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| Perino del Vaga Lamentation ca. 1535 oil on panel Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
"A truly great gift is art, who, paying no regard to abundance of riches, to high estate, or to nobility of blood, embraces, protects, and uplifts from the ground a child of poverty much more often than one wrapped in the ease of wealth. ... And whoever has any doubt of this, will be enlightened in this present Life of Perino del Vaga, a painter of great excellence and genius. ... This Perino, the son of a poor father, having been left an orphan as a little child and abandoned by his relatives, was guided and governed by art, whom he always acknowledged as his true mother and honored without ceasing. ... Thus left in Rome, and seeing the ancient works of sculpture and the marvelous masses of the buildings, reduced for the most part to ruins, Perino stood lost in admiration at the greatness of the many renowned and illustrious men who had executed those works. And so, becoming ever more and more aflame with love of art, he burned unceasingly to attain to a height not too far distant from those masters, in order to win fame and profit for himself with his works, even as had been done by those at whom he marveled as he beheld their beautiful creations. And while he contemplated their greatness and the depths of his own lowliness and poverty, reflecting that he possessed nothing save the desire to rise to their height, and that, having no one who might maintain him and provide him with the means to live, he was forced, if he wished to remain alive, to labor at work for those ordinary shops, now with one painter and now with another, after the manner of the day-laborers in the fields, a mode of life which so hindered his studies, he felt infinite grief and pain in his heart at not being able to make as soon as he would have liked that proficience to which his mind, his will, and his necessities were urging him. He made the resolve, therefore, to divide his time equally, working half the week at day work, and during the other half devoting his attention to design; and to this second half he added all the feast-days, together with a great part of the nights, thus stealing time from time itself, in order to become famous and to escape from the hands of others so far as it might be possible."
– from the Life of Perino del Vaga by Giorgio Vasari (1568) translated into English by Gaston du C. de Vere (1912)
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| Polidoro da Caravaggio Cupid and Psyche before 1543 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Polidoro da Caravaggio Psyche and her Sisters before 1543 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Polidoro da Caravaggio Venus at the Forge of Vulcan before 1543 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Polidoro da Caravaggio Scene of Battle before 1543 oil on canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Girolamo Siciolante da Sermonetea Allegory of Diligence and Sloth before 1580 oil on panel, transferred to canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Raffaellino del Colle Holy Family before 1566 oil on panel, transferred to canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Raphael Holy Family 1506-07 tempera and oil on panel, transferred to canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| copy after Giulio Romano Battle of the Milvian Bridge 16th century oil on panel, transferred to canvas Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Giulio Romano Jonah and the Whale ca. 1531-32 drawing Hermitage, Saint Peteresburg |
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| Jacopo Caraglio after Rosso Fiorentino Battle between Hercules and Centaurs 1526-27 engraving Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Baccio Bandinelli Holy Women at the Empty Tomb ca. 1525-50 drawing Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Baldassare Peruzzi Androcles and the Lion 1530s drawing Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Daniele da Volterra Sibyl ca. 1540-45 drawing Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
"Many more drawings on paper, of every type, ranging from first sketches to detailed studies and full-scale cartoons, survive from Italy than from Northern Europe."
This consoling fact is revealed by David Bomford in the 2002 catalog from the National Gallery in London – Underdrawings in Renaissance Paintings.