Foreign artists patronised by the dukes Della Rovere--The
tomb of Julius II. by Michael Angelo--Character and
influence of his genius--Titian's works for Urbino--Palma
Giovane--Il Semolei--Sculptors at Urbino.
It would occupy a full chapter were we to trace the history of
what Julius II. meant to have been his tomb, from the chisel of
Michael Angelo Buonarroti; yet the subject is too illustrative of
that Pontiff's grandiose spirit, and of the artist's unfulfilled
aspirations, as well as too intimately connected with the ducal
house of Urbino, to be overlooked. The work was commissioned by
Julius himself, who, early in his pontificate, called Buonarroti
from Florence to execute a resting-place for his ashes, which,
in the words of Vasari, should "surpass in beauty and grandeur,
in imposing ornament and elaborate sculpture, all antique and
imperial sepulchres." The vast size and colossal proportions of the
first design were worthy of artist and patron, and cannot be at
all estimated from the curtailed and aimless substitute which now
challenges our criticism. Yet there was exaggeration in the ideas as
well as the forms; the allegories were far-fetched, the adulation
fulsome, and the intention obscure. Such at least is the impression
left by the descriptions of Vasari and Condivi. Without attempting
to reconcile these with the sketch engraved in the Milanese edition
of the former author [1811], it is enough to say that the original
plan was an isolated parallelogram, with about ten statues and seven
caryatides on each façade, and a sarcophagus aloft for the Pope's
body, the estimate for all which seems to have been 10,000 ducats,
augmented by his executors to 16,000. Its destined site was St.
Peter's, and its utter disproportion in style and extent to that
time-worn basilicon appears to have suggested to the indomitable
Pontiff the vast idea of reconstructing the metropolitan church
of Christendom. This more engrossing undertaking absorbed much of
the enterprise and materials destined for the tomb, so the latter
remained unfinished at the death of Julius, who barely survived the
completion of those Sistine frescoes to which he had transferred
the sculptor's reluctant labours. A new and reduced contract having
been made by his executors for its completion, Buonarroti resumed it
with the preference due to a favourite work; but he sought in vain
for leisure to proceed with it on the accession of Leo X., who, by
a strange misapplication of his powers, sent him to work the marble
quarries of Pietra Santa. Indeed, the executors failed to obtain
implement of his undertaking under either of the Medicean popes,
alienated as these were from the della Rovere, and intent upon
otherwise employing the genius of their gifted countryman.
[Illustration: _Alinari_
THE COMMUNION OF THE APOSTLES
_By Giusto di Gand, in the Palazzo Ducale Urbino._ (_From the Ducal
Collection_)]
At length Francesco Maria I. took up the forgotten memorial of his
uncle, whose over-ambition of monumental honours had meanwhile led
to a total oversight of his place of sepulture. As early as 1525,
we find the Duke addressing complaints and threats to Buonarroti,
whom he charged with idleness, after receiving prepayment of his
stipulated price, unaware apparently that he had been overborne by
higher authority, and thus compelled to employ himself on commissions
less germane to his feelings and tastes. A misunderstanding in regard
to the sums so advanced further complicated this unfortunate affair,
which was throughout fraught with disappointment and annoyance to
Michael Angelo. It slept on till 1532, when a further modification
was made of the plan to a single façade whereon six statues
were to be placed; but amid competing calls upon his "fearless and
furious" chisel or pencil, little progress was made in the next ten
years. Irritated by continual exercise of the papal control, such as
his independent spirit could ill brook, fretting at the uncongenial
labours often thrust upon him, and galled by repeated allegations
against his gratitude and his integrity, Buonarroti turned his eyes
to Urbino, as a home where his genius would be appreciated without
sacrificing his freedom of action, and took steps to retire thither
and redeem his pledge to the Duke. But in Paul III. he had a yet more
exacting task-master, from whom there was no escape, and in November,
1541, Cardinal Ascanio Parisani wrote to Duke Guidobaldo that the
Pope having commissioned the sculptor to paint the Last Judgment,
which would occupy his undivided attention during several years, to
the exclusion of the monument, he had to propose, at the instance of
his Holiness, a new arrangement, whereby the statues for its reduced
design, so far as not already finished by Michael Angelo, were
committed to other artists, working upon his models and under his
eye. Yielding gracefully to the necessity of the case, the Duke wrote
the following letter.[225]
[Footnote 225: There is a copy of it in the Magliabechiana Library,
class viii., No. 1392, to which Gaye has from other sources supplied
the date of 6th March, 1542. Carteggio, II., 289-309. From him,
Ciampi, Vasari, and Condivi, we have condensed the very confused
details respecting the monument of Julius which have come down to us.]
"Most excellent Messer Michelangiolo,
"His Holiness having deigned to [inform] me of his urgent
desire to avail himself for some time of your labours,
in painting and decorating the new chapel he is making
in the Apostolic Palace, and I, esteeming and gratefully
acknowledging all service and satisfaction given to his
holiness as bestowed on myself, in order that you may
more freely give your mind to that matter, am perfectly
content that you place on the tomb of my uncle of blessed
memory, Pope Julius, those three statues already terminated
entirely by your hand, the Moses included. And in order,
as nearly as possible, to perfect the whole in terms of
our last stipulations, which, as I am informed, you are
anxious and ready to do, [I consent] that you commit the
execution of the other three statues to some good and
esteemed master, but after your own designs and under your
superintendence; relying confidently, from your good-will
to his sacred memory and to my house, that you will bring
the work to a satisfactory issue, and so contrive that it
shall be deemed most laudable, and in all respects worthy
of you. Such a result will fully satisfy me; and I again
beseech you to see to this, as conferring on me a special
obligation; offering myself at all times [ready] for all
your commands and pleasure."
Under this final alteration of his contract, Michael Angelo forthwith
assigned to Raffaele da Montelupo the execution of his designs for
a Madonna with a Child in her arms, and for a prophet and a sibyl
seated, at the price of 400 scudi; employing at the same time two
decorative stonecutters upon the ornamental details of the façade,
at a cost of 800 more. The statues from his own hand were to be
Moses, and two caryatides holding captives, who had been introduced
into the first plan, as allegorical of the cities in Romagna subdued
by Julius. But, finding these too large for the reduced design, he
proposed to substitute for them two other figures from his chisel,
already far advanced, and which he would entrust to be finished by
others at a cost of 200 scudi, his Moses being destined to stand
between them. All this is stated by him in a petition to the Pope
of 20th July, 1542. The two substituted statues were finished by
Buonarroti, and, in the documents printed by Gaye, are named
by him Active and Contemplative Life. This, however, is a free
interpretation of the allegory, the figures being, according to
Vasari, Leah and Rachel. The recumbent Pope was the wretched work of
one Maso di Bosco or Boscoli; and the prophet and sibyl by Montelupo
are said to have greatly dissatisfied Michael Angelo. The two
rejected caryatide prisoners found their way to Paris in the time
of Francis I., and remain in the Louvre; another similar is in the
great hall of the Palazzo Vecchio, at Florence; and some grandiose,
half-blocked ideas, still to be seen here and there, whose rough
power identifies them with Michael Angelo, may have belonged to his
original plan. About the beginning of 1545, forty years after it had
been undertaken, the work was placed in the Church of S. Pietro in
Vincoli, of which Julius had been Cardinal-presbyter. Though meant
as his tomb, it is but his monument; for the bones of that imperious
high priest have found a fitter resting-place in the grandest of
Christian fanes, his own creation, and best memorial. Few works of
art have occasioned greater variety of opinion. In his Lectures,
Fuseli has exposed several of his defects, and the impression it most
frequently leaves upon the spectator is thus aptly expressed by him
in an Italian letter to the translator of Webb on the Beautiful:--
"In the Moses, Michael Angelo has sacrificed beauty to anatomical
science, and to his favourite passion for the terrible and the
gigantic. If it be true that he looked at the arm of the famous
Ludovisi satyr, he probably, also, studied the head, in order to
transfer its character to the Moses, since both of them resemble that
of an old he-goat. There is, notwithstanding, in the figure a quality
of monstrous grandeur which cannot be denied to Buonarroti, and
which, like a thunder-storm, presaged the bright days of Raffaele."
This monument must ever be regarded as but the epitome of a grand
design, curtailed without scale or measurement, deformed by colossal
portions from the original in combination with dwarfish details of
its pigmy substitute, marred by incomplete allegories, and eked
out by supposititious figures. Yet few will leave the spot without
another glance at the tremendous Moses, nor will any connoisseur
avert his gaze until the awful majesty of that one statue has
eclipsed the petty incongruities of its location. It is among those
rare creations of man's mind which, rising above the standard
of human forms and human sympathies, demand a loftier test. The
pervading sentiment alone challenges our intellectual regard, and
bespeaks our verdict; yet with playful prodigality, the artist has
lavished an ivory finish upon its details, without detracting from
the sublime character of the irate lawgiver.[226]
[Footnote 226: A favourite workman of Buonarroti, often met with
under the patronymic Urbino, was Francesco Amadori di Colonello, of
Castel Durante, who lived with him from 1530 to 1536. See GUALANDI,
_Nuovo Raccolta di Lettere sulla Pittura_, I., 48-52.]
* * * * *
Although this work is the only link directly connecting Michael
Angelo with the ducal house of Urbino, we may be allowed a passing
tribute to that genius which has hammered huge rocks into colossal
compositions, and embodied themes the most difficult in forms the
most daring. Of the simple element of beauty we, indeed, find in him
few traces. Gentleness and pathos had no place either in his wayward
spirit or in his works.[*227] Discarding the beau-ideal aimed at
in antique sculpture, where movement was restrained by the observance
of form, and passion modified to the measure of fair proportion, he
either startled by impossible postures, gnarled limbs, and sturdy
deformity, or, in the words of Fuseli, "perplexed the limbs of
grandeur with the minute ramifications of anatomy." Hence, when tried
by the rules of art, many of his creations are found wanting; when
submitted to the standard of pure taste, their faults become glaring.
In straining to shake off the trammels of manner, he often fell into
mannerism the most infelicitous; and the impression too commonly left
on the spectator is that of energy wasted and talent misapplied. But
his mind was of that lofty cast which, soaring above common themes,
and spurning conventional restrictions, substituted power for beauty,
and challenged our wonder rather than our approbation. Awed by the
sublimity of his ideas, we overlook their inadequate development,
until, descending to details, we impugn the unfinished sketch, and
half-chiselled marble, painfully reminded that superhuman gifts are
often marred by very ordinary weaknesses.
[Footnote *227: No? Consider then the Pietà of S. Pietro in Vaticano,
the unfinished Pietà of S. Maria del Fiore. All that Dennistoun says
of Michelangelo is full of misunderstanding. For instance, he never
"startles" though he may terrify one. It would be ridiculous to
defend him. His work is beautiful, with the beauty of the mountains
in which he alone has found the spirit of man. His figures, half
unveiled from the living rock, are like some terrible indictment
of the world he lived in: an indictment of himself too, perhaps,
of his contempt for things as they are; it is in a sort of rage at
its uselessness that he leaves them unfinished. In him the spirit
of man has stammered the syllables of eternity, and in its agony
of longing or sorrow has failed to speak only the word love. All
things particular to the individual, all that is small or of little
account, that endures but for a moment, he has purged away, so
that life itself may make, as it were, an immortal gesticulation
almost monstrous in its passionate intensity--a shadow seen on the
mountains, a mirage on the snow.]
[Illustration: _Anderson_
GIOVANNI AND FEDERICO, ELECTORS OF SAXONY
_After the Portraits by Cranach, once in the Ducal Collection at
Urbino, now in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence_]
No one, perhaps, fully aware of Michael Angelo's celebrity, ever
looked for the first time upon one of his principal works without
a shade of disappointment. Inventions appealing to the intellect
without sympathy from the feelings,--attitudes struggling with
difficulty rather than aiming at elegance,--muscular masses, rugged
as the blocks from which they are rudely hewn; such things surpass
the comprehension of superficial observers, and disenchant common
minds. Yet there is a spell around all of them which arrests the most
careless, and recalls the most disappointed, and the longer they
are examined, especially by persons of cultivated understanding,
the more certain will be the final tribute to their transcendent
qualities, the more unreserved the avowal that their author stands
out among the foremost geniuses whom the world has seen. Feebleness
or insipidity had no place in his conceptions, and no individual
ever left the impress of his vigorous mind upon so many various
arts. He was a poet of no mean pretensions. His architecture is as
successful as bold. It is difficult to say whether his frescoes
or his sculptures are the more admirable. Even his oil paintings
are worthy of more notice than they have met with; and, the few
ascertained specimens display a mastery of finish little to be looked
for from their wayward and impetuous author, and develop in their
execution, as well as in their design, an extraordinary pictorial
science. The trite assertion that he never painted but three easel
pictures seems fully negatived by the mechanical perfection which,
notwithstanding a certain languor of colouring and flatness of
surface, these exhibit, and which must have been gained by extensive
practice. In his house, even a miniature on parchment is shown as
his work; and not a few tiny productions in bronze and ivory bear
the stamp of his invention, if not of his hand. These were probably
labours of those early days when, with equal verity and shrewdness
the Gonfaloniere Soderini recommended him to the Roman court as "a
fine young man, unequalled in his art throughout Italy, or perhaps
the world. He will do anything for good words and caresses; indeed,
he must be treated with affection and favour, in which case he will
perform things to astonish all beholders."[228] In the sacristy of
S. Lorenzo, at Florence, these anticipations were amply realised on
the monuments of two of the Medici, with whom an earlier portion of
these pages has made us acquainted. These works were, however, no
labour of love to the sculptor, whose sympathies had been alien to
that race from the days when Pietro ceased to walk in the ways of
his fathers. Accordingly, their greatest fault is, that the artist
absorbs our interest almost to the exclusion of the personages
commemorated, to whom the allegorical compositions appear to have
no reference. It is, indeed, only their portraits that recall the
purpose of the monuments. That of the elegant and gentle Giuliano
awakens no association that might not be suggested by the statue
of some nameless warrior of the classic age. More appropriate is
the bearing of Lorenzo, the usurper of Urbino. The stern gloom that
broods over his casque, and shadows his repulsive features, scowling
upon the world from whose sympathies he seems a voluntary alien,
is an enduring index of his unamiable character. But it is in the
Sistine chapel that Buonarroti sits pre-eminent. Who that stands
beneath its grand frescoes can doubt the daring, the originality, and
grasp of his genius, who triumphantly called into existence forms and
movements before which ordinary minds shrink into pigmy dimensions?
Yet, who that observes the rapid decline of the Michael-Angelesque
school into mannered contortion and extravagant caricature, can
question its mischievous influence, or the danger of opening up
such fields to uninspired labourers? On both sides of the Alps, its
followers or imitators, mistaking extravagance for energy, manner
for power, and servilely substituting exceptional attitudes for the
sublimity of nature and the dignity of repose, have copied his design
without imbibing his spirit, and have embodied feeble conceptions in
preposterous forms.
[Footnote 228: See Gaye, _Carteggio_, II., 83-109, sub anno 1506.]
Freely have we spoken of a name to whom all honour is due, whose
failings may be noted as a warning, without diminishing our respect
for his manifold attainments. Our readers may appreciate his success
as a poet through Mr. Glassford's felicitous version of a sonnet
worthy the noblest of art's disciples.[*229]
[Footnote *229: Cf. J.A. SYMONDS, _The Sonnets of Michelangelo_.]
"Now my fair bark through life's tempestuous flood
Is steered, and full in view that port is seen,
Where all must answer what their course has been,
And every work be tried, if bad or good.
Now do those lofty dreams, my fancy's brood,
Which made of ART an idol and a queen,
Melt into air; and now I feel, how keen!
That what I needed most I most withstood.
Ye fabled joys, ye tales of empty love,
What are ye now, if twofold death be nigh?
The first is certain, and the last I dread.
Ah! what does Sculpture, what does Painting prove,
When we have seen the Cross, and fixed our eye
On Him whose arms of love were there outspread!"
The home patronage of the della Rovere dukes was, however, by no
means limited to their subjects, and TITIAN[*230] enjoyed
high favour from the first two sovereigns of that dynasty. The
coronation of Charles V., in 1532, having attracted to Bologna a
concourse of distinguished persons, Titian, then in his fifty-fifth
year, was honoured by an imperial invitation to join the throng. The
monarch, himself reputed no mean craftsman, delighted to pass what
time he could snatch from business, in conversing with the painter,
and observing his progress, till one day, having picked up a fallen
pencil, he returned it, saying, "Titian deserves to be waited on by
an Emperor." The Duke of Urbino, who may have known the Venetian
in his native city, was among the sovereigns and cardinals whose
commissions on that occasion contended for preference, and but a
short time, probably, elapsed ere his own and his consort's portraits
were produced,[*231] although Vasari and Ridolfi have erroneously
fixed their date in 1543, five years after Francesco Maria's death.
[Footnote *230: For Titian, consult GRONAU, _Titian_ (Duckworth,
1904). By far the best handbook on the painter.]
[Footnote *231: As before stated, the first works that Titian painted
for Francesco Maria were a portrait of Hannibal, a Nativity, a figure
of our Lord. The Duke writes him concerning them in 1533 as follows
(cf. GRONAU, _op. cit._, p. 91):--
"Dearest Friend,--
"You know through our envoy how much we wish for pictures
... and the longer we have to wait the more eager we are to
have them ... and so we beg you to satisfy us as soon as
possible. Finish at least one of the pictures, that we may
rejoice in something by your hand."
The portraits were begun in 1536, in which year (October) Aretino
wrote a sonnet on that of the Duke. They were finished early in 1538.
Of the earlier pictures, the figure of Christ is probably that in the
Pitti Gallery (228); the others apparently have perished.
In 1536 the Duke wrote again asking for a _Resurrection_ for the
Duchess, and begging Titian to finish the "picture of a woman in a
blue dress as beautifully as possible." This latter is probably the
_Bella_ of the Pitti Gallery (18), which some have thought to be
Eleonora Gonzaga, Francesco Maria's wife. She was then forty-three
years old, and her portrait was painted at this time by the same
master (Uffizi, 599) as a companion for that of the Duke (Uffizi,
605).
Duke Guidobaldo, while yet but Duke of Camerino, had sat to Titian,
and had bought from him the picture of a "Nude Woman" (GRONAU, _op.
cit._, p. 95). In March, 1538, he sent a messenger to Venice, who
was instructed not to leave the city without them. He got one, but
the other had not been delivered in May of that year. The Duke wrote
to him to beware lest it passed elsewhere, "for I am resolved to
mortgage a part of my property if I cannot obtain it in any other
way." This picture was probably the _Venus_ of the Tribune (Uffizi,
1117) who is so like the _Bella_. Now if we are right in supposing
the pictures alluded to in the letters--the lady in the blue dress
and the nude woman--are the pictures we know (which came from
Urbino), it seems obvious that they cannot have been portraits of the
Duchess. And, again, we have the Duchess's portrait painted at this
time, in which we see a woman of forty-three, which was in truth her
age.
In June, 1539, Guidobaldo, Duke of Urbino now, received three
portraits, of the Emperor, the King of France, and the Turkish
Sultan, from Titian. Vasari speaks of them, but they have been lost.
In 1542-44 he painted a banner for the Brotherhood of Corpus Domini
at Urbino--the Resurrection and the Last Supper. The pictures were
shortly afterwards framed, and are now in the Urbino Gallery (10).
Then in November, 1546, Duchess Giulia Varana of Urbino writes
impatiently to Titian, sending at the same time some sleeves he had
asked for, and hoping that he will not delay longer to finish "our
portraits" (GRONAU, _op. cit._, p. 99). And letters of Aretino in
1545 confirm the fact that Titian was painting portraits of the Duke
and Duchess. Then in February, 1547, one of the courtiers of Urbino
sent Titian a dress of the Duchess, adding that "a handsomer one
would have been sent if he had not wished for one of crimson or pink
velvet"; a damask one was sent of the desired colour. The portrait by
Titian in the State Apartments of the Pitti Palace, discovered only a
few years ago, is said to be of Catherine de' Medici, by Tintoretto.
It is, however, certainly Titian's (GRONAU, _op. cit._, p. 100),
and is probably the missing portrait of the Duchess Giulia. It is
unfinished, and the dress is of rose colour. It is one of his finest
portraits.
There were two portraits at least of Guidobaldo by Titian, one
of 1538 and one of 1545; one of these is said to have been in
Florence in the seventeenth century. Gronau suggests that the "Young
Englishman" of the Pitti Gallery (92), the finest portrait even
Titian ever painted, may be one of them. But I cannot persuade myself
that that figure is other than English. Yet if it be, it might well
companion the Bella.
In 1545 Titian, on his way to Rome, travelled by Ferrara and Pesaro,
where Guidobaldo, who had accompanied him, entertained him and made
him many presents, sending a company of horse with him to Rome. There
follows an interval of twenty years, in which their friendship seems
not altogether to have been forgotten. Then between 1564 and 1567
Titian painted several pictures for Guidobaldo, among them a "Christ"
and a "Madonna"; in 1573 he apparently had another commission. It is
impossible to say what these pictures may have been.]
[Illustration: _Anderson_
LA BELLA
_After the picture by Titian in the Pitti Gallery. Florence. Supposed
portrait of Duchess Leonora_]
Few of Titian's likenesses have been more lauded than the Duke's,
both as regards truth and execution; but we shall quote only the
testimony of Aretino, who knew well the painter and his subject.
"In gazing upon it, I called Nature to witness, making her confess
that Art was positively metamorphosed into herself; and to this,
each wrinkle, each hair, each spot bears testimony, whilst the
colouring not only exhibits vigour of person, but displays manliness
of mind. The vermilion hue of that velvet drapery behind him is
reflected in the lustrous armour he wears. How fine the effect of his
casquet-plumes, reproduced on the burnished cuirass of the mighty
general! Even his batons of command are perfect nature, chiefly that
of his own adventure, thus budding on the faith of his renown, which
began to shed its glories in the war which humbled his private foe.
Who would assert that the truncheons confided to him by the Church,
Venice, and Florence, were not of silver?"[232] In Aretino's letter
were enclosed two sonnets on the portrait and its companion; they
will be found in the Appendix, No. XI., together with one in which
Bernardo Tasso appeals to Titian for a likeness of his lady-love.
Aretino's lines regarding the Duke may be thus literally rendered:--
"Fear on the crowd from either eyebrow falls;
Fire in his glance, and pride upon his front,
The spacious seat of honour and resolve.
Beneath that bust of steel, with arm prepared,
Burns valour, prompt all peril to repel,
From sacred Italy, that on his worth relies."
[Footnote 232: The style of Aretino was often rugged, wayward, and
unintelligible, like his character. He seems to imagine that, of the
three batons placed behind the Duke, one, bearing acorns and oak
leaves, alludes to his successful campaigns on his own account, for
recovery of his states. _Lettere Pittoriche_, I., App. No. 29. The
force of colour peculiar to this, above all Titian's works, cannot be
fully given by the burin, especially not by the _mezza macchia_ style
in which it has been engraved for this volume. Our frontispiece,
though accurate as a likeness, is accordingly among the least
effective illustrations in our work. No other original portrait of
the Duke has fallen under my observation; and if the slight youthful
figure introduced by Raffaele into the Disputa and School of Athens
really was meant for him, no resemblance can be traced in it.]
[Illustration: _Anderson_
THE VENUS OF URBINO
_Supposed portrait of the Duchess Leonora, after the picture by
Titian in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence. Once in the Ducal Collection_]
The other sonnet, descriptive of Leonora's likeness, alludes to
the master's harmonious tints as figuring varied charms met in her
character, such as humility of disposition, decorum in dress and
manners, sustained by a dignified expression. In her features, beauty
united with modesty, a rare combination; and grace was enthroned on
her eyebrows. Prudence presided over her becoming silence, and other
excellent qualities marvellously adorned her forehead. Nor are these
praises exaggerated. Those who attentively observe this portrait in
the Uffizi Gallery will readily acknowledge that, although, perhaps,
more elaborated in its details than any other from the master's hand,
his pencil never attained greater breadth, nor embodied high art in
more severe character.[233]
[Footnote 233: The _zebellino_ on the Duchess's knee was the
fashionable bag or reticule of that day, made of an entire
sable-skin, the animal's head, richly jewelled, forming its clasp.
Giulia della Rovere d'Este commissioned such a one from a jeweller at
Bologna in 1555, and paid him forty-six dollars to account.]
The connection thus formed by Titian with the house of Urbino was
maintained after the accession of Duke Guidobaldo, through whom Paul
III. invited him to Bologna in 1543, where he painted that Pontiff
with his wonted success. About the same time the Duke commissioned
from him a likeness of himself, which was finished two years later.
The misfortune sustained by its disappearance may be appreciated
from the words of Aretino, who, writing to Guidobaldo, says, "For he
has so embodied in his colours the very air you breathe, that in the
same attitude as you at this instant appear to others at Vicenza, we
now behold you in Venice, where we circle, bow, and pay court to you,
just as do your suite who are in waiting upon you there." Vecellio
lived among men whose talents, and fame, and forms, and dress
deserved commemoration; and to such he did justice, for painter and
sitters were worthy of each other, conferring a mutual and enduring
illustration. His pencil, and those of his followers, were singularly
happy in preserving individual character, although wanting in
ideality and intense expression. But their great excellence displayed
itself in the representation of voluptuous scenes, adapted alike to
their glowing tints and the taste of their countrymen.
In 1545, Titian repaired to Rome, at the request of Cardinal
Alessandro Farnese, visiting Urbino[*234] on the way, and receiving
several commissions which he could not stay to execute. Setting
forward on his journey, he was conducted by Guidobaldo in person to
Pesaro, and thence by an escort to Rome. The impression left upon
the painter in this passage is thus described to the Duke, by his
friend Aretino:--"Titian writes me, 'Worship the Lord Guidobaldo,
gossip!--worship him, I say, gossip! for no princely bounty
can compare with his.' And these exclamations are his grateful
acknowledgment of the mounted escort of seven attendants which your
Excellency provided for him, with good company, and all paid; over
and above the ease wherewith, amid caresses, honours, and gifts, you
made him feel quite at home. I was, indeed, melted by the account he
gave me of your marvellous efforts to benefit, honour, and welcome
him." We have, to the like purpose, the less exceptionable testimony
of Bembo, who, on the 10th of October, wrote to Girolamo Querini: "I
must add that your old friend Maestro Tiziano is here, who represents
himself as much beholden to you.... The Lord Duke of Urbino has
treated him with exceeding kindness, retaining him about his person,
and bringing him as far as Pesaro, and thence forwarding him thither,
well mounted and attended, for all which he acknowledges himself
under great obligations."
[Footnote *234: Apparently he only went to Pesaro. Cf. note *2, p.
390.]
[Illustration: _Anderson_
SLEEPING VENUS
_After the picture by Giorgione in the Dresden Gallery, after which
the Venus of Urbino was painted_]
Vasari mentions, as executed by Titian for the court of Urbino,
portraits of Popes Sixtus IV., Julius II., and Paul III.; of Charles
V., Francis I., Sultan Solyman, and the Cardinal of Lorraine. I
have not succeeded in tracing any of these with certainty, but two
half-lengths of beautiful women, added to the list by Ticozzi, may
probably be the Flora[*235] now in the Uffizi Gallery, and the Bella
in the Pitti Palace: their features exhibit considerable analogy
with each other, and with the former of two pictures we are now
to describe. In the last number of the Appendix we shall rectify
various errors regarding Titian's two celebrated Venuses in the
Tribune at Florence. One of them, painted for Guidobaldo II., has
no proper right to that title, being correctly called in the old
Urbino inventories, "a naked woman lying." She is stretched at full
length along a bed, on which is a linen sheet, with a green curtain
above. A tiny spaniel crouches at her feet, and two waiting-maids
are searching in a chest near an open balcony, for garments
wherewith to veil her all-exposed charms. The languor of her eye,
the listless attitudes into which her limbs have dropped, personify
voluptuousness, and express a mind quietly gloating over the past. A
certain harmony and warmth of tone, fused throughout the vast surface
of delicate flesh-tints and snowy linen, over which broad daylight
streams without shadow, are worthy of our highest admiration; and the
relief given to the figure, with little aid from the chiaroscuro, is
probably unrivalled. The companion picture, which was not, however,
executed for Urbino, represents an equally nude figure on a couch
of purple damask, near a balcony opening upon a distant landscape.
The boy of love, archly toying upon her bosom, decides the subject
to be Venus; and her glowing eye-ball expresses the ardour that
thrills through her veins. The full and solid flesh is true to those
developed forms which, still characterising the women about Treviso,
formed the standard of female perfection in Titian's studio; and
although the skill with which they undulate, softened by chiaroscuro,
demands all praise, there may yet be some who, dissenting from such
an ideal of beauty, wish this mortal mould had been refined into the
symmetry of that "perfect goddess-ship" which close by "loves in
stone." Having thus noticed these nudities, it may be well to add,
that the shameless Aretino, while boasting of his own unrestrained
debaucheries, bears testimony to the purity of Titian's morals, and
the habitual control under which his passions were maintained.
[Footnote *235: It seems unlikely that the _Flora_ was ever in
Urbino. At any rate, in the seventeenth century it was in the
collection of the Spanish ambassador at Amsterdam (cf. GRONAU, _op.
cit._, p. 289).]
As an antidote, perhaps, to so sensual a production, Titian sent
to Urbino, with his Venus, a picture offering the utmost contrast
in sentiment and artistic treatment. It was the first of those
Magdalens,[*236] frequently repeated by him with slight variations,
of whom not a few school copies may be seen passing for originals.
Ridolfi tells us that he caught the idea from an antique sculpture,
transforming it into a penitent daughter of sin. Yet he has treated
it according to those ideas of female beauty which it was the
peculiar province of the Venetian school to develop, and which in
Italy have passed into the proverbial phrase of _un bel pezzo di
carne_, meaning a buxom dame. To borrow the words of Ticozzi, "he
has represented a noble lady, who, while yet in her prime, had
abandoned the delights and delicacies of her station. With due regard
to her past position, he has lavished upon her the beauties of form
and complexion; her repentance he has characterised with the most
devoted expression of which art is capable." The ascetic sentiment
prevailing in this work is well adapted to the sympathies of the
Roman Church, among whose followers it has ever been more a favourite
than with Protestant amateurs.
[Footnote *236: Pitti Gallery, No. 67. We know nothing of this
picture save that it must have been painted about 1530-35, and that
Vasari saw it in the Guardaroba of the Palace of Urbino.]
[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF HIS WIFE, BY LUCAS CRANACH
_From the picture in the Roscoe Collection, Liverpool. Possibly
modelled on the Venus of Urbino_]
Our notice of Titian in connection with the court of Urbino, may be
closed by a letter, which, in the servile phrase of this century,
ventures thus to dun Guidobaldo for payment of a picture sent him
five months before:--
"To the most illustrious and most excellent Lord, the Lord
Duke of Urbino.
"Most illustrious and most excellent Lord,
"Very many days have now passed since your most illustrious
Excellency desired that I should be advised how your
[servant] Agatone ought to have remunerated me for the
picture which I sent to your most illustrious Excellency.
Which he not having done, although six months are nearly
elapsed since the 10th of March, but having only put me off
with words, I have chosen to take the step of informing
your illustrious Excellency by these lines, that your
boundless liberality may aid my necessity, though I admit
that I may thereby appear wanting in modesty. I know
that your illustrious Excellency, occupied by important
affairs, cannot have your mind distracted by such trifles,
yet I consider it my duty respectfully to let you know my
difficulty; and beseeching you to retain me in your wonted
favour, I humbly kiss your most distinguished hands. From
Venice, the 27th of October, 1567. Your most illustrious
Excellency's most humble servant,
"TITIANO VECELLIO."
In one of his visits to Venice, about 1559, Guidobaldo, chancing to
enter a church of the Crociferi, where a youth was engaged in copying
the St. Laurence of Titian, he entered into conversation with him,
and subsequently returned more than once to observe his progress.
On one of these occasions, while the Duke was hearing mass at a
neighbouring altar, the young artist seized the opportunity to sketch
his likeness, which was shown him by an attendant. Pleased with its
success, and with the painter's manners, he invited him to enter his
service. The object of this casual patronage proved not unworthy of
it. He was JACOPO PALMA the younger, a name already known to art;
for his grandfather, who bore it, had distinguished himself among
the scholars of Giorgione and Titian; and his aunt, Violante, was
mistress and favourite model of the latter. Palma Giovane, then in
his sixteenth year, accompanied the Duke to Pesaro, where he employed
his pencil in copying works of Raffaele and Titian. The only anecdote
preserved of his residence in the court of Urbino proves that he
continued to enjoy his patron's favour; for, in a dispute with the
house-steward as to his luncheon, the latter was ordered to treat
the youth with more consideration. In order to obtain for him every
advantage, the Duke sent him to the charge of his brother, Cardinal
della Rovere, at Rome. After there diligently studying antique
marbles, with the works of Michael Angelo and those of Polidoro di
Caravaggio, Palma, at twenty-four, returned to Venice. On his way,
he paid a visit of thanks to Guidobaldo, and by his works removed
certain unfavourable impressions made by unfriendly detractors in
his absence. Of those which he may have executed for this court, no
account has reached us, beyond a notice that Francesco Maria II.
paid him, at Venice, 1591, 86 scudi for a Madonna and a St. Francis,
which do not, however, appear in the wardrobe inventories. He painted
for the metropolitan cathedral at Urbino the Discovery of the Holy
Cross, a picture praised by Lanzi beyond its merits; and for Pesaro,
a S. Ubaldo, and the Annunciation.
Another Venetian, patronised by Guidobaldo, was GIANBATTISTA
FRANCO, surnamed _il Semolei_, who was brought to Urbino on
a recommendation of Girolamo Genga, in order to paint the choir
of the cathedral. He there treated the favourite Umbrian theme of
the Coronation of the Madonna in a manner utterly at variance with
the old feeling, taking as his prototype the Judgment of Michael
Angelo, of whom he was a devoted and assiduous imitator. This work
having been destroyed by the fall of the roof in 1789, we shall
content ourselves with the description of Vasari, who had seen it,
and whose leaning must have been favourable to a work produced under
such influence. "And so, in imitation of Buonarroti's Judgment, he
represented in the sky the glorification of the saints, scattered on
clouds over the roof, with a whole choir of angels around our Lady,
in the act of ascending to heaven, where Christ waited to crown her,
whilst a number of patriarchs, prophets, sibyls, apostles, martyrs,
confessors, and maidens, in varied groups and attitudes, manifested
their joy at the arrival of the glorious Virgin. This subject might
have afforded to Battista an excellent opportunity of proving his
ability, had he adopted a better plan, not only in the practical
management of his fresco, but in conducting his entire theme with
more judicious arrangement. But in this work he fell into his usual
system, constantly repeating the same faces, figures, draperies, and
extremities. The colouring was likewise utterly destitute of beauty,
and everything was strained and puny. Hence the work, when finished,
greatly disappointed the Duke, Genga, and every one, much having been
expected from his known capacity for design." Several easel pictures
of his, in the sacristy of the Duomo, are weak in composition and
poor in colour; but one of St. Peter and St. Paul, before the Madonna
and Child, is an exceedingly grandiose production, in the Buonarroti
style. We shall have further occasion to speak of this artist in
our next chapter. He was born about 1498, and lived to the age of
sixty-three; but aware of his deficiencies as a painter, he betook
himself in a great measure to engraving, for which his accuracy as a
draftsman well qualified him.
* * * * *
In absence of native sculptors of eminence, the plastic art never
was much cherished in our duchy, and few commissions were given,
except for decorative or monumental purposes. The festive arches
on Duchess Vittoria's marriage were probably designed by Tiziano
Aspetti, a bronzist of Upper Italy. Her husband having acquired a
Leda by Bartolomeo Ammanati of Florence, he was called to Urbino, to
construct a memorial for Francesco Maria I. It does not, however,
appear to have been successful, and being quite disproportioned to
the little octangular church of Sta. Chiara, of which it occupied the
centre, it was removed after the Devolution, and probably destroyed.
SEBASTIANO BECIVENNI of Mercatello, was celebrated as a
decorative sculptor, and his dexterity is attested by two pulpits
in the duomo at Arezzo, dated 1563. In 1581, Francesco Maria II.
commissioned two small statues from John of Bologna, and in the
following year his minister at Rome wrote, proposing to send him a
miniature painter from thence, at a monthly salary of ten golden
scudi, besides board and travelling expenses. Late in life, he had
his own and his father's portraits executed in mosaic by Luigi
Gaetano at Venice. The statue of Duke Federigo, which we have already
mentioned as modelled by Baroccio, was executed for this Duke by
Girolamo Campagna of Venice, and one of his grandfather, attired
as a Roman warrior, leaning on his baton of command, and resting
upon a stump, was the work of Giovanni Bandini of Florence, an
eminent scholar of Bandinelli. After his sovereignty had virtually
passed from the bereaved Duke, he disposed of this memorial of its
brighter days in a touching letter to the Doge of Venice, which
finely illustrates the resignation beautifully exemplified in all the
correspondence of his latter years:--
"Most serene Prince,
"My grandfather, the Lord Duke Francesco Maria, was during
life honoured by your serene state with such high authority
and dignities, that, even after his decease, its esteem
and favour have ever been specially exhibited towards
his posterity and race; in these, now about to close in
my person, your Highness will lose a line of supporters
whose services are well known to you. Yet, being unwilling
that these good offices should pass entirely from memory,
I have resolved to present to the serene Republic and
your Highness, the statue which I erected in testimony of
dutiful respect to my said grandfather; for nowhere can
it be more fittingly placed than in your renowned city.
I therefore herewith send it to you, and with the more
pleasure from knowing that your state will gladly receive
the portrait of one who so faithfully served it, and who,
though no longer able to do so directly, will, virtually
and by example, demonstrate how your Republic ought to
be served. It will, at all events, afford irrefragable
evidence of his attachment to that cause for which he would
have desired longer life, and will prove a sure token of
my unbounded devotion to your Highness, which, indeed, I
cannot more fittingly demonstrate: beseeching, however,
that your Highness will regard this act as a solemn
testimony of the old and continued love of my house for
your distinguished state, which God preserve as long as my
unbounded wishes; and so I kiss your Highness's hands with
devoted affection.
"Your Highness's most devoted son and servant,
"FRANCESCO MARIA DELLA ROVERE, DUKE.[237]
"From Castel Durante, this ..., 1625."
[Footnote 237: _Carteggio d'Artisti_, vol. III., 540.]
The statue now stands in the court of the Doge's ducal palace, thus
inscribed: "To Francesco Maria I., Duke of Urbino, leader of the
armies of this Republic; erected at Pesaro, and recommended to the
affectionate care of Venice by Francesco Maria II., when bereaved of
progeny." The original inscription ran thus: "To Francesco Maria,
an eminent general, leader of the armies of the holy Romish Church,
the Florentine republic, the Venetian state, and the princes of the
League against the Turks, and of his own troops; the conqueror,
subduer, and sustainer of potentates at home and abroad; his
grandson, Duke Francesco Maria II. had this erected."