安德烈的油画和湿壁画一样好。难道不记得早期文艺复兴画家常常将颜料和蛋清或胶水混合在一起使用吗？不过后来有人发现将颜料和油混合一起则更好用，所以没过多久，除了湿壁画外，所有的画家都开始用油料作画。如果用传统的蛋清或胶水混合制成颜料的话，那么画家就得在涂有一种叫“石膏粉”的光滑的灰泥木板上绘画。但如果用油料的话，他们就可以在帆布或没有涂石膏粉的木板上作画。这样就容易多了，而且画出来的画也好看得多。
安德烈最为著名的一幅油画是圣母像。画中，圣母玛利亚怀抱圣婴基督，圣方济各和圣约翰分别站在两旁，中间还有两个小天使。这幅画有一个很特别的名字，叫《有鸟身女妖基座的圣母玛利亚像》。你知道“鸟身女妖”是什么吗？鸟身女妖是一种虚构的动物，一种长着女人脑袋的鸟。安德烈画中的圣母站在一个基座上，基座上配有两个小的鸟身女妖做装饰。这就是我们为什么把这幅画称作《有鸟身女妖基座的圣母玛利亚像》的原因。
据猜测，这幅画中的圣母玛利亚看起来很像安德烈的妻子。他所有的画里都有以他妻子为原型的人物。不过，当可怜的安德烈染上瘟疫，病得很重的时候，他那自私自利的妻子却因为害怕传染弃他而去，一直到安德烈去世都没来照顾他。
安德烈·德尔萨托是以他父亲的职业而命名的。现在我们来认识另一位画家，他是以自己家乡起名的。还记得那个以居住地起名画家佩鲁吉诺吧？在离佩鲁贾不远的地方，有一个叫“科雷吉欧”的小镇，镇上住着一位画家，大家都以小镇的名字来喊他。我们对科雷吉欧的生平不是很了解，但我们都很欣赏他的绘画作品。同安德烈·德尔萨托一样，科雷吉欧既画湿壁画也画油画。他所有的湿壁画都保存在意大利的帕尔玛，因为他以前在那里专为教堂和修道院作画。
帕尔玛的大教堂顶部有一个圆形的塔，叫圆顶塔。科雷吉欧在这个圆顶塔内画了一幅画。这幅画是圆形的，所以刚好适合圆顶塔的天花板。因为这幅画只能站在地板上从下往上看，所以科雷吉欧决定将画中的天使和人物画成往上才能看到的在天空飞翔时的样子。假如你抬头看见一位天使从你头顶飞过的话，你肯定能看见天使的脚底要比他的头离你更近一些。但是，如果你从一个人头部往下看的话，你会觉得他的头离你更近。
很少有画家知道能把从下往上看时的人物样子画出来。科雷吉欧首先请来一位雕刻家，让他做些泥人模型，这样他就能看到人们在各种奇奇怪怪姿态下的样子。我们把他这种绘画方式叫着“缩短法”。
科雷吉欧还画了一些圆顶画，也是按照“缩短法”画的。但是，人们根本不知道这些画是怎样画成的。因为这是一种新型的绘画方法，所以一开始并不是很受欢迎。有人甚至说这种画看起来就像是画了一堆青蛙。不过后来，一位叫提香的画家来到帕尔玛，当他看到科雷吉欧在大教堂圆顶上画的那幅画时，他惊叹道：“就算是把圆顶塔拆下来后全填满金子，也抵不上这幅画的价值。”
科雷吉欧的油画以其绝妙的光影而闻名。他正是我们所说的光影大师。他画中的人物很优雅，笑容满面，精致可爱，神态快乐，所以几乎人人喜欢。人们发现画中人物的唯一缺陷就是他们好像没有多少内涵，这是因为科雷吉欧不是米开朗基罗和达芬奇那样伟大的思想家。
科雷吉欧的另外一幅画叫《圣凯瑟琳的神秘婚礼》。圣凯瑟琳曾梦到自己即将嫁给圣婴基督，而这幅画正向我们展示了圣婴在玩弄圣凯瑟琳梦中所见的那枚结婚戒指时的情景。
他还有一幅画和这幅一样有名，叫《圣夜》或《牧羊人的膜拜》。画面上，圣婴躺在马槽里，他母亲和牧羊人围在他周围。一道绚丽的光芒射进圣婴卧的马槽，膜拜的人们的脸庞在光照下显得神采奕奕。
有一个关于科雷吉欧去世的奇怪故事，但我们无法考究这个故事的真实性。据说，有人要买科雷吉欧的一幅画，但全用铜币来支付。要知道如果用硬币支付一些贵重东西的话，那得要很多很多的硬币。所以科雷吉欧这卖画所得的一大堆铜币成了一个大负担。科雷吉欧要把这堆铜板带回家，那天天气刚好很热，就这样一下子把科雷吉欧累病倒了。他卧病在床没多久就去世了。光影大师的一生就这样结束了，但他的绘画在他死后，一直给人们带来快乐。
FLEMINGS
佛兰德斯人
DO YOU know what a Fleming is？It isn’t some strange animal you can see in the zoo.In fact，a Fleming isn’t any stranger than you are，yourself，for a Fleming is a Flemish person—a person of Flanders.The strange thing about a Fleming is that he is also bound to be either a Frenchman or a Belgian or a Dutchman，as well as just a Fleming，for Flanders is now partly in France，partly in Belgium，and partly in Holland.
An interesting thing about the Flemings is that they had great artists who were painting at the same time as the early Renaissance，or Born Again，artists in Italy.There weren’t quite so many great artists in Flanders as in Italy at that time，but there were many more there than in any other country.If you want to look up this country of Flanders on the map，look for Belgium.You will find it along the North Sea.
The first of the famous Flemish artists were two brothers named Van Eyck.Hubert was the older brother and Jan the younger.They worked in the city of Bruges，which is not a very important city now but then was one of the largest and richest cities in Europe.For a church in Ghent these two brothers painted a magnificent altar-piece.An altar-piece was not like an ordinary picture.An altar-piece had a central panel with wings or shutters on each side.like a threefold screen.These shutters could be closed like the shutters of a window and so the Van Eycks painted pictures on the back as well as on the front.
Hubert was the one who planned the paintings on this altar-piece，but before he had finished them all he died，and then Jan completed the work.The altar-piece was so much admired that several cities wanted it for their museums.So it was taken apart and for a long time the central part was in one city and each of the shutters in another.After World War I the pieces were brought back to Ghen，to make a complete altar-piece again.
The altar-piece is almost all we have to show us how good an artist Hubert Van Eyck was，but Jan’s paintings have been better preserved and there are several very famous ones in museums.Both the Van Eycks painted with oil，and they used oil so well to bring out the colors and to keep the paintings fresh-looking that the story soon grew up that they were the inventors of oil paintings.This isn’t exactly true，but they did improve oil painting so much that we can call them the fathers of oil painting.From them the Italians learned to paint with oil.
The Van Eyck brothers were followed by other good painters in Flanders，but I’m going to have to skip them and tell you about the greatest Flemish artist，who lived two hundred years later than the Van Eycks.So that you’ll know the time this was，I’ll tell you that he lived from 1577to 1640.His name was Peter Paul Rubens.
Peter Paul must have been a very bright boy，for he learned to speak Latin，French，Italian，Spanish，English，German，and Dutch！Do you know anybody who can speak seven languages？
As a young man Peter Paul worked for several years in Italy，for one of the dukes there.The duke liked his work so much that he would not give Rubens permission to leave.One day，however，Rubens had a message from Flanders telling him his mother was very ill.He started for home at once without waiting to get the duke’s permission.
The rulers of Flanders were glad Rubens had come back and they not only gave him orders for pictures but made good use of him in other ways.He was entrusted with important missions to carry out in Spain，in France，and in England.Every place he went he won friends.The King of Spain made him a knight.The King of England made him a knight.Honors were heaped upon him.He continued to paint hundreds of pictures.
In his house was a huge studio，where he had many young artists helping him as they themselves learned from him.He liked to paint big pictures best and the stairway of his studio was made very large so that his largest paintings could be taken from the studio after they were painted.