Antonio Allegri Da Correggio, an Italian painter, born at Correggio, near Modena, in 1494, died there, March 5, 1534. His father Pellegrino Allegri, a tradesman in moderate circumstances, caused him to be instructed in various branches of polite learning, and his uncle, Lorenzo Allegri, an artist of tolerable ability, taught him the rudiments of painting. His first regular instructions probably were received in the school of Andrea Mantegna, continued by his son Francesco, in Mantua, whence he acquired his wonderful skill in foreshortening. Francesco Bianchi Ferrari is also said to have been one of his masters, and the works of Leonardo da Vinci exercised an important influence on him. He never visited Rome, never studied the antique, unless from such specimens as the cities of northern Italy contained, and seems never to have had intercourse with the great painters of the age, except through their works. Yet by the force of his individual genius he created a manner entirely original, in which movement, variety, and the most delicate gradation of light and shadow, are the principal elements, and in the art of chiaroscuro surpassed all former artists. In 1518 Correggio, having already acquired some reputation as an artist, was invited to Parma to paint a saloon in the convent of San Paolo for the abbess.

The subjects were selected from ancient mythology, and the groups of scantily draped gods and goddesses, of graces, nymphs, satyrs, and fauns, were represented with a fulness of life, gayety, and grace of which the severer ideal of contemporary masters had scarcely conceived. The reputation which this work gained for the artist procured him in 1520 the commission to execute the frescoes on the cupola of San Giovanni in Parma. He painted the "Ascension of Christ," who appears soaring up to heaven, while below, the apostles, seated on clouds, are watching his departure. In 1525, on the invitation of Duke Federigo Gonzaga, he went to Mantua, where he painted a celebratad series of mythological subjects: "Leda and the Swan," and "Jupiter and Io,"now in the Berlin gallery; "Danae," in the Borghese gallery in Rome; "Jupiter and Antiope," in the Louvre; and "The Education of Cupid," in the British national gallery. The subjects, appealing to the artist's feeling for grace and the expression of tender and voluptuous emotion, were executed with felicity, yet without grossness. The "Jupiter and Io," however, which was once in the possession of Queen Christina of Sweden, having passed into the Orleans collection, the son of the regent duke ordered the face of Io to be cut out and burned.

It was afterward skilfully restored by the French artist Prud'hon. In 1526 he began his celebrated fresco in the duomo of Parma. In the centre of the dome he represented the Assumption - the Madonna borne up to heaven by an innumerable throng of rejoicing angels, while the Saviour descends to meet her; below are the apostles and evangelists. This is esteemed the masterpiece of Correggio, and Titian when he first saw it said, "If I were not Titian, I would be Correggio." Some of the cartoons of this work were accidentally discovered in a garret in Parma, and are now in the British museum. Upon its completion in 1530, Correggio returned to his native town, where he passed the remainder of his life. He died of a malignant fever after a few days' illness. - Correggio's works are not so numerous as those of some painters, but nearly every one is a masterpiece. The famous picture of the Nativity, in the Dresden gallery, called the Notte, in which the light proceeds from the head of the infant Saviour, shows his command over the stronger contrasts of light and shadow, as well as his ntter carelessness in drawing the subordinate parts of his pictures; while in his "Mercury instructing Cupid," the gradations are so fine that the shadows seem mutable and aerial, as if between the eye and the colors.

The reading Magdalen, in the Dresden gallery, has perhaps been multiplied through engravings and copies beyond any other picture. Among other celebrated pictures are the St. Catharine in the Louvre, the St. Jerome in Parma, the St. George in Berlin, and the "Zingarella " Madonna in Naples. Correggio probably had no pupils, unless the persons who assisted him in executing his frescoes can be called such; but his imitators, who formed what was called the school of Parma, were numerous. Among the latter, the most celebrated was Parmigianino. His son, Pomponio Allegri, followed his father's style, but acquired no great reputation.