The Garden of Earthly Delights by Jheronimus Bosch:
An Online Interactive Adventure
Forgotten Artists: Anon. (Maestro del Trionfo della Morte): Il trionfo della morte (The Triumph of Death)
The Triumph of Death is a fresco in the Regional Gallery of Palazzo Abatellis in Palermo, southern Italy. It is considered one of the most representative works of the late Gothic painting in Italy. The author of the work, which is dated around 1446, is unknown. The work comes from the court of Palazzo Sclafani, also in Palermo. Due to its highly refined style, it is thought to have been commissioned directly by the Aragonese Kings of Naples, probably to a Catalan or Provençal artist. The theme of the "Triumph of Death" was already widespread in Europe during the 14th century, but here is represented with a particular stress on macabre and grotesque themes characterized by a cruel appearance, all features rare in Italy. Names proposed for the author include Guillaume Spicre from Bourgogne.
Two Mona Lisas?
Did Leonardo paint an earlier version of Lisa del Giocondo? A lot of documentation seems to suggest as much... and a number of art historians feel that the so-called "Isleworth Mona Lisa" may have been the original portrait of Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo, painted for her husband, Francesco del Giocondo... and according to several accounts by Leonardo's contemporaries, left unfinished. In contrast, the finished Mona Lisa in the Louvre is suggested to have been painted well over a decade later for Giuliano de' Medici and shows the same woman, Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo, no longer in early twenties, but now in her mid- thirties.
Based upon historical documentation, a good many art historians have long held the theory of "two Mona Lisas". Leonardo's habit of creating multiples or variations upon the same painting has long been established:
Two paintings of The Virgin of the Rocks
Two paintings of The Madonna of the Yarnwinder
- Three variations upon The Virgin and St. Anne.
These two paintings of The Madonna of the Yarnwinder are generally accepted as being at least partially by Leonardo's hand. Certainly the composition and the under-drawing... which shows pentimenti or experimental changes made to the composition in both instances... is from Leonardo.
In the instance of the third painting of The Virgin and St. Anne, it is believed this was the product of Leonardo's studio or workshop.
The history of the portrait(s) of Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo is not without historical documentation. The initial commission for the portrait was undertaken for her husband, Francesco del Giocondo, shortly after her marriage. Agostino Vespucci, relative to the explorer Amerigo Vespucci, writes of having witnessed Leonardo working upon the portrait of Lisa del Giocondo in 1503. He also notes that Leonardo had adopted the then popular habit of leaving the painting unfinished in the recorded manner of the Greek painter, Apelles. This unfinished manner is corroborated by Vasari who writes that the portrait undertaken for Francesco del Giocondo was labored over for 4 years... then left unfinished. But the Mona Lisa in the Louvre is clearly a finished painting, leaving us with a discrepancy.
In his well-known (in academic circles) travel journal, Antonio de Beatis writes of a meeting with Leonardo and Cardinal Luigi d'Aragona in 1517... some 14 years after Vespucci's having recorded seeing Leonardo on work on the portrait of Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo. Antonio de Beatis records in his journal that Leonardo showed them a portrait of a Florentine woman commissioned by the magnificent Giuliano de' Medici. He writes that this was among three "finished" paintings that Leonardo showed to him and the Cardinal at that meeting. Most historians acknowledge that this was the painting of Mona Lisa now in the Louvre... a finished painting... and one that employed a glazing technique that Leonardo only began to use after returning from Milan in 1508, where he likely came upon the oil paintings of Antonella da Messina (who first brought oil painting to Italy) or one of his followers.
This lends further credence to the supposition that a recently discovered portrait of an Italian "princess" thought by some historians to have been Beatrice d'Este...
...sister of Isabella d'Este, wife of Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan (who had commissioned The Last Supper), may actually be the "missing" portrait of Isabella that Leonardo was thought to have painted. At least a single drawing of Isabella by Leonardo has survived...
... and this painting attributed to Leonardo bears an uncanny resemblance to a miniature portrait of Isabella from the same period...
... and even Titian's later portrait of Isabella:
Did Leonardo first experiment in Milan with the oil glazing techniques he would employ on the Louvre's Mona Lisa?
And then we have this famous little sketch...
... Raphael's drawing of 1504 made during a visit to Leonardo's studio. The experience would also inspire the younger artist's paintings from 1505:
-Lady with a Unicorn
... and 1506:
-Portrait of Maddalena Doni
Like Raphael's sketch, the Lady with the Unicorn, and early copies of the Mona Lisa...
... show the sitter upon a balcony flanked by columns. But only the base of these columns are suggested in the Louvre Mona Lisa...
... yet recent analysis undertaken by the Louvre submit that the painting shows no sign of ever having been cropped... further advancing the theory that there were at least two distinctly different portraits: the one seen by Raphael, Agostino Vespucci, and Vasari and undertaken for Francesco del Giocondo... and a second painting seen a decade and a half later by Antonio de Beatis and Cardinal Luigi d'Aragona as having been painted for Giuliano de' Medici.
The Renaissance art historian, Giovanni Lomazzo, refers in his Trattato dell'arte della Pittura Scultura ed Architettura, published 1584, to "della Gioconda, e di Mona Lisa ("the Gioconda, and the Mona Lisa"). This reference further supports the notion that there were, in fact, two separate paintings.
But if there were two Mona Lisas, the painting in the Louvre, and an earlier unfinished painting... where is the earlier work? Shortly before World War I, English art collector Hugh Blaker discovered a painting of Mona Lisa in the home of a Somerset nobleman in whose family it had been for nearly 100 years. This discovery reinforced Blaker's firmly held conjecture that Leonardo painted two portraits of Lisa del Giocondo: the famous one in the Louvre, and possibly the one discovered by Blaker, who bought the painting and took it to his studio in Isleworth, London, from which it takes its name.
Modern technology applied to the study of the "Isleworth Mona Lisa" has found nothing inconsistent with it having been at the very least, a painting of the period of Leonardo. Further mathematical analysis find that when adjusted to the same scale, the two paintings correlate exactly in spite of their difference in size:
Of course Leonardo was fascinated with mathematics and employed such measurements and ratios in the creation of his paintings...
... and this is something a copyist or follower is not likely to pick up on... especially when the two paintings are of differing sizes. And then we have the age difference of the two sitters. The "Isleworth Mona Lisa" suggests a much younger woman than that of the Louvre's Mona Lisa... which again would suggest that the Louvre painting was of the same woman... aged 15 years older.
Some observers have suggested the two paintings look like the portrait of two sisters... one a decade or so older than the other... or a portrait of mother and daughter.
Is the Isleworth Mona Lisa truly Leonardo's first portrait of Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo? Obviously we can never know for certain. Ultimately, it remains... like the portrait of Mona Lisa herself... an enigmatic mystery.
(Interesting short video on the subject:
stlukesguild reblogged
Glass Window Panel, Fragment, 15th century. England
Lorenzo Ghiberti: The Gates of Paradise
Lorenzo di Cione Ghiberti, one of the most influential artists of the early Renaissance, was born in Pelgao, near Florence, Italy, in 1378. He was educated by his father, Bartoluccio Ghiberti, a well-respected goldsmith in Florence. A child prodigy, he passed the examination to become a guild master goldsmith by 1398 and received his first commission shortly thereafter.
In 1400, he traveled to Rimini to escape the plague in Florence and received further training as a painter, assisting in the completion of wall frescoes at the Castle of Carlo I Malatesta.
In 1401, Lorenzo Ghiberti began work for a commission sponsored by the Arte di Calimala (Cloth Importers Guild) to make a pair of bronze doors for the Baptistery of Florence. Seven finalists, including Filippo Brunelleschi, Donatello, Jacopo della Quercia, and Ghiberti, worked for a year to depict in bronze the story of Abraham’s call to sacrifice his son Isaac. In the end, it came down to two artists, Ghiberti and Brunelleschi.
-The Sacrifice of Isaac- Brunelleschi
-The Sacrifice of Isaac- Ghiberti
Brunelleschi’s version emphasized the violence, while Ghiberti devised a calmer, more lyrical composition. To our eyes, the Brunelleschi seems more powerful and “modern.” But Brunelleschi’s determination to cram as many attention-grabbing devices into one work may have seemed willful to 15th-century Florentine jurors. Certainly, Ghiberti’s craftmanship was superior; unlike Brunelleschi, who soldered his panel from many separate pieces of bronze, Ghiberti cast his in just two, and he used only two-thirds as much metal—a not-inconsiderable savings. The combination of craft and parsimony would have appealed to the practical-minded men of the Calimala.
Ross King's book, Brunelleschi's Dome, offers a fascinating view of the competition for the commission of the doors and subsequent competition between the two artists. Brunelleschi would turn away from sculpture and focus upon architecture, becoming one of the towering geniuses of the Renaissance... in many ways a model for the ideal of the "Renaissance Man" as exemplified by Leonardo and Michelangelo.
Ghiberti's victory in the competition would eventually result in two sets of doors. The original plan had been for the first set of doors to depict various scenes from the Old Testament, but the plan was later expanded to include scenes from the New Testament. These doors were to be placed at the Northern entrance to the Baptistery in compliment to Andrea Pisano's door on the South side of the Baptistery, completed in 1336:
-Andrea Pisano- South Doors of the Baptistery of Florence
-Lorenzo Ghiberti- North Doors to the Baptistery of Florence
Ghiberti spent 21 years laboring upon the the doors, completing the work in 1424. In Ghiberti’s North Doors contain 14 quatrefoil-framed scenes from the life of Christ, the evangelists and the church fathers. In rendering the doors, Ghiberti adopted the linear grace of the early 15th century gothic style of Florence to the expressive power of the newer Renaissance style. The result was a heightened illusion of depth.
By the time of the completion of the Doors, Ghiberti was widely recognized as a celebrity and the top artist in this field. Along with the production of the Doors, Ghiberti worked upon designs for stained glass windows, acted as an architectural consultant on several projects, and created two major bronze sculptures of the Biblical figures of St. John the Baptist and St. Matthew.
-St. John the Baptist
-St. Matthew
These bronze figures were placed in niches in the Orsanmichele, along side sculptural figures by Nanni di Banco, Andrea del Verrocchio, Donatello, and Giambologna.
Ghiberti fame and reputation was such that he was showered with commissions, including one from the Pope. In 1425, however, he would be given his most important commission... that for a second set of doors for the Baptistery of Florence... this time for the East side of the Baptistery. He and his workshop (which employed many assistants including talented masters in their own right such as Michelozzo, Paolo Uccello and Benozzo Gozzoli) toiled for 27 years, upon the project... far excelling themselves... and in the process producing one of the greatest works of the Italian Renaissance.
After completing the first set of doors for the Baptistery of Florence, Lorenzo Ghiberti embarked upon an intense exploration of new ways of forming pictorial space and lifelike figures to occupy it. Historians believe that Ghiberti encountered Leon Battista Alberti, a young humanist scholar who, inspired by the art of Florence, composed theoretical treatises on the visual arts. Ghiberti was also influenced by 11th century Arab polymath Alhazen, whose Book of Optics, about the optical basis of perspective, was translated into Italian during the 14th century.
Ghiberti incorporated these techniques into the Baptistery’s next set of bronze doors, considered his greatest work. Dubbed the “Gates of Paradise” by Michelangelo, each door portrays five scenes from the Old Testament. In the individual panels, Ghiberti used a painter’s point-of-view to heighten the illusion of depth. He also extended that illusion by having the figures closer to the viewer extend outward, appearing almost fully round, with some of the heads standing completely free from the background. Figures in the background are accented with barely raised lines that appear flatter against the background. This “sculpture’s” aerial perspective gives the illusion that the figures become less distinct as they appear farther from the viewer.
Ghiberti employed the recently discovered principles of perspective to give depth to his compositions. Each panel depicts more than one episode. In "The Story of Joseph" is portrayed the narrative scheme of Joseph Cast by His Brethren into the Well, Joseph Sold to the Merchants, The merchants delivering Joseph to the pharaoh, Joseph Interpreting the Pharaoh's dream, The Pharaoh Paying him Honour, Jacob Sends His Sons to Egypt and Joseph Recognizes His Brothers and Returns Home. According to Vasari's Lives, this panel was the most difficult and also the most beautiful.
Having said that, I must admit that my personal favorite panel is that of the Creation of Adam, the Creation of Eve, the Fall, and the Expulsion:
The figures are distributed in very low relief in a perspective space (a technique invented by Donatello and called rilievo schiacciato, which literally means "flattened relief".) Ghiberti uses different sculptural techniques, from incised lines to almost free-standing figure sculpture, within the panels, further accentuating the sense of space.
Michelangelo referred to these doors as fit to be the "Gates of Paradise" (It. Porte del Paradiso), and they are still invariably referred to by this name. Giorgio Vasari described them a century later as "undeniably perfect in every way and must rank as the finest masterpiece ever created". Ghiberti himself said they were "the most singular work that I have ever made".
I must certainly agree with Michelangelo, Vasari, and Ghiberti.
*****
After 27 years of careful restoration, The Gates of Paradise (Michelangelo’s naming of Lorenzo Ghiberti’s Renaissance work) were put on public display once again in September, 2012. The original resting place of the doors, the Baptistry of San Giovanni, has been donned with replicas since the restoration began. The doors will not be sent back to the Baptistry of San Giovanni, but instead they will be displayed at the Museo dell’Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore; they are to be kept in glass cases filled with nitrogen to prevent future damage.
Made more than 500 years ago, the doors weigh around nine tons and are made of bronze and layered with gold. There are ten panels, each representing a different story from the Old Testament - from the creation of Adam and Eve to the battle of David and Goliath.
During World War II, the “Doors of Paradise” were temporarily removed from the baptistery to spare it from damage. Over the years the doors had become blackened by wind, water, and pollution. The most serious damage occurred as a result of the devastating flood of Florence of 1966 when the Arno breached its banks. Six of its 10 panels were ripped away by the force of the raging muddy waters. The panels were re-attached, but it became obvious that a full-scale restorantion was needed.
Ghiberti’s masterpiece is one of several Italian art treasures to end up in a museum following restoration.
The four gilded bronze horses on the facade of St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice were moved inside St. Mark’s museum in 1982 and replaced outside by copies.
In the heart of Rome, the 1,800-year-old bronze equestrian statue of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, badly eroded by pollution, was removed from its outdoor perch in 1981 atop the Capitoline Hill for restoration and is now a star of the Capitoline Museums. A replica of the statue adorns the square outside the museum.
"When you take an artwork from its original context, it is always a defeat," Cristina Acidini, a Florence museums official, told The Associated Press. However, she added, it is a "necessary process to save the original."
Giorgione and the Venetian School
I have gone out of my way to see the works of any number of artists in "real life" in retrospectives and exhibitions... but I can only think of a single exhibition that so overwhelmed me that I had to go back... driving some 400+ miles... a second time... but a single week later!
I had traveled to Washington DC with three artist friends to see an exhibition of Anselm Kiefer's paintings at the Hirschhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. The show was quite impressive... with several paintings that struck me as truly masterful. Yet at the same time I could not help but recognize that Kiefer's work was somewhat limited. So much gray!... and so many charred and wasted landscapes!... and so many allusions to the horrors of WWII and the Holocaust! It was like watching Schindler's List again and again. Now undoubtedly, Spielberg's work is a brilliant film... but how many times in a row can you watch it without wanting to slit your wrists?! I found myself calling out for something that spoke of life and sensuality and color!... and then we headed over to the National Gallery.
At the same time as the Kiefer exhibition, there in the National Gallery, Washington was a visiting exhibition of Venetian Renaissance painters... primarily Giovanni Bellini, Giorgione, and Titian.
The Italian High-Renaissance is commonly seen as being divided between the Florentine/Roman School and the Venetian School. The Florentine/Roman School, exemplified by Michelangelo and Raphael stressed sculptural form, sharp contours, clean, bright colors and even light. The Venetian School stressed color first and foremost, atmosphere, soft contours, and sensuality.
There have been many theories for the divide between the Florentine/Roman and Venetian Schools put forth by art historians... all likely containing a degree of truth. Some have pointed out the fact that the Florentine/Roman painters benefited from direct exposure to the examples of Classical Roman statuary. Others have pointed out that the Florentine/Roman preference for egg-tempera and fresco reinforced a linear/sculptural approach to painting. Some have even suggested that the homosexuality of major Florentine/Roman artists Donatello, Leonardo, Michelangelo, and others, as well as the church dictates against the use of the nude female models resulted in a focus upon the more sculptural male figure.
By way of contrast, the Venetians developed a preference for oil painting... and pushed the possibilities of this medium far further than anyone else. Up until this point, the primary approaches to painting were fresco (painting on wet plaster) and egg-tempera. Smaller "panel" paintings were rendered in egg-tempera... a fragile media that needed a stable surface such as a wood panel to minimize cracking. Egg-tempera is an incredibly time-intensive medium. To achieve the illusion of a gradual modeling of form, the painter must layer dozens... even hundreds of layers of single-hair brushstrokes in a cross-hatching method. Botticelli's masterpiece, Primavera, took over a year to complete... with the artist painting 8-12 hours a day, 6 days a week:
-Sandro Botticelli- Primavera (Spring)
Not only did egg-tempera make painting extremely time-consuming... and thus expensive... but being painted on wood panels... in the days before plywood... made the paintings... especially a large painting like Primavera... quite heavy and difficult... if not impossible... to move or transport. The medium also limited the amount of changes a painter might make to a painting. Large scale composition changes were nearly out of the question... or required the surface be sanded down and the new passages be feathered into the old.
Oil painting was developed in the North by Netherlandish painters such as Jan van Eyck:
-Jan van Eyck- Arnolfini Wedding Portrait
... and Rogier van der Weyden:
-Rogier van der Weyden- St. Luke Painting the Virgin and Child (note: this is where my moniker, Stlukesguild comes from... the legend of St. Luke painting the Virgin resulted in St. Luke becoming the patron saint of artists... and the artist's guild becoming known as the Guild of St. Luke or St. Luke's Guil)
These Flemish masters had discovered that they could achieve the most brilliant colors and the most subtle modeling of forms by the application of thin, semi-transparent layers of oil paint (known as "glazes") over an under-painting of egg-tempera. Quickly they determined that the egg-tempera could be done away with all together. Art patrons and collectors across Europe were in awe of the phenomenal detail and illusion of real space and form that the Flemish painters could achieve. Naturally, they were quite protective of their techniques.
The development of oil painting in Venice, owes much to fortune. The painter, Antonella da Messina settled in Venice, bringing with him the knowledge of the new technique.
-Antonella da Messina- Portrait of a Young Man
Antonella da Messina- St. George in his Study
There are various notions as to how da Messina acquired a grasp of oil painting, but the best theory is that he learned the technique from Jan van Eyck's pupil, Petrus Christus:
-Petrus Christus- Portrait of a Young Lady
-Petrus Christus- Deposition
As both Antonello and Petrus Christus were in Milan at the same time... and as Antonella left Milan with a grasp of oil painting while Petrus Christus soon after exhibited the first examples of the use of linear perspective in Northern painting (a development then known only to the Italians), there is a strong likelihood that the two artists exchanged "trade secrets".
Settling in Venice, the technique of oil painting spread from Da Messina to the leading Venetian painters... including Giovanni Bellini:
-Giovanni Bellini- Portrait of a Gentleman
-Giovanni Bellini- The Portrait of Doge Leonardo Loredan
The early Italian attempts at oil paint did not vary far from the Flemish models. The primary concern remained cracking, and so the paint was still applied in thin, transparent layers as it had been with egg tempera. However with the passage of time it became apparent that oil paint had a flexibility that avoided this problem. At the same time, Venice was asserting itself as a cultural center... but was unable to compete with the epic fresco paintings of Florentine masters such as Giotto, Fra Angelico, Simone Martini, Masaccio, etc... The humidity and constant flooding of Venice led to the rapid deterioration of attempts at fresco... and painting on an epic scale on wood panels was wholly impractical. Again, fortune came to the aid. They say "Necessity is the Mother of Invention."
Venice, as a great naval power, had developed into a leading maker of canvas for sails... made with Flemish linen. At some point it was recognized that the flags on ships and decorations on the sails were essentially paint on canvas, and so the artists began to experiment with oil on canvas... primed with rabbit's skin glue to avoid the deterioration of the linen fibers caused when oil came into contact with the fabric. The artists began timidly... but soon realized that oil paint held up incredibly well... and that they could work in a direct manner... without detailed drawings... immediately on the canvas... making changes as they saw fit.
For much of the later 15th century, the Bellini Family dominated painting in Venice. There was Giovanni Bellini's father, Jacopo Bellini:
-Jacopo Bellini- Annunciation
His brother, Gentile Bellini:
-Gentile Bellini- The Miracle of the Bridge of San Lorenzo
and their Brother-in-Law, Andrea Mantegna:
-Andrea Mantegna- The Arrival of the Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga
Giovanni began his career as a talented and poetic painter and was quickly recognized as the leading painter in Venice. He established stylistic conventions that would be followed by later Venetian artists such as his approach to the theme of the Madonna and Child:
Giovanni Bellini- Madonna and Child
-Giovanni Bellini- Madonna and Child
And his large altarpiece paintings that are among the first epic-scaled paintings in Venice:
Giovanni Bellini- The Baptism of Christ
Giovanni Bellini- The San Zaccaria Altarpiece
-Giovanni Bellini- The Deposition
These paintings began to establish the Venetian tradition of atmospheric painting. Bellini establishes the sfumato... the softened, smoky edges that suggests the illusion of depth as contours become increasing blurred as they recede in space. This technique will be famously adapted by Leonardo da Vinci in the landscape backgrounds of his paintings:
Leonardo da Vinci- Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo
But Bellini and the Venetians bring to this technique a brilliance of color... owed to the Flemish painters. This was achieved through layers of semi-transparent "glazes" until that the paintings literally glow like stained glass.
Bellini stands as one of the great artists of art history whose work continued to grow and develop throughout the whole of his career as the artist was ever open to ideas developed by younger artists.
The two most important younger painters in Venice were Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco (or Giorgione) c. 1477/8 – 1510, and Tiziano Vecellio (or Titian) c. 1488/1490 – 27 August 1576. In spite of his short life span and limited oeuvre, Giorgione is one of the most important painters in the history of Western Art. If the greatest loss to music due to an early death was Mozart or Schubert, Giorgione's premature death must be among the greatest losses to the visual arts.
In the ten years, from 1500 until Giorgione's death in 1510, the triumvirate of Bellini, Titian, and Giorgione... who worked so closely together... physically and stylistically... that it is often difficult 500 years later to discern who painted what... reinvented Western painting to the point that their efforts are often thought as having resulted in the "Golden Age" of oil painting.
Giorgione's early works echo elements of Bellini's portraits...
-Giorgione- Portrait of a Man
Giorgione- Portrait of a Gentleman
-Giorgione- Portrait of Francesco Rovera
Yet by the time of his Portrait of a Gentleman...
-Giorgione- Portrait of a Gentleman
... he is already suggesting stylistic elements that will later be employed by Titian...
-Titian- Portrait of a Gentleman in Blue Sleeves
... and eventually Raphael...
Raphael Sanzio d'Urbino- Portrait of Baldasarre Castiglione
and even Rembrandt:
-Rembrandt van Rijn- Sketch after Raphael's Portrait of Baldasarre Castiglione
-Rembrandt van Rijn- Self Portrait 1659
Giorgione's religious paintings build upon Bellini's use of atmosphere and brilliant color. Some art historians have suggested that these elements owe much to the natural environment of Venice... the humidity as a result of the location of Venice on the sea leading to a blurring of edges... and refraction of colors. The effect in person is almost akin to that of stained glass... as the paintings virtually glow.
-Giorgione- The Holy Family
-Giorgione- Sacrae Conversazione
-Giorgione- Sacrae Conversazione
-Giorgione- The Virgin and Child in a Landscape
-Giorgione- Judith
-Giorgione- The Adulteress Brought before Christ
-Giorgione- The Madonna and Child Enthroned
-Giorgione- The Judgment of Solomon
-Giorgione- Moses' Trial by Fire
Whatever the truth may be, few paintings have ever radiated with such rich luminosity as those of the Venetian School... and it is not surprising that many painters deem the School of Venice... from Bellini through Tintoretto, Veronese, and Tiepolo...
-Tintoretto- The Birth of the Milky Way
-Tintoretto- Marriage at Cana
Veronese- Perseus and Andromedae
-Veronese- The Rape of Europa
-Giovanni Battista Tiepolo -Apollo and Daphne
-Giovanni Battista Tiepolo- The Immaculate Conception
...as the peak of Western painting. While the art historian, Giorgio Vasari was rather dismissive of the whole Venetian School, this was to be expected. Vasari was himself a painter... deeply schooled in the lessons of the Florentine/Roman School and revered artists such as Michelangelo and Raphael who stressed line and form... drawing above all else. The Venetian School stressed color and brushwork... and as such they would become the model for all future "painterly" approaches... including Peter Paul Rubens:
-Peter Paul Rubens- The Judgment of Paris
-Peter Paul Rubens- The Feast of Venus
... Rococo painters such as Boucher...
-Francois Boucher- Portrait of Mademoiselle O'Murphy
... Romantics such as Delacroix...
-Eugene Delacroix- Algerian Women
... the Impressionists...
-Pierre Renoir- Portrait of Jeanne Samary
... and beyond:
-Henri Matisse- Seated Riffian
-Philip Guston- Zone
One of Giorgione's last religious paintings is the magnificent Adoration of the Shepherds.
-Giorgione (Bellini?)- Adoration of the Shepherds
This is one of those paintings open to dispute as to authorship. There are elements suggestive of Bellini's last paintings... especially the landscape... and some suggest it was begun by Bellini. There are also elements that point toward early Titian... and paintings such as Noli me tangere:
Titian- Noli me tangere ("Touch me not...")
Whatever the case may be, the Adoration of the Shepherds is an absolutely stunning painting... and one of my true favorites. I never fail to spend a good period of time with it whenever I visit Washington D.C. and the National Gallery. For a good many years a reproduction of this painting hung in my bedroom.
The structure or composition of paintings prior to Giorgione and the Venetian School tends to be more "obvious"... often based on geometric structures. If we were to make a comparison to literature, we might draw an analogy with formally structured works such as sonnets... or Dante's terza rima. Giorgione and the Venetian School employed a far more "organic" approach to composition. Again, if we were making a comparison with literature, we might draw a comparison with Wordsworth or Whitman and a far freer structure. Giorgione ties the Adoration of the Shepherds together with a repetition of arches... the cave mouth, the bodies of the participants, the shrubs, and even the rocks... but the effect is as if this were all natural... not as if the artist had intentionally composed the work, but rather as if he had merely painted what was before his eyes.
Giorgione's most innovative works are those that some have termed "poesies". These are paintings in which the artist has broken with the expectation that outside of the realm of portraiture (and one should remember that the genre of landscape has yet to have evolved) the goal of all painting is to illustrate a narrative... from history, from literature, from mythology... or from the Bible. The painter today takes it for granted that he or she may paint whatever comes to mind... whatever interests them. But prior to Giorgione, this was not so.
Looking at a painting such as Nymphs, Children, and Shepherds in a Landscape:
-Giorgione- Nymphs, Children, and Shepherds in a Landscape
... we are immediately baffled as to just what the hell the subject is. Ultimately, it is just what it is: nymphs, children, and shepherds lolling about in some bucolic landscape. We can struggle to uncover some Greco-Roman mythology involving Venus and other goddesses... but there are no elements to suggest such.
Let's look at another of the poesies: the Landscape with Sunset:
-Giorgione- Landscape with a Sunset
There are few (if any) true landscapes prior to those of the great German Renaissance master, Albrecht Dürer... (and we should make a note of the fact that Dürer spent a period of time in Venice where he became friends with Giovanni Bellini)
-Albrecht Dürer- House by the Pond
At a time in which travel was dangerous and the great untamed distances between cities were filled with bears and wolves and highway robbers, "nature"... and landscape... had not yet been romanticized. And yet... here Giorgione seemingly offers a painting that is first and foremost a landscape. There is a figure rearing on a horse before a serpent... possibly St. George... and there's a couple of men sitting in the foreground... one apparently helping the other with his boot (perhaps he's broken or sprained an ankle)... but the painting is essentially a landscape... if only due to the fact that no one can discern just what the subject really is.
Another painting that has similarly baffled art historians is the so-called "Tempest":
-Giorgione- The Tempest
What we are presented with is an image of a nearly-nude woman breastfeeding in the forest landscape outside a city. To the left stands a soldier, and in the distrance dark clouds and a flash of lighting suggest an on-coming storm... the "tempest" of the title. Some have suggested that the painting represents the flight of the holy family into Egypt... but to present Mary nude would have literally verged upon heresy. And where is Joseph? And who is the soldier? Where are any symbols that might lead us to recognize that this is indeed an image of the Holy Family? At a time in which painters were expected to illustrate known narratives employing recognized symbols and iconography, Giorgione has essentially invented a narrative of his own... and challenged us to interpret it.
This is as true of his stunning nude, the so-called "Dresden Venus":
Giorgione- The Dresden Venus
The absolute wealth of female nudes in Western painting has resulted in a failure by many to recognize just how innovative this painting by Giorgione was at the time. Giorgione has essentially invented the genre of the "reclining nude". Where Botticelli's Primavera revived the Greco-Roman tradition of the Three Graces...
...and his Birth of Venus...
Sandro Botticelli- The Birth of Venus
... revived the tradition of the Greco-Roman standing Venus... especially per the example of the Medici Venus...
-Roman after a Greek original: [I]The Medici Venus[/I]
... Giorgione's Dresden Venus in one fell swoop virtually establishes (or "re-establishes") the whole of the Western tradition of the "reclining nude". There were Etruscan and Roman precursors to Giorgione's reclining figure... but these are nearly all clearly portraits... or representations of Venus or other goddesses. But if we look at Giorgione's sleeping nude, there is absolutely nothing that suggests that she is indeed Venus... or any other Goddess. Giorgione has simply presented us with an image of a beautiful nude woman sleeping in the warm hills outside of Venice.
While some art historians, critics, and theorists have argued that the purpose of painting the nude must have some higher, symbolic value... Giorgione offers us nothing more than a work in which he has simply painted a beautiful nude woman because he finds her attractive... or beautiful.
The painterly manner in which Giorgione's "Venus" is rendered... the lack of hard contours and sculptural form... and the sensuality of the brushwork, the softened edges, and the warm and atmospheric color all stress the sense of touch... and suggest erotic desire as the raison d'etre.
Subsequent artists would jump upon (eek!) the subject after Giorgione opened the door. Shortly thereafter we get Titian's Venus d'Urbino:
The Rococo presents us with Bouche'r Portrait of Mademoiselle O'Murphy (seen above), and in the 19th century, we get Manet's Olympia:
-Edouard Manet- Olympia
Both Titian's and Manet's paintings outraged members of the audience for the simple reason that like Giorgione's audacious painting, they did not disguise the sexual or erotic intent behind the work. (Boucher's work was reserved for the eyes of the King of France and his inner circle).
Giorgione's most famous painting, along with the Dresden Venus, most certainly must be the stunning Fête champêtre:
Giorgione (Titian?)- Fête champêtre
This is yet another painting open to dispute with regard to authorship. Some art historians ascribe the painting to Titian... or suggest that it may have been completed by Titian, while others... pointing to the open-ended narrative... attribute the work to Giorgione. This painting again became the source of a work by Manet, Le déjeuner sur l'herbe:
-Edouard Manet- Le déjeuner sur l'herbe
Manet was astutely struck by the fact that the Fête champêtre (housed in the Louvre) was essentially nothing more than a painting of a couple of fashionable dressed young men accompanied by a couple of naked young ladies sitting about enjoying the landscape on a warm summer's day. While some have suggested that due to the manner in which the men seem oblivious to the presence of the nude women, and in consideration of the clothing suggestive of "classical" robes worn by the woman on the left, the women in the Fête champêtre are actually invisible muses... the sources of inspiration visible only in the mind's eye of the young musicians/artists in the painting. In all actuality, there is nothing to suggest that they are anything more than a couple of young naked Venetian ladies.
Manet recognized that the subject matter of the Fête champêtre... or rather its lack of any legitimate narrative... was diffused by the perfume of time. As one of the prize possessions of the Louvre, no one questioned what was really going on in the Fête champêtre... let alone dared suggest something slightly risqué or unseemly... but when Manet ironically modernized the theme matter and set the same exact subjects in a park in 19th century Paris, the result was absolute outrage.
Once again, Giorgione confronts the audience with an open-ended narrative... rather than a clear illustration of a known theme or subject using accepted symbols and iconography.
I had the chance to see the Fête champêtre in person in the National Gallery, Washington some few years ago. The painting glows and exudes a rich and luxurious sense of warmth and atmosphere. It stands among my favorite paintings of all time.
The year before he died, Giorgione completed work on the so-called Three Philosophers:
Giorgione- The Three Philosophers
The work was commissioned by Taddeo Contarini, a Venetian merchant with an interest for occult and alchemy. It was later partially reworked by Sebastiano del Piombo and the painting was cut down... somewhat unbalancing the composition. Again, the subject matter of the painting is left open-ended and uncertain. Some have suggested that the three men represent three Greek Philosophers... and there are constant disputes as to just which three philosophers.
Another intriguing interpretation suggests that the three men represent the three great Abrahamic religions: the bearded figure on the right being Moses (or Abraham), holding the law; the turbaned central figure representing Muhammad, and the young, seated figure being Matthew of Patmos writing down his visions and Revelations. But then such a subject... sympathetic to Judaism and Islam... would have been seen as even more outrageous and blatantly blasphemous than the idea of a naked Holy Virgin in "The Tempest".
Still other interpretations suggest the three represent the 3 Magi, or the ages of European Civilizations (the Classical Age, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance), or merely the Three Ages of Mankind (Youth, Middle Age, Old Age). The manner in which the young man looks into the darkened void of the cavern is especially intriguing (Matthew... Youth looking into the future?).
Considering the strength and inventiveness of Giorgione's later painting, one cannot help but feel especially saddened by the artist's premature death. Had he survived another decade or two his name would most assuredly have been immortalized or canonized along-side of the names of Michelangelo, Raphael, Leonardo, and Titian. Even so... he remains one of the towering figures of Venetian painting... a true "painter's painter."
Pieter Bruegel the Elder
Pieter Brueghel (also spelled Bruegel) c. 1525 – 9 September 1569- was a Flemish Renaissance painter and print-maker. Breughel was born the Dutch town of Breda. He apprenticed with Pieter Coecke van Aelst, whose daughter Mayken he later married. He dropped the "h" is his name in order to differentiate himself from a dynastic family of painters also named "Brueghel". He lived for a period in Antwerp before touring and studying in France and Italy. He was accepted into the painters guild (The Guild of St. Luke) in 1551 and permanently settled in Brussels 10 years later.
Brueghel began his career as something of an heir to the fantastic paintings of Hieronymus Bosch. Bosch was already dead by the time Brueghel had become a mature artist, but his work remained highly popular and there were any number of copies and forgeries. Demand for Bosch-like paintings and prints continued well into the 16th century. Hieronymus Cock, the great Flemish printer and publisher fed this demand with prints after Bosch and in the manner of Bosch. Brueghel was among the many artists who provided drawings for Cock to have engraved, and his print Big Fish Eat Little Fish was actually published attributed to Bosch... no doubt in hope for a larger audience.
Brueghel almost certainly knew of Bosch' Garden of Earthly Delights (which remained in the Netherlands until 1566) either through the original, or through one of the dozens of known copies. A good many of Brueghel's engravings employed themes and imagery similar to those of Bosch.
Like Bosch, Brueghel's paintings and engravings were commonly set among lush landscapes seen from a "bird's eye view" that were teeming with endless tiny figures... quite often engaged in all sorts of dirty deeds... all laden in symbolism and allegory. The meaning of Big Fish Eat Smaller Fish is not too difficult to discern but prints such as the suite of The Seven Deadly Sins/Vices and the Last Judgment are full of bizarre Bosch-like details that leave the viewer puzzling for hours.
Brueghel also produced a number of paintings that following in the fantastic tradition of Bosch. Among my favorites (already explored in some depth earlier in this blog) are The Fall of the Rebel Angels:
As the Rebel Angels are driven from heaven by those Angels loyal to God, they already have begun to metamorphose into strange creatures... amphibians, fish, one toad-like creature that opens his own belly to reveal his guts and eggs... and another fallen angel... the most beautiful... perhaps Lucifer himself... is blessed with the lovely wings of a butterfly. As with the "Hell" panel of Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights the viewer can virtually hear the cacophonous noise of this scene as the battle is accompanied by yelling, howling, horns blaring and bleating, the drone of a hurdy-gurdy, and the pluck of various stringed instruments. Of course Bosch takes this even further, transforming the instruments that in earthly life were the source of profane and lurid music, into the very means of torture for sinners in his hellish orchestra:
Another favorite painting by Brueghel in the tradition of Bosch is the painting entitled Dulle Griet (or "Mad Meg"). The painting portrays a tale from Flemish folklore, of a woman so driven by desire for riches that she leads an army of women in a raid on hell itself. The painting is an obvious comment on the sin of avarice.
Perhaps the greatest of Brueghel's paintings in the realm of Bosch-inspired fantasy is the harrowing Triumph of Death. In this painting, death is unrelenting and unforgiving. He shows no mercy and no concern for age, wealth, or rank. Women, children, kings, knights, Popes, court jesters, musicians, mothers, lovers... death comes for all... and all are ferried away to the scorched landscape of the dead.
As much as Brueghel may have owed to the fantastic examples of Heironymus Bosch, he was no mere follower of Bosch. Brueghel worked in a far broader range. Beyond his fantastic paintings and engravings, Brueghel also created any number of rather traditional religious images. In the painting, The Procession to Calvary, Christ carrying the cross is almost lost in a landscape teeming with people engaged in all sorts of activities. We see lovers, gamblers, robbers, murderers, soldiers... and in the foreground, the Virgin, Magdalene, and St. Matthew in mourning.
Another favorite of mine is The Tower of Babel:
Brueghel's Tower of Babel makes clear the wages of vanity. The construction project has clearly begun well enough... as can be seen from the left side of the tower... but it has soon slipped into decline and collapse. What is the reason for this? In the foreground we see the king and his fawning aristocratic minions visiting the construction site... not unlike today's politicians who never lose the chance to have their photo taken at the opening of a new school building or interstate highway.
As a result of the visit, all the work has ceased as the laborers prostrate themselves before the visiting dignitaries. "Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity."
Two of the most stunning examples of Brueghel's religious works are the late, monochromatic paintings, Christ and the Adulteress, and The Death of the Virgin which employ an absolutely audacious use of chiaroscuro... or light/dark contrast not seen again until Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Adam Elseheimer and the Baroque.
Brueghel was also an early "realist"... documenting the socio-political realities of the time. A good number of his paintings have a subtle political content hidden beneath what initially appears as little more than a painting of a traditional Biblical narrative. In the painting, John the Baptist Preaching in the Wilderness...
...we are presented with the image of a crowd gathered around to hear John the Baptist. The word of God is being brought to the whole world as in the foreground we see individuals who are Turkish, Arabic... even Chinese. Brueghel's knowledge of such foreign dress undoubtedly came from observation of immigrants, sailors, traders, and merchants who arrived in the ports of the Netherlands at the time of burgeoning trade with the East. Even more intriguing, however, are the number of individuals in Protestant garb. At a time in which the Spanish rulers of the Netherlands had outlawed Protestantism and burned their churches, clandestine gatherings such as this in the forest were quite common. One cannot help but recognize that Brueghel is equating such illegal worship with that of nascent Christianity.
A more unnerving painting of socio-political commentary is that of The Massacre of the Innocents:
The theme of "The Massacre of the Innocents" was quite common in Renaissance painting... but there are details here that are quite unique. Brueghel sets the "massacre" in a snow-covered Netherlandish village. Soldiers carry out their murderous orders under the watchful eye of a battalion of Spanish armored knights. At the head of the battalion sits the brutal Duke of Alba, Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, the Governor of the Spanish Netherlands. Again, Brueghel seems to be equating the Biblical Massacre of the Innocents with the violence carried out against the Netherlands by their Spanish rulers.
In another painting, Brueghel frames the reality of the Netherlands in a manner that is almost a caricature... akin to the prints of Daumier. In the painting, Two Chained Monkeys the Netherlands... Brueghel's home... has become a prison... and the native population but monkeys performing for the entertainment of their rulers... while just outside the window the ships in the harbor beckon to the open sea and freedom.
The Polish poet, Wislawa Szymborska, composed a poem on Brueghel's painting alluding to the realities of Poland after the 1956 workers riots led to a brutal crackdown by Stalin:
Two Monkeys by Brueghel
I keep dreaming of my graduation exam: in a window sit two chained monkeys, beyond the window floats the sky, and the sea splashes.
I am taking an exam on the history of mankind: I stammer and flounder.
One monkey, eyes fixed upon me, listens ironically, the other seems to be dozing-- and when silence follows a question, he prompts me with a soft jingling of the chain.
trans. from the Polish by Magnus Kryski
Another "realist" genre that Brueghel excelled in was that of the "illustration" of the everyday lives of the peasants with whom he lived. In Children's Games, the artist observed and accurately recorded children playing some hundred different games:
In Brueghel's drawings and paintings of Kermesse, an annual Netherlandish feast, the artist captures the jovial... and somewhat drunken comings and goings:
In the painting, Kermesse/Peasant Dance, we can almost hear the heavy klompen footed dancing and the sound of the bagpipes... while lovers kiss in the background and drinkers slip into pleasant inebriation:
The Peasant Wedding captures many of the same elements as The Peasant Dance... although it is perhaps a little less rowdy and a little more ordered:
Yet Brueghel is capable of going to the opposite end of the spectrum with his painting The Feast of Fools... which is essentially a drunken brawl or orgy taking place on the final day of Carnival... before the beginning of the Lenten Season:
One of my favorite of Brueghel's "Peasant Paintings" is that of The Peasant and the Tree Nester.
In this painting we are presented with Brueghel's eye for irony and comic details. A "peasant" looks out at us, the viewer, with a bemused smile and points to the foolish "tree nester" who has lost his hat and appears about to fall from the tree in his eager efforts to get at the eggs in the tree he has climbed. But the "peasant" is not immune from foolishness himself. In his keen desire to point out the foolishness of another, he, himself is about to stumble headfirst into a creek.
Brueghel's observant eye and ability to capture the foibles and foolishness of others was not shunned when looking at himself. One of the most marvelous of old master drawings is surely that of Brueghel's Artist and "Critic".
Brueghel presents an image of the artist... himself... as a wild-haired, dour looking old man... almost a precursor of the ideal of the Bohemian artist... standing at his easel... brush in hand. Peering over his shoulder... and squinting through his glasses (how good can his visual acumen and judgment of art be?)... is a potential costumer... reaching into his purse for his money. Surely there has never been a better rendering of the ambivalent relationship between the artist and patron.
Along the lines of Brueghel's astute observations of the everyday realities of peasant life are his paintings that essentially "illustrate" popular peasant sayings/folk tales/fables, etc... The Land of Cockaigne illustrates a mythical land of plenty that dates back to the middle ages:
Beneath a roof made of pies a soldier waits with his mouth open for the food to just fly right in. A soft boiled egg wanders about looking for any hungry individual. A roast duck lies down on the serving platter while a roast pig runs about... a knife in its side to allow anyone to carve up a slide of ham.
The theme is echoed in an American Folk Song from the Great Depression: The Big Rock Candy Mountain:
In Brueghel's painting, this fantasy land of endless food and no work becomes an allegory on the dangers of Sloth and Gluttony. The three men lay sprawled out beneath a table strewn with a half-eaten feast: a clergyman/scholar, a knight, and a farmer, clearly represent the three stations of Renaissance life: The Church, The Aristocracy, and The Peasants. Gluttony and Sloth have diverted all three from their duties... from the harvest, from soldiering, from their role as spiritual leaders. To the right... through the clouds... another new members arrives to the ever-growing Land of Cockaigne.
The Parable of the Blind Leading the Blind is a rather straight-forward, literal illustration of the parable of blindly following after leaders who are no less blind themselves... and one which continues to resonate into the present.
Perhaps the most marvelous of Brueghel's paintings of parables and fables is the great Netherlandish Parables:
Like a good many of Brueghel's paintings, The Netherlandish Parables seems initially to be far simpler... far more straight-forward than it really is. On first sight, one might presume that what the painter has offered is an every-day view of the common comings and goings in a Netherlandish village of the time. But in actuality... nearly every figure is a literal rendering or illustration of a well-known Flemish Proverb: "He has an eel by the tail." (Not unlike our "Tiger by the tail") "One has to crawl to make one's way through the world" "He holds the world on the tip of his thumb." "They're so close they shit out of the same hole." "He runs his head against a brick wall." etc... There are over 100 identified proverbs in the painting... and yet the overall appearance is of complete naturalism.
For those interested, the majority of the proverbs have been identified on the Wikipedia page:
Perhaps the most important contribution that Brueghel made to painting was that of legitimizing the landscape as a subject matter. Like Bosh, he stages most of his paintings within a landscape viewed from above... from a "bird's eye view". Even within paintings that have a central subject matter beyond the landscape, his landscapes remain a key element and exhibit an acute observation of the details of the real world that is astounding. These were clearly the result of endless life studies... some of which have survived.
Brueghel's study of beekeepers presents an almost "surreal" image... yet one wholly rooted in reality. In spite of the fact that the Netherlandish painters lacked the formal understanding of anatomy, physiology, and perspective that the Italian masters such as Michelangelo, Raphael, Leonardo, etc... displayed, Brueghel still exhibits an unprecedented grasp of foreshortening, the body seen in a broad array of poses... at work and at play... especially in his study of harvesters... and the illusion of receding space as conveyed through scale and aerial perspective.
From his earliest years of travels in Italy Brueghel was obsessed with the landscape as can be seen in this early painting of The Harbor of Naples:
Brueghel is one of the earliest Northern artists by whom we have a good number of drawings. A great many of theses... marvelous sepia ink on paper drawings that suggest some Asian drawings as well as works by Brueghel's Flemish and Dutch heirs, Rubens, Rembrandt, and Van Gogh... are landscapes. A good many of these landscapes of mountain passes are clearly from Brueghel's youthful travels through Italy:
One of the finest of Brueghel's drawings (immediately above) was turned into one of the artist's first prints... and in this instance the print is especially noted for its having been engraved by Brueghel himself. The exquisite tenuous mark-making (there are aspects that suggest dry-point) of this print stands out from all the other prints that were more mechanically rendered by professional engravers:
No artist surpassed Brueghel in his ability to capture not only the details of the landscape... but the sense of atmosphere and color. The teal-pewter-gray sky and the black figures isolated against the stark white snow in Hunters in the Snow perfectly conveys the frozen atmosphere of February.
In the painting The Harvesters/August one can literally feel the heavy oppressive humid atmosphere that has led a number of the farm-workers to collapse with exhaustion.
In Haymaking/July(?) we are presented with a glorious summer day. I have always thought it appears more like June than July. The weather is not yet too hot as conveyed by the cool colors, the clothing, and the attitudes of the laborers. While hay is gathered in the fields, girls haul baskets of fruit... berries and cherries... off to market.
Peter Paul Rubens, the great Flemish Baroque painter, was Brueghel's greatest heir, and the artist most instrumental in synthesizing the art of the North (The Netherlands and Germany) and the South (Italy). He was also the artist most instrumental in the development and spread of the genre of the landscape outside of the Netherlands... especially to France and England. Rubens was a great admirer of Breughel and deeply indebted to his example. He owned several of Brueghel's paintings and was a close friend and co-worker with Brueghel's son, Jan. Elements of Brueghel's landscapes pop up again and again in the later artist's work:
One can draw a direct line of influence from Brueghel to Rubens...
...to the "Little Dutch Masters"...
... to the French Rococo...
on through Gainsborough...
Constable...
Turner...
and the entire English landscape tradition... on through Monet and Impressionism:
One of the most intriguing of Brueghel's landscapes is that which is quite possibly the artist's last paintings as well: The Magpie on the Gallows:
Gallows were a common site in the war-torn Netherlands as they struggled against oppressive Spanish rule. But here we have the gallows in the most beautiful... even idyllic of landscapes. Beneath it peasants dance joyfully. Clearly the painting suggest the co-existence of life and death. Like Poussin's painting "Et in Arcadia ego"... even in paradise we shall find death...
The fact that Brueghel left this one painting to his wife in his will has led others to surmise that the image of the magpie (a symbol of gossip) on the gallows was something of a warning to his wife against excessive loose talk after he was gone.
Art Work of the Day: Pieter Breugel the Elder: Fall of the Rebel Angels
And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,
And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven.
And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
Revelations 12: 7-9
The great Netherlandish master, Pieter Breugel the Elder, painted his marvelous realization of the Fall of the Rebel Angels in 1562 while he was living in Amsterdam and supplying drawings to the publisher, Hieronymus Cock, in the manner of the artist's brilliant predecessor, Hieronymus Bosch. Cock tapped into a considerable audience for the sort of fantastic imagery that Bosch had been known for, and Breugel became his chief supplier of fantastic drawings to be turned into engravings for this market:
In spite of his travels through Italy, in Breugel's painting of The Fall of the Rebel Angels he clearly turns his back upon Italian models rooted in Greco-Roman "classicism" and looks back to the examples of Northern Gothic art...
The Limbourg Brothers- Fall of the Rebel Angels from Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry
Hieronymus Bosch- The Garden of Earthly Delights (detail)
Upon first viewing the painting we are confronted with a bewildering array of luminous colors and intertwined jigsaw puzzle-like shapes. One can almost imagine Breugel's painting as a distant precursor to Willem DeKooning:
Emerging from the blinding light of a distant halo of light, the Rebellious angels tumble headlong toward the earth. As they fall a horrific metamorphosis takes place as they change into monstrous beings.
Angels loyal to God engage them in mortal combat led by St. Michael, rail thin and clad in gleaming golden armor...
St. Michael strikes his sword at the dragon with the seven crowned heads. Michael's allies... thin, delicate, refined, elegant... garbed in luminous robes...
easily dominate their monstrous adversaries... who are their polar opposites: crude, inhuman, grotesque hybrids. The undoubted victory of God's champions is heralded from above by further angels blowing upon golden horns.
One can almost hear the cacophonous sound of the chaotic melee.
Like Bosch, Breugel infuses his phantasmagorical imagery with a degree of unsettling verism by employing minutely observed details from the plant and animal world in creating his monstrous deformed hybrid beings, thus increasing the overall impact of the painting.
Sea urchins, fish, crabs and lobster, birds, wild animals, and insects are combined in the most inventive manner resulting in the most repulsive... and yet curious, fantastic... and ultimately beautiful creatures.
Bruegel proves himself a most masterful colorist, employing translucent layers of pigment in glazes in such a manner that the painting still glows some 500 years later.
Art Work of the Day: The Annunciation by Simone Martini
Rather than overwhelm those who might be interested with in-depth explorations of the entire oeuvre of given artists, I thought I might take a different approach... especially when looking at the work of the "Old Masters"... that being offering a closer look at individual works of art... works of art that have spoken to me over time for one reason of another. Having recently taken a closer look at Gentile da Fabriano and the International Gothic, I thought I might begin with a painting from this same movement that has remained among my most beloved since I first came upon it: Simone Martini's Annunciation.
The Annunciation with St. Ansanus and St. Margaret (or St. Giulita) is a painting by the Italian Gothic artists Simone Martini and his Brother-in-Law: Lippo Memmi. The painting dates from 1333 as is revealed in the "signature" in Latin hidden beneath the ornate frame (a 19th cenmtury restoration): SYMON MARTINI ET LIPPVS MEMMI DE SENIS ME PINXERVNT ANNO DOMINI MCCCXXXIII. It is uncertain as to what role Lippi Memmi played in the realization of the painting, but a hypothesis has been put forth suggesting that Martini painted the central panel, while Memmi was responsible of the side saints and the tondos with prophets in the upper part. The painting originally decorated the altar of St. Ansanus in the Cathedral of Siena, and had been commissioned as part of a cycle of four altarpieces dedicated to the city's patrons saints. Currently it is housed in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.
The central panel depicts the moment in which the Angel Gabriel announces to the Virgin Mary that she shall give birth to the son of God:
And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth, To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women. And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be. And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God. And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.
Luke 1:26-33
Gabriel's announcement can be seen quite literally... coming forth from his mouth and moving toward Mary: Ave, gratia plena, Dominus tecum: "Hail Mary, full of grace, blessed art thou among women..." (Literally: Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you...)
The figures are rendered in the most elegant and sophisticated linear manner. Gabriel's robes flutter and float about him as if he had only just landed, while Mary's angular form recoils... suggesting both modesty as well as a sense of fear of the other-worldly apparition that has confronted her.
Above Mary the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove is seen. Rays of light... the light of God... issue forth from his open beak and emanate toward the Virgin as a second blessing.
Gabriel holds forth a olive branch (and also wears a crown of olive leaves). The olive branch is symbolic of the coming of Christ and hearkens back to the story of Noah and the dove returning with the olive branch denoting the coming of peace and the covenant with God.
Martini clearly took great pleasure in rendering the most elegant lines that twist and turn and hook about the picture like the images in a Greek Vase painting...
or a line drawing or print by Picasso or Matisse:
He also clearly embraced the decorative expressiveness of the most resplendent textures. The angel's gown... as flat as wallpaper... shimmers with a golden floral pattern. Rather than the usual golden wings, the wings of Martini's Gabriel suggest the plumage of a rare and marvelous bird.
There are a few elements that suggest a more three-dimensional form, such as the vase, holding the lilies, a symbol of Mary's purity, and the throne upon which she sits. There is a certain tension between these more solid 3-D forms and the overall flat space made even more flat and graphic by the background of gold leaf. Martini has organized the image in a flat, linear, graphic manner that will appear outdated by later Renaissance artists... but would certainly have been admired by more modern painters such as Gauguin, Maurice Denis, and Matisse.
Gentile da Fabriano
Gentile da Fabriano (c. 1370 – 1427) was an Italian painter known for his highly ornate and decorative paintings of the so-called International Gothic style.
-Virgin and Child
Gentile was born in or near the Italian city of Fabriano. His first known painting, the Virgin and Child dates from 1395-1400 and shows elements of Northern Italian painting.
-Madonna with Child
-Madonna and Child with Two Angels
-Virgin and Child with Two Saints
-Nativity
By 1405, the artist was working in Venice. Gentile Bellini may have worked in his studio, and Da Fabriano certainly was acquainted with the painter, Pisanello:
Pisanello- Portrait of a Princess
One of Da Fabriano's greatest masterworks, the Valle Romita Polyptych dates from 1410-12:
- Valle Romita Polyptych
- The Coronation of the Virgin from the Valle Romita Polyptych
-The Coronation of the Virgin (detail)
In 1414 he moved to Brescia, at the service of Pandolfo III Malatesta, father of the infamous and despicable Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta. In the Spring 1420 he was again in Frabriano.
-The Nativity
-The Flight into Egypt
-The Adoration of the Magi
-The Annunciation
Da Fabriano's painting of The Annunciation suggests an awareness of the great painting of the same subject (c. 1333) by the Sienese Master, Simone Martini...
-Simone Martini- The Annunciation
... and establishes a clear example for the later Florentine Master, Fra Angelico:
-Fra Angelico- The Annunciation
On 6 August 1420 he was in Florence, where he painted his famous altarpiece depicting the Adoration of the Magi (1423), now in the Uffizi, a painting regarded as one of the masterpieces of the International Gothic style:
It has been suggested by some that Da Fabriano was the artist who created the magnificent set of Tarot cards known as the Visconti-Sforza Tarot, commissioned by Filippo Maria Visconti, Duke of Milan, and by his successor Francesco Sforza. This, however, is highly unlikely as the cards were produced around 1451, almost 25 years after Da Fabriano's death. The resplendent, decorative style of the cards... and the flattened forms certainly echo the work of Da Fabriano: