names of his foreign imitators, particularly the Flemish, who were much
devoted to his style, some of whose copies I have seen in collections
believed to be originals. But the handle of their pencil, the clearness
of colouring, and sometimes, the diminution of the figures, not common
to the Bassani, afford means to distinguish them; not however with such
a degree of certainty, but that connoisseurs themselves are of different
opinions. This occurred in my own time at Rome, respecting a fine
picture of the Nativity of Jesus Christ, in the Rezzonico collection.
One of the best imitators of that style was David Teniers, who, by his
exquisite skill acquired the surname of Bassano. To him I am happy to
add another foreigner, Pietro Orrente di Murcia, whom Spanish writers
give as a pupil to Jacopo; and were there no other authority, we might
upon that of Sig. Conca, receive him as his very exact imitator. In his
two pictures referred to (vol. i. p. 266) he is pronounced superior to
the Bassani, meaning, perhaps, superior to the sons of Jacopo; it would
be too absurd a proposition to prefer him to the head of the school.]
[Footnote 68: It is, as I am informed by Signor dalla Rosa, a picture of
the Pentacost.]
[Footnote 69: He attained this effect by drawing these figures with
rather bold contours, and the other parts after his works were
completed. Owing to his knowledge, as well as his felicity and grace of
hand, they are not in the least disagreeable to those who observe them
near. (_Zanetti_, p. 181.)]
[Footnote 70: This was easily produced by his rapidity of execution, by
which his tints always remained clear and simple. The artist who repeats
his touches frequently, and uses much research, can with difficulty
preserve freshness, to obtain which another method must undoubtedly be
pursued. (_Zanetti_, p. 163.)]
[Footnote 71: It has been stated in his defence, that had he clothed the
whole of his figures with those tunics and ancient mantles, he would
have become monotonous, and consequently uninteresting in his great
history pieces. But I am of opinion, that whoever is familiar with
ancient statues and bassi relievi, will find means of varying his
compositions. The Cavalier Canova has recently produced two bassi
relievi, on the condemnation of Socrates. The Greek vests are two, the
tunic and pallium; yet these are finely varied, though there are a
number of spectators.]
[Footnote 72: According to Ridolfi, however, he is said to have attained
his twenty-sixth year; but certainly not more.]
[Footnote 73: Father Federici has, in the course of this year, 1803,
brought to light another scholar of Paul, and afterwards of Carletto,
born, like Parrasio, in Venice. He calls him Giacomo Lauro, and Giacomo
da Trevigi, because, having established himself in that city, with his
family, while still a youth, no one could distinguish him by any other
patronymic than that of Trevigiano. Thus speak several anonymous
contemporaries, from whose MSS. the reverend father has extracted no
slight information relative to the pictures executed by Lauro in his new
country. There he enjoyed the friendship of the fathers of San Domenico,
for whose church he painted his celebrated picture of St. Rocco, in
which he exhibited, with great tragic power, the terrific scourge of the
plague. It is honourable to this artist, who died young, that this
altarpiece, as well as his other pictures, both in oil and in fresco,
have, until lately, been attributed either to Paul or to Carlo, or to
some less celebrated hands, but always to good and experienced artists.]
[Footnote 74: See Boschini, Carta, p. 160. Zanetti, p. 494.]
[Footnote 75: A class of artists so called, from their excessive use of
deep shades and dark colours. _Tr._]
[Footnote 76: There was an attempt to revive it, made in Florence.
Roscoe, in his "Life of Lorenzo de' Medici," (vol. ii. p. 220, 6th ed.)
relates, that, with Gherardo, Lorenzo associated Domenico Ghirlandajo to
work in mosaic at the chapel of San Zenobio: but that this undertaking,
so admirably begun, was interrupted by Lorenzo's death; insomuch that
"his attempts," observes the historian, "were thus in a great degree
frustrated." This honour appeared to be reserved for Venice.]
VENETIAN SCHOOL.
THIRD EPOCH.
_Innovations of the Mannerists of the Seventeenth Century.
Corruption of Venetian Painting._
A sort of fatality seems to prevail in all human things, rendering their
duration in the same state of short continuance; so that after attaining
their highest elevation, we may assuredly at no distant period look for
their decline. The glory of precedency, of whatever kind, will not long
remain the boast of one place, or in possession of a single nation. It
migrates from country to country; and the people that yesterday received
laws from another, will tomorrow impose them. Those who today are the
instructors of a nation, will tomorrow become ambitious of being
admitted in the number of its disciples. Numerous examples might be
adduced in support of this proposition, but it would be quite
superfluous. For whoever is even slightly acquainted with civil or
literary history, whoever has observed the passing events of the age in
which we live, will easily furnish himself with proofs, without the aid
of writers to direct him. We have already traced the same revolution of
affairs in the art of painting, in the two schools of Rome and Florence,
which, arriving at the zenith of their fame, fell into decay precisely
at the period when that of Venice began to exalt itself. And we shall
now perceive the decline of the latter, during the same age in which the
Florentine began to revive, in which the school of Bologna acquired its
highest degree of reputation; and what is still more surprising, seemed
to rise by studying the models of the Venetian. So indeed it was: the
Caracci were much devoted to Titian, to Giorgione, to Paul Veronese, and
Tintoretto, and thence formed styles, and produced pupils that conferred
honour upon the whole of the seventeenth century. The Venetians, too,
studied the same examples, and derived from them a certain mannerism
reprehensible enough in them, but much more so in their disciples.
These, devoting themselves in their first studies to more classical
artists, and attaining a certain practice both in design and colouring,
next aimed at displaying upon a grand scale, figures, not so much taken
from life, as from engravings and pictures, or from their own
imaginations; and the more rapidly these were executed, the better did
they suppose they had succeeded. I am inclined to believe, that the
examples of Tintoretto proved, in this respect, more prejudicial than
useful. Few were ambitious of emulating his profound knowledge, which in
some measure serves to veil his defects; but his haste, his
carelessness, and his grounds, they more willingly adopted; while his
great name was advanced as a shield to cover their own faults. And the
earliest of these, not yet unmindful of the maxims of a better age, did
not rush blindly into all these errors and excesses; but by their
superiority of spirit, and by their tints, maintained their ground
better than the mannerists of the Roman and Florentine styles. But to
these succeeded others, whose schools degenerated still more from the
ancient rules of art. We advance this without meaning the least
imputation upon really good artists, who flourished even during this
period; for an age rarely occurs in which good sense becomes altogether
extinct. Even during the barbarity of the dark ages, we meet with
specimens of some marble busts of the Caesars, and some of their medals,
which approach a better taste; and thus also in the age we are
describing appeared geniuses, who either wholly, or in great measure,
kept themselves free from the general infection; "et tenuere animum
contra sua saecula rectum." _Propert._
Jacopo Palma the younger, so called to distinguish him from the other
Palma, his great uncle, was an artist who might equally be entitled the
last of the good age, and the first of the bad. Born in 1544, after
receiving the instructions of his father Antonio, a painter of a
confined genius, he exercised himself in copying from Titian, and the
best of the national artists. At the age of fifteen years he was taken
under the patronage of the Duke of Urbino, and accompanied him to his
capital. He afterwards spent eight years in Rome, where he laid a good
foundation for his profession, by designing from the antique, copying
Michelangiolo and Raffaello; and, in particular, by studying the
chiaroscuros of Polidoro. This last was his great model, and next to him
came Tintoretto; he being naturally inclined, like them, to animate his
figures with a certain freedom of action, and a spirit peculiarly their
own. On his return to Venice, he distinguished himself by several works,
conducted with singular care and diligence; nor are there wanting
professors who have bestowed on him a very high degree of praise, for
displaying the excellent maxims of the Roman, united to what was best in
the Venetian School. It is observed by Zanetti, that some of his
productions were attributed by professors to the hand of Giuseppe del
Salviati, whose merit, in point of design and solidity of style, has
been already noticed. The whole of these are executed with peculiar
facility, a dangerous gift both in painting and in poetry, which this
artist possessed in a remarkable degree. Though he made the greatest
exertions to bring himself into notice, he was little employed; the post
was already occupied by men of consummate ability, by Tintoretto and
Paul Veronese; and these monopolized all the most lucrative commissions.
Palma, however, obtained the rank of third; chiefly by means of
Vittoria, a distinguished sculptor and architect; whose opinion was
adopted in the distribution of the labours even of artists themselves.
Displeased at the little deference shewn him by Robusti and Paul, he
began to encourage Palma, and to assist him also with his advice, so
that he shortly acquired a name. We have related a similar instance in
regard to Bernini, who brought forward Cortona against Sacchi, at Rome,
besides several more, productive of the greatest detriment to the art.
So true it is that the same passions prevail in every age, every where
pursue the same track, and produce the same results.
Nor was it long before Palma, overwhelmed with commissions, remitted
much of his former diligence. In progress of time, he became even yet
more careless, until upon the death of his eldest rivals, including
Corona, who in his latest works had begun to surpass him, free from
competition he asserted unquestioned sway, and despatched his pieces
rapidly. His pictures, indeed, might often be pronounced rough draughts,
a title bestowed upon them in ridicule by the Cavalier d'Arpino. In
order to prevail upon him to produce a piece worthy of his name, it
became requisite, not only to allow him the full time he pleased, but
the full price he chose to ask, without further reference, except to his
own discretion, in which truly he did not greatly abound. Upon such
terms he executed that fine picture of San Benedetto, at the church of
SS. Cosmo and Damiano, for the noble family of Moro. It resembled many
of those he had produced in his best days at Venice, and in particular
that celebrated naval battle of Francesco Bembo, placed in the Palazzo
Pubblico. Other valuable specimens are found scattered elsewhere, in
part mentioned by Ridolfi, and in part unknown to him. Such are his
Santa Apollonia, at Cremona, his San Ubaldo and his Nunziata, at Pesaro,
and his Invenzione della Croce, at Urbino, a piece abounding in figures,
and full of beauty, variety, and expression. His tints are fresh, sweet,
and clear, less splendid than those of Paul, but more pleasing than in
Tintoretto; and though scantily applied, they are more durable than
those of certain foreign pictures more heavily laid on. In the animation
of his figures he approaches the two preceding artists, particularly in
his more studied works, as he has shewn in his Chastisement of the
Serpents, a picture that seems embued with horror. In every other
instance he has always sufficient art to please; and it is surprising
how a man who led the way to the most corrupt period in Venice, as it
has been observed of Vasari at Florence, and of Zuccaro at Rome, could
thus exhibit so many attractions, both of nature and of art, calculated
to feast the eye, and to fix the soul of the spectator. Both Guercino
and Guido were sensible of the power of his pencil; and when examining
one of his altarpieces, at the Cappucini, in Bologna, "What a pity,"
they exclaimed, "that the master of such a pencil should be no more."
(Boschini, p. 383.)
In observance of my plan of accompanying each master with his train of
followers, I set out with Marco Boschini, a Venetian, who flourished
during this same deterioration of a nobler age. He was a pupil to Palma,
and has left some memorials of the different professors of the third
epoch, not to be met with in any other work. Professing the art of
engraving, rather than that of painting, he had, nevertheless, so much
merit in the latter, as to approach the manner of Palma, in his picture
of the Supper of our Lord, in the Sacristy of San Girolamo; as well as
that of Tintoretto, as we gather from a few of his altarpieces in the
territory of Padua, and his pictures for private ornament, remaining at
Venice, at least as far as I can learn. He was the author of several
works recorded in the preface to this work, the most remarkable of which
is composed in Quartine, with the following title; and, by this
production, he is perhaps best known: "The Chart of pictorial
Navigation, a Dialogue between a Venetian senator (a dilettante) and a
professor of painting, under the names of Ecelenza and Compare, divided
into eight _venti_, or winds, with which the Venetian vessel is borne
into the deep Sea of Painting, as its Absolute Mistress, to the
confusion of such as do not understand the loadstone and the compass."
Thus, much in the same manner as we judge from the facade of the style
of a whole edifice in the gothic taste, the reader may gather, from this
very loaded title, the exact nature of Boschini's work. It is, indeed,
written in the most verbose style of the Seicentisti; a mixture of
unsound reasoning, strange allegory, tame allusions, frivolous conceits
invented on every name, and phraseology that surpasses even that of
Ciampoli and Melosio; for these at least wrote in the Italian dialect,
whereas Boschini protests that he does not pretend to a _foreign idiom_,
but to speak like the Venetian people. From this undistinguishing kind
of nationality arises his malevolence against Vasari, and the methods of
the foreign schools, as well as his exaggerated praise of the Venetian
artists, whom he prefers, as we learn from his title page, to all the
painters in the world, not merely as respects their manner of colouring,
but in point of invention and design. What is worse, he makes no
distinction between the fine old painters and the mannerists of his own
times, and speaks as if the masters of the former age were still
flourishing, and teaching in their schools, or as if the modern
possessed the same powers and the same reputation; a gross equivocation
into which the tiresome _Compare_, or gossip, is continually falling,
and which his credulous Excellency as frequently commends.
If, however, in treating of Vasari, I in some measure excused his
partialities, in consideration of the prejudices acquired by his
education, which are afterwards with difficulty eradicated; I ought to
make use of the same liberality in regard to Boschini, more especially
as he possessed fewer opportunities of ridding himself of them, never
having visited Rome or Florence, and giving his opinions upon foreign
schools, from the hearsay relations of others. It is true that he cites
in favour of the Venetians the opinion of many distinguished men; as
that of Velasco, who protested to Salvator Rosa, that Raffaello was no
longer a favourite with him after having seen Venice; or that of Rubens,
who, after spending upwards of six years at Rome to little purpose,
formed his style on the models of Titian. Albano likewise regretted that
he had not commenced his studies in Venice, preferably to Rome; and Pier
da Cortona having seen the works of the Venetian School, cancelled some
of his labours, and ornamented afresh two chambers of the Palazzo Pitti,
and one in the Casa Barberini. But these authorities, which he adduces
along with others, taken chiefly from artists who preferred beauty of
colouring to accuracy of design, do not prove much, and might be opposed
by other authorities, even of great painters, more particularly English
and French, who embraced a contrary opinion. Besides, the panegyrists
thus cited by him, did not commend the modern so much as the ancient
Venetian painters, so as by no means to possess the weight he would
attribute to them. Moreover, in the present day, when so much has been
written upon Italian painting, we shall not, on investigating what is to
be admired and imitated, and what to be shunned or approved in the
examples of the Venetians, appeal to the vain boastings of the sixteenth
century, but to the critics of our own times. Still we do not mean to
deny, but that the work in question, however strangely written, contains
many valuable historical notices, and many pictorial precepts,
particularly useful to such as cannot aspire to any thing beyond the
character of mere naturalists, incapable of drawing a stroke that does
not appear in their model, and content with portraying the dimensions of
any kind of head or body, provided they be of the human shape, inventing
with infinite difficulty, slow in resolving, and quite incapable of
forming a grand history, more especially of battles, of flights, in
short of any objects they never saw. This sect, which at that period
boasted many followers, and which is not even yet extinct, is there
ridiculed in a vein it is impossible to surpass, and would that the
party proceeding to the opposite extreme of mannerism, at that time
triumphant in Venice, had not met with equal applause! But how difficult
is it to observe the golden mean! though the artists of Bologna will
point out the way in due time. At present we must return to those of
Venice.
Numerous other artists very nearly approached the style of Palma.
Boschini enumerates six, whose manner so extremely resembles him, as to
impose upon those who have not tact enough to detect the peculiar
characteristics of each; (and in Palma there is a mixture of the Roman
and Venetian,) consisting of the names of Corona, Vicentino, Peranda,
Aliense, Malombra, and Pilotto. The same author extols them as
illustrious painters; and truly, besides the splendour of their
colouring, they composed upon a magnificent scale, emulating, for the
most part, the fire and the striking contrasts that produced such an
impression after the time of Titian, executing pictures every way
deserving of a place in good collections.
Leonardo Corona, of Murano, who, from a copyist, succeeded in becoming a
painter, was the rival of Palma, and nevertheless enjoyed the patronage
of Vittoria; whether to keep alive the emulation of the former, or for
some other reason, is uncertain. He sometimes prepared models in clay,
to discover the best distributions of his chiaroscuro. By aid of these
he painted his Annunciation, at SS. Giovanni and Paolo, a work very
highly commended, as well as his picture at San Stefano, displaying a
grandeur that arrests the eye, and reminds us more of Titian than any
other model. In general, however, Corona exhibited more of Tintoretto,
if not in his colouring, which in the present day appears to more
advantage, at least in many other points. He produced a crucifixion so
much in this artist's style, that Ridolfi has defended him with the
utmost difficulty from the charge of theft. He availed himself likewise
of the engravings of Flemish artists, particularly in the composition of
his landscape. He did not long flourish; but left an excellent imitator
of his style in Baldassare d'Anna, an artist of Flemish origin, who
completed a few of his master's pieces. He also produced some original
pieces for the Servi and other churches, which, though inferior to those
of Corona in the selection of forms, yet surpass them in the softness,
and sometimes in the force of their chiaroscuro.
Andrea Vicentino was, according to some writers, a Venetian, and pupil
to Palma; not excelling in point of taste, he was nevertheless very
skilful in the handling of his colours, and shewed great power of
invention. Being employed in many labours, both within and without the
boundaries of Venice, and even in depicting histories of the Republic,
which still continue to adorn several halls in the Palazzo Grande, he
was one of the most popular artists of his time. He rarely fails to
exhibit in his works some perspective, or some figure borrowed,
according to the custom of the plagiarists, from the best masters:
including even Bassano, an artist of few ideas constantly repeated, and
so far less easily pillaged with impunity. At the same time he bestows
upon his plagiarisms a beauty of composition, and a general effect that
does honour to his talents, applicable to every variety of subject. He
could also employ a very delicate, tasteful, and effective pencil, when
he chose to exert himself. In his grounds, however, he must have been
less successful, many of his paintings being already much defaced. In
collections, always more favourable to their duration than public
places, we may find several in good preservation, and deserving of much
commendation, as we gather from his Solomon Anointed on becoming king of
Israel, preserved in the Royal Gallery at Florence. Marco Vicentino, son
of Andrea, also acquired some celebrity by his imitations, and more by
the name of his father.
Santo Peranda, a scholar of Corona and of Palma, and tolerably well
versed in Roman design, having passed some time at Rome, aimed at a
diversity of styles. His usual manner a good deal resembles that of
Palma, while, in his large histories, which he produced at Venice and at
Mirandola, he appears in a more poetical character of his own. Yet he
was naturally of a more slow and reflective turn, and more studious of
art, qualities that in the decline of age led him to adopt a very
delicate and laboured manner. He was not ambitious of equalling his
contemporaries in the abundance of his works; his aim was to surpass
them in correctness; nor did he any where succeed better in his object
than in his Christ taken from the Cross, painted for the church of San
Procolo. Among his disciples, Matteo Ponzone, from Dalmatia, more
particularly distinguished himself, assisting Peranda in his great works
executed at Mirandola. In progress of time he formed an original style,
which surpasses in softness that of his master, though not equal to it
in point of elegance. He was fond of copying from the life, without
attempting much to add to its dignity. His scholar, Gio. Carboncino,
pursued his studies at Rome also, where we do not, however, find mention
of him,[77] owing probably to his speedy return to Venice. Among the few
pieces produced by him for churches, there is a Bto. Angelo, at the
Carmini, which has been much commended by Melchiori, and a San Antonio,
at La Pieta, mentioned by Guarienti. Two others, named Maffei, of
Vicenza, and Zanimberti, of Brescia, will come under consideration in
their respective states.