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[Illustration: Sarah Bernhardt as Cleopatra.]
GREAT MEN AND FAMOUS WOMEN
_A Series of Pen and Pencil Sketches of_
THE LIVES OF MORE THAN 200 OF THE MOST PROMINENT PERSONAGES IN HISTORY
VOL. VIII.
Copyright, 1894, BY SELMAR HESS
edited by Charles F. Horne
[Illustration: Publisher's arm.]
New-York: Selmar Hess Publisher
CONTENTS OF VOLUME VIII.
SUBJECT AUTHOR PAGE
MICHAEL ANGELO, _Anna Jameson_, 214
BEETHOVEN, _C. E. Bourne_, 319
SARAH BERNHARDT, _H. S. Edwards_, 382
ROSA BONHEUR, _Clarence Cook_, 276
EDWIN BOOTH, _Clarence Cook_, 370
CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN, _Dutton Cook_, 355
_Letter from Miss Cushman to a young friend on the subject
of "Self-conquest,"_ 362
LEONARDO DA VINCI, _Anna Jameson_, 209
GUSTAVE DORE, _Kenyon Cox_, 298
ALBERT DUeRER, _W. J. Holland_, 231
EDWIN FORREST, _Lawrence Barrett_, 349
DAVID GARRICK, _Samuel Archer_, 343
GEROME, _Clarence Cook_, 281
HANDEL, _C. E. Bourne_, 302
HAYDN, _C. E. Bourne_, 315
WILLIAM HOGARTH, 247
JOSEPH JEFFERSON, _Clarence Cook_, 374
FRANZ LISZT, _Rev. Hugh R. Haweis, M.A._, 332
MEISSONIER, _Clarence Cook_, 272
MENDELSSOHN, _C. F. Bourne_, 326
JEAN FRANCOIS MILLET, _Clarence Cook_, 265
MOZART, _C. E. Bourne_, 308
PAGANINI, 325
ADELINA PATTI, _Frederick F. Buffen_, 378
PHIDIAS, _Clarence Cook_, 203
RACHEL, _Dutton Cook_, 363
RAPHAEL, _Mrs. Lee_, 221
REMBRANDT, _Elizabeth Robins Pennell_, 240
SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS, _Samuel Archer_, 250
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI, _Edmund Gosse_, 287
RUBENS, _Mrs. Lee_, 236
THORWALDSEN, _Hans Christian Andersen_, 258
TITIAN, _Giorgio Vasari_, 226
GIUSEPPE VERDI, 342
RICHARD WAGNER, _Franklin Peterson, Mus. Bac._, 338
BENJAMIN WEST, _Martha J. Lamb_, 254
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
VOLUME VIII.
PHOTOGRAVURES
ILLUSTRATION ARTIST TO FACE
PAGE
SARAH BERNHARDT AS CLEOPATRA, _Georges Clairin_ _Frontispiece_
MICHAEL ANGELO AND VITTORIA COLONNA, _Hermann Schneider_ 220
ALBERT DUeRER VISITS HANS SACHS, _Richard Gross_ 234
MARIE DE MEDICI AT THE HOUSE OF
RUBENS, _Florent Willems_ 240
CONNOISSEURS AT REMBRANDT'S STUDIO, _Adolphe-Alexandre Lesrel_ 244
MEISSONIER'S ATELIER, _Georges Bretegnier_ 272
MOZART SINGING HIS REQUIEM, _Thomas W. Shields_ 314
AN ANECDOTE ABOUT BEETHOVEN, _Paul Leyendecker_ 322
FRANZ LISZT, _Fortune-Joseph-Seraphin
Layraud_ 334
WAGNER AND HIS FRIENDS, _Wilhelm Beckmann_ 340
RACHEL AS THE MUSE OF GREEK TRAGEDY, _Jean Leon Gerome_ 368
JOE JEFFERSON AS BOB ACRES, _From life_ 376
WOOD-ENGRAVINGS AND TYPOGRAVURES
RAPHAEL INTRODUCED TO DA VINCI, _Brune Pages_ 212
LEO X. AT RAPHAEL'S BIER, _Pietro Michis_ 224
A FETE AT THE HOUSE OF TITIAN, _F. Kraus_ 228
ALBERT DUeRER'S WEDDING, _A. Bodenmueller_ 232
HOGARTH SKETCHING THE HIGHWAY OF
QUEENBOROUGH, 248
BENJAMIN WEST, PRESIDENT OF THE
ROYAL ACADEMY, _Sir Thomas Lawrence_ 258
ROSA BONHEUR, _E. Dubufe_ 278
HANDEL'S RIVER-CONCERT FOR GEORGE I., _A. Hamman_ 304
HAYDN COMPOSING HIS "CREATION," _A. Hamman_ 318
PAGANINI IN PRISON, _Louis Boulanger_ 326
GARRICK AS RICHARD III., _William Hogarth_ 346
FORREST AS METAMORA, _From Photograph_ 352
CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN AS MRS. HALLER, _Watkins_ 360
PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS
PHIDIAS[1]
[Footnote 1: Copyright, 1894, by Selmar Hess.]
By CLARENCE COOK
(ABOUT 500-432 B.C.)
Phidias, one of the greatest sculptors the world has seen, and whose
name has become, as it were, the synonym of his art, was born at
Athens about 500 B.C. He belonged to a family of artists, none of whom
indeed were distinguished in their profession, but their varied
occupations furnished the atmosphere in which such a talent as that of
Phidias could best be fostered and brought to maturity. His father was
Charmides, who is believed to have been an artist, because the Greeks,
in their inscriptions, did not associate the name of the father with
that of the son unless both were of the same calling. A brother of
Phidias, Panoenos, was a painter, and is mentioned among those
artists, twenty or more in number, who in conjunction with Polygnotus,
one of the chief painters of his day, were employed in the decoration
of the Poecile or Painted Portico, one of the many beautiful buildings
erected by Cimon. The Poecile was simply a long platform, with a roof
supported by a row of columns on one side and by a wall on the other.
It was called "the painted," because the wall at the back was covered
with a series of large historical pictures containing many figures,
and recording some of the chief events of the time, together with
others relating to an earlier and more shadowy epoch. The subject of
the painting, executed, at least in part, by the brother of Phidias,
was the Battle of Marathon, in which great event it is thought he may
himself have taken part.
The boyhood of Phidias fell in a time of national revival, when under
the influence of an ennobling political excitement, all the arts were
quickened to a fresh, original, and splendid growth. The contest
between the Greeks and Persians, which had begun with the Ionian
revolt, was in full activity at the time of his birth. He was ten
years old when the battle of Marathon was fought, and when he was
twenty, four of the most striking events in the history of Greece were
crowded into a single year; the battle of Thermopylae, the victory at
Salamis, and the twin glories of Plataea and Mycale. His early youth,
therefore, was nourished by the inspiring influences that come from
the victorious struggle of a people to maintain their national life.
He was by no means the only sculptor of his time whom fame remembers,
but he alone, rejecting trivial themes, consecrated his talent to the
nobler subjects of his country's religious life and the ideal
conception of her protecting gods. No doubt, Phidias, like all who are
born with the artistic temperament, would be interested from childhood
in the progress of the splendid works with which Athens was enriching
herself under the rule of Cimon. But his interest must have been
greatly increased by the fact that his brother Panoenos was actively
engaged in the decoration of one of those buildings. It would be
natural that he should be often drawn to the place where his brother
was at work, and that the sight of so many artists, most of them young
men, filled with the generous ardor of youth, and inspired by the
nature of their task, should have stirred in him an answering
enthusiasm. It gives us a thrill of pleasure to read in the list of
these youths the name of the great tragic poet, Euripides, who began
life as a painter, and in whose plays we find more than one reference
to the art. It cannot be thought unreasonable to suppose that two such
intelligences as these must have had an attraction for one another,
and that, as in the case of Dante and Giotto, the great poet and the
great artist would be drawn together by a likeness in their taste and
aims.
Phidias studied his art first at Athens, with a native sculptor,
Hegias, of whom we know nothing except from books. Later, he went to
Argos, and there put himself under the instruction of Ageladas, a
worker chiefly in bronze, and very famous in his time, of whom,
however, nothing remains but the memory of a few of his more notable
works. For us, his own works forgotten, he remains in honor as the
teacher of Myron, of Polycletus, and of Phidias, the three chief
sculptors of the next generation to his own. On leaving the workshop
of Ageladas, Phidias executed several statues that brought him
prominently before the public. For Delphi, he made a group of thirteen
figures in bronze, to celebrate the battle of Marathon and apotheosize
the heroes of Attica. In this group, Miltiades was placed in the
centre, between Athena, the tutelary goddess of Athens, and Apollo,
the guardian of Delphi; while on each side were five Athenian heroes,
Theseus and Codrus with others, arranged in a semicircle. This
important work was paid for by Athens out of her share in the spoils
of Marathon. Another important commission executed by Phidias was a
statue of Athena made for her temple at Plataea, and paid for with the
eighty talents raised by the contributions of the other Grecian states
as a reward for the splendid services of the Plataeans at Marathon,
where they played somewhat the same part as the Prussians at the
battle of Waterloo. The head, hands, and feet of this statue were of
marble, but the drapery was of gold; so arranged, probably, as in the
case of the great statue of Athena designed later by Phidias for the
Parthenon, as to be removable from the marble core at pleasure.
Phidias made so many statues of the virgin goddess Athena, that his
name became associated with hers, as at a later day that of Raphael
was with the Virgin Mary. In the first period of his artistic career,
moved perhaps by his patriotic gratitude for her intervention in
behalf of his native state, he had represented the goddess as a
warlike divinity, as here at Plataea; but in his later conceptions, as
in a statue made for the Athenians of Lemnos, Athena appeared invested
with milder attributes, and with a graceful and winning type of
beauty.
In their invasion of Attica the Persians had destroyed the city of
Athens, and the people, who had fled to all quarters of the peninsula
to seek refuge from the enemy, returned after the victory at Salamis
and the flight of the Persians, to find their homes a heap of ruins.
The dwelling-houses of the Greeks were everywhere, even in their
largest cities, built of mean materials: walls of stubble overlaid
with stucco and gayly painted. It was not long, therefore, before
Athens resumed something of her old appearance, with such improvements
as always follow the rebuilding of a city. The most important change
effected was that brought about in the character of the great plateau,
the fortified rock of the Acropolis. Here, as in many Greek cities,
the temples of the gods had been erected, and about them, as about the
cathedrals of the Middle Ages, there had grown up a swarm of houses
and other buildings built by generations of people who sought there at
once the protection of the stockade which enclosed the almost
inaccessible site, and the still further safeguard of the presence of
the divinities in their temples. The destructive hand of the Persian
invaders had swept this platform clear of all these multiplied
incumbrances, and in the rebuilding of the city it was determined to
reserve the Acropolis for military and religious uses alone.
The work of improvement was begun by Cimon, who, however, confined his
attention chiefly to the lower city that clustered about the base of
the Acropolis. Here, among other structures, he built the temple of
Theseus and the Painted Portico, and he also erected, near the summit
of the Acropolis, on the western side, the little gem-like temple of
the Wingless Victory, Nike Apteros, in commemoration of the success of
the Athenian arms at the battle of the Eurymedon. It was from Cimon
that Phidias received his first commission for work upon the
Acropolis, where later he was to build such a lasting monument to his
own fame and to the fame of his native land. The commission given him
by Cimon was to erect a bronze statue of Athena which was to stand on
the citadel, at once a symbol of the power of Athens and a tribute to
the protecting goddess of the city. The work upon the statue was
probably begun under Cimon, but according to Ottfried Mueller it was
not completed at the death of Phidias. It stood in the open air, and
nearly opposite the Colonnade at the entrance of the great flight of
marble steps that led from the plain to the summit of the Acropolis,
and was the first object to meet the eye on passing through the
gateway. It represented the goddess, armed, and in a warlike attitude,
from which it derived its name, Athena Promachos: Athena, the leader
of the battle. With its pedestal it stood about seventy feet high,
towering above the roof of the Parthenon, the gilded point of the
brazen spear held by the goddess flashing back the sun to the ships as
in approaching Athens they rounded the promontory of Sunium. We read
that the statue was still standing so late as 395 A.D., and it is said
that its towering height and threatening aspect caused a panic terror
in Alaric and his horde of barbarians when they climbed the Acropolis
to plunder its temple of its treasure.
But it was under the rule of Pericles that Phidias was to find at
Athens his richest employment. Pericles had determined, probably by
the advice of Phidias, to make the Acropolis the seat and centre of
the new and splendid city that was to arise under his administration.
The first great undertaking was the building of a temple to Athena
Parthenos, Athena the Virgin, a design believed to have been suggested
to Pericles by Phidias. The plans were intrusted to Ictinus, an
Athenian, one of the best architects of the day; but the general
control and superintendence of the work were given to Phidias. As the
building rose to completion, workmen in all branches of the arts
flocked to Athens from every part of Greece and were given full
employment by Phidias in the decoration and furnishing of the temple.
The taste of Phidias controlled the whole scheme of decoration applied
to the building, into which color entered, no doubt, to a much greater
extent than was formerly believed. Even after time and the destructive
hand of man have done their worst, there still remain sufficient
traces of color to prove that the sculpture, and the whole upper part
of the temple, were painted in bright but harmonious colors, and that
metal ornaments and accessories accented the whole scheme with
glittering points of light reflected from their shining surfaces.
The sculptures with which the Parthenon was adorned by Phidias, and
which were executed under his immediate superintendence, consisted of
two great groups that filled the eastern and western pediments; of
groups of two figures each in the ninety-two metopes or panels above
the outer row of columns; and, finally, the famous frieze that ran
completely round the temple itself, just below the ceiling of the
colonnade, and at a height of about thirty-nine feet from the floor.
The subject of the group that filled the eastern pediment, the one
above the entrance door of the temple, was the birth of Athena. Just
how the event was represented we do not know because quite half the
group, including the principal figures, disappeared very early in our
era, and no description of them remains in any ancient or modern
writer. The group in the western pediment represented the contest
between Athena and Poseidon for the dominion over Attica. According to
the legend, the strife between the two divinities took place in an
assembly of the gods on the Acropolis, who were to determine which of
the two contestants should be the protector of the city. To prove his
power, Poseidon struck the rock with his trident, and a salt spring
leaped forth, as if the sea itself had obeyed the call of its lord.
Athena struck the ground, and an olive-tree sprang up, the emblem of
peace and of the victories of commerce, and the assembly awarded the
prize to her. The goddess having thus received the sovereignty of
Athens, it was but natural that a day should be set apart for her
special honor, and a festival instituted to commemorate the great
event. This was the greater Panathenaia, or All Athenians Day, which
was celebrated every fourth year in honor of the goddess, and which,
as its name implies, was taken part in by all the people of the city.
It occurred in the early summer and lasted five days. On the fifth
day, it closed with a procession which went through all the chief
streets of the city and wound its way up the Great Stairway to the
Acropolis, bearing the _peplos_ or embroidered robe woven by young
virgin ladies of Athens, chosen from the highest families, and known
for their skill in this kind of work. After the _peplos_ had been
consecrated in the temple it was placed with due solemnities upon the
ancient and venerable figure of the goddess, made of olive-wood, and
said to have descended from heaven. From its subject, which thus
celebrates the Panathenaic procession, the frieze is often called the
Panathenaic frieze.
It is carved from Pentelic marble, of which material the marble
building is constructed. Its original length, running as it did around
the entire building, was 522.80 feet, of which about 410 feet remain.
Of this portion, 249 feet are in the British Museum in slabs and
fragments; the remainder is chiefly in the Louvre, with scattered
fragments in other places. As a connected subject this was the most
extensive piece of sculpture ever made in Greece. From all that can be
gathered from the study of the fragments that remain, the design of
the frieze was of the utmost simplicity and characterized by the union
of perfect taste and clear purpose that marks all the work of the
great sculptor. The subject begins in the frieze at the western end of
the temple, where we watch the assembling of the procession. It then
proceeds along the northern and southern sides of the building, in
what we are to suppose one continuous line, moving toward the east,
since all the faces are turned that way; and at the eastern end,
directly over the main entrance to the building, the two parts of the
procession meet, in the presence of the magistrates and of the
divinities who had places of worship in Athens.
Of the grace, the skill in arrangement, the variety of invention, the
happy union of movement and repose shown in this work, not only
artists--men best fitted to judge its merits from a technical point of
view--but the cultivated portion of the public, and a large and
ever-increasing circle of every-day people, have by common consent
agreed in praise. By the multiplication of casts, to be found now in
all our principal museums, we are enabled to study and to enjoy the
long procession even better than it could have been enjoyed in its
original place, where it must have been seen at a great disadvantage
in spite of the skill shown by Phidias in adapting it to its site;
for, as the frieze stood thirty-nine feet from the floor, and as the
width of the portico between the wall and the columns was only nine
feet, it was seen at a very sharp angle, and owing to the projection
of the roof beyond the wall of the temple the frieze received only
reflected light from the marble pavement below.
Apart from the marble sculptures on the exterior of the Parthenon, the
two most famous works of Phidias were the statues of Athena, made for
the interior of the Parthenon, and of Zeus for the temple of the god
at Olympia in Elis. Both these statues were of the sort called
_Chryselephantine_, from the Greek _chrousous_, golden, and
_elephantinos_, of ivory; that is, they were constructed of plates of
gold and ivory, laid upon a core of wood or stone. The style was not
new, though its invention was at one time ascribed to Phidias. It came
from the East, but it was now employed for the first time in Greece in
a work of national importance.
In the Athena, the face, neck, arms, hands, and feet were made of
ivory, and the drapery and ornaments, the helmet, the shield, and the
sandals of gold, which as in the case of the statue made for Plataea,
was removable at pleasure. The height of the statue, including the
pedestal, was nearly forty feet. The goddess stood erect, clothed with
a tunic reaching to the ankles, and showing her richly sandalled feet.
She had the aegis on her breast, her head was covered with a helmet,
and her shield, richly embossed with the Battle of the Amazons, rested
on the ground at her side. In one hand she held a spear, and in the
other, an image of Victory six feet high.
A still more splendid work, and one which raised the fame of Phidias
to the highest point, was the statue of the Olympian Zeus, made for
the Eleans. In this statue, Phidias essayed to embody the Homeric
ideal of the supreme divinity of the people of Greece sitting on his
throne as a monarch, and in an attitude of majestic repose. The
throne, made of cedar-wood, was covered with plates of gold, and
enriched with ivory, ebony, and precious stones. It rested on a
platform twelve feet high, made of costly marble and carved with the
images of the gods who formed the council of Zeus on Olympus. The feet
of the god rested on a footstool supported by lions, and with the
combat of Theseus and the Amazons in a bas-relief on the front and
sides. In one hand Zeus held the sceptre, and in the other a winged
Victory. His head was crowned with a laurel wreath; his mantle,
falling from one shoulder, left his breast bare and covered the lower
part of his person with its ample folds of pure gold enamelled with
flowers. The whole height of the statue with the pedestal was about
fifty feet; by its very disproportion to the size of the temple it was
made to appear still larger than it really was. This statue was
reckoned one of the wonders of the world. In it the Greeks seemed to
behold Zeus face to face. To see it was a cure for all earthly woes,
and to die without having seen it was reckoned a great calamity.
The downfall of Pericles, due to the jealousies of his rivals, carried
with it the ruin of Phidias, his close friend, to whom he had
entrusted such great undertakings. An indictment was brought against
the sculptor, charging him with appropriating to himself a portion of
the gold given him for the adornment of the statue of Athena; and
according to some authorities Pericles himself was included in the
charge. The gold had, however, been attached to the statue in such a
manner that it could be taken off and weighed, and in the proof, the
charge had to be abandoned. But Phidias did not escape so easily. He
was accused of sacrilege in having introduced portraits of himself and
Pericles on the shield of the goddess, where, says Plutarch, in the
bas-relief of the Battle of the Amazons, he carved his own portrait as
a bald old man lifting a stone with both hands, and also introduced an
excellent likeness of Pericles fighting with an Amazon.
Phidias died in prison before the trial came off, and his name must be
added to the long list of those whom an ungrateful world has rewarded
for their services with ignominy and death.
[Signature of the author.]
LEONARDO DA VINCI
By ANNA JAMESON
(1452-1519)
[Illustration: Leonardo Da Vinci.]
Leonardo da Vinci seems to present in his own person a _resume_ of all
the characteristics of the age in which he lived. He was _the_ miracle
of that age of miracles. Ardent and versatile as youth; patient and
persevering as age; a most profound and original thinker; the greatest
mathematician and most ingenious mechanic of his time; architect,
chemist, engineer, musician, poet, painter--we are not only astounded
by the variety of his natural gifts and acquired knowledge, but by the
practical direction of his amazing powers. The extracts which have
been published from MSS. now existing in his own handwriting show him
to have anticipated by the force of his own intellect some of the
greatest discoveries made since his time. "These fragments," says Mr.
Hallam, "are, according to our common estimate of the age in which he
lived, more like revelations of physical truths vouchsafed to a single
mind than the superstructure of its reasoning upon any established
basis. The discoveries which made Galileo, Kepler, Castelli, and other
names illustrious; the system of Copernicus, the very theories of
recent geologists, are anticipated by Da Vinci within the compass of a
few pages, not perhaps in the most precise language, or on the most
conclusive reasoning, but so as to strike us with something like the
awe of preternatural knowledge. In an age of so much dogmatism he
first laid down the grand principle of Bacon, that experiment and
observation must be the guides to just theory in the investigation of
nature. If any doubt could be harbored, not as to the right of
Leonardo da Vinci to stand as the first name of the fifteenth century,
which is beyond all doubt, but as to his originality in so many
discoveries, which probably no one man, especially in such
circumstances, has ever made, it must be by an hypothesis not very
untenable, that some parts of physical science had already attained a
height which mere books do not record."
It seems at first sight almost incomprehensible that, thus endowed as
a philosopher, mechanic, inventor, discoverer, the fame of Leonardo
should now rest on the works he has left as a painter. We cannot,
within these limits, attempt to explain why and how it is that as the
man of science he has been naturally and necessarily left behind by
the onward march of intellectual progress, while as the poet-painter
he still survives as a presence and a power. We must proceed at once
to give some account of him in the character in which he exists to us
and for us--that of the great artist.
Leonardo was born at Vinci, near Florence, in the Lower Val d'Arno, on
the borders of the territory of Pistoia. His father, Piero da Vinci,
was an advocate of Florence--not rich, but in independent
circumstances, and possessed of estates in land. The singular talents
of his son induced Piero to give him, from an early age, the advantage
of the best instructors. As a child he distinguished himself by his
proficiency in arithmetic and mathematics. Music he studied early, as
a science as well as an art. He invented a species of lyre for
himself, and sung his own poetical compositions to his own music, both
being frequently extemporaneous. But his favorite pursuit was the art
of design in all its branches; he modelled in clay or wax, or
attempted to draw every object which struck his fancy. His father sent
him to study under Andrea Verrocchio, famous as a sculptor, chaser in
metal, and painter. Andrea, who was an excellent and correct designer,
but a bad and hard colorist, was soon after engaged to paint a picture
of the baptism of our Saviour. He employed Leonardo, then a youth, to
execute one of the angels; this he did with so much softness and
richness of color, that it far surpassed the rest of the picture; and
Verrocchio from that time threw away his palette, and confined himself
wholly to his works in sculpture and design, "enraged," says Vessari,
"that a child should thus excel him."
The youth of Leonardo thus passed away in the pursuit of science and
of art; sometimes he was deeply engaged in astronomical calculations
and investigations; sometimes ardent in the study of natural history,
botany, and anatomy; sometimes intent on new effects of color, light,
shadow, or expression in representing objects animate or inanimate.
Versatile, yet persevering, he varied his pursuits, but he never
abandoned any. He was quite a young man when he conceived and
demonstrated the practicability of two magnificent projects: one was
to lift the whole of the church of San Giovanni, by means of immense
levers, some feet higher than it now stands, and thus supply the
deficient elevation; the other project was to form the Arno into a
navigable canal as far as Pisa, which would have added greatly to the
commercial advantages of Florence.
It happened about this time that a peasant on the estate of Piero da
Vinci brought him a circular piece of wood, cut horizontally from the
trunk of a very large old fig-tree, which had been lately felled, and
begged to have something painted on it as an ornament for his cottage.
The man being an especial favorite, Piero desired his son Leonardo to
gratify his request; and Leonardo, inspired by that wildness of fancy
which was one of his characteristics, took the panel into his own
room, and resolved to astonish his father by a most unlooked-for proof
of his art. He determined to compose something which should have an
effect similar to that of the Medusa on the shield of Perseus, and
almost petrify beholders. Aided by his recent studies in natural
history, he collected together from the neighboring swamps and the
river-mud all kinds of hideous reptiles, as adders, lizards, toads,
serpents: insects, as moths, locusts, and other crawling and flying
obscene and obnoxious things; and out of these he composed a sort of
monster or chimera, which he represented as about to issue from the
shield, with eyes flashing fire, and of an aspect so fearful and
abominable that it seemed to infect the very air around. When
finished, he led his father into the room in which it was placed, and
the terror and horror of Piero proved the success of his attempt. This
production, afterward known as the "Rotello del Fico," from the
material on which it was painted, was sold by Piero secretly for one
hundred ducats to a merchant, who carried it to Milan, and sold it to
the duke for three hundred. To the poor peasant, thus cheated of his
"Rotello," Piero gave a wooden shield, on which was painted a heart
transfixed by a dart, a device better suited to his taste and
comprehension. In the subsequent troubles of Milan, Leonardo's picture
disappeared, and was probably destroyed as an object of horror by
those who did not understand its value as a work of art.
During this first period of his life, which was wholly passed in
Florence and its neighborhood, Leonardo painted several other pictures
of a very different character, and designed some beautiful cartoons of
sacred and mythological subjects, which showed that his sense of the
beautiful, the elevated, and the graceful was not less a part of his
mind than that eccentricity and almost perversion of fancy which made
him delight in sketching ugly, exaggerated caricatures, and
representing the deformed and the terrible.
Leonardo da Vinci was now about thirty years old, in the prime of his
life and talents. His taste for pleasure and expense was, however,
equal to his genius and indefatigable industry; and anxious to secure
a certain provision for the future, as well as a wider field for the
exercise of his various talents, he accepted the invitation of
Ludovico Sforza il Moro, then regent, afterward Duke of Milan, to
reside in his court, and to execute a colossal equestrian statue of
his ancestor, Francesco Sforza. Here begins the second period of his
artistic career, which includes his sojourn at Milan, that is from
1483 to 1499.
Vasari says that Leonardo was invited to the court of Milan for the
Duke Ludovico's amusement, "as a musician and performer on the lyre,
and as the greatest singer and _improvisatore_ of his time;" but this
is improbable. Leonardo, in his long letter to that prince, in which
he recites his own qualifications for employment, dwells chiefly on
his skill in engineering and fortification; and sums up his
pretensions as an artist in these few brief words: "I understand the
different modes of sculpture in marble, bronze, and terra-cotta. In
painting, also, I may esteem myself equal to anyone, let him be who he
may." Of his musical talents he makes no mention whatever, though
undoubtedly these, as well as his other social accomplishments, his
handsome person, his winning address, his wit and eloquence,
recommended him to the notice of the prince, by whom he was greatly
beloved, and in whose service he remained for about seventeen years.
It is not necessary, nor would it be possible here, to give a
particular account of all the works in which Leonardo was engaged for
his patron, nor of the great political events in which he was
involved, more by his position than by his inclination; for instance,
the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. of France, and the subsequent
invasion of Milan by Louis XII., which ended in the destruction of the
Duke Ludovico. The greatest work of all, and by far the grandest
picture which, up to that time, had been executed in Italy, was the
"Last Supper," painted on the wall of the refectory, or dining-room,
of the Dominican convent of the Madonna delle Grazie. It occupied
Leonardo about two years, from 1496 to 1498.
The moment selected by the painter is described in the 26th chapter of
St. Matthew, 21st and 22d verses: "And as they did eat, he said,
Verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me: and they were
exceeding sorrowful, and began every one of them to say unto him,
Lord, is it I?" The knowledge of character displayed in the heads of
the different apostles is even more wonderful than the skilful
arrangement of the figures and the amazing beauty of the workmanship.
The space occupied by the picture is a wall twenty-eight feet in
length and the figures are larger than life.
Of this magnificent creation of art, only the mouldering remains are
now visible. It has been so often repaired that almost every vestige
of the original painting is annihilated; but from the multiplicity of
descriptions, engravings, and copies that exist, no picture is more
universally known and celebrated. Perhaps the best judgment we can now
form of its merits is from the fine copy executed by one of Leonardo's
best pupils, Marco Uggione, for the Certosa at Pavia, and now in
London, in the collection of the Royal Academy. Eleven other copies,
by various pupils of Leonardo, painted either during his lifetime or
within a few years after his death, while the picture was in perfect
preservation, exist in different churches and collections.
While engaged on the Cenacolo, Leonardo painted the portrait of
Lucrezia Crivelli, now in the Louvre (No. 483). It has been engraved
under the title of _La Belle Ferronniere_, but later researches leave
us no doubt that it represents Lucrezia Crivelli, a beautiful favorite
of Ludovico Sforza, and was painted at Milan in 1497. It is, as a work
of art, of such extraordinary perfection that all critical admiration
is lost in wonder.
Of the grand equestrian statue of Francesco Sforza, Leonardo never
finished more than the model in clay, which was considered a
masterpiece. Some years afterward (in 1499), when Milan was invaded by
the French, it was used as a target by the Gascon bowmen, and
completely destroyed. The profound anatomical studies which Leonardo
made for this work still exist.
[Illustration: Raphael Introduced to Da Vinci.]
In the year 1500, the French being in possession of Milan, his patron
Ludovico in captivity, and the affairs of the state in utter
confusion, Leonardo returned to his native Florence, where he hoped to
re-establish his broken fortunes, and to find employment. Here begins
the third period of his artistic life, from 1500 to 1513, that is,
from his forty-eighth to his sixtieth year. He found the Medici family
in exile, but was received by Pietro Soderini (who governed the city
as "_Gonfaloniere perpetuo_") with great distinction, and a pension
was assigned to him as painter in the service of the republic. One of
his first works after his return to Florence was the famous portrait
of Madonna Lisa del Giocondo, called in French _La Joconde_, and now
in the Louvre (484), which after the death of Leonardo was purchased
by Francis I. for 4,000 gold crowns, equal to 45,000 francs or L1,800,
an enormous sum in those days; yet who ever thought it too much?
Then began the rivalry between Leonardo and Michael Angelo, which
lasted during the remainder of Leonardo's life. The difference of age
(for Michael Angelo was twenty-two years younger) ought to have
prevented all unseemly jealousy; but Michael Angelo was haughty and
impatient of all superiority, or even equality; Leonardo, sensitive,
capricious, and naturally disinclined to admit the pretensions of a
rival, to whom he could say, and _did_ say, "I was famous before you
were born!" With all their admiration of each other's genius, their
mutual frailties prevented any real good-will on either side.
Leonardo, during his stay at Florence, painted the portrait of Ginevra
Benci, the reigning beauty of her time. We find that in 1502 he was
engaged by Caesar Borgia to visit and report on the fortifications of
his territories, and in this office he was employed for two years. In
1503 he formed a plan for turning the course of the Arno, and in the
following year he lost his father. In 1505 he modelled the group which
we now see over the northern door of the San Giovanni, at Florence. In
1514 he was invited to Rome by Leo X., but more in his character of
philosopher, mechanic, and alchemist, than as a painter. Here Raphael
was at the height of his fame, and engaged in his greatest works, the
frescos of the Vatican. The younger artist was introduced to the
elder; and two pictures which Leonardo painted while at Rome--the
"Madonna of St. Onofrio," and the "Holy Family," painted for Filiberta
of Savoy, the pope's sister-in-law (which is now at St.
Petersburg)--show that even this veteran in art felt the irresistible
influence of the genius of his young rival. They are both
_Raffaelesque_ in the subject and treatment.
It appears that Leonardo was ill-satisfied with his sojourn at Rome.
He had long been accustomed to hold the first rank as an artist
wherever he resided; whereas at Rome he found himself only one among
many who, if they acknowledged his greatness, affected to consider his
day as past. He was conscious that many of the improvements in the
arts which were now brought into use, and which enabled the painters
of the day to produce such extraordinary effects, were invented or
introduced by himself. If he could no longer assert that measureless
superiority over all others which he had done in his younger days, it
was because he himself had opened to them new paths to excellence. The
arrival of his old competitor, Michael Angelo, and some slight on the
part of Leo X., who was annoyed by his speculative and dilatory habits
in executing the works intrusted to him, all added to his irritation
and disgust. He left Rome, and set out for Pavia, where the French
king, Francis I., then held his court. He was received by the young
monarch with every mark of respect, loaded with favors, and a pension
of 700 gold crowns settled on him for life. At the famous conference
between Francis I. and Leo X., at Bologna, Leonardo attended his new
patron, and was of essential service to him on that occasion. In the
following year, 1516, he returned with Francis I. to France, and was
attached to the French court as principal painter. It appears,
however, that during his residence in France he did not paint a single
picture. His health had begun to decline from the time he left Italy;
and feeling his end approach, he prepared himself for it by religious
meditation, by acts of charity, and by a most conscientious
distribution by will of all his worldly possessions to his relatives
and friends. At length, after protracted suffering, this great and
most extraordinary man died at Cloux, near Amboise, May 2, 1519, being
then in his sixty-seventh year. It is to be regretted that we cannot
wholly credit the beautiful story of his dying in the arms of Francis
I., who, as it is said, had come to visit him on his death-bed. It
would indeed have been, as Fuseli expressed it, "an honor to the king,
by which destiny would have atoned to that monarch for his future
disaster at Pavia."
MICHAEL ANGELO
By ANNA JAMESON
(1474-1564)
[Illustration: Michael Angelo.]
We have spoken of Leonardo da Vinci. Michael Angelo, the other great
luminary of art, was twenty-two years younger, but the more severe and
reflective cast of his mind rendered their difference of age far less
in effect than in reality. It is usual to compare Michael Angelo with
Raphael, but he is more aptly compared with Leonardo da Vinci. All the
great artists of that time, even Raphael himself, were influenced more
or less by these two extraordinary men, but they exercised no
influence on each other. They started from opposite points; they
pursued throughout their whole existence, and in all they planned and
achieved, a course as different as their respective characters.
Michael Angelo Buonarroti was born at Setignano, near Florence, in the
year 1474. He was descended from a family once noble--even among the
noblest of the feudal lords of Northern Italy--the Counts of Canossa;
but that branch of it represented by his father, Luigi Leonardo
Buonarroti Simoni, had for some generations become poorer and poorer,
until the last descendant was thankful to accept an office in the law,
and had been nominated magistrate or mayor (_Podesta_) of Chiusi. In
this situation he had limited his ambition to the prospect of seeing
his eldest son a notary or advocate in his native city. The young
Michael Angelo showed the utmost distaste for the studies allotted to
him, and was continually escaping from his home and from his desk to
haunt the ateliers of the painters, particularly that of Ghirlandajo
who was then at the height of his reputation.
The father of Michael Angelo, who found his family increase too
rapidly for his means, had destined some of his sons for commerce (it
will be recollected that in Genoa and Florence the most powerful
nobles were merchants or manufacturers), and others for civil or
diplomatic employments; but the fine arts, as being at that time
productive of little honor or emolument, he held in no esteem, and
treated these tastes of his eldest son sometimes with contempt and
sometimes even with harshness. Michael Angelo, however, had formed
some friendships among the young painters, and particularly with
Francesco Granacci, one of the best pupils of Ghirlandajo; he
contrived to borrow models and drawings, and studied them in secret
with such persevering assiduity and consequent improvement, that
Ghirlandajo, captivated by his genius, undertook to plead his cause to
his father, and at length prevailed over the old man's family pride
and prejudices. At the age of fourteen Michael Angelo was received
into the studio of Ghirlandajo as a regular pupil, and bound to him
for three years; and such was the precocious talent of the boy, that,
instead of being paid for his instruction, Ghirlandajo undertook to
pay the father, Leonardo Buonarroti, for the first, second, and third
years, six, eight, and twelve golden florins, as payment for the
advantage he expected to derive from the labor of the son. Thus was
the vocation of the young artist decided for life.
At that time Lorenzo the Magnificent reigned over Florence. He had
formed in his palace and gardens a collection of antique marbles,
busts, statues, fragments, which he had converted into an academy for
the use of young artists, placing at the head of it as director a
sculptor of some eminence, named Bertoldo. Michael Angelo was one of
the first who, through the recommendation of Ghirlandajo, was received
into this new academy, afterward so famous and so memorable in the
history of art. The young man, then not quite sixteen, had hitherto
occupied himself chiefly in drawing; but now, fired by the beauties he
beheld around him, and by the example and success of a fellow-pupil,
Torregiano, he set himself to model in clay, and at length to copy in
marble what was before him; but, as was natural in a character and
genius so steeped in individuality, his copies became not so much
imitations of form as original embodyings of the leading idea. For
example: his first attempt in marble, when he was about fifteen, was a
copy of an antique mask of an old laughing Faun; he treated this in a
manner so different from the original, and so spirited as to excite
the astonishment of Lorenzo de Medici, who criticised it, however,
saying, "Thou shouldst have remembered that old folks do not retain
all their teeth; some of them are always wanting." The boy struck the
teeth out, giving it at once the most grotesque expression; and
Lorenzo, infinitely amused, sent for his father and offered to attach
his son to his own particular service, and to undertake the entire
care of his education. The father consented, on condition of
receiving for himself an office under the government, and thenceforth
Michael Angelo was lodged in the palace of the Medici and treated by
Lorenzo as his son.
Michael Angelo continued his studies under the auspices of Lorenzo;
but just as he had reached his eighteenth year he lost his generous
patron, his second father, and was thenceforth thrown on his own
resources. It is true that the son of Lorenzo, Piero de Medici,
continued to extend his favor to the young artist, but with so little
comprehension of his genius and character, that on one occasion,
during the severe winter of 1494, he set him to form a statue of snow
for the amusement of his guests.
Michael Angelo, while he yielded, perforce, to the caprices of his
protector, turned the energies of his mind to a new study--that of
anatomy--and pursued it with all that fervor which belonged to his
character. His attention was at the same time directed to literature,
by the counsels and conversations of a very celebrated scholar and
poet then residing in the court of Piero--Angelo Poliziano; and he
pursued at the same time the cultivation of his mind and the practice
of his art. Engrossed by his own studies, he was scarcely aware of
what was passing around him, nor of the popular intrigues which were
preparing the ruin of the Medici; suddenly this powerful family were
flung from sovereignty to temporary disgrace and exile; and Michael
Angelo, as one of their retainers, was obliged to fly from Florence,
and took refuge in the city of Bologna. During the year he spent there
he found a friend, who employed him on some works of sculpture; and on
his return to Florence he executed a Cupid in marble, of such beauty
that it found its way into the cabinet of the Duchess of Mantua as a
real antique. On the discovery that the author of this beautiful
statue was a young man of two-and-twenty, the Cardinal San Giorgio
invited him to Rome, and for some time lodged him in his palace. Here
Michael Angelo, surrounded and inspired by the grand remains of
antiquity, pursued his studies with unceasing energy; he produced a
statue of Bacchus, which added to his reputation; and in 1500, at the
age of five-and-twenty, he produced the famous group of the dead
Christ on the knees of his Virgin Mother (called the "Pieta"), which
is now in the church of St. Peter's, at Rome; this last being
frequently copied and imitated, obtained him so much applause and
reputation, that he was recalled to Florence, to undertake several
public works, and we find him once more established in his native city
in the year 1502.
In 1506 Michael Angelo was summoned to Rome by Pope Julius II., who,
while living, had conceived the idea of erecting a most splendid
monument to perpetuate his memory. For this work, which was never
completed, Michael Angelo executed the famous statue of Moses, seated,
grasping his flowing beard with one hand, and with the other
sustaining the tables of the Law. While employed on this tomb, the
pope commanded him to undertake also the decoration of the ceiling of
the Sistine Chapel. Pope Sixtus IV. had, in the year 1473, erected
this famous chapel, and summoned the best painters of that time,
Signorelli, Cosimo Roselli, Perugino, and Ghirlandajo, to decorate the
interior; but down to the year 1508 the ceiling remained without any
ornament; and Michael Angelo was called upon to cover this enormous
vault, a space of one hundred and fifty feet in length by fifty in
breadth, with a series of subjects representing the most important
events connected, either literally or typically, with the fall and
redemption of mankind.
No part of Michael Angelo's long life is so interesting, so full of
characteristic incident, as the history of his intercourse with Pope
Julius II., which began in 1505, and ended only with the death of the
pope in 1513.