CAROTO. - Two painters of this name. GIOVANNI FRANCESCO (Verona 1480?-1555?) was the best pupil of Liberale da Verona, and was influenced by Mantegna, by Raphael and also by Bonifacio Veronese and by Titian.

In 1501 he painted the Madonna Sewing (Pinacoteca Estense); in 1508 the Annunciation, a fresco in S. Girolamo in Verona; in 1514 the Virgin with the Child and a Donor (Accademia Virgiliana in Mantua); in 1515 the Pietà (Fontana collection in Turin); in 1527 the Massacre of the Innocents (Accademia Carrara in Bergamo); in 1528 the Madonna in Glory and Saints in S. Fermo in Verona; in 1531 the Holy Family and the Raising of Lazarus (respectively in the museum and in the archiepiscopal palace of the same city); in 1545 St. Ursula in S. Giorgio in Braida, also in Verona.

He was essentially an eclectic: the Madonna Sewing shows the forms of Liberale, weighed down by thick shadows; the Adoration of Jesus in the museum of Verona displays Mantegnesque derivations; the Madonna with the Child in the Museo Civico of Verona and the Madonna of S. Fermo take up the Raphaelesque manner spread in Verona by Cavazzola. And Raphael, through Giulio Romano, is found again in the Holy Family and in the Raising of Lazarus.

As the years went on, C. again drew close to the Venetians, especially to Bonifacio Veronese and to Titian (Adoration of the Magi and Massacre of the Innocents in the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo). He was called the Raphael of the Veronese School. Considered a mannerist by some, he was praised by others for his landscapes and for the beauty of his female figures.

GIOVANNI, his brother and assistant (Verona 1488?-1566), shows the influence of the Giorgionesque manner, but distinguished himself by linear and luministic effects, as in the Madonna with Sts. Peter and Paul in St. Paul's in Verona and in the Madonna with Sts. Stephen and Martin and a Donor (cathedral of Verona, 1514). The figures of the man and the woman in prayer in the Museo Civico of Verona are grandiose, a painting in which C. displays a great mastery of color.

Bibliography6 works

BIBL.: Venturi, IX, III, Milan 1928, pp. 867-89; W. Arslan, Quattro piccoli contributi per C. G. F., in Critica d'arte, 3 (1938), pp. 75-79; J. Byam Schaw, C., in Old Master Drawings, 14 (1939-40), p. 3; F. Hart, C.'s Meditation on the Passion, in Art Bull., 22 (1940), pp. 25-35; E. G. Treche, Die « Ariadne » der Sammlung Lanz, in Pantheon, 25 (1940), pp. 20-22; B. Berenson, I pittori italiani del Rinascimento, trad. it. di E. Cecchi, 2nd ed., Milan 1942, p. 215.

Vincenzo Golzio

@incollection{ec3_caroto, author = {Golzio, Vincenzo}, title = {Caroto}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {III}, pages = {924--925}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1949}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/caroto} }

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