A Popular Handbook to the National Gallery, Volume I, Foreign Schools

1211, 1212. SCENES AT A TOURNAMENT

Domenico Morone (Veronese: 1442-1508?)

Domenico Morone was in 1493 called upon by the Veronese authorities in conjunction with Liberale (1134) to adjudicate upon an artistic dispute. It seems, therefore, that he was recognised as a leading painter of the day. This also is Vasari's estimate: Domenico, he says, was in higher repute than any other painter of Verona, Liberale alone excepted. Little, however, is known to us about Domenico. Only two pictures are known to bear his signature; one of these, a "Madonna and Child," is in the Berlin Gallery. He was the father of the better known Francesco Morone (285).

Possibly scenes from the fêtes at the marriage of Isabella d'Este and Francesco Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua.235 Domenico Morone, called Pellacane, the dog-skinner, from his father's occupation, may have been present at the marriage ceremony, which took place in 1490; but at any rate these little pictures are of historical interest as contemporary illustrations. The scene in both is a tilt court, with its seat of honour in the middle. In the first the knights are tilting, the marquis being on his throne and the seats filled with ladies. In the second the tilting is over, courtiers and ladies are dancing in the side compartments; whilst in the centre a knight in full armour, but bareheaded, awaits his award of victory from Isabella and her husband, who are standing on the dais. There is much artistic merit in the sprightly way in which such momentary actions as that of the page going to spring over the partition in 1212 are rendered (see Times, July 24, 1886).

1213. PORTRAIT OF A PROFESSOR

Gentile Bellini (Venetian: 1427-1507).

Gentile was the elder brother of Giovanni (189), and was named after Gentile da Fabriano under whom his father had studied. In 1464, after severe training in his father's school, he moved from Padua to Venice, and was employed by the State. His high reputation is shown by the fact that, when in 1479 the Sultan Mahomet II. applied to the Venetians to send him a good painter, he was deputed by them to go to Constantinople. His visit there was marked by a well-known incident. He showed the Sultan a picture of Herodias's daughter with the head of John the Baptist. The Sultan objected to the bleeding head as untrue to nature, and to prove his point ordered a slave to be beheaded in Bellini's presence. The painter fled from the scene of such experiments, but the influence of his visit is to be seen in the oriental costumes which he was fond of introducing into his pictures (as in the studies in the British Museum and the library of Windsor Castle). The portrait of the great Ottoman conqueror acquired by the late Sir Henry Layard is an autograph replica of the work painted by Gentile at Constantinople. On his return to Venice he was taken into the permanent employment of the State, and executed many works in the Ducal Palace and elsewhere; some were destroyed in the fire of 1577, others remain. In 1486 Titian, then a boy of nine, entered Gentile's studio. Easel pictures by him are very scarce. His principal works are at Venice, and are the most valuable record extant of the city as it was in his time. They are described and highly praised by Ruskin in his Guide to the Academy at Venice. In the same style is the "St. Mark preaching at Alexandria," now in the Brera at Milan. This work, left unfinished when Gentile died, was completed, as his will enjoined, by Giovanni.

Supposed to be a portrait of Girolamo Malatini, Professor of Mathematics in Venice (notice his brass compasses), who is said to have taught Gentile and his brother Giovanni the rules of perspective. "The portrait fully justifies the fame that Gentile had acquired as a painter of portraits, and shows him the forerunner of Titian" (Layard's edition of "Kugler," i. 306). The prominence given in this picture to the sitter's hands should be noticed. The older tradition strictly limited portraiture to the representation of the head only, or at most to the bust. Afterwards the expressiveness of the human hand per se came to be recognised (see Mr. Herbert Cook's Giorgione, p. 19, and compare the portraits Nos. 808 and 1440).

1214. CORIOLANUS, VOLUMNIA, AND VETURIA

Michele da Verona (Veronese: 1470-1523?)

Michele, a pupil of Domenico Morone (1211), was a contemporary and sometimes an assistant of Cavazzola (735). The works of the two are easily distinguishable. Michele, says Morelli, "is more pointed in the foldings of his draperies, as well as in the fingers of his hands, which are always rather stumpy in Cavazzola. In conception, however, Cavazzola is far above Michele, and also more elegant and noble in his drawing" (German Galleries, p. 54). Many of Michele's works are to be seen at Verona. His landscape backgrounds, as in the present picture, are interesting.

Coriolanus, a noble Roman, so called from Corioli, a city of the Volscians he had taken, bore himself haughtily, and was banished. Nursing his revenge, he threw himself into the arms of the Volscians, determined henceforth to bear himself "As if a man were author of himself, And knew no other kin," and advanced at their head upon Rome. The Romans, in terror, endeavoured in vain to appease him, and at last sent out his wife, Volumnia, with her child, here kneeling before him, and his mother, Veturia (Volumnia in Shakespeare's play), to intercede. In their presence "the strong man gave way; he throws himself on his knee, and is restored once more to human love" —

Like a dull actor now,I have forgot my part … O, a kissLong as my exile, sweet as my revenge!Now, by the jealous queen of heaven, that kissI carried from thee, dear; and my true lipHath virgin'd it e'er since. Ye gods! I prate,And the most noble mother of the worldLeave unsaluted: sink, my knee, i' the earth.Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act v. Sc. 3.

1215. MADONNA AND CHILD

Domenico Veneziano (died 1461). See 766.

For the history of this picture (now withdrawn from exhibition) see under 766. The restorations of 1851 there referred to were in great part removed after the acquisition of the picture by the National Gallery. But "it was found, late in 1904, that its state threatened its immediate destruction, and it was hoped that the mischief might be arrested by re-lining. The pigment was, however, found to be falling from the plaster ground in such a way that re-lining, which would affect only the adherence of the ground to the canvas backing, was useless, and very reluctant recourse was had to the process of transferring the picture itself to canvas. This transfer resulted in such a loss to the picture that it has been withdrawn from public exhibition, and, for the present, it is thought better to leave it as a genuine picture, of interest to connoisseurs, rather than subject it to the extensive repainting without which it would hardly be intelligible to the ordinary visitor" (Director's Report, 1905). A small copy of the picture is exhibited among the Arundel Society's Collection.

1216, 1216 a & b. THE FALL OF THE REBEL ANGELS

Spinello Aretino (Tuscan: about 1333-1410). See 581.

These fragments of a fresco, now transferred to canvas, are of particular interest from the following mention of it by Vasari. He relates how Spinello Aretino, after executing important works in various cities of Italy, returned to his native city, Arezzo, and very shortly settled down to decorate the church of S. Maria degli Angeli. The subject chosen was certain stories from the life of St. Michael. "At the high altar," says Vasari, "he represented Lucifer fixing his seat in the North, with the fall of the angels, who are changed into devils as they descend to the earth. In the air appears St. Michael in combat with the old serpent of seven heads and ten horns, while beneath and in the centre of the picture is Lucifer, already changed into a most hideous beast. And so anxious was the artist to make him frightful and horrible that it is said – such is sometimes the power of imagination – that the figure he had painted appeared to him in his sleep, demanding to know where the painter had seen him looking so ugly as that, and wherefore he permitted his pencils to offer him, the said Lucifer, so mortifying an affront." Vasari attributes a fatal result to this vision. "The artist awoke," he says, "in such extremity of terror that he was unable to cry out, but shook and trembled so violently that his wife, awakening, hastened to his assistance. But the shock was so great that he was on the point of expiring suddenly from this accident, and did not in fact survive it beyond a very short time, during which he remained in a dispirited condition, with eyes from which all intelligence had departed" (i. 269). In fact, however, Spinello lived many years and executed several important works after the date in question. Some years ago the church of the Angeli was dismantled, and the greater portion of the frescoes perished. Sir A. H. Layard, who was passing Arezzo at the time, was fortunately able to secure a large piece of the principal fresco. The fragment is from the centre of the composition, and contains a portion of the figure of Michael and six of the angels following him. The archangel, with raised sword, is striking at the dragon; his attendants, armed with spears and swords, thrust down the demons. Besides these figures, Sir A. H. Layard was able to save a portion of the decorated border of the fresco (1216 A & B). These he presented to the nation in 1886.

1217. THE ISRAELITES GATHERING MANNA

Ercole Roberti de' Grandi (Ferrarese: 1450-1496).See 1127

"The lithe and sinewy form in the nude figure of the young man, the accurate draughtsmanship, the firm modelling, the care and study bestowed even on the tiny figures in the background, the dramatic intention and impression of vitality, indicate a familiarity with the works of Mantegna" (Times, July 24, 1886). The artist exhibits, adds Sir F. Burton, "no less appreciation of natural grace in the female figures than of dignity in the principal male personages."

1218, 1219. JOSEPH AND HIS BRETHREN

Francesco Ubertini (Florentine: 1494-1557).

Francesco, the son of Ubertino, a goldsmith, called Il Bacchiacca, studied first under Perugino, and afterwards with Franciabigio and Andrea del Sarto. He was also at one time in Rome, where he lived on terms of intimacy with Giulio Romano and Benvenuto Cellini; he is mentioned in Cellini's Autobiography. He was "more particularly successful," says Vasari, "in the execution of small figures, which he executed to perfection and with infinite patience. Ultimately Bacchiacca was received into the service of the Duke Cosimo, seeing that he was excellent in the delineation of all kinds of animals, and was therefore employed to decorate a study for his Excellency, which he did with great ability, covering the same with birds of various kinds, together with rare plants and foliage. At a later period he painted in fresco the grotto of a fountain which is in the garden of the Pitti Palace, and also prepared the designs for hangings of a bed to be richly embroidered all over with stories in small figures, this being considered the most gorgeous decoration of the kind that has ever been executed in similar work, seeing that the designs of Francesco have been worked in embroidery, thickly mingled with pearls and other costly material, by Antonio, the brother of Francesco, who is an excellent master in embroidery" (iv. 492). It would appear from Vasari's account that Francesco's works consisted of predelle for altar-pieces, and pictorial adornments for wedding chests, and other pieces of "art furniture."236 Morelli, however, in an interesting chapter on Bacchiacca (Roman Galleries, pp. 103-113), claims for him a much more important position, ascribing to him among other works the charming and celebrated "Portrait of a Boy" in the Louvre, commonly attributed to Raphael.

The present panels decorated the room in the house at Florence, from which Pontormo's picture of Joseph also comes (see under 1131); they were doubtless painted for "cassoni," or large chests which were used by the Italians of the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries as wardrobes. "In those palmy days art was welcomed everywhere in Italy, and had a share in all the concerns of men, and in all the events and festivities of daily life. The nobles took a delight in enriching their palaces, their country houses, and the chapels in their churches, with paintings and sculpture, and even required that their household furniture should, whilst useful, be graceful and beautiful." Our panels were purchased many years ago from the heirs of the Borgherini.

Several incidents occur in each of the two pictures, but the main figures constantly recur, and we recognise them by their dress and look. (1218). On the left, in this picture, are Joseph's brethren travelling in search of corn towards the land of Egypt, quaint figures in fantastic dresses, with little Benjamin, a child in a blue frock, and Reuben weeping, and another brother trying in vain to console him. "And the famine was sore in the land… And the men took … Benjamin; and rose up, and went down to Egypt" (Genesis xliii. 1, 15). On the right in the same picture is Joseph welcoming his brothers in the portico of the palace, Pharaoh's armed guard outside looking rather grimly and inhospitably on the intruders. The landscape is green and picturesque. It is noticeable that blue (the colour of hope) is here made sacred to Joseph and Benjamin, the children of promise, who are in every instance dressed alike.

(1219). In the companion panel the further history of Joseph and his brethren is depicted in three scenes or compartments, divided by pillars. On the left are the brothers unloading the donkey of the empty meal-jars, now to be filled through Joseph's kindness. In the centre is Joseph making himself known to his eleven brethren. He is gazing tenderly on little Benjamin, who advances towards him in the foreground. "And Joseph said unto his brethren, I am Joseph: doth my father yet live?" (Genesis xlv. 3). On the right are seen the brethren departing homeward, and the mule laden with Benjamin and the filled meal-bags is being driven off.

1220. THE VIRGIN AND CHILD

L' Ingegno (Umbrian: painted 1484-1511).

This is the only picture, says the Official Catalogue, which can be authenticated "with something like certainty" as the work of Andrea di Luigi, of Assisi. His name occurs in receipts and registers from 1505 to 1511, in the capacity of procurator, arbitrator, auditor to the magistracy, and finally of papal cashier at Assisi. It was perhaps this "talent" for affairs that won him the name of "L' Ingegno." Vasari says he was the most promising disciple of Perugino, and the resemblance to that artist in this picture is strong. Compare for instance even so small a thing as the dress patterns here with those in 288, as also the close resemblance to the "purist" landscape there described.

1221. "DARBY AND JOAN."

Abraham de Pape (Dutch: died 1666).

This painter, a friend and pupil of Gerard Dou, was a well-to-do citizen of Leyden. He was twice Dean of the Painters' Guild in that place. This picture (formerly in the Blenheim Collection) is considered one of the best of his works. The painter's name is inscribed on the wooden cupboard on the wall above the spinning-wheel.

1222. A STUDY OF FOLIAGE, BIRDS, ETC

Melchior de Hondecoeter (Dutch: 1636-1695). See 202.

Formerly ascribed to Otto Marseus; but the defaced part of the signature has recently been deciphered as being that of Hondecoeter, dated 1668.

1227. VIRGIN AND CHILD

Marcello Venusti (Florentine: 1515-1579). See 1194.

Also St. Joseph and St. John the Baptist, with the skin of a wild beast quaintly treated as a head-dress. A picture from a composition by Michael Angelo, known as "Il Silenzio."

1229. VIRGIN AND CHILD

Luis de Morales (Spanish: 1509-1586).

Luis de Morales was born at Badajos, and is one of the most native of Spanish artists. He did not resort to Italy, such foreign influence as is discernible in him being rather that of the Flemings; and the religious sanctity of his work won him the surname of "the Divine." "His subjects, always devotional, were," we are told, "mostly of the saddest, as the Saviour in his hour of suffering, or dead in his mother's arms, or the weeping Madonna. His object was to excite devotion through images of pain, and to this end the forms are attenuated and the faces disfigured by the marks of past or present anguish." He was very largely commissioned by churches and convents, and his fame spread over Spain. He was called to the court of Philip II. in 1563, but was dismissed as soon as he had painted one picture, and thereafter he fell into great poverty. He had appeared at court, it is said, "in the style of a grand seigneur" which seemed to the king and his courtiers absurd in a mere painter, and was the cause of their disfavour. Some years later, however, the king, learning of his poverty, granted him a pension. In his earlier period, Morales painted crowded compositions with numerous figures; in his later, smaller pictures, such as the one before us.

1230. PORTRAIT OF A GIRL

Domenico Ghirlandajo (Florentine: 1449-1494).

The name of Ghirlandajo is one of the great landmarks in the history of Florentine art. He was the first to introduce portraits into "historical" pictures for their own sake, and his series of frescoes in S. Maria Novella is particularly interesting for the numerous portraits of his friends and patrons, dressed in the costume of the period and introduced into scenes of Florentine life and architecture. "There is a bishop," says Vasari, "in his episcopal vestments and with spectacles on his nose" – Ghirlandajo was the first master who ventured to paint a figure wearing spectacles – "he is chanting the prayers for the dead; and the fact that we do not hear him alone demonstrates to us that he is not alive, but merely painted." These groups of men and women in Ghirlandajo's sacred compositions stand by in the costume of their day as spectators of the incidents represented. He introduced also the architecture of Florence in the richest display and in complete perspective; and thus in his subjects taken from sacred story he has left us "an exalted picture of life as it presented itself to him in that day." "In the technical management of fresco Ghirlandajo exhibits an unsurpassed finish, and worked in it with extraordinary facility. He is said to have expressed a wish that he might be allowed to paint in fresco the whole of the walls which enclosed the city of Florence." He was carried off by the plague in his forty-fifth year, but he had already completed a very large body of work. He was the son of a silk-broker named Bigordi. He and his brother David, who was also a painter, were apprenticed to a goldsmith. Their master probably manufactured the garlands of gold and silver which were so much in favour with the women of Florence, and the young men coming from his shop thus acquired the name of del Ghirlandajo. Domenico early showed his bent by the striking likenesses he drew of the people who passed by the goldsmith's shop. He remained to the end of his life, says Ruskin, "a goldsmith with a gift of portraiture." As early as 1475 his reputation was established, for in that year he was called to Rome to paint in the Sistine Chapel, where his "Calling of Peter and Andrew" is still well preserved. Among the frescoes executed after his return to Florence may be mentioned the "St. Jerome" in the church of the Ognissanti, the history of "St. Francis" in the Trinita, and the famous series in the choir of S. Maria Novella. Copies from several of these works may be seen in the Arundel Society's Collection. They are described by Ruskin in his Mornings in Florence (see also Praeterita, vol. ii., and numerous incidental references in Modern Painters). Ghirlandajo had not, perhaps, Giotto's dramatic instinct for the heart of his subjects, but his frescoes are remarkable, not only for their brilliantly decorative effect, but for their noble and dignified realism. In the Uffizi at Florence are his best easel pictures. There is also a fine "Visitation" in the Louvre. Ghirlandajo was celebrated further as a worker in mosaic (e. g. the mosaic over the north door of the Cathedral at Florence). He was twice married. The painter Ridolfo (1143) was a son by his first wife. Amongst his other pupils were Granacci and Michael Angelo.

The girl is of the same type – with the same hair, "yellow as ripe corn," and the same dainty primness – as the lady in Mr. Willett's picture (for some years on loan in the National Gallery, and now in the collection of M. Rodolphe Kann at Paris), but she was perhaps of humbler station – a simple flower in her hair and a coral necklace being her only ornaments.

1231. PORTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN

Sir Antonio More (Flemish: 1512-1578). See 1094.

"A man in the prime of life, attributed to Sir Antonio Moro; the signature is perhaps apocryphal. There is little doubt, however, that the attribution is correct; the manipulation shows all the prodigious power of Moro. His capacity for seizing character and the fine tone of his flesh colour are all here. The execution suggests the brilliant study of Hubert Goltzius, by Moro, in the Brussels Gallery. That masterpiece was stated to have been painted in an hour; the present head bears every indication of almost equally rapid brush work" (Times, September 19, 1887).

1232. PORTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN

Heinrich Aldegrever (Westphalian: about 1502-1555).

"Aldegrever is a son of the Renaissance, but he has not altogether escaped the old Franconian stiffness and provincialism… His real strength is in engraving… He worked also as a goldsmith, and his ornamental designs are numerous. We also know of a small number of woodcuts by him" (Woltmann, ii. 234). His pictures are very rare. The flower and ring which figure in the best known portrait by him at Vienna are again met with here, but this picture is less stiff and formal than that.

1233. THE BLOOD OF THE REDEEMER

Giovanni Bellini (Venetian: 1426-1516). See 189.

A devotional picture recalling such reminiscences of mediæval mysticism as are found in many of our hymns —

Come let us stand beneath his Cross:So may the blood from out his sideFall gently on us drop by drop.Jesus our Lord is crucified.

"A cold sky with underlit clouds suggests the still and solemn hour of early dawn, a fitting time for the advent of this weird and livid apparition. Gaunt, bloodless, and with attenuated limbs, the Redeemer, we recognise, has passed through the Valley of 'the Shadow of Death' – not victoriously; there is no light of triumph in the lustreless eyes; no palm nor crown awaits this victim of relentless hate, the type of infinite despair and eternal sacrifice" (Times, September 19, 1887) —

Sunrise is close: the upper sky is blueThat has been darkness; and the day is new,Bleaching yon little town: where the white hue,Spread blank on the horizon, skirtsThe night-mass there is strife and wavy rushOf beams in flush…The dawn is blue among the hills and whiteAbove their tops; a gladness creeps in sightAcross the silver-russet slopes, but nightObscures the mortal ebb and flowFlushing Thy veins; Thy lips in strife for breathAre full of death.("Michael Field" in Sight and Song.)

The looks and gestures of the Saviour seem to demonstrate that the blood which pours from His riven side is freely given for the redemption of the world. In the details of the picture, which careless observers might mistake for mere chance accessories, there is an allegorical meaning. The paved terrace with the open doorway symbolises the Paradise regained by the Blood of the Sacrificed, the ideal Church, the Church of the New Covenant, in contradistinction to the Hortus Inclusus, the garden enclosed, without a door, which was the type of the Old Covenant. The antique reliefs are pagan prototypes of the Christian sacrifice. On the right is Mucius Scaevola, before Lars Porsena, thrusting his hand into the fire, – the ancient type of heroism and readiness to suffer; on the opposite side is a pagan sacrifice, with Pan playing the pipes, signifying the propitiatory sacrifices of the ancients, and thus foreshadowing the Sacrifice on the Cross. The landscape background carries out the same ideas. On the right is a barren hill with leafless trees, and at its base some ancient ruins and a crumbling fountain. In contrast to this on the opposite side is a prosperous and well-fortified city, lying amid meadows; a church tower; the sky above is rosy with the light of early dawn. Figures are seen turning from the ancient ruins and making their way along the path which leads to a new and better home, the Christian city (Richter's Lectures on the National Gallery, p. 37).