MONTAGNA, BARTOLOMEO Italian painter, the most eminent master of the school of Vicenza. He was a Brescian by birth. Vasari classes him among the pupils of Andrea Mantegna, but although there can be little doubt of the influence of the great Paduan master on his style, he more prob ably studied at Venice under the influence of Giovanni Bellini and Vittore Carpaccio. Montagna's style is dignified and austere, his form plastic, his colour exquisitely harmonious. He interpreted his favourite subject, "The Virgin and Child," either alone or attended by saints with a solemn, quiet grandeur. Montagna is first heard of at Vicenza in 1480; he also worked elsewhere, at Praglia near Padua and at Verona (1504-07) where he painted a fresco in the oratory of S. Biagio in the church of SS. Nazaro and Celso, as well as an altar-piece for the church of S. Sebas tiano now in the Venice academy. His most important work is probably the great altar-piece of San Michele at Vicenza dated now in the Brera, Milan. Here the stateliness of the com
position, staged under a lofty vault, the nobleness of the en throned Madonna, the dignity of the attendant saints, the charm of the angels making music at the foot of the throne, are pro foundly impressive. It would be impossible here to enumerate the numerous works of Montagna in Vicenza and in many public and private collections. One of his last pictures is the altar-piece, dated 1522, in the cathedral at Cologna Veneta. He died at Vicenza on Oct. 11, 1523. Bartolomeo founded a school of painting at Vicenza, from which sprang Giovanni Speranza, and partly also Giovanni Bonconsiglio and Francesco Ponte, the father of Jacopo Bassano.
His son, BENEDETTO MONTAGNA (1470-1540), imitated the style of his father in his paintings. He was a distinguished engraver.
See T. Borenius, The Painters of Vicenza (i909).