disposition which always wants to lean on other men. Such students are
always talking of the prodigious progress they should make, if they
could but have the advantage of being taught by some particular eminent
master. To him they would wish to transfer that care which they ought
and must take of themselves. Such are to be told, that after the
rudiments are past, very little of our art can be taught by others. The
most skilful master can do little more than put the end of the clue into
the hands of his scholar, by which he must conduct himself.
It is true the beauties and defects of the works of our predecessors
may be pointed out; the principles on which their works are conducted
may be explained; the great examples of ancient art may be spread out
before them; but the most sumptuous entertainment is prepared in vain,
if the guests will not take the trouble of helping themselves.
Even the Academy itself, where every convenience for study is procured,
and laid before them, may, from that very circumstance, from leaving no
difficulties to be encountered in the pursuit, cause a remission of
their industry. It is not uncommon to see young artists, whilst they are
struggling with every obstacle in their way, exert themselves with such
success as to outstrip competitors possessed of every means of
improvement. The promising expectation which was formed, on so much
being done with so little means, has recommended them to a patron, who
has supplied them with every convenience of study; from that time their
industry and eagerness of pursuit has forsaken them; they stand still,
and see others rush on before them.
Such men are like certain animals, who will feed only when there is but
little provender, and that got at with difficulty through the bars of a
rack, but refuse to touch it when there is an abundance before them.
Perhaps such a falling off may proceed from the faculties being
overpowered by the immensity of the materials; as the traveller despairs
ever to arrive at the end of his journey, when the whole extent of the
road which he is to pass is at once displayed to his view.
Among the first moral qualities, therefore, which a student ought to
cultivate, is a just and manly confidence in himself, or rather in the
effects of that persevering industry when he is resolved to possess.
When Raffaelle, by means of his connection with Bramante, the Pope’s
architect, was fixed upon to adorn the Vatican with his works, he had
done nothing that marked in him any great superiority over his
contemporaries; though he was then but young, he had under his direction
the most considerable artists of his age; and we know what kind of men
those were: a lesser mind would have sunk under such a weight; and if we
should judge from the meek and gentle disposition which we are told was
the character of Raffaelle, we might expect this would have happened to
him; but his strength appeared to increase in proportion as exertion was
required; and it is not improbable that we are indebted to the good
fortune which first placed him in that conspicuous situation, for those
great examples of excellence which he has left us.
The observations to which I formerly wished, and now desire, to point
your attention, relate not to errors which are committed by those who
have no claim to merit, but to those inadvertences into which men of
parts only can fall by the overrating or the abuse of some real, though
perhaps subordinate, excellence. The errors last alluded to are those of
backward, timid characters; what I shall now speak of belong to another
class, to those artists who are distinguished for the readiness and
facility of their invention. It is undoubtedly a splendid and desirable
accomplishment to be able to design instantaneously any given subject.
It is an excellence that I believe every artist would wish to possess;
but unluckily, the manner in which this dexterity is acquired,
habituates the mind to be contented with first thoughts without choice
or selection. The judgment, after it has been long passive, by degrees
loses its power of becoming active when exertion is necessary.
Whoever, therefore, has this talent, must in some measure undo what he
has had the habit of doing, or at least give a new turn to his mind:
great works, which are to live and stand the criticism of posterity,
are not performed at a heat. A proportionable time is required for
deliberation and circumspection. I remember when I was at Rome looking
at the fighting gladiator, in company with an eminent sculptor, and I
expressed my admiration of the skill with which the whole is composed,
and the minute attention of the artist to the change of every muscle in
that momentary exertion of strength, he was of opinion that a work so
perfect required nearly the whole life of man to perform.
I believe, if we look around us, we shall find, that in the sister art
of poetry, what has been soon done has been as soon forgotten. The
judgment and practice of a great poet on this occasion is worthy
attention. Metastasio, who has so much and justly distinguished himself
throughout Europe, at his outset was an _improvvisatore_, or extempore
poet, a description of men not uncommon in Italy: it is not long since
he was asked by a friend if he did not think the custom of inventing and
reciting _extempore_, which he practised when a boy in his character of
an _improvvisatore_, might not be considered as a happy beginning of his
education; he thought it, on the contrary, a disadvantage to him: he
said that he had acquired by that habit a carelessness and
incorrectness, which it cost him much trouble to overcome, and to
substitute in the place of it a totally different habit, that of
thinking with selection, and of expressing himself with correctness and
precision.
However extraordinary it may appear, it is certainly true, that the
inventions of the _pittori improvvisatori_, as they may be called,
have,--notwithstanding the common boast of their authors that all is
spun from their own brain,--very rarely anything that has in the least
the air of originality:--their compositions are generally commonplace,
uninteresting, without character or expression, like those flowery
speeches that we sometimes hear, which impress no new ideas on the mind.
I would not be thought, however, by what has been said, to oppose the
use, the advantage, the necessity there is, of a painter’s being readily
able to express his ideas by sketching. The further he can carry such
designs, the better. The evil to be apprehended is his resting there,
and not correcting them afterwards from nature, or taking the trouble to
look about him for whatever assistance the works of others will afford
him.
We are not to suppose, that when a painter sits down to deliberate on
any work, he has all his knowledge to seek; he must not only be able to
draw _extempore_ the human figure in every variety of action, but he
must be acquainted likewise with the general principles of composition,
and possess a habit of foreseeing, while he is composing, the effect of
the masses of light and shadow, that will attend such a disposition. His
mind is entirely occupied by his attention to the whole. It is a
subsequent consideration to determine the attitude and expression of
individual figures. It is in this period of his work that I would
recommend to every artist to look over his portfolio, or pocket-book, in
which he has treasured up all the happy inventions, all the
extraordinary and expressive attitudes that he has met with in the
course of his studies; not only for the sake of borrowing from those
studies whatever may be applicable to his own work, but likewise on
account of the great advantage he will receive by bringing the ideas of
great artists more distinctly before his mind, which will teach him to
invent other figures in a similar style.
Sir Francis Bacon speaks with approbation of the provisionary methods
Demosthenes and Cicero employed to assist their invention: and
illustrates their use by a quaint comparison after his manner. These
particular _Studios_ being not immediately connected with our art, I
need not cite the passage I allude to, and shall only observe that such
preparation totally opposes the general received opinions that are
floating in the world concerning genius and inspiration. The same great
man in another place, speaking of his own essays, remarks, that they
treat of “those things, wherein both men’s lives and persons are most
conversant, whereof a man shall find much in experience, but little in
books”; they are then what an artist would naturally call invention; and
yet we may suspect that even the genius of Bacon, great as it was, would
never have been enabled to have made those observations, if his mind had
not been trained and disciplined by reading the observations of others.
Nor could he without such reading have known that those opinions were
not to be found in other books.
I know there are many artists of great fame, who appear never to have
looked out of themselves, and who probably would think it derogatory to
their character, to be supposed to borrow from any other painter. But
when we recollect, and compare the works of such men with those who took
to their assistance the inventions of others, we shall be convinced of
the great advantage of this latter practice.
The two men most eminent for readiness of invention, that occur to me,
are Luca Giordano and La Fage; one in painting, and the other in
drawing.
To such extraordinary powers as were possessed by both of those artists,
we cannot refuse the character of genius; at the same time, it must be
acknowledged that it was that kind of mechanic genius which operates
without much assistance of the head. In all their works, which are (as
might be expected) very numerous, we may look in vain for anything that
can be said to be original and striking; and yet, according to the
ordinary ideas of originality, they have as good pretensions as most
painters; for they borrowed very little from others, and still less will
any artist, that can distinguish between excellence and insipidity, ever
borrow from them.
To those men, and all such, let us oppose the practice of the first of
painters. I suppose we shall all agree that no man ever possessed a
greater power of invention, and stood less in need of foreign
assistance, than Raffaelle; and yet, when he was designing one of his
greatest as well as latest works, the cartoons, it is very apparent that
he had the studies which he had made from Masaccio before him. Two noble
figures of St. Paul, which he found there, he adopted in his own work:
one of them he took for St. Paul preaching at Athens; and the other for
the same saint, when chastising the sorcerer Elymas. Another figure in
the same work, whose head is sunk in his breast, with his eyes shut,
appearing deeply wrapped up in thought, was introduced amongst the
listeners to the preaching of St. Paul. The most material alteration
that is made in those two figures of St. Paul is the addition of the
left hands, which are not seen in the original. It is a rule that
Raffaelle observed (and indeed ought never to be dispensed with), in a
principal figure, to show both hands; that it should never be a
question, what is become of the other hand. For the Sacrifice at Listra,
he took the whole ceremony much as it stands in an ancient
basso-relievo, since published in the _Admiranda_.
I have given examples from those pictures only of Raffaelle which we
have among us, though many other instances might be produced of this
great painter’s not disdaining assistance: indeed his known wealth was
so great, that he might borrow where he pleased without loss of credit.
It may be remarked, that this work of Masaccio, from which he has
borrowed so freely, was a public work, and at no farther distance from
Rome than Florence; so that if he had considered it a disgraceful theft,
he was sure to be detected; but he was well satisfied that his character
for invention would be little affected by such a discovery; nor is it,
except in the opinion of those who are ignorant of the manner in which
great works are built.
Those who steal from mere poverty; who, having nothing of their own,
cannot exist a minute without making such depredations; who are so poor
that they have no place in which they can even deposit what they have
taken; to men of this description nothing can be said: but such artists
as those to whom I suppose myself now speaking, men whom I consider as
competently provided with all the necessaries and conveniences of art,
and who do not desire to steal baubles and common trash, but wish only
to possess peculiar rarities which they select to ornament their
cabinets, and take care to enrich the general store with materials of
equal or of greater value than what they have taken; such men surely
need not be ashamed of that friendly intercourse which ought to exist
among artists, of receiving from the dead and giving to the living, and
perhaps to those who are yet unborn.
The daily food and nourishment of the mind of an artist is found in the
great works of his predecessors. There is no other way for him to become
great himself. _Serpens, nisi serpentem comederit, non fit draco_,[21]
is a remark of a whimsical Natural History, which I have read, though I
do not recollect its title; however false as to dragons, it is
applicable enough to artists.
Raffaelle, as appears from what has been said, had carefully studied the
works of Masaccio; and indeed there was no other, if we except Michael
Angelo (whom he likewise imitated), so worthy of his attention; and
though his manner was dry and hard, his compositions formal, and not
enough diversified, according to the custom of painters in that early
period, yet his works possess that grandeur and simplicity which
accompany, and even sometimes proceed from, regularity and hardness of
manner. We must consider the barbarous state of the arts before his
time, when skill in drawing was so little understood, that the best of
the painters could not even foreshorten the foot, but every figure
appeared to stand upon his toes; and what served for drapery had, from
the hardness and smallness of the folds, too much the appearance of
cords clinging round the body. He first introduced large drapery,
flowing in an easy and natural manner: indeed he appears to be the first
who discovered the path that leads to every excellence to which the art
afterwards arrived, and may therefore be justly considered as one of the
great fathers of modern art.
Though I have been led on to a longer digression respecting this great
painter than I intended, yet I cannot avoid mentioning another
excellence which he possessed in a very eminent degree; he was as much
distinguished among his contemporaries for his diligence and industry,
as he was for the natural faculties of his mind. We are told, that his
whole attention was absorbed in the pursuit of his art, and that he
acquired the name of Masaccio[22] from his total disregard to his dress,
his person, and all the common concerns of life. He is indeed a signal
instance of what well-directed diligence will do in a short time; he
lived but twenty-seven years; yet in that short space carried the art so
far beyond what it had before reached, that he appears to stand alone as
a model for his successors. Vasari gives a long catalogue of painters
and sculptors, who formed their taste, and learned their art, by
studying his works; among those, he names Michael Angelo, Lionardo da
Vinci, Pietro Perugino, Raffaelle, Bartolomeo, Andrea del Sarto, Il
Rosso, and Pierino del Vaga.
The habit of contemplating and brooding over the ideas of great
geniuses, till you find yourself warmed by the contact, is the true
method of forming an artist-like mind; it is impossible, in the presence
of those great men, to think, or invent in a mean manner; a state of
mind is acquired that receives those ideas only which relish of grandeur
and simplicity.
Beside the general advantage of forming the taste by such an
intercourse, there is another of a particular kind, which was suggested
to me by the practice of Raffaelle, when imitating the work of which I
have been speaking. The figure of the Pro-consul, Sergius Paulus, is
taken from the Felix of Masaccio, though one is a front figure, and the
other seen in profile; the action is likewise somewhat changed; but it
is plain Raffaelle had that figure in his mind. There is a circumstance
indeed, which I mention by the bye, which marks it very particularly;
Sergius Paulus wears a crown of laurel; this is hardly reconcilable to
strict propriety and the _costume_, of which Raffaelle was in general a
good observer; but he found it so in Masaccio, and he did not bestow so
much pains in disguise as to change it. It appears to me to be an
excellent practice, thus to suppose the figures which you wish to adopt
in the works of those great painters to be statues; and to give, as
Raffaelle has here given, another view, taking care to preserve all the
spirit and grace you find in the original.
I should hope, from what has been lately said, that it is not necessary
to guard myself against any supposition of recommending an entire
dependence upon former masters. I do not desire that you should get
other people to do your business, or to think for you; I only wish you
to consult with, to call in, as counsellors, men the most distinguished
for their knowledge and experience, the result of which counsel must
ultimately depend upon yourself. Such conduct in the commerce of life
has never been considered as disgraceful, or in any respect to imply
intellectual imbecility; it is a sign rather of that true wisdom, which
feels individual imperfection, and is conscious to itself how much
collective observation is necessary to fill the immense extent, and to
comprehend the infinite variety, of nature. I recommend neither
self-dependence nor plagiarism. I advise you only to take that
assistance which every human being wants, and which, as appears from the
examples that have been given, the greatest painters have not disdained
to accept. Let me add, that the diligence required in the search, and
the exertion subsequent in accommodating those ideas to your own
purpose, is a business which idleness will not, and ignorance cannot,
perform. But in order more distinctly to explain what kind of borrowing
I mean, when I recommend so anxiously the study of the works of great
masters, let us for a minute return again to Raffaelle, consider his
method of practice, and endeavour to imitate him, in his manner of
imitating others.
The two figures of St. Paul which I lately mentioned, are so nobly
conceived by Masaccio, that perhaps it was not in the power even of
Raffaelle himself to raise and improve them, nor has he attempted it;
but he has had the address to change in some measure without
diminishing the grandeur of their character; he has substituted, in the
place of a serene composed dignity, that animated expression which was
necessary to the more active employment he has assigned them.
In the same manner he has given more animation to the figure of Sergius
Paulus, and to that which is introduced in the picture of St. Paul
preaching, of which little more than hints are given by Masaccio, which
Raffaelle has finished. The closing the eyes of this figure, which in
Masaccio might be easily mistaken for sleeping, is not in the least
ambiguous in the cartoon: his eyes indeed are closed, but they are
closed with such vehemence, that the agitation of a mind _perplexed in
the extreme_ is seen at the first glance; but what is most
extraordinary, and I think particularly to be admired, is, that the same
idea is continued through the whole figure, even to the drapery, which
is so closely muffled about him, that even his hands are not seen; by
this happy correspondence between the expression of the countenance, and
the disposition of the parts, the figure appears to think from head to
foot. Men of superior talents alone are capable of thus using and
adapting other men’s minds to their own purposes, or are able to make
out and finish what was only in the original a hint or imperfect
conception. A readiness in taking such hints, which escape the dull and
ignorant, makes in my opinion no inconsiderable part of that faculty of
the mind which is called genius.
It often happens that hints may be taken and employed in a situation
totally different from that in which they were originally employed.
There is a figure of a Bacchante leaning backward, her head thrown quite
behind her, which seems to be a favourite invention, as it is so
frequently repeated in basso-relievos, cameos, and intaglios; it is
intended to express an enthusiastic frantic kind of joy. This figure
Baccio Bandinelli, in a drawing that I have of that master, of the
Descent from the Cross, has adopted (and he knew very well what was
worth borrowing) for one of the Marys, to express frantic agony of
grief. It is curious to observe, and it is certainly true, that the
extremes of contrary passions are with very little variation expressed
by the same action.
If I were to recommend method in any part of the study of a painter, it
would be in regard to invention; that young students should not presume
to think themselves qualified to invent, till they were acquainted with
those stores of invention the world already possesses, and had by that
means accumulated sufficient materials for the mind to work with. It
would certainly be no improper method of forming the mind of a young
artist, to begin with such exercises as the Italians call a _pasticcio_
composition of the different excellences which are dispersed in all
other works of the same kind. It is not supposed that he is to stop
here, but that he is to acquire by this means the art of selecting,
first what is truly excellent in art, and then what is still more
excellent in nature; a task which, without this previous study, he will
be but ill qualified to perform.
The doctrine which is here advanced, is acknowledged to be new, and to
many may appear strange. But I only demand for it the reception of a
stranger; a favourable and attentive consideration, without that entire
confidence which might be claimed under authoritative recommendation.
After you have taken a figure, or any idea of a figure, from any of
those great painters, there is another operation still remaining, which
I hold to be indispensably necessary, that is, never to neglect
finishing from nature every part of the work. What is taken from a
model, though the first idea may have been suggested by another, you
have a just right to consider as your own property. And here I cannot
avoid mentioning a circumstance in placing the model, though to some it
may appear trifling. It is better to possess the model with the attitude
you require, than to place him with your own hands: by this means it
happens often that the model puts himself in an action superior to your
own imagination. It is a great matter to be in the way of accident, and
to be watchful and ready to take advantage of it: besides, when you fix
the position of a model, there is danger of putting him in an attitude
into which no man would naturally fall. This extends even to drapery. We
must be cautious in touching and altering a fold of the stuff, which
serves as a model, for fear of giving it inadvertently a forced form;
and it is perhaps better to take the chance of another casual throw,
than to alter the position in which it was at first accidentally cast.