by Grant Allen
Compare these works with those in the predella of the Agnolo Gaddi, where the story of Joachim and Anna, with which you are now, I hope, familiar, is similarly related. Joachim expelled from the Temple, with the angel announcing to him the future birth of the Virgin, ought by this time to be a transparent scene. In the Meeting at the Golden Gate you will recognise the angel who brings together the heads of wife and husband, as in the lunette at Santa Maria Novella. The Birth of the Virgin has, in a very simple form, all the characteristic elements of this picture. So has the Presentation in the Temple, with its flight of steps and its symbolical building. Most interesting of all is the Annunciation, which should be closely compared with similar representations.
Beneath this Agnolo Gaddi, again, is a small series, also attributed to Giotto, of the life of St. Francis. The scenes are the conventional ones: compare with Santa Croce: St. Francis divesting himself of his clothes and worldly goods to become the spouse of poverty: St. Peter shows Innocent III. in a dream the falling church (St. John Lateran at Rome) sustained by St. Francis: The Confirmation of the Rules of the Order. St. Francis appears in a chariot of fire (121). He descends to be present at the martyrdom of Franciscan brothers at Ceuta, etc. The scene of St. Francis receiving the Stigmata is closely similar (with its six-winged seraph and its two little churches) to the great altar-piece from San Francesco at Pisa, now preserved in the Louvre. Note its arrangement. Next it on the left, St. Francis appearing at Arles while St. Anthony of Padua is preaching, recalls the fresco in Santa Croce. Indeed, all the members of this little series may be very well collated with the frescoes of similar scenes in the Bardi Chapel. (Go also to Santa Trinità for the Ghirlandajos.)
On the end wall, 129, is an altar-piece of the Coronation of the Virgin, with attendant saints. All are named on the frame; so are the painters. Observe the saints and their symbols — especially Santa Felicità, for whose convent it was painted. Notice also the usual group of angels playing musical instruments, who develop later into such beautiful accessories. It may be worth while to note that these early altar-pieces give types for the faces of the apostles and saints which can afterward be employed to elucidate works of the Renaissance, especially Last Suppers. Left panel, Spinello: centre, Lorenzo: right, Niccolò.
To the right of the door are two stories from the life of St. Nicholas of Bari. In the upper one, he appears in the sky to resuscitate a dead child, where the double figure, dead and living, is characteristic. For the legends in full you must see Mrs. Jameson.
In 134, the Presentation in the Temple, by Ambrogio Lorenzetti (one of the best of the early School of Siena), note the positions of St. John and the Madonna, St. Simeon and St. Anne, whose names are legibly inscribed on their haloes. Observe also the architecture of the temple, and note that in early pictures churches and other buildings are represented as interiors by the simple device of removing one side, exactly as in a doll’s house.
LORENZETTI. — PRESENTATION IN THE TEMPLE.
All the early altar-pieces on this wall deserve attention. Do not omit St. Nicholas of Bari throwing the three purses as a dowry into the window of the poor nobleman with three starving daughters. One is already thrown and being presented: the saint is holding the other two. St. Nicholas was the patron saint of pawnbrokers (they “freely lend to all the poor who leave a pledge behind”), hence his three golden balls are the badge of that trade.
Number 137 represents the Annunciation, with saints, among whom St. John of Florence and St. Dominic are conspicuous. All are named on the frame, and should be separately identified. The wall behind the Madonna and angel, the curtain, and the bedroom in the background, are all conventional. Notice the frequent peacocks’ wings given to Gabriel. Observe, in the predella, Pope Gregory the Great, with the dove whispering at his ear as always. I do not particularise in these altar-pieces, because, as a rule, the names of the saints are marked, and all you require is the time to study them. The longer you look, the better will you understand Italian art in general.
The next picture, 139, shows itself doubly to be a Franciscan and a Florentine picture. It has the Medici saint, St. Lawrence, beside the Florentine St. John the Baptist; while on the other side stand St. Francis and St. Stephen, the latter, as often, with the stones of his martyrdom on his head, and in the rich dress of a deacon. The donor was probably a Catherine, because (though it was painted for a Franciscan convent of Santa Chiara, as the inscription states) at the Madonna’s side stand St. Catherine of Siena, the Dominican nun, and St. Catherine of Alexandria, the princess, with her wheel. In the predella, observe the Adoration of the Magi, where attitudes, camels, and other details, lead up in many ways to later treatments.
Number 140 is a characteristic Holy Trinity, with St. Romuald the Abbot and St. Andrew the Apostle. The chief subject of the predella is the Temptation of St. Anthony. In another predella, below it, notice the Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple and the Marriage of the Virgin, all the elements in which should be closely compared with the frescoes at Santa Croce.
Number 143 is an Annunciation, by Don Lorenzo Monaco, where the floating angel, just alighting on his errand, and the shrinking Madonna, represent an alternative treatment of the subject from that in Neri di Bicci. Look out in future for these floating Gabriels. Note that while no marked division here exists between Gabriel and Our Lady, the two figures are yet isolated in separate compartments of the tabernacle. The saints are named. St. Proculus shows this work to have been probably painted for a citizen of Bologna, of which town he is patron, though it comes here direct from the Badia in Florence.
Number 147 introduces us to a different world. It was usual in mediæval Florence to give a bride a chest to hold her trousseau, and the fronts of such chests were often painted. This example represents a marriage between the Adimari and Ricasoli families, and is interesting from the point of view of costume and fashion. The loggia is that of the Adimari family.
The Neri di Bicci, 148, uninteresting as art, has curious types of St. Mary Magdalen, St. Margaret, St. Agnes, and St. Catherine, each with her symbol. These insipid saints have little but their symbolical significance to recommend them; yet they deserve attention as leading up to later representations.
On the window wall, notice 155, a picture which seems to lead up to or reflect the manner of Botticelli.
Near the door, 164, a Luca Signorelli is not a pleasing example of the great master. The Archangel St. Michael, weighing souls, and Gabriel bearing the lily of the Annunciation, are the best elements. The Child is also well painted, and the faces of St. Ambrose and St. Athanasius below are full of character.
The next room, the Sala Seconda, is chiefly interesting as containing, on an easel in the centre, * *Ghirlandajo’s magnificent Adoration of the Shepherds. In its wealth of detail and allusiveness, its classical touches and architecture, its triumphal arch, its sarcophagus, etc., this is a typical Renaissance work. As commonly happens with Ghirlandajo, the shepherds are clearly portraits, and admirable portraits, of contemporary Florentines. Notice the beautiful iris on the right representing the Florentine lily, also the goldfinch, close to the Divine Child, and Joseph’s saddle to the left. The distance represents the Approach of the Magi, and may be well compared with the Gentile da Fabriano. Note how the Oriental character of the head-dress survives. The landscape, though a little hard, is fine and realistic. The contrast between the ruined temple and the rough shed built over it is very graphic. Not a detail of the technique should be left unnoticed. Observe, for example, the exquisite painting of the kneeling shepherd’s woollen cap, and the straws and thatch throughout the picture. The Madonna is characteristic of the Florentine ideal of Ghirlandajo’s period. The ox and ass, on the other hand, are a little unworthy of so great an artist.
On the walls of this room are pictures, mostly of secondary interest, belonging to the age of the High Renaissance. To the right of the door are a series of good heads by Fra Bartolommeo, the best of which is that of St. Dominic, with his
finger to his lips, to enforce the Dominican rule of silence.
Above them, a fine Madonna and Child by Mariotto Albertinelli, where the figures of St. Dominic with his lily, St. Nicholas of Bari with his three golden balls, and the ascetic St. Jerome with his cardinal’s hat and lion, will now be familiar. But the finest figure is that with a sword, to the left, representing St. Julian, the patron saint of Rimini. The fly-away little angels and the unhappy canopy foreshadow the decadence.
Better far is Mariotto’s Annunciation, adjacent, where the addition of the heavenly choir above is a novel feature. The shrinking position of the Madonna may well be compared with the earlier specimens, and with the beautiful Andrea del Sarto in the Uffizi.
Beyond, 171 and 173, are two Madonnas by Fra Bartolommeo, which may be taken as typical specimens of his style in fresco. Compare with the heads to the left in order to form your conception of this great but ill-advised painter, who led the way to so much of the decadence.
Between them is 172, also by Fra Bartolommeo: Savonarola in the character of St. Peter Martyr, a forcible but singularly unpleasant portrait.
Above it, 170, Fra Paolino, Madonna and Child with saints, is interesting as showing the grouping that came in with the High Renaissance, and the transformation effected in the character of the symbols. These canopied thrones belong to the age of Fra Bartolommeo. The Magdalen can only be known by her box of ointment. St. Catherine of Siena, to whom the infant Christ extends a hand, seems to be painted just for the sake of her drapery. St. Dominic with his lily becomes an insipid monk, and even the ascetic face of St. Bernardino of Siena almost loses its distinctive beauty. The attitude of St. Anthony of Padua, pointing with his hand in order to call St. Catherine’s attention to what is happening, as though she were likely to overlook it, is in the vilest taste. Altogether, a sad falling off from the purity and spirituality of the three great rooms of Botticelli and Perugino. This picture comes from the convent of Santa Caterina in Florence.
Number 174, the Madonna letting drop the Sacra Cintola to St. Thomas, is a far more pleasing specimen of Fra Paolino. The kneeling Thomas has dignity and beauty, and is not entirely painted for the sake of his feet. St. Francis is a sufficiently commonplace monk, but St. John the Baptist has not wholly lost his earlier beauty. The tomb full of lilies is pleasingly rendered, and the figures of St. Elizabeth of Hungary (or is it St. Rose?) and St. Ursula with her arrow behind have simplicity and dignity. This is of course a Franciscan picture: it comes from the convent of St. Ursula in Florence. The little frieze of saints by Michele Ghirlandajo, beneath it, is worthy of notice. The second of the series is Santa Reparata.
The other pictures in this room can, I think, be sufficiently interpreted by the reader in person.
Number 177 is by Sogliani, the angel Raphael, with Tobias and the fish. As the angel carries the sacred remedy, this was probably a blindness ex voto. To the left is St. Augustine.
The Pietà, above, by Fra Bartolommeo and Fra Paolino, is noticeable for its Dominican saints. You will know them by this time.
A second group of the Madonna letting drop her girdle to St. Thomas, by Sogliani, may be instructively compared with Fra Paolino.
The late Renaissance pictures on the rest of the wall need little comment. The Sala Terza contains works of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, mostly as unpleasant as theatrical gesture and false taste can make them.
CARLO DOLCI. — ETERNAL FATHER.
Number 198, Alessandro Allori’s Annunciation, while preserving many of the traditional features, is yet a noble and valuable monument of absolute vulgarity. The fly-away Gabriel, with coarsely painted lily, the cloud on which he rests in defiance of gravitation, the cherubs behind, the third-rate actress who represents Our Lady, the roses on the floor, and the attitudes of the hands in both the chief characters, are as vile as Allori could make them. But the crowning point of bad taste in this picture is surely the eldest of the boy-angels, just out of school, and apparently sprawling in ambush on a cloud to play some practical joke on an unseen person. Comparison of this hateful Annunciation with the purity and simplicity of Fra Angelico’s at San Marco will give you a measure of the degradation of sacred art under the later Medici.
Number 203, Carlo Dolci’s Eternal Father, may be taken as in another way a splendid specimen of false sentiment and bad colouring.
Number 205, Cigoli’s St. Francis, admirably illustrates the attempt on the part of an artist who does not feel to express feeling.
Most of these pictures deserve some notice because, as foils to the earlier works, they excellently exhibit the chief faults to be avoided in painting. Sit in front of them, and then look through the open door at the great Ghirlandajo, if you wish to measure the distance that separates the fifteenth from the later sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Cigoli’s Martyrdom of Stephen, however, has rather more merit both in drawing and colouring; and one or two of the other pictures in the room just serve to redeem it from utter nothingness. Such as they are, the reader will now be able to understand them for himself without further description.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE HALL OF FRA ANGELICO.
Return through the Cupola and the first part of the Corridor to the room on the left, the Sala del Beato Angelico. This room contains numerous smaller works of Fra Angelico and his contemporaries.
Left of the door, 227, is a Fra Angelico, Madonna and Child enthroned, under a niche, with Franciscan and Medici saints on either side. This work is interesting for the transitional stage it shows in the development of these Madonna pictures. The saints are now grouped in a comparatively natural manner, but the arches behind them show reminiscences of the earlier tabernacle and altar-piece arrangement. On the left of the throne, on a raised marble daïs, a step below the level of Our Lady, stand the Medici saints, Cosimo and Damian, in their red deacons’ robes, with their boxes of ointment and palms of martyrdom (note here as always that the most important saints for the purpose of the picture are to the Madonna’s right, and the spectator’s left). On the opposite side, balancing them, and equally raised on the daïs, are St. John the Evangelist and St. Lawrence with his deacon’s robe and palm of martyrdom. Below, on the ground, stand the Dominican St. Peter Martyr, with his wounded head, and the Franciscan St. Francis, with the Stigmata, in the robes of their orders. Observe that the later historical saints stand on a lower level than their legendary predecessors. The face and dress of the Madonna, the stiff draped Giottesque child, the star on Our Lady’s shoulder, and many other accessories deserve close study. This picture is one which marks time in the progress of painting. Compare the arrangement of saints here with the Giottesque altar-pieces just outside, and then with the quite naturalistic arrangements in the three rooms of the great fifteenth century painters.
Left of these works begins a series by Fra Angelico of the Life of Christ, — small panel pictures (from the doors of a press in the Annunziata), some of them of comparatively little artistic merit, but all interesting from the point of view of development. (The first three, as they stand, do not seem to me to be Fra Angelico’s at all.) Notice particularly the scene of the Baptism, for comparison with the Verrocchio in an adjoining room. The position of the Baptist and the small symbolical Jordan are highly typical. Verses from the Vulgate beneath explain the subjects. Above are prophecies from the Old Testament, supposed to foreshadow the events here pictured. In 234, an Annunciation, with its loggia and garden background, is very noteworthy. Here, only a doorway separates the Madonna from the announcing angel. The Adoration of the Magi in the same set may be well compared with Gentile da Fabriano. The Massacre of the Innocents, on the other hand, shows Fra Angelico’s marked inability to deal with dramatic action, and especially with scenes of cruelty. In the Sacred Wheel, in 235, observe the curious figures of the four Evangelists, at the cardinal points of the centre, each with human body, but with the head of his beast as a symbol. The whole of this mystic wheel, explained by its inscriptions, deserves close a
ttention. The Circumcision and the *Flight into Egypt below are entirely conventional. Note the inefficient drawing of the ass. Compare the St. Joseph with that in the upper panel of 236, the Nativity, where the type of this saint continually repeated by Fra Angelico will become apparent. In 237, * *Judas Receiving the Money is especially spirited: the dramatic element is rare in Fra Angelico. The Last Supper, close by, is noteworthy as a historical delineation, for comparison with the mystical one on the walls of San Marco. The scenes of the Buffeting and the Flagellation again exhibit Fra Angelico’s limitations. I advise attentive study of all these little works, many of which are of high merit: make careful comparisons with the same subjects in the Giottos and elsewhere.
FRA ANGELICO. — ST. COSIMO AND ST. DAMIAN.
Number 243, also by Fra Angelico, contains a graphic account of the * *history of St. Cosimo and St. Damian, the holy physicians who despised money, and who in the lower left hand compartment are represented as declining the heavy fees proffered by a wealthy woman. (Or rather, St. Cosimo refuses, and St. Damian accepts, because the lady asks him to take it in the name of the Lord.) The other subjects relate the trial of the two saints, with their three younger brethren, and the attempts successively made to drown them, from which death they are saved by angels; to burn them alive, when the flames seize upon their persecutors; to crucify and stone them, when the stones recoil on the heads of the senders and the arrows bend round to strike the assailants; and finally the last successful effort to behead them — a punishment which no saint except St. Denis ever survives. This is a very miraculous story, delineated with perfect faith and naïveté, in a series of exquisite miniatures, far superior in execution to the Life of Christ. They formed a gradino at the Annunziata. Observe the complete mediævalism of the details, untouched as yet by the slightest Renaissance tendency. The Roman official who condemns them is dressed like a Florentine gentleman of the period; there is no archæology.
