The most exhilarating painter of the Renaissance and arguably
of the whole of western art, Tintoretto was known as Il Furioso
because of the attack and energy of his style. His vaunting ambition
is recorded in the inscription he placed in his studio: l disegno di
Michelangelo ed il colorito di Tiziano ("Michelangelo's drawing and
Titian's colour").
The Florentines Vasari and Borghini, and the Venetians Ridolfi
and Boschini wrote the earliest biographies of the artist. The four
accounts are related each other and form the backbone of the
critical success of Tintoretto. Borghini is the first one to give some
information about Marietta Tintoretto, also an artist, and Ridolfi
is the richest in anecdotes about the artist's life and personality -
including the one about the inscription which he may, however,
have invented. Boschini, a witty Venetian nationalist, wrote his
account in dialect verse. El Greco, whose marginal notes to Vasari
are included for the first time in English, Calmo and Franco knew
Tintoretto personally and their writings give a real flavour of this
complicated man.
Unavailable in any form for many years, these biographies have
been newly edited for this edition. They are introduced by the
scholar Carlo Corsato, who places each in its artistic and literary
context. Approximately 50 pages of colour illustrations cover the
full range of Tintoretto's astonishing output.