THE UNIVERSAL EXHIBITION AT PARIS IN 1867--THE IMITATORS OF
VELA--INEDITED MUSIC BY ROSSINI AND GUSTAVE DORÉ--DOMENICO
MORELLI--GROUP OF PRINCE TRABIA'S CHILDREN AND THE
THIEVES--"STICK NO BILLS"--THE STATUE OF MARSHAL
PALLAVICINI--THE EMPRESS MARIA TERESA AND MARSHAL
PALLAVICINI--A MEMORIAL MONUMENT TO FRA GIROLAMO
SAVONAROLA--THE UNIVERSAL EXHIBITION AT VIENNA--A TINY
ROOM--EXCELLENT AND VERY DEAR--ON HARMONY OF SOUNDS--ON THE
HARMONY IN THE ANIMAL WORLD--THE HARMONY OF THE HUMAN FORM AS
MANIFESTED BY THE INNER BEAUTY OF THE SOUL--THE CAMPANILE OF ST
STEPHEN'S AND CANOVA'S MONUMENT.
It is now necessary for me to speak of the Universal Exhibition at Paris
in 1867; but first, I wish frankly to give my opinion on the utility or
non-utility of such exhibitions, monstrous agglomerations of
manufactures, machinery, raw material, food, liquid for drink, sacred
utensils, machines for war, &c., all exposed by the different nations of
the world at the same time and in the same place. It has been said that
this serves to create rivalry and emulation in the people of the
different civilised nations, by placing their industries in contact with
each other, to be judged by special men named for the purpose to give
them their merited reward. The idea seems to be a fine one; in fact, it
is so much too fine that the excess deforms it. On the contrary, I
believe that all this assemblage of things in an immense edifice, with
thousands and thousands of visitors, on one of the pleasantest and most
smiling sites, in the most beautiful part of the year, in one of the
great metropolises of the world, answers admirably to the economical and
political aims of the State that assembles the exhibition; gives an
opportunity to travellers and exposers to see, to divert and enjoy
themselves, and make acquaintances, sometimes good, but oftener bad;
brings money into the pockets of intriguers and swindlers in proportion
to their dexterity, and gives or increases the renown of Tizio or Caio,
to the detriment of Sempronio, in the opinion of some with justice, and
in the opinion of others with great injustice. But who has the rights of
it? The rights of it are at the bottom of a well, and need the
grappling-irons of time to drag them out.
[Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF WORLD EXHIBITIONS.]
I should believe in the utility of these world exhibitions if
they were by sections--industries, manufactures, machinery, and
agriculture--everything separate; and separated always absolutely from
all the rest, in time and in place, the Fine Arts, to which I should
wish to see prizes awarded, not by a medal, but rather by the purchase
of the work itself, or if this be already disposed of, by the commission
for another.
It may be somewhat useful to artists to see the works of others, their
variety, and the different modes of feeling and seeing of their authors;
it may infuse into them new life, new strength, and stimulate them to
search within themselves for what they find in the works of others: but
if this examination, this comparison, this stimulating fever be of
assistance to some, to the greater number it is a stumbling-block, and
the cause of their going astray. It is useless to have any illusion. The
greater number of young artists allow themselves to be taken by the bait
of novelty, only because it is novelty, without being able to discern
the hidden reasons for which good sense and experience concede or deny
merit to such novelty. To but few belongs the power of examination and
criticism,--to them alone who, having by nature the sentiment and cult
of art, exercise themselves by constantly holding up the mirror before
it; for they find in it always something new and varied, and on this
very account do not ignore the reasons and laws that willingly give
consent to these varieties and novelties. But the others allow
themselves to be dazzled, and accept the novelty whatever it may be,
choosing by preference the strangest and most unusual, which for that
very reason is sure to be the least true; and so they fall into double
error--into imitation which lands one in mediocrity, and into oddity
which has affinity with error. As with both--that is to say, amongst
those who do not depreciate novelty, and amongst the others that are
seduced by the false attractions of mere novelty--there are some who are
capable of appreciating the good only so far as the means for being able
to manifest it is made apparent to them. To these, great exhibitions are
of use; but to the first named they are not of use, as they have no need
of them--and to the others even less so, for to them they can do harm.
[Sidenote: THE MILANESE SCHOOL OF SCULPTURE.]
When, now many years ago, Vela and others of the Milanese school taught
a new and totally different way of looking at and treating drapery,
flesh, and more especially hair, they would never have believed, I
think, that their imitators would have gone to such lengths, and have so
exaggerated that method as to have rendered it supremely false,
ridiculous, and incomprehensible. In fact, things have got to such a
pass to-day that hair looks like anything but hair--more like
stalactites or beehives, salad or whipped cream; and this last the hair
made by some of the imitators and exaggerators of that peculiar way of
seeing nature particularly resembles. At the great exhibition at Paris
one saw both master and scholars; or it would be better to say, the
initiator and the imitators. Vela with his sobriety of purpose, full of
life, here and there with rough-and-ready touches as art and taste
counsel, and nature and harmony teach--the others, with little taste,
great self-reliance, and equal audacity, striving their best to muddle
up everything together in a topsy-turvy fashion. Taste, which is an
individual sentiment, was reduced to a system, or rather a manner;
sobriety was transformed into hardness, and a studied neglect of certain
parts, exchanged for a systematic and excessive carelessness; and on the
contrary, as if in contrast, an affected imitation of little folds,
bands, lace, and polished beads and necklaces, the delight and
admiration of women and children, little and big.
[Sidenote: FRIVOLOUS AND AFFECTED ART.]
At the exhibition in Paris, amongst the fops and the milliners this
alluring kind of work was received with enthusiasm, because a novelty
always makes a greater impression on the frivolous; but serious people
of good taste, as well as the judges, did not allow themselves to be
attracted by such superficiality. It is true, however, that they were
too severe with works of merit, and if it had not been that the limited
number of prizes prevented them from being more liberal, the jury that I
belonged to would have been to blame. But it is not requisite for me to
repeat here what I said on sculpture, and what I wrote officially on
that exhibition.
I became acquainted at that time with the best French artists, and they
showed me almost brotherly kindness. I sat at their meetings at the
Academy, of which I had been a member since 1863, and was afterwards
raised to the rank of corresponding member, which is the highest honour
the Academy can confer. Although unworthy to do so, I had Giovacchino
Rossini's seat.
[Sidenote: ROSSINI'S HOUSE IN PARIS.]
Rossini's house was the genial meeting-place of all there was of most
distinguished then in Paris, not only of the musical class, but of the
artistic and literary. He had music, and often sat down to the piano and
accompanied his inedited songs. I remember two of singular beauty; one
most sad in subject, words, and notes, of a father from whom his little
son had been stolen. It was a lament, refined, delicate, and touching,
and at the end of every verse came the _ritornello--"Chi l'avesse
trovato il mio piccino!_" The words, I was told, were by Castellani of
Rome. The other song was brilliant, strong, thrilling. It was an
outburst of love, where a Tyrolese _jodel_ was interpolated and sung by
that brilliant imaginative genius Gustave Doré. Here one met with choice
conversation, fruitful, instructive, amiable, and vivacious, from which
one came forth with the mind more elevated and a greater warmth at
heart; but....
To that exhibition I sent a plaster cast of my bas-relief representing
the "Triumph of the Cross," the marble group of the "Pietà," and the
model for the base of the Egyptian Vase. For these works the great medal
of honour was conferred upon me. In painting, Professor Ussi had the
same great medal for his picture "La Cacciata del Duca d'Atene."
Domenico Morelli for his "Torquato Tasso," and Vincenzo Vela for his
"Dying Napoleon," obtained the first-class gold medal, but they also
deserved to have had the great medal.
A fine genius is Domenico Morelli, as well as a loyal and generous
friend, for he greatly rejoiced when Ussi obtained the great prize for
Italian painting; and I remember that he said, "As long as there is the
great prize, be it awarded to myself, Ussi, or any one else, it is of
small consequence as long as Italy does not fall behind. Long live Art
and Italy!"
[Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF THE PARIS EXHIBITION.]
For the matter of that, one art (I speak of painting) was most worthily
represented, and brought forward a virgin element--subject to discussion
and confirmation, it is true, yet fruitful of good result, such as
recalling art to its fundamental principle, which is the imitation of
nature, and relieving young men from the conventional trammels learnt on
the benches of the Academy (I wish I could say learnt in the past),
making them breathe a more ventilated, healthy air, placing before their
eyes that infinite variety and beauty of which nature is composed in all
its parts, in all its effects, and in all its forms--in the heavens, in
the sea, on the hills, in the plains, in the forests, in the animals and
in men--and every one of these things always varying according to light,
according to the quietness or the emotions of nature, according to
temperament, to the habits of animals and men; all of which things are
so well taught by nature to those holding a constant firm will to study
her. This element, I say, appeared with but slight deviations at the
world's exhibition in Paris, and did good. It rejuvenated art, and
lifted it out of some conventionalities, whilst it placed others in bad
repute. But enough of this for the present; let us speak of something
else.
[Sidenote: LIFE-SIZE GROUP FOR PRINCE TRABIA.]
One of the reasons that spurred me on to write these memoirs is this:
Allowing that my works may with time not be entirely forgotten, I have
wished to register them all in this book, that it should not occur after
a certain time that some copy, some imitation, or unknown piece of
sculpture, more or less praiseworthy than mine, should be attributed to
me. For this reason, from the first I have mentioned even such works as
are of no great size and importance, and will continue to do so,
excluding, be it understood, reproduction, which would carry me to too
great lengths. The Signora Maria Galeotti, _nata_ Petrovitz, ordered
from me a life-size group of her grandchildren, sons of Prince Trabia.
This group reminds me of that most unfortunate robbery that I have
spoken of further back, and this is why I am reminded of it. In the
closet where I kept the money shut up that was stolen from me, there was
a little of everything, papers, designs, tools, books, medals, and
various little trinkets, that were respected--that is, not taken away,
for they were scattered about on the floor. In this closet I also kept
my clothes; and for convenience, or out of carelessness, amongst other
things I had left a straw hat there. This straw hat of mine the thieves
had put on the head of one of the little ones in the Trabia group, and
it would have been really ridiculous to see the statuette of that little
boy with my great straw hat hiding half of his head, had it only been at
another time, because even now (and a good many years have passed), only
to think of it--no, indeed, it does not make me laugh! And to think that
of those gentlemen thieves, for there were several, some escaped the
claws of justice, and some must have come out of "college" by this time,
and if by chance they meet me, may smile to themselves under their
beards at my simplicity. So goes the world; it is so fashioned, and has
always been the same, even from the so-called prehistoric ages, and no
instruction, either more or less obligatory, will change it one atom. As
for me, when I am Minister of "Justice and Mercy" (devil take it, why
not?) I will have engraved upon all the corners where one now reads
"Stick no bills," the eighth commandment, "Thou shalt not steal; or if
so, the whip will be administered and plenty of it;" and to my
colleagues in favour of progress who rise up in arms against me I will
answer: "A little luxury as regards the whip, my good gentlemen, will
bring about great economy as regards the prisons and domiciliary
compulsion, and what is more, will bring about a considerable rise in
the funds--of public security. But it is said the lash degrades
humanity. Perhaps it is degraded less by theft? In times not very
remote, theft was punished much more severely even when it was not a
very grave matter; but if it was grave and accompanied by the breaking
open of drawers, the thieves were hanged outright. Certainly this
punishment was excessive, Draconian, and in a word barbarous; and yet,
in those days Arnolfo built, Giotto painted, and Dante wrote his
immortal poem. Be it as it may, this is most certain, that thieves were
then conspicuous by their very scarcity, whereas to-day they shine by
their frequency; and _vice versâ_, Arnolfo, Giotto, and Dante then
existed, _e questo è quanto_, as Marchese Colombi would say."
[Sidenote: THE WHIP FOR THIEVES.]
Count Antonio Pallavicini, a man cut out after the old-fashioned
stamp,--one of the few who in their hearts keep to the religion of
gratitude and affectionate remembrance of their dear relations,--gave me
the order for a statue of his grandfather, Marshal Pallavicini, who was
in the Austrian service under the reign of Maria Teresa. The Count told
me an anecdote of this excellent grandfather that I wish to repeat, so
that one may see how, though in a foreign service, the heart--I will not
say of an Italian, for Italy was hardly spoken of then, but--of a
Genoese and good republican beat. Here it is: The Republic of Genoa--I
know not on what question with Austria--had become discontented, and
threatened to resist by force the pretension of that powerful Empress,
who, either because she was by nature careless and unmindful of public
virtue, or because she thought of obtaining a better result, decreed
that Marshal Pallavicini should move at the head of an army to put down
Genoese arrogance. But this brave soldier--this worthy patriot--on
coming into the presence of the sovereign, took off his sword, and
placing it on the table, said with calm dignity--
[Sidenote: MARSHAL PALLAVICINI.]
"Your Majesty, it is impossible for me, a Genoese, to make war against
my own country; and I therefore to-day give up this sword that I have so
often used in the defence of your empire, that it may not be stained by
the blood of my brothers." At which the Empress smilingly answered--
"Take back your sword, that is so well suited to you, and that you use
so valorously; and as your service is denied us in reducing to obedience
your dear but obstinate brothers, be at least our envoy to arrange the
difficulties and treat of peace." And peace was concluded.
It must be agreed that the subject was a fine one and a worthy one, and
the statue was made and placed in the cemetery of the Certosa at
Bologna; but the above-mentioned anecdote, that I would have so
willingly treated in bas-relief as portraying vividly the character of
this personage, was not given me to carry out, because the base was
entirely occupied by long Latin inscriptions that the Count would at all
costs have engraved upon it, to set forth the whole family history, and
the reasons for his gratitude and the erection of the monument.
About that time I had to make a little monumental memorial of Frate
Girolamo Savonarola. The reason for my having this order was this,--that
in Germany--I do not remember in what town--a monument had been put up
to Luther, and one of the figures that adorned this monument was Fra
Girolamo Savonarola; and how much to the purpose, all, excepting those
good Germans, can see, for they know Savonarola as well as I do the
Emperor of the Mississippi. The promoters of this work were Gino
Capponi, Bettino Ricasoli, Niccolò Tommaseo, Raffaello Lambruschini,
Augusto Conti, Cesare Guasti, and Isidoro del Lungo. I assisted at their
meetings, and the idea that prevailed was to make the statue of
Savonarola and place it in the cloisters of St Mark; but this intention
we did not fulfil, because another commission had already been formed
with the same purpose of doing honour to Savonarola, and this had
already asked for and obtained the place in the cloister, the more
readily as the statue was already made by Professor Enrico Pazzi. We
therefore had to change our project, and after many propositions it was
decided that the monument should consist of a bas-relief and bust to be
placed in the friar's cell. This was done accordingly, and there it is
to be found. The subject of the bas-relief is Savonarola before the
Gonfaloniere and Priori of the Comune, reading the Government statutes
proposed by him for the Florentine Republic. On one of the sides or
flanks of the bas-relief is the youth Savonarola in pensive attitude
meditating leaving the world and dedicating himself to monastic life,
and on the other one are represented the last moments of his life when
he is on the way to his martyrdom. The bust is in bronze.
[Sidenote: MONUMENT TO SAVONAROLA.]
Six years have not passed since the honour befell me of sitting amongst
those famous men who wanted this work to be made by me, and three of
them are already dead. Gino Capponi, Tommaseo, and Lambruschini--they
are dead, but their names and their works live, and will live as long
as Truth and Good are loved and revered.
[Sidenote: UNIVERSAL EXHIBITION AT VIENNA.]
In 1873 the Universal Exhibition at Vienna took place, and I was named
on the jury in the Italian section on sculpture, in company with my
dearest friend Giovanni Strazza, so early lost to his family, to art,
and to his country, which he so honoured and loved. On an occasion like
this I had the means of knowing the clear acumen and kind heart of my
illustrious colleague, be it either in his judgment on works of art, or
in his intimate relation of friendship with our colleagues.
I will not speak of that great gay city, nor of the works of art in
which she is so rich, nor of the Pinacoteca, her galleries and
magnificent library--for this is not what I have undertaken, and these
are things that can be found in the guide-books; and even if I wished to
make some observations about them, it would be impossible for me to do
so, because at that time I was most unhappy in the recent loss of my
dear daughter Luisina; and therefore, alone and far from my family, I
felt a void around me, and a most vivid desire to see them again, so
that I looked at everything most hurriedly and through a veil of sadness
and anguish.
[Sidenote: MUSIC IN VIENNA.]
I was lodged at the Hotel Britannia on the Schillerplatz, on the fourth
floor, up one hundred and thirty-seven steps, in a small room, even
smaller than that of my own maid-servant; there was only one window, and
this opened on an inner court. The furniture consisted of a little bed,
too small, but soft and sufficiently clean; a table, two chairs, a
wardrobe, a looking-glass, a dressing-table--and that was all. All this
for the miserable sum of ten _lire_ a-day. I will say nothing about the
meals; but the breakfast, I mean the early one of coffee and milk, a
roll and butter, was sixty _kreutzers_--a _lira_ and a half; and with
the little refreshment of ice in your water (it was in June), twenty
_kreutzers_ more--half a _lira_. A cigar was half a _lira_, the washing
and doing up of a shirt one _lira_, an ice one _lira_, and so on to your
taste. For the matter of that, if I had had a little of the good-humour
that my Italian companions Petrella, Boito, Govi, Bonghi, Palizzi,
Mussini, Cantoni, Colombo, and Mariani had, without counting Jorick, who
had to give and to spare, I should have remained there longer, and
should have amused myself--for the city is really beautiful, most
animated and bright, especially in the evening, well lighted, with fine
theatres and music. Oh, for music, you must hear it at Vienna! I do not
mean by music German music--for on the contrary, I love our own Italian;
but I speak of the execution, of which we have (setting aside
exceptions) but a most imperfect idea. It cannot be otherwise. There the
musician has an assured position. There there is an institute where he
is trained to be a professor of music--that is to say, as far as
execution goes--where music is provided for, and nothing else is taught.
During the day he studies, and in the evening he plays, and the next day
the same thing over again, and so on until the day comes for receiving
holy unction. I defy any one, therefore, not to play well! I heard one
Sunday, at the St Stephen's Cathedral, music so sad and so sweet that I
was almost carried away by it, it seemed as if it were a sweet and
loving lament of the angels. These seemed not to be the voices of the
instruments of this world, but a something superhuman, celestial, that
filled one with emotion. Oh, music comes directly from heaven! The
harmony of sounds is something of a more intimate, secret, and
mysterious nature than the harmony of lines and colours; for what
constitutes the beauty, harmony, and attraction of exterior things, is
not there alone in appearance, but radiates from the spirit within:
therefore it is that the beautiful, emanating from the divine harmony of
sound, is more exquisite and more living, because it is the
manifestation of the soul and the spirit without encumbrance. Our
intellect grasps hold of it and falls in love with it, because it is
itself also a part of that immortal beauty to which it feels an
irresistible attraction to unite itself. But the impression of the
beautiful, visible or invisible, we receive imperfectly, because the
senses through which it is revealed to us are only so fitted as to
enable us to receive it in part--that part which gives us pleasure, for
its entire splendour would kill us. Harmony has laws of order and unity,
and relations and affinities, inexplicable. We feel that certain
combinations of notes express sorrow, others joy, others love, and so
on; but given without that order and unity, without those relations and
affinities, they express nothing, and are only unpleasant sounds. Why is
it so? Oh, friend Biaggi, if I speak profanely, make the sign of the
cross and correct me!
[Sidenote: THE CHARM OF MUSIC.]
[Sidenote: NATURE IS NOT ALWAYS BEAUTY.]
The same can be said of all things that have form and colour, that are
animate or inanimate. There is in nature, in the configuration of
certain parts of the country and certain places, a something, I know not
what, of gloominess and melancholy, that, when we look at them, fills us
with sadness. Others, on the contrary, are bright, happy, and joyous. It
is just the same with one's self, and not by reason of the more or less
fertility in this or sterility in that, nor by reason of the state of
one's soul, but entirely from the effect of lines and colours. And so it
is, again, with things animate. There are beautiful animals, and animals
that seem ugly--some, in fact, absolutely repulsive--and why? Perhaps
because they are harmful? Yet no; for there are most beautiful animals
that are really bad and most dangerous--for example, the lion, the
tiger, and the leopard; whilst others, as for instance a spider, a
mouse, a tarantula, a black beetle, a worm, and a scorpion, which do no
harm, or very little, seem to us so ugly, so repulsive, that we are
obliged to turn away from them. Be it observed that this sort of
aversion is felt the most by those natures that have the most exquisite
feeling and love of the beautiful--the reason being that these animals
have in their form a harmony certainly necessary to the universal order
of nature, but most ungrateful to our eyes; whereas the lion, tiger,
leopard, and above all, the horse, are beautiful and attractive to them.
Therefore, in nature, to our way of seeing, there is the beautiful and
the ugly--there are beings that attract and others that repulse us.
"Certainly there are," I am answered. "What sort of a discovery do you
think that you have made?" Very well, I am delighted with this answer,
because the above tirade was made by me for the benefit of those who
affirm that all is beautiful in nature,--in fact, their formula is,
_nature is beauty_. Instead of which, I, with what I have said and am
about to say, would wish to demonstrate that ugliness has a negative
harmony all her own, and only in conformity with her cold and obtuse
vitality; and therefore, nothing of it radiating on us, we are not
attracted by it, but rather repulsed. In as far as the animal is perfect
in living harmony, so much the greater the light that emanates from him.
Man, who is the most perfect of animate creation, radiates so much the
greater _light_ in proportion as the interior harmony of order, of
justice, and of love makes its impress upon and forms the body that
encloses it. In the serenity of the brow one observes the majesty of
order, in the erect bearing of the person and the temperate firm use of
words the dictates of justice, and love is in the intense calm look of
the eyes and almost happy expression of the mouth, which, with the eyes,
are, as it were, the windows of the soul, from which that beauty
radiates that attracts and impels to admiration and to love.
[Sidenote: ST STEPHEN'S CATHEDRAL.]
Man, therefore, is the most living manifestation of the beautiful, and
he is also the being that most thirsts for the enjoyment of it. He looks
for it everywhere--in the splendour of the heavens, over the expanse of
the sea, on the high mountain-sides, in the mysterious shadows of the
forests, and in the solitude of the valleys, when the dying sun casts
languidly over them its violet light. At night, when man and beast rest
after the fatigues of the day, and silence and quiet begin, he feels a
tender harmony, delicate and mysterious, as the memory of the days of
innocence, or as the hope of a future life. The harmony of night is, as
it were, the breath of sleeping nature.
Look, now, into what a labyrinth I have been dragged by the music I
heard at St Stephen's! The campanile of this cathedral is pointed and
very high; it can be seen from all parts of the city. One sees at once
that it is the campanile of the _ecclesia major_. I wished to see it.
The cathedral is always the first thing that attracts the stranger's
curiosity when he arrives in a place, because therein is expressed the
religious sentiment of the people who have built it, which is the first
of all sentiments, and then follows that of the citizen. First the
cathedral was made by the people of old, and then the town-hall, and in
the same order I also look at them and think of them. I wished to see
it, therefore; but being at a distance, I stopped a cab and said to the
driver that I wanted to go there. Bravo! and without knowing a bit of
German! I told him in three languages--in Italian, in French, and in
Latin (macaronic, of course); but it was dense darkness to him. I
pointed with my hand to the campanile in the distance, and this time he
understood! He answered, "_Ja, ja_," and whipping up his horses, off he
went for some time; but as we never arrived, I again pointed to the
campanile. "_Ja, ja_," and on we went, but away from the place I
indicated. Then I stopped him, paid him, and got out. On the venture, I
jumped into an omnibus, just to leave the man, who was going who knows
where, returned to the centre, and got out at Oberring. There I found a
friend, who took me in a short time on foot to St Stephen's, where I
heard that wonderful music, the remembrance of which still excites me to
ecstasy. This does not often happen to me, but it does sometimes.
[Sidenote: CANOVA'S MARIA CHRISTINA.]
From there--that is, not from my ecstasies, but from St Stephen's--I
went to the Church of the Augustins, where Canova's famous monument in
honour of Maria Christina is. As to its being beautiful, I say nothing,
but an artist who was with me extolled it to the seventh heaven; though
to me, with the music of St Stephen's still in my ears, it seemed that
Canova in other works had arrived at greater perfection, both as regards
general conception and as regards sentiment of truth. But, I repeat, it
may have been the music that made it seem to me--and I say so in all
reverence--a little conventional. I was there in Vienna, however, to
form part of the jury on the sculpture of to-day, and not to criticise
the art of the past; so that a little want of appreciation or a judgment
too lightly given may be forgiven me. For the matter of that, Canova is
Canova, and the braying of donkeys, as the proverb says, does not reach
heaven.