Art Principles Part 26

It has been suggested that the foot of Hercules in this fine bronze was placed upon the skull of an ox to indicate a successful hunt,[a] but Hercules was a demiG.o.d, and so could not be connected in art with any but a superhuman task or exploit. Moreover the only instance recorded in mythological history where Hercules fought with an ox (unless the feat of strength against the white bull of Augeas be called a fight), is that of the Cretan bull, which was captured and not killed. There is no other sculptured figure now known where a foot is placed on the skull of an ox, but Pausanias records that he saw one in a temple of Apollo at Patrae, the figure being that of the G.o.d himself.[b] Pausanias attributes the motive of the design to Apollo's love of cattle. There is no doubt about the significance of the Frick bronze. The skull of an ox, and rams' heads are frequently found on ancient tombs, and acanthus leaves were commonly used both in Greece and Rome as funereal signs, while the base of the statuette, which is cast with the figure, is clearly intended to represent an altar. It is noticeable that the form of acanthus leaf used is Roman, suggesting that Pollaiuolo had access to the reproductions of tomb inscriptions made to the order of Lorenzo de'

Medici.

There is apparently no other existing design of a hero contemplating death, but Lysippus carved several figures, now lost, of Hercules in a sad or depressed mood. In the most celebrated of these, the demiG.o.d was seated in a thoughtful att.i.tude on a lion's skin, and it is possible that this design was connected with the contemplation of death, because it was produced in relief soon after the time of Lysippus, and later in a Pompeian fresco, in both cases in the presence of Lichas, the bearer of the poisoned garment.

[a] Bode's Preface to the _Catalogue of the Morgan Bronzes_.

[b] Pausanias, vii.

NOTE 60. PAGE 192

The attempt of Ruskin to raise landscape to a high level in the art of the painter[a] need scarcely be referred to here, so completely have his arguments been refuted elsewhere.

The authority of Alexander Humboldt has been sometimes quoted in support of the a.s.sertion that landscape can appeal to the higher attributes, the pa.s.sage relied upon affirming that descriptive poetry and landscape painting "are alike capable in a greater or lesser degree of combining the visible and invisible in our contemplation of nature." But it is clear from the whole references of the writer to these arts, that he means nothing more by his statement than that a painting or descriptive poem may, like an actual landscape, induce a feeling of wonder at the powers of the original Cause of nature. The opinion of Humboldt upon the position of landscape painting may be gathered from his definite observation that it has "a more material origin and a more earthly limitation than the art which deals with the human form."[b]

[a] _Modern Painters_, vols i. and ii., and the preface to the second edition of the work.

[b] _Cosmos_, vol. ii.

NOTE 61. PAGE 194

It is doubtful whether an artist can invent a form of tree which does not exist in nature, without producing something of the character of a monstrosity. From the point of view of dimensions, the two extreme forms of trees used in painting, are represented in Raphael's Madonna with the Goldfinch[a] as to the slender forms, and as to the giant trunks, in two or three of Claude's pictures. The very beautiful trees of Raphael have been often regarded as pure inventions, and Ruskin was actually surprised that the artist did not delineate the "true form of the trees and the true thickness of the boughs";[b] but as a matter of fact precisely similar trees (a variety of ash) are to be found in the valleys of the Apennines to this day. All the change that Raphael made was to transport the trees from a sheltered spot to an open position.

Very similar trees are introduced in the same master's Apollo and Marsyas.[c] Perugino was the first painter to use them, and in some of his earlier works he made them of great height,[d] but he gradually modified the form till he approached the perfect symmetry and delicacy of Raphael's examples.[e] Marco Basaiti introduced them into at least three of his pictures, and they are also to be found in works by Timoteo della Viti and Francia.[f] Higher and equally slender trees have been appropriately used by Antonio della Ceraiuolo,[g] and even by so late a painter as Nicholas Poussin.[h]

[a] Uffizi Gallery, Florence.

[b] _Modern Painters_, vol. iv.

[c] The Louvre.

[d] Baptism of Christ, Perugia; and The Crucifixion, Florence.

[e] The Deposition, Pitti Palace.

[f] Madonna and Child in a Rose Garden, Munich.

[g] The Crucifixion, Florence Academy.

[h] Diana sleeps in the Forest, Prado, Madrid.

NOTE 62. PAGE 194

In noting the fact that the great landscape artist invents his designs, Byron observes that nature does not furnish him with the scenes that he requires, and adds[a]:

Nature is not lavish of her beauties; they are widely scattered, and occasionally displayed, to be selected with care, and gathered with difficulty.

Had Byron been a painter, he would have known that the trouble of the artist is due to the over, and not the under, supply of beauty by nature. The artist sees the beauty, but cannot identify it with particular signs, and so has to invent a scene himself, using nature only for sketches or ideas.

[a] _Art and Nature._

NOTE 63. PAGE 200

"The force of natural signs," says Lessing, "consists in their resemblance to the things they represent."[a] In a criticism upon the second part of _Faust_, G. H. Lewes writes[b]:

The forms which are his (the artist's) materials, the symbols which are his language, must in themselves have beauty and an interest readily appreciable by those who do not understand the occult meaning. Unless they have this they cease to be art: they become hieroglyphs. Art is picture painting, not picture writing.

While this is generally true, beauty in the lesser signs of the poet is of greater importance than in those of the painter, because a painting is looked upon direct as a whole, while a poem has to be comprehended in its parts before it can be properly considered as a whole.

[a] Laoc.o.o.n.

[b] _Life of Goethe_, 2d edition.

NOTE 64. PAGE 203

Although those of the fifteenth-century artists who treated landscape seriously did not thoroughly understand perspective, yet they were seldom at a loss in representing distance, that is, in the clear atmosphere which they invariably used. They were diffident in attempting distance with unbroken level country, and till quite the end of the century there is no instance where middle and far distance are shown together, even with the a.s.sistance of hilly ground. The almost invariable practice of the leading painters who made landscape a feature in their works, was to introduce water leading back from the foreground, so that breaks therein could be used to indicate distance. More or less numerous jutting forks of low lying land were thrown into the stream from either side, this plan being successfully adopted in Italy,[a]

Flanders,[b] and Germany.[c]

Early in the sixteenth century much improvement was made in the use of water for providing distance, and a few of the Venetian painters gave some consideration to aerial perspective, but the most perfect example of this perspective in the period is contained in an early work of Raphael.[d] In the background is a lake extending into a gradually deepening haze, and in this a boat is so skilfully placed as to increase considerably the apparent distance to the horizon. This picture is a distinct advance upon the Venetian distance work of the time.[e] Later on in the century an artist rarely introduced water into a view specially to a.s.sist in producing distance by means of boats, more advanced methods being adopted. t.i.tian used sunlight effects with varying shadows,[f] or alternating clear and wooded ground.[g] These plans, and the use of water with the addition of trees and low hills,[h]

const.i.tute the chief devices to be found in the late sixteenth-century Italian pictures. Some of the sun effects rendered for distance purposes even before t.i.tian's best time are quite effective, though formal.[i]

[a] See Piero di Cosimo's Death of Procris, National Gallery, London, and Mars and Cupid, Berlin.

[b] Van Eyck's Chancellor Rollin before the Virgin, and Bout's Adoration of the Magi.

[c] Lucas Moser's Voyage of the Saints (1431), Tiefenbroun, Germany.

[d] Central panel in a triptych of the Crucifixion, Hermitage, Petrograd. This picture has been sometimes attributed to Perugino, but it is unquestionably from the hand of Raphael.

[e] See t.i.tian's Jacopo Pesaro presented to St. Peter, Antwerp.

[f] Charles V. at Muhlberg, Madrid.

[g] Meeting of Joachim and Anna, Padua; and others.

[h] Bronzino's Venus and Cupid, Uffizi, Florence.

[i] Schiavone's Jupiter and Io, Hermitage.