Jacopo (or Giacomo) Ponte

Jacopo Bassano trained under his father, Francesco the Elder, from whom he learnt the technique of painting altarpieces and constructing altars out of wood. Around 1540 he returned to his hometown of Bassano, where he spent the rest of his life, although he did not lose touch with Venetian artistic circles, and became one of the main innovators of Venetian painting during the second half of the Cinquecento. Bassano was always something of a popular artist. He painted biblical scenes in the style of rustic genre scenes, using realistic settings which included details of peasant life and animals. Bassano managed to create a taste for a style of painting in which the genre element or the still life took on greater significance than the religious subject being represented. From 1560 onwards he enhanced his scenes with light tonalities and was slightly influenced by Tintoretto's use of colour. Bassano softened the colours and created a magical nocturnal atmosphere, such as in his "Susanna" in the Museum of Nîmes and in the "Baptism of St Lucy" in the Museum of Bassano. In works like "The Way to Calvary" in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, he adopted an unsettled, Mannerist style. He accentuated iridescent and cold colour ranges which break with Giorgione's unified schemes.