Leader Scott

“ It is hard and dull in colouring, the prevailing tone being a heavy drab; there are several nude figures, of doubtful forms as to beauty of drawing, the flesh is painted in a smooth glazed style, without relief or tenderness.
Francia Bigio shines more in fresco than in oil; his hardness is less apparent, and he gains in freedom and brilliance of colouring in the more congenial medium. The finest of his frescoes is, unfortunately, spoiled by his own hand, and remains as a memorial of his genius and hasty temper. ”

“ Andrea Del Sarto is a curious instance of the vital power of art, which, like a flower forcing its way to the light through walls or rocks, will find expression in spite of obstacles.
Andrea the painter, "senza errori," was an artist in spite of lowering home influences, of want of encouragement in his patrons—for his greatest works only brought the smallest remuneration—and even in spite of his own nature, which was material, wanting in high aims, and deficient in ideality; yet his name lives for ever as a great master, and his works rank close to those of the leaders of the Renaissance. ”

“ Who can draw one soul? How much more impossible then to depict the incomprehensible soul in which all others have their being? The utmost we can do is to give the indication of the spirit in the expression of a face, and that so imperfectly that not two beholders read it alike. Study Perugino and Raphael, see how they raise human nature and etherealize it till we see the divinity of soul in the faces of their saints and martyrs. But the moment they try to depict the Almighty, or even his angels, they fall at once below humanity. ”

“ In these the genius of the great masters, the Pleiades of stars at the culmination of art in Florence, was either tenderly nursed, or sharply pruned into vigour by struggling against discouragement and envy. In these the spirit of awakened devotion found an outlet, in altarpieces and designs for church frescoes which were to influence thousands. Here the spirit of poetry, brooding in the mysterious lines of Dante, or echoing from past ages in the myths of the Greeks, took form and glowed on the walls in mighty cartoons to be made imperishable in fresco. ”

“ Did any other young man show talent or surpass him, revenge deep and mean as that of Bandinelli to Michelangelo was sure to follow, the envied work being spoiled in his rage. Then there were the fun-loving Francesco Granacci, and the witty Rustici, as full of boyish pranks as they were of genius—what could one old man do among so many?—and now comes the impetuous Mariotto to add one more unruly member to his class. ”

“ Fra Mariano understood human nature, as priests often do; he had seen the envious rivalship growing between them, as the friends, who should have worked together, took separate compartments, and cast jealous criticising glances on each other's designs and method of work. Having ambition of his own, he knew how to work on that of others to further his own aspirations, which were, to be considered a patron of art and a benefactor to his convent. ”

“ On Fra Bartolommeo the spirituality of Fra Angelico still lingered, while the perfection of Raphael illumined him. Andrea del Sarto, on the other side, had gathered into his hands the gleams of genius from all the great artists who were his elder contemporaries, and so blending them as to form seemingly a style of his own, distinct from any, has left on our walls and in our galleries hundreds of masterpieces of colour, as gay and varied as the tints the orientals weave into their wondrous fabrics. ”

“ It is painted in a soft, harmonious style, but not masterly as regards chiaroscuro. It might be by Francia Bigio, as it has something of the manner of his master, Albertinelli.
Another now in the Uffizi is a most life-like portrait of sombre colouring, but not highly finished. Here we have the same black cap and long hair; the dress is a painter's blouse of a blue-grey, which well brings out the flesh tints. The face is intelligent, but not refined; the clear dark eyes bespeak the artist spirit, but the full mobile mouth tells the material nature of the man. ”

“ Probably Baccio was at the Duomo on that Sunday in Lent, 1495, and reported to Mariotto those wondrous words of Savonarola, that "Beauty ought never to be taken apart from the true and good," and how, after quoting the same sentiments from Socrates and Plato, the preacher went on to say, "True beauty is neither in form nor colour, but in light. God is light, and His creatures are the more lovely as they approach the nearer to Him in beauty. And the body is the more beautiful according to the purity of the soul within it." ”

“ Here the spirit of luxury was satisfied by beautiful designs for ornaments, dress stuffs, tapestries, vases and "cassoni," &c., which brought beauty into every life, and made each house a poem. The soul, the mind, and the body, could alike be supplied at those fountains of the beautiful, the artshops or schools.
Whilst Michelangelo as a youth was drawing from the cartoons of the Sassetti chapel in the school of Domenico Ghirlandajo, Cosimo Roselli was just receiving as a pupil a boy only a little behind him in genius. ”

“ Another charming painting of this period is the Nativity at the Pitti, a round, on panel. The Madonna is not quite so noble as that of the Salutation, but the limbs of the child are beautifully rounded. There is a pretty group of three angels singing in the sky; the landscape is as minute in detail as those his old fellow-pupil Piero used to paint in Cosimo's studio. ”

“ Reading Andrea's heart, he played on all his strongest feelings, placed before him the glory he would win by covering the lunettes of the arches in the court of the fine church with frescoes which would carry his name down to posterity; he said that any other artist would pay much to obtain leave to paint upon historical walls like those, and how they would all envy the man who should obtain the coveted honour! Then, with a half-whispered hint that for one, Francia Bigio was dying to get the commission for nothing, the wily Frate went his way victorious. ”

“ Bernard's face, his white robe contrasts well with two saints behind him, which carry out Fra Bartolommeo's favourite triangular grouping, and with a rich harmony of colour balance his white robe.
The Virgin is drawn with great nobility and grace, her drapery admirably majestic, yet airy, and a sweet, infantile playfulness renders the Child charming. The angels beneath the Virgin's feet are lovely, but the group of seraphs behind are the least pleasing of all. They are of the earth, earthy, and seem reminiscences of the Florentine maidens the artist met in the streets. ”

“ In this Andrea has shown his genius in a style entirely new, the composition being crowded, the perspective intricate, the background a building adorned with statues. The subject being allegorical, he has given the reins to his fancy and produced a wonderful assemblage of strange beasts and stranger human beings, Moors, Indians, and dwarfs. There are giraffes, lions, and all kinds of animals, which he had an opportunity of studying in the Serraglio of Florence. The drawing is true and free, the figures and animals full of life, the colouring as usual well harmonised and bright. ”

“ As a building San Marco has been a shrine of art; since the time that Michelozzi, with the assistance of the Medici, built the convent for Sant' Antonino, and Fra Angelico left the impress of his soul on the walls, a long line of artist monks has lived within its cloisters. With San Marco our story has now to deal, for it is impossible to write Fra Bartolommeo's life without touching on the well-known history of Savonarola. ”

“ The second day the sun rose on the shores of many-isled Greece, and shed its rays over Etruria and Rome, and ere it set, temples and palaces were flooded with beauty. The gods had taken human form, and were come to dwell with men. ”

“ In the Pitti Palace, a charming Pietà of Fra Bartolommeo's occupies a place near the Pietà of Andrea del Sarto, the two pictures forming a most interesting contrast of style. The kneeling Virgin and S. John support the head of the prostrate Saviour, S. Catherine and Mary Magdalen weep at his feet, the latter in an agony of grief crouches prone on the ground hiding her face. The colouring is extremely rich, broad masses of full-tone melting softly into deep shadows. The handling in the flesh-tones of the dead Saviour, as well as the modelling of form, are most masterly. ”

“ The composition is level, the four disputing saints standing in a row, the two listeners, S. Sebastian and Mary Magdalen, kneeling in front. S Agostino, with fierce vehemence, expounds the mystery of the Trinity; S. Stephen turns to S. Francesco interrogatively, S. Domenico (whom Vasari, by the way, calls S. Peter Martyr) has a face full of silent eloquence—he seems only waiting his turn to speak. In S. Sebastian we have a good study from the nude, and in Mary Magdalen's kneeling figure—a charming portrait of Lucrezia—is concentrated the principal focus of colour. ”

“ I allude to the Sposalizio (A.D. 1513) in the courtyard of the Servite church, where Andrea did his series of frescoes from the life of Filippo Benizzi. The composition is grand and carefully thought out, the colouring bright and pleasing; perhaps in emulating Andrea's luxurious style of drapery he has gone a little too far, and crowded the folds. The bridegroom is a noble figure, and shows in his face his gladness in the blossoming rod. A man in the foreground breaks a stick across his knees. ”

“ Look at the little round-backed nestling child in Fra Angelico's Madonna della Stella, imperfect as it is in form, the whole spirit of love is in it. He does not give only the mother-love for the child, but the child-love for the mother, which is more divine, and the same feeling is seen in the Madonna of Fra Bartolommeo. ”

“ How well one can imagine the young men—in loose blouses confined at the waist, or in buff jerkins and close-fitting hose, with jaunty cloaks or doublets, and little red or black caps, set on flowing locks cut square in front—passing beneath the shadows of the arches among the dim statues, or crossing the garden in the sunshine amid the orange-trees, under the splendid blue Italian skies. ”

“ Thirdly, a faithless woman could never have kept her husband's devoted love, and had she been so, would that affectionate though exaggerated letter of hers, recalling him from France, have been written? That a man who thinks his wife the most lovely creature living may be tormented with jealousy without wrong doing on her part is more than possible.
Let us then place Lucrezia's character where it ought to stand in Andrea del Sarto's life—as a powerful influence, lowering his moral nature, weaning him from his duties as a son and brother, by fixing all his care and affection on herself ”

“ If Andrea, a contadino by birth, an artisan by education, was not originally of the most refined nature, his artistic training did not go far towards refining him. Giovanni Barile was a coarse painter and a rough man; he had, however, generosity enough to see that the boy was worthy of better teaching, and got him entered in the bottega of Piero di Cosimo, who had attained a good rank as a colourist, his eccentricities possibly adding to his reputation. ”

“ In an equal degree Renaissance Art has its roots in Christianity; but the religion is deeper and greater, and has left art behind.
The early Christians must have felt this when they expressed everything in symbols, for these are merely suggestive, and allow the imagination full play around and beyond them; they are mere stepping-stones to the ideal which exists but is as yet inexpressible.
"Myths and symbols always mark the dawn of a religion, incarnation and realism its full growth." So after a time when the first vague wonder and ecstasy are over, symbols no longer content people ”

“ This second union between the friends could not have been so satisfactory to either as the first pure boyish love, when they had been full of youthful hopes, and felt their hearts expand with the dreams and visions of genius. ”

“ There are no caves and holes of torture with muscular bodies writhing within them; but in the despairing figures passing away on the right, some with heads bowed on clasped hands, others lifting up faces and arms in a vain cry for mercy, what suggestions there are of infinite remorse!—more dignified far than the distorted sufferers in the torture pits of previous masters. ”

“ Then came that strange carnival when there were no maskers in the city, but white-robed boys went from house to house to collect the vanities for the burning—when the flames of the fires, hitherto saturnalian, were the flames of a holocaust, wherein each one cast the sins and temptations, even the pretty things which, though dear to himself, withdrew him from God. ”

“ There is a fine painting in the church of S. Caterina of Pisa, in the chapel of the Mastiani family, Michele Mastiani having given the commission, and paid thirty ducats, in October, 1511. It represents the Madonna and Child seated on a base; the action is quiet and yet vivacious; she is supported on each side by S. Peter and S. Paul, figures as large as life, and even more noble than the ones in Rome. The colouring has been much injured by a fire in the seventeenth century, but is robust and harmonious. ”

“ Children healed by the garments of S. Philip, which are held by a priest, standing before an altar, the women and their children kneeling in front of him. The grouping is symmetrical, the figures lifelike, but not refined, round-cheeked buxom women, and rough, human men's faces, bespeak Andrea as the painter of reality rather than ideality; there is vivid life in every attitude, but the life is not high caste. A fine old man, leaning on his staff, is a portrait of Andrea della Robbia, whose son Luca stands near. ”

“ Raphael tried to bring realism into religion through painting, and to give us the scenes of our Lord's and the Apostles' lives in such a humanized aspect, that we should feel ourselves of his nature. But the incarnation of religion in art defeated its own ends; sensuousness was introduced in place of the calm, unearthly spirituality of the earlier masters. ”

“ The background is an intricate piece of architecture with vaulted roof, showing that he too had profited by Raphael's instructions in perspective to Fra Bartolommeo.
The Virgin is a tender sweet figure; indeed no artist has given more gracious dignity to womanhood than Albertinelli, although his detractors say his life showed no great respect for it. Above, the Almighty is seen in a yellow light with a circle of angels and seraphs around. It is strange how the realistic painters stopped at nothing, not even the representation of the eternal in a human form. ”

“ Being the eldest of five brothers, it is difficult to conceive how a member of a large family grew up developing such eccentricities as are usually the fruit of isolation.
In the studio Piero was industrious and steady, working earnestly, whether he was assisting his master's designs or carrying out his own fancies of monsters, old myths, and classic fairy stories. No doubt the two boys, Mariotto and Baccio, found little companionship in this abstracted young man always dreaming over his own ideas. ”

“ His works are too numerous and not sufficiently important to catalogue or describe, his composition is overcrowded and wanting in perspective. There is generally a superabundance of flesh; muscular limbs in all attitudes form a great part of his pictures, but as the flesh tints he used were wanting in mellowness and shadow, and have turned pink with age, they compare disadvantageously with those of the more solid masters who preceded him. After all, Vasari's name and fame rest principally on the labours of his pen, not those of his brush. ”

“ Baccio d' Agnolo had carved wonderful coffers, chairs, and bedsteads in walnut wood. Pontormo painted beautiful cabinets and cassoni, and Granacci, Francesco d' Ubertini Verdi, called Bacchiacca, and Andrea were all employed on the walls. Andrea furnished two pictures; the one tells the story of Joseph in Canaan, the other gives his life in Egypt. The style is that of Piero di Cosimo, but with greater excellence and more dignified figures. The landscape is highly finished and minute, and has a part of the story in every nook of it. ”

“ Miss Owen [Footnote: Art Schools of Medieval Christendom, edited by Ruskin.] accuses Raphael of having rendered Art pagan, but this seems blaming him for the weakness of his followers, who took for their type his works rather than his ideal. The causes of the decline were many, and are not centred in one man. As long as Religion slumbered in monasticism and dogma, Art seizing on the human parts, such as the maternity of the Madonna, the personifications of saints who had lived in the world, was its adequate exponent. ”