal rows parallel to the picture plane in his Maestà at Siena, while Simone Martini showed the rows of figures around the Virgin at a slightly oblique angle in his Maestà in the Palazzo Pubblico, Siena. The latter system had been introduced and systematically employed by Giotto, in perfect harmony with his conception of pictorial space.

• • • Keywords: *************

Author: GIOTTO di Bondone Title: Legend of St Francis: 7. Confirmation of the Rule Time-line: 1301-1350 School: Italian Form: painting