a trade which you can teach like brickmaking; nor its produce an article
of which you can supply any quantity 'demanded' for the next railroad
waiting-room. It may perhaps, indeed, seem to you that, in the
difficulties thus presented by it, bas-relief involves more direct
exertion of intellect than finished solid sculpture. It is not so,
however. The questions involved by bas-relief are of a more curious and
amusing kind, requiring great variety of expedients; though none except
such as a true workmanly instinct delights in inventing, and invents
easily; but design in solid sculpture involves considerations of weight
in mass, of balance, of perspective and opposition, in projecting forms,
and of restraint for those which must not project, such as none but the
greatest masters have ever completely solved; and they, not always; the
difficulty of arranging the composition so as to be agreeable from
points of view on all sides of it, being, itself, arduous enough.
173. Thus far, I have been speaking only of the laws of structure
relating to the projection of the mass which becomes itself the
sculpture. Another most interesting group of constructive laws governs
its relation to the line that contains or defines it.
In your Standard Series I have placed a photograph of the south transept
of Rouen Cathedral. Strictly speaking, all standards of Gothic are of
the thirteenth century; but, in the fourteenth, certain qualities of
richness are obtained by the diminution of restraint; out of which we
must choose what is best in their kinds. The pedestals of the statues
which once occupied the lateral recesses are, as you see, covered with
groups of figures, inclosed each in a quatrefoil panel; the spaces
between this panel and the inclosing square being filled with sculptures
of animals.
You cannot anywhere find a more lovely piece of fancy, or more
illustrative of the quantity of result, than may be obtained with low
and simple chiseling. The figures are all perfectly simple in drapery,
the story told by lines of action only in the main group, no accessories
being admitted. There is no undercutting anywhere, nor exhibition of
technical skill, but the fondest and tenderest appliance of it; and one
of the principal charms of the whole is the adaptation of every subject
to its quaint limit. The tale must be told within the four petals of the
quatrefoil, and the wildest and playfulest beasts must never come out of
their narrow corners. The attention with which spaces of this kind are
filled by the Gothic designers is not merely a beautiful compliance with
architectural requirements, but a definite assertion of their delight in
the restraint of law; for, in illuminating books, although, if they
chose it, they might have designed floral ornaments, as we now usually
do, rambling loosely over the leaves, and although, in later works, such
license is often taken by them, in all books of the fine time the
wandering tendrils are inclosed by limits approximately rectilinear, and
in gracefulest branching often detach themselves from the right line
only by curvature of extreme severity.
174. Since the darkness and extent of shadow by which the sculpture is
relieved necessarily vary with the depth of the recess, there arise a
series of problems, in deciding which the wholesome desire for emphasis
by means of shadow is too often exaggerated by the ambition of the
sculptor to show his skill in undercutting. The extreme of vulgarity is
usually reached when the entire bas-relief is cut hollow underneath, as
in much Indian and Chinese work, so as to relieve its forms against an
absolute darkness; but no formal law can ever be given; for exactly the
same thing may be beautifully done for a wise purpose, by one person,
which is basely done, and to no purpose, or to a bad one, by another.
Thus, the desire for emphasis itself may be the craving of a deadened
imagination, or the passion of a vigorous one; and relief against shadow
may be sought by one man only for sensation, and by another for
intelligibility. John of Pisa undercuts fiercely, in order to bring out
the vigor of life which no level contour could render; the Lombardi of
Venice undercut delicately, in order to obtain beautiful lines and edges
of faultless precision; but the base Indian craftsmen undercut only that
people may wonder how the chiseling was done through the holes, or that
they may see every monster white against black.
175. Yet, here again we are met by another necessity for discrimination.
There may be a true delight in the inlaying of white on dark, as there
is a true delight in vigorous rounding. Nevertheless, the general law is
always, that, the lighter the incisions, and the broader the surface,
the grander, caeteris paribus, will be the work. Of the structural terms
of that work you now know enough to understand that the schools of good
sculpture, considered in relation to projection, divide themselves into
four entirely distinct groups:--
1st. Flat Relief, in which the surface is, in many places,
absolutely flat; and the expression depends greatly on the
lines of its outer contour, and on fine incisions within them.
2d. Round Relief, in which, as in the best coins, the
sculptured mass projects so as to be capable of complete
modulation into form, but is not anywhere undercut. The
formation of a coin by the blow of a die necessitates, of
course, the severest obedience to this law.
3d. Edged Relief. Undercutting admitted, so as to throw out the
forms against a background of shadow.
4th. Full Relief. The statue completely solid in form, and
unreduced in retreating depth of it, yet connected locally with
some definite part of the building, so as to be still dependent
on the shadow of its background and direction of protective
line.
176. Let me recommend you at once to take what pains may be needful to
enable you to distinguish these four kinds of sculpture, for the
distinctions between them are not founded on mere differences in
gradation of depth. They are truly four species, or orders, of
sculpture, separated from each other by determined characters. I have
used, you may have noted, hitherto in my Lectures, the word 'bas-relief'
almost indiscriminately for all, because the degree of lowness or
highness of relief is not the question, but the _method_ of relief.
Observe again, therefore--
[Illustration: XII.
BRANCH OF PHILLYREA.]
A. If a portion of the surface is absolutely flat, you have the first
order--Flat Relief.
B. If every portion of the surface is rounded, but none undercut, you
have Round Relief--essentially that of seals and coins.
C. If any part of the edges be undercut, but the general protection of
solid form reduced, you have what I think you may conveniently call
Foliate Relief,--the parts of the design overlapping each other, in
places, like edges of leaves.
D. If the undercutting is bold and deep, and the projection of solid
form unreduced, you have Full Relief.
Learn these four names at once by heart:--
Flat Relief.
Round Relief.
Foliate Relief.
Full Relief.
And whenever you look at any piece of sculpture, determine first to
which of these classes it belongs; and then consider how the sculptor
has treated it with reference to the necessary structure--that
reference, remember, being partly to the mechanical conditions of the
material, partly to the means of light and shade at his command.
[Illustration: FIG. 9.]
177. To take a single instance. You know, for these many years, I have
been telling our architects, with all the force of voice I had in me,
that they could design nothing until they could carve natural forms
rightly. Many imagined that work was easy; but judge for yourselves
whether it be or not. In Plate XII., I have drawn, with approximate
accuracy, a cluster of Phillyrea leaves as they grow, Now, if we wanted
to cut them in bas-relief, the first thing we should have to consider
would be the position of their outline on the marble;--here it is, as
far down as the spring of the leaves. But do you suppose that is what an
ordinary sculptor could either lay for his first sketch, or contemplate
as a limit to be worked down to? Then consider how the interlacing and
springing of the leaves can be expressed within this outline. It must be
done by leaving such projection in the marble as will take the light in
the same proportion as the drawing does;--and a Florentine workman could
do it, for close sight, without driving one incision deeper, or raising
a single surface higher, than the eighth of an inch. Indeed, no sculptor
of the finest time would design such a complex cluster of leaves as
this, except for bronze or iron work; they would take simpler contours
for marble; but the laws of treatment would, under these conditions,
remain just as strict: and you may, perhaps, believe me now when I tell
you that, in any piece of fine structural sculpture by the great
masters, there is more subtlety and noble obedience to lovely laws than
could be explained to you if I took twenty lectures to do it in, instead
of one.
[Illustration: XIII.
GREEK FLAT RELIEF, AND SCULPTURE BY EDGED INCISION.]
178. There remains yet a point of mechanical treatment on which I have
not yet touched at all; nor that the least important,--namely, the
actual method and style of handling. A great sculptor uses his tool
exactly as a painter his pencil, and you may recognize the decision of
his thought, and glow of his temper, no less in the workmanship than the
design. The modern system of modeling the work in clay, getting it into
form by machinery, and by the hands of subordinates, and touching it at
last, if indeed the (so-called) sculptor touch it at all, only to
correct their inefficiencies, renders the production of good work in
marble a physical impossibility. The first result of it is that the
sculptor thinks in clay instead of marble, and loses his instinctive
sense of the proper treatment of a brittle substance. The second is that
neither he nor the public recognize the touch of the chisel as
expressive of personal feeling of power, and that nothing is looked for
except mechanical polish.
179. The perfectly simple piece of Greek relief represented in Plate
XIII., will enable you to understand at once,--examination of the
original, at your leisure, will prevent you, I trust, from ever
forgetting,--what is meant by the virtue of handling in sculpture.
The projection of the heads of the four horses, one behind the other, is
certainly not more, altogether, than three-quarters of an inch from the
flat ground, and the one in front does not in reality project more than
the one behind it, yet, by mere drawing,[35] you see the sculptor has
got them to appear to recede in due order, and by the soft rounding of
the flesh surfaces, and modulation of the veins, he has taken away all
look of flatness from the necks. He has drawn the eyes and nostrils with
dark incision, careful as the finest touches of a painter's pencil: and
then, at last, when he comes to the manes, he has let fly hand and
chisel with their full force; and where a base workman, (above all, if
he had modeled the thing in clay first,) would have lost himself in
laborious imitation of hair, the Greek has struck the tresses out with
angular incisions, deep driven, every one in appointed place and
deliberate curve, yet flowing so free under his noble hand that you
cannot alter, without harm, the bending of any single ridge, nor
contract, nor extend, a point of them. And if you will look back to
Plate IX. you will see the difference between this sharp incision, used
to express horse-hair, and the soft incision with intervening rounded
ridge, used to express the hair of Apollo Chrysocomes; and, beneath, the
obliquely ridged incision used to express the plumes of his swan; in
both these cases the handling being much more slow, because the
engraving is in metal; but the structural importance of incision, as the
means of effect, never lost sight of. Finally, here are two actual
examples of the work in marble of the two great schools of the world;
one, a little Fortune, standing tiptoe on the globe of the Earth, its
surface traced with lines in hexagons; not chaotic under Fortune's feet;
Greek, this, and by a trained workman;--dug up in the temple of Neptune
at Corfu;--and here, a Florentine portrait-marble, found in the recent
alterations, face downwards, under the pavement of Sta. Maria Novella;
both of them first-rate of their kind; and both of them, while
exquisitely finished at the telling points, showing, on all their
unregarded surfaces, the rough furrow of the fast-driven chisel, as
distinctly as the edge of a common paving-stone.
180. Let me suggest to you, in conclusion, one most interesting point of
mental expression in these necessary aspects of finely executed
sculpture. I have already again and again pressed on your attention the
beginning of the arts of men in the make and use of the plowshare. Read
more carefully--you might indeed do well to learn at once by heart,--the
twenty-seven lines of the Fourth Pythian, which describe the plowing of
Jason. There is nothing grander extant in human fancy, nor set down in
human words: but this great mythical expression of the conquest of the
earth-clay and brute-force by vital human energy, will become yet more
interesting to you when you reflect what enchantment has been cut, on
whiter clay, by the tracing of finer furrows;--what the delicate and
consummate arts of man have done by the plowing of marble, and granite,
and iron. You will learn daily more and more, as you advance in actual
practice, how the primary manual art of engraving, in the steadiness,
clearness, and irrevocableness of it, is the best art-discipline that
can be given either to mind or hand;[36] you will recognize one law of
right, pronouncing itself in the well-resolved work of every age; you
will see the firmly traced and irrevocable incision determining, not
only the forms, but, in great part, the moral temper, of all vitally
progressive art; you will trace the same principle and power in the
furrows which the oblique sun shows on the granite of his own Egyptian
city,--in the white scratch of the stylus through the color on a Greek
vase--in the first delineation, on the wet wall, of the groups of an
Italian fresco; in the unerring and unalterable touch of the great
engraver of Nuremberg,--and in the deep-driven and deep-bitten ravines
of metal by which Turner closed, in embossed limits, the shadows of the
Liber Studiorum.
Learn, therefore, in its full extent, the force of the great Greek word
[Greek: charasso];--and give me pardon, if you think pardon needed, that
I ask you also to learn the full meaning of the English word derived
from it. Here, at the Ford of the Oxen of Jason, are other furrows to be
driven than these in the marble of Pentelicus. The fruitfulest, or the
fatalest, of all plowing is that by the thoughts of your youth, on the
white field of its Imagination. For by these, either down to the
disturbed spirit, "[Greek: kekoptai kai charassetai pedon];" or around
the quiet spirit, and on all the laws of conduct that hold it, as a fair
vase its frankincense, are ordained the pure colors, and engraved the
just characters, of AEonian life.
FOOTNOTES:
[29] Nothing is more wonderful, or more disgraceful, among the forms of
ignorance engendered by modern vulgar occupations in pursuit of gain,
than the unconsciousness, now total, that fine art is essentially
Athletic. I received a letter from Birmingham, some little time since,
inviting me to see how much, in glass manufacture, "machinery excelled
rude hand-work." The writer had not the remotest conception that he
might as well have asked me to come and see a mechanical boat-race rowed
by automata, and "how much machinery excelled rude arm-work."
[30] Such as the Sculptureless arch of Waterloo Bridge, for instance,
referred to in the Third Lecture, Sec. 84.
[31] It is strange, at this day, to think of the relation of the
Athenian Ceramicus to the French Tile-fields, Tileries, or Tuileries:
and how these last may yet become--have already partly become--"the
Potter's field," blood-bought. (_December, 1870._)
[32] This relief is now among the other casts which I have placed in the
lower school in the University galleries.
[33] The reference is to a cast from a small and low relief of
Florentine work in the Kensington Museum.
[34] The actual bas-relief is on a coin, and the projection not above
the twentieth of an inch, but I magnified it in photograph, for this
Lecture, so as to represent a relief with about the third of an inch for
maximum projection.
[35] This plate has been executed from a drawing by Mr. Burgess, in
which he has followed the curves of incision with exquisite care, and
preserved the effect of the surface of the stone, where a photograph
would have lost it by exaggerating accidental stains.
[36] That it was also, in some cases, the earliest that the Greeks gave,
is proved by Lucian's account of his first lesson at his uncle's; the
[Greek: enkopeus], literally 'in cutter'--being the first tool put into
his hand, and an earthenware tablet to cut upon, which the boy, pressing
too hard, presently breaks;--gets beaten--goes home crying, and becomes,
after his dream above quoted, (Sec.Sec. 35, 36,) a philosopher instead of a
sculptor.
LECTURE VI.
THE SCHOOL OF ATHENS.
_December, 1870._
181. It can scarcely be needful for me to tell even the younger members
of my present audience, that the conditions necessary for the production
of a perfect school of sculpture have only twice been met in the history
of the world, and then for a short time; nor for short time only, but
also in narrow districts,--namely, in the valleys and islands of Ionian
Greece, and in the strip of land deposited by the Arno, between the
Apennine crests and the sea.
All other schools, except these two, led severally by Athens in the
fifth century before Christ, and by Florence in the fifteenth of our own
era, are imperfect; and the best of them are derivative: these two are
consummate in themselves, and the origin of what is best in others.
182. And observe, these Athenian and Florentine schools are both of
equal rank, as essentially original and independent. The Florentine,
being subsequent to the Greek, borrowed much from it; but it would have
existed just as strongly--and, perhaps, in some respects more nobly--had
it been the first, instead of the latter of the two. The task set to
each of these mightiest of the nations was, indeed, practically the
same, and as hard to the one as to the other. The Greeks found
Phoenician and Etruscan art monstrous, and had to make them human. The
Italians found Byzantine and Norman art monstrous, and had to make them
human. The original power in the one case is easily traced; in the other
it has partly to be unmasked, because the change at Florence was, in
many points, suggested and stimulated by the former school. But we
mistake in supposing that Athens taught Florence the laws of design; she
taught her, in reality, only the duty of truth.
183. You remember that I told you the highest art could do no more than
rightly represent the human form. This is the simple test, then, of a
perfect school,--that it has represented the human form, so that it is
impossible to conceive of its being better done. And that, I repeat, has
been accomplished twice only: once in Athens, once in Florence. And so
narrow is the excellence even of these two exclusive schools, that it
cannot be said of either of them that they represented the entire human
form. The Greeks perfectly drew, and perfectly molded, the body and
limbs; but there is, so far as I am aware, no instance of their
representing the face as well as any great Italian. On the other hand,
the Italian painted and carved the face insuperably; but I believe there
is no instance of his having perfectly represented the body, which, by
command of his religion, it became his pride to despise and his safety
to mortify.
184. The general course of your study here renders it desirable that you
should be accurately acquainted with the leading principles of Greek
sculpture; but I cannot lay these before you without giving undue
prominence to some of the special merits of that school, unless I
previously indicate the relation it holds to the more advanced, though
less disciplined, excellence of Christian art.
In this and the last Lecture of the present course,[37] I shall
endeavor, therefore, to mass for you, in such rude and diagram-like
outline as may be possible or intelligible, the main characteristics of
the two schools, completing and correcting the details of comparison
afterwards; and not answering, observe, at present, for any
generalization I give you, except as a ground for subsequent closer and
more qualified statements.
And in carrying out this parallel, I shall speak indifferently of works
of sculpture, and of the modes of painting which propose to themselves
the same objects as sculpture. And this, indeed, Florentine, as opposed
to Venetian, painting, and that of Athens in the fifth century, nearly
always did.
185. I begin, therefore, by comparing two designs of the simplest
kind--engravings, or, at least, linear drawings both; one on clay, one
on copper, made in the central periods of each style, and representing
the same goddess--Aphrodite. They are now set beside each other in your
Rudimentary Series. The first is from a patera lately found at Camirus,
authoritatively assigned by Mr. Newton, in his recent catalogue, to the
best period of Greek art. The second is from one of the series of
engravings executed, probably, by Baccio Bandini, in 1485, out of which
I chose your first practical exercise--the Scepter of Apollo. I cannot,
however, make the comparison accurate in all respects, for I am obliged
to set the restricted type of the Aphrodite Urania of the Greeks beside
the universal Deity conceived by the Italian as governing the air,
earth, and sea; nevertheless, the restriction in the mind of the Greek,
and expatiation in that of the Florentine, are both characteristic. The
Greek Venus Urania is flying in heaven, her power over the waters
symbolized by her being borne by a swan, and her power over the earth by
a single flower in her right hand; but the Italian Aphrodite is rising
out of the actual sea, and only half risen: her limbs are still in the
sea, her merely animal strength filling the waters with their life; but
her body to the loins is in the sunshine, her face raised to the sky;
her hand is about to lay a garland of flowers on the earth.
186. The Venus Urania of the Greeks, in her relation to men, has power
only over lawful and domestic love; therefore, she is fully dressed, and
not only quite dressed, but most daintily and trimly: her feet
delicately sandaled, her gown spotted with little stars, her hair
brushed exquisitely smooth at the top of her head, trickling in minute
waves down her forehead; and though, because there is such a quantity of
it, she can't possibly help having a chignon, look how tightly she has
fastened it in with her broad fillet. Of course she is married, so she
must wear a cap with pretty minute pendent jewels at the border; and a
very small necklace, all that her husband can properly afford, just
enough to go closely round her neck, and no more. On the contrary, the
Aphrodite of the Italian, being universal love, is pure-naked; and her
long hair is thrown wild to the wind and sea.
These primal differences in the symbolism, observe, are only because the
artists are thinking of separate powers: they do not necessarily involve
any national distinction in feeling. But the differences I have next to
indicate are essential, and characterize the two opposed national modes
of mind.
187. First, and chiefly. The Greek Aphrodite is a very pretty person,
and the Italian a decidedly plain one. That is because a Greek thought
no one could possibly love any but pretty people; but an Italian thought
that love could give dignity to the meanest form that it inhabited, and
light to the poorest that it looked upon. So his Aphrodite will not
condescend to be pretty.