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| Michelangelo Doni Tondo 1506-1508 tempera on panel Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence |
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| Michelangelo Entombment ca. 1500-1501 oil on panel (unfinished) National Gallery, London |
"Imagine walking into a small, round classical temple and immediately being stopped short – blinded by a cascade of light streaming in from above that reflects off the surface of a marble floor. As our eyes grow accustomed to the interior space, seven colossal statues emerge from the shadowy walls. They serve as columns to support the entablature, and, above that, a dome and fenestrated lantern. We examine the face of one figure and gradually discover the features of Michelangelo: high prominent forehead, beady little eyes, broken nose, scraggly beard, and cropped hair. Cast in lead, the Florentine master carries the tools of his trade and stands proudly on an elaborately carved pedestal that depicts artists formed from his alter ego, Saturnine characters gone bad – anxious, tedious, envious, desperate types – who warn the visitor against any similar folly. Continuing along the wall of this edifice, we next encounter a statue of Guadenzio Ferrari, a sixteenth-century Piedmont painter of the finest kind who worked extensively in Milan. His Jovian aspect forms a pleasant contrast to the greedy, tyrannical counterparts engraved on his pedestal. The third statue, made of iron, represents Polidoro da Caravaggio. And so we proceed around the perimeter of the circle, identifying the other statues, one by one, as Leonardo, Raphael, Andrea Mantegna, and Titian, each cast in a different metal and mounted on a decorated pedestal displaying the dark flip side of each artistic temperament. Where are we? Who are these artists? We are standing in the ideal Temple of Painting conceived by Giovan Paolo Lomazzo in 1590. These eminent masters are the gods he chose to govern this art."
– from the introduction by Jean Julia Chai to her translation of Giovan Paolo Lomazzo's Idea of the Temple of Painting (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2013)
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| Gaudenzio Ferrari Christ rising from the Tomb before 1546 oil on panel National Gallery, London |
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| Gaudenzio Ferrari St Andrew before 1546 oil on panel National Gallery, London |
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| Polidoro da Caravaggio Scene of Battle before 1543 oil on canvas (grisaille) Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Polidoro da Caravaggio River God before 1543 oil on canvas (grisaille) Museum of Fine Arts, Boston |
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| Leonardo da Vinci Leda ca. 1510-15 oil on panel Galleria Borghese, Rome |
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| Leonardo da Vinci La Belle Ferronière ca. 1490 oil on panel Musée du Louvre, Paris |
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| Raphael Entombment 1507 oil on panel Galleria Borghese, Rome |
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| Raphael Alba Madonna ca. 1510 oil on panel, transferred to canvas National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
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| Andrea Mantegna Christ as Suffering Redeemer ca. 1495-1500 tempera on panel Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen |
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| Andrea Mantegna Judith ca. 1495 tempera on panel National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
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| Titian Noli me tangere ca. 1514 oil on canvas National Gallery, London |
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| Titian- Tarquin and Lucretia ca. 1571 oil on canvas Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge |