SCHOOL OF ART. Presented to for success In the Elementary Section of the Course of Instruction In Art* BY ORDER OF THE LORDS OF THE COMMITTEE OF PRIVY COUNCIL ON EDUCATION. i87oT^ SCIENCE AND ART DEPARTMENT OF THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL ON EDUCATION. ^ ~jj E3 K>^sj KrT*^?^ %'^‘i ' THE DELPHIC SIBYL, FROM THE CEILIXG OF THE SISTINE CHAPEL PAIN'TEI) BY JIICHAEL ANGELO. PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED; INCLUDING Fresco, Oil, Mosaic, Water-Colour, Water-Glass, Tempera, Encaustic, Miniature, Painting on Ivory, Vellum, Pottery, Porcelain, Enamel, Glass, &c. WITH Ptslorital of ilje ^progress of Ilje BY THOMAS JOHN GULLICK ASSISTED BY JOHN TIMES, F.S.A. THIRD EDITION, REVISED AND ENLARGED LONDON: LOCKWOOD & CO., STATIONERS’-HALL COURT. MDCCCLXXIII. [77/e right of t)anslaiiov is reserved.} LONDON : PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE AND PARLIAMENT STREET THE GEITY CEt'JTEP I iRRARY PEE FACE. Numerous eloquent and also some ^ dry-as-dust ’ books have been written on the theory of painting. Modern German writers, more especially, have speculated very ingeniously, as well as very vaguely, upon the nature of those high faculties in man through which he derives pleasurable perceptions and refining emotions from the beautiful in the material world ; and these speculations have been, under the name of aesthetics, elevated to the dignity of a science. The his- tory of Art has afforded more tangible subjects for a large class of authors; while practical treatises for the exclusive guidance of art-students already exist of, perhaps, adequate authority and in sufficient number. We are, however, ac- quainted with very few books containing precisely those explanations of the processes and materials employed in painting which we believe can be given, and would greatly assist, not only the student, but the general public to under- stand and appreciate pictures, and to estimate how far ma- terial and technical relations have had historical influence on painting — books which in fact contain the particular in- formation which an artist might be presumed best capable of communicating. To supply (from practical acquaintance with painting ) such information is the chief aim of the present volume. In working out such a design, the opportunity will not always be afforded for even attempting to increase the a IV PREFACE. attractiveness of the subject by literary embellishment : but our desire is to be useful, and we are content to rough-hew the corner-stone, if we may not foliate the capital. Never- thele s, as the better part, beyond all comparison, of paint- ing consists of those mental and imaginative elements which entitle it to rank with the sister-art of poetry, w^e shall take all occasions which may appear fitting to press the superior importance of these higher qualities upon the reader’s con- sideration. We would not, from professional prejudice, and still less disingenuously, seek to obtain the reception of an over-estimate of the value of technical and professional knowledge. Without such knowledge, truth, beauty, and sentiment in pictures may undoubtedly be enjoyed. But we submit that even this enjoyment may sometimes be heightened in degree, other gratification assuredly derived, and the power of appreciating the relative merits and com- parative value of paintings certainly gained, through the knowledge to which we have alluded. All who have prac- tised painting will likewise, we think, allow, that experience gained with the pencil has removed many misconceptions respecting at least surface appearances in pictures. Artists will, we feel assured, candidly admit that some portion of the art consists of definite operations and definable modes of manipulation, and may therefore be compared to a deli- cate description of workmanship, requiring a regular ap- prenticeship and long practice. To carry out the comparison, then, to its legitimate issue, we beg the good-natured reader who would listen to the man who could make only an in- different watch, if he had anything to say about its me- chanism, to kindly lend his attention to what we have to say about the mechanism of a picture. As all men cannot be painters or watchmakers — cannot all learn ‘howto do it,’ or even see it done — surely the next best thing must be to get a trustworthy description of how it is done. This will at all events save them from making some awkward mistakes. If Pliny, for example, could have anticipated the numerous sneers with which his shade has ■been insulted, he would not have attempted to write about PREFACE. V painting while ignorant of some of its simplest operations. This consideration may touch self-respect, but another must reach self-interest. We allude to the fact that a knowledge of the nature of the materials employed for painting will also almost necessarily include acquaintance with the pre- cautions indispensable for the possessor of pictures to take in order to secure the preservation of his art- treasures, and to display them to the best advantage. But — and this is of great general importance — the reader who accompanies us through this volume will hardly deny the important influence of materials and processes upon the painter’s fidelity of imitation ; and even upon his modes of conception, and the higher manifestation of painting as a form of poetical utterance. The reader will, in succession, see what gave value to the encaustic picture, in the eyes of rich Roman Collectors, and that the too exclusive employ- ment of the more mechanical process of mosaic hastened the decline and degradation of art. He will see how the sepa- rate introduction of gold into the mediaeval tempera picture led to hard outlines, a patchwork character, absence of ^ tone,’* and an unnatural scale of colour ; while the material limitations of fresco seem, on the contrary, only to have compelled greater attention to the higher and more essential qualities of art. He will see how ‘ depth,’ the greatest re- commendation of oil painting, is simply a property of the ‘ vehicle ’t employed^ and how chiaroscuro,| or light and shade of pictures, has been influenced by the painter’s habi- tual use of light or dark ground, or his custom of painting in full daylight or a darkened studio. Lastly, the reader will see that the early Flemish painters followed a definite series of processes, which would alone secure the purity of colour, the transparency and accuracy of detail so noticeable in their works : a system which presents a marked contrast to what has been the too prevalent practice in modern painting, both in oil and water colours — in which, from the * See p. 1.5, nofe.' f See pp. 4 note, and 197, X An Italian word, compounded of ^ cliiaro ’ and ‘oscuro,’ signify- ing literally light-dark. VI PKEFACE. facility of making alterations, meaningless licence has been allowed to the play of the brush, and effects have been re- peated in proportion as they are easily gained. The chronological arrangement adopted in this work is explained in the Introduction. Early Christian and Medi- aeval Art having rapidly grown in public estimation, and pos- sessing besides a kind of geological, novel interest^ we have, we trust, worked out this rich vein with satisfactory indus- try. Great importance has also been attached to historical inquiries into the origin of methods and materials ; because we believe such inquiries are in the highest degree instruc- tive ; but where individual painters have rendered eminent service to art, they are noticed in a more biographic spirit. At the same time we have endeavoured to render the book in every respect as complete as possible ; it has, in fact, been attempted not only to give a description of every kind of painting, bnt also some account of the art in every age, to- gether with sketches of the principal painters of the different schools. We repeat, that our great ambition has been to be useful ; and no inconsiderable result will have been achieved if we only succeed in directing attention to the best source of in- formation on every subject, and especially to the stores of material accumulated in such works as those by Sir Charles Eastlake and Mrs. Merrifield. To the former as an author, and the latter as an editor of valuable ancient MSS., we shall have frequently to acknowledge our obligations ; but, in the words of Quintilian, ‘ if we can say what is right we shall be delighted, though it may not he of our own invention.’ The explanation of every kind of technicality has been one of the objects of this work; in every instance, therefore, where a technical term first occurs, it is explained either in the text itself or in a note ; so that the reader who follows the order of the book need anticipate no difficulty in this particular. Should, however, the clue to the exact meaning PREFACE. Vil of any artistic word or phrase be lost, a copious index has been added, the references of which, instead of affording the dry definitions a mere glossary would supply, will, it is hoped, be found at once to define the word and illustrate its application. In conclusion, we would still further conciliate the reader’s confidence by assuring him that — as we have already inti- mated — nearly all the technical explanations in this book are derived from a more than usually varied practical ac- quaintance with painting. The writer whose name occurs first on the title-page has not merely contributed largely to the press for some years past on the subject of Art, hut he is (though the reader may be unaware of the fact) also a painter by profession. It may perhaps he asked, with a smile, how it happens that he did not prefer — like, and in the words of, Annibale Carracci — ‘ only to speak by works,’ meaning, of course, pictures. The answer to this is that his natural tendencies have inclined equally to literary and to artistic pursuits ; and the observation may be ventured, though at the risk of provoking unfavourable comparisons, that — whatever may be his own fate — many painters have been better known by the productions of their pen than by those of their pencil. *** The present edition of ‘ Painting Popularly Explained ’ has been very carefully revised, and contains numerous im- portant additions ; as an instance of which we may name the description of the Stereochrome or Water-Glass Painting employed for the great works in the New Palace, West- minster. vin THE FRONTISPIECE. The sublime Titanic forms, the ‘ awful synod,’ as Fuseli calls them, of Prophets and Sibyls on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, are de- scribed at p. 157 as being by general consent the grandest single figures of modern painting. In a note on the same page, reference is made to the circumstances which led to the Sibyls becoming favourite subjects of pictorial representation, and to their elevation to almost equal rank with the Prophets of the Old Testament. In Christian Art each Sibyl is occasionally distinguished by a legend or motto se- lected from her reputed prophecy. The following is that appropriated to the subject of our Frontispiece : ‘ A prophet shall be born of a virgin, and he shall be crowned with thorns.’ The well-known oracle of Apollo at Delphi was consulted by all Greece, and the Pythia, or Sibyl, seated on the mystic tripod, was the accredited medium, while under prophetic influence or ‘ afflatus,’ of transmitting the answers of the god. The Delphic Sibyl of Michael Angelo is then, we are to under- stand, the enthusiastic representative of classical art, poetry, andphi- losophy. Mr. Harford, in his Life of Michael Angelo, justly says : ‘ Her looks are fraught with intellectual expression, and her form and features with youthful grace and severe beauty : fit emblems of the noblest and most finished schools which the world has ever seen of taste and eloquence.’ The Sibyls were always represented as tall, majestic, and somewhat masculine ; but we have selected the Delphic prophetess, with her attendant genii, from others on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel,* as calculated to at least qualify the popular opinion, that all the figures of Michael Angelo are of uniform character, and always robust and excessively muscular. The engraving on the title-page of this volume is from one of the portraits of Sir Joshua Eeynolds in his official robes, as (first) Pre- sident of the Royal Academy, from his own pencil. The head was alone adapted to serve in its present position, but in the background of the original is introduced a bust of Michael Angelo. The mention of this can scarcely fail to recall the impressive tribute paid by Sir Joshua to the genius of the great Italian, when the President, con- cluding in solemn silence the last of his Discourses, said, ‘ I should desire that the last words which I should pronounce in this Academy, and from this place, might be the name of Michael Angelo.’ * A large chromo-lithograph of the whole ceiling has been published by Messrs. Colnaghi, Pall Mall. CON T ENTS PAGK INTRODUCTION 1 PAINTING IN TEMPERA 4 GILDING, ETC 10 HATCHING AND STIPPLING ; FUSION OF TIN'IS, ETC. ... 15 THE VARNISH 19 THE COLOURS . 23 WAX PAINTING, OR ENCAUSTIC ........ 25 TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC IN ANTIQUITY AND THE MIDDLE AGES 30 1. THE EGYPTIANS 30 2. THE ASSYRIANS 36 3. THE GREEKS 37 4. THE ETRUSCANS . . 52 5. THE ROMANS 52 6. REMAINS OF ANCIENT PAINTING 55 7. CHRISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC .... 58 8. TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC IN MODERN TIMES .... 75 MOSAIC PAINTING 79 ANCIENT MOSAICS 81 CHRISTIAN MOSAICS : THE LATER ROMAN STYLE .... 84 CHRISTIAN MOSAICS : THE BYZANTINE STYLE 89 THE ROMANESQUE STYLE ; AND THE LATER HISTORY OF MGSAIC 97 MISSAL AND OTHER MANUSCRIPT ILLUMINATIONS; MINIATURE PAINTING ON IVORY, ENAMEL, POTTERY, ETC. 1. MISSAL AND OTHER MS. ILLUMINATIONS 100 2. HISTORICAL SKETCH OF MS. ILLUMINATIONS 104 3. MINIATURE PAINTING ON IVORY AND ENAMEL .... 107 4. THE EARLIER KINDS OF ART-ENAMELS AND ENAMEL PAINTING 114 5. PAINTING ON POTTERY AND PORCELAIN 125 G. GLASS PAINTING . 129 X CONTENTS, FRESCO PAINTING iro OTHER KINDS OF PAINTING ALI lED TO BUT MISTAKEN FOR FRESCO 142 1. DID THE ANCIENTS PAINT IN TRUE FRESCO? .... 144 2. FRESCO PAINTING IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY . . . 146 3. FRESCO PAINTING IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY . . . 152 4. FRESCO PAINTING IN ITALY IN THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES 173 5. FRESCO PAINTING IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY . . . 177 OIL PAINTING 184 THE PAINTING-ROOM . 185 THE IMPLEMENTS, ETC 192 VEHICLES 197 OILS 201 VARNISHES 204 OF THE USE OF VARNISH WITH THE COLOURS, AND ON " VARNISHING 207 CANVAS, PANELS, ETC 210 GROUNDS 213 THE COLOURS 215 PROCESSES AND MANIPULATIONS 222 1. OIL PAINTING PRACTISED BEFORE THE VAN EYCKS . . 230 2. THE IMPROVEMENT OF VAN EYCK: IN WHAT IT CONSISTED 238 3. OIL painting: early flemish and german .... 245 4. introduction of oil painting into ITALY .... 253 5. THE later german, FLEMISH, AND DUTCH SCHOOLS . 255 6. THE SPANISH SCHOOLS 260 7. THE FRENCH SCHOOL 266 8. THE BRITISH SCHOOL 271 PAINTING IN WATER COLOURS 281 THE PAPER 281 PIGMENTS, BRUSHES, ETC 288 LEGITIMACY OF PRACTICE 292 PERMANENCY AND PRESERVATION 296 THE RISE OF MODERN WATER-COLOUR PAINTING .... 298 STEREOCHROME OR WATER-GLASS PAINTING . . .301 APPENDIX. NOTE A. ON PHOTOGRAPHY AND COLOURED PHOTOGRAPHIC PORTRAITS 309 NOTE B. THE DISTRIBUTION, HANGING, FRAMING, AND CARE OF PICTURES; AND ON PICTURE CLEANING AND RESTORING 313 NOTE C. SCENE PAINTING: DIORAMAS, PANORAMAS, ETC. . .316 NOTE D. ON TRIPTYCHS, RETABLKS, ANTEPENDIA, ETC. . .319 NOTE E. THE GLORY, NIMBUS, AI’REOLA, ETC * . 323 NOTE F. PAINTING IN EMBROIDERY 324 NOTE G. STUDY AT THE ROYAL ACADEMY, ETC 325 NOTE H. CRAYON OR PASTEL PAINTING 326 NOTE I. WHAT IS PRE-RA ITIA ELISM ? 327 INDEX 329 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. IntraMictioK. J C^AINTING/ Coleridge felicitously says^ Gs a some- thing between a thought and a thing.’ With a little more circumlocution^ painting is the art of conveying thoughts by the imitation of things. The principle of imitation in painting as regards form is^ however, abstractly unreal j for imitation, to be complete, must include the relief or roundness of objects, as in sculpture, while painting is restricted to a flat surface. But no art pretends in the fullest sense to imitate Nature, that is to say, to realize all her intinity. Imitation carried as far as possible would only end with reproduction. Each art has characteristic qualities, which its rivals do not possess in equal degree ; and upon these stress is laid, in order to compensate for the deficien- cies. Thus, although painting has not the power of giving actual relief like sculpture, it yet can, by means of imitating the effects of form, light, and shadow on the eye, sufficiently secure the impression of relief, so that no want is suggested ; and, in the addition of colour, it has the means of imitating a very beautiful class of facts in nature, beyond the scope of sculpture. So, on comparing representation with description : language, as a vehicle for conveying ideas of natural objects, is far less definite than painting; but it can narrate the suc- cession of events, which painting cannot do. On the other hand, painting can embody impressions of simultaneous action and effect, and thus obtain innumerable harmonious combinations, which it would be impossible for mere words, B 2 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. even if the highest poetry, to do more than indefinitely suggest. Although a degree of imitation is necessary in a work of art for the conveyance of thought, the quantity or exactitude of imitation in a picture forms by no means a measure of the amount of thought or emotion which it may awaken, apart from the simple ideas which the mind receives through the painted resemblance of natural objects. Indeed, literal imi- tation is sometimes so much dissociated from imagination, that Haydon went so far as to say, that Hhe power of representing things as they are, constituted merely the painter of domestic art ; ’ adding, with characteristic bold- ness and enthusiasm, ^ while that of restoring them to what they were at creation constitutes the great painter in High Art.’ When we reflect, however, upon the inexhaustible richness of nature, a more humble spirit of imitation appears not only excusable, but laudable. Modern pre-Raphaelitism is on this ground — viz., that of protest — chiefly serviceable to art. For it is a mistake to suppose that artistic imitation can ever be entirely mechanical, that it is only a means to an end, or that it is but as language is to thought. The eye has its own poetry, and the faithful rendering of the simplest object in nature has a special value and beauty that touches some of the pleasantest chords of our being. Still we must unhesitatingly give the preference to those works in which we have not only the inherent and intrinsic poetry of art, but also subject and incident conveying thought, expression, and sentiment. Moreover, though art is finite, yet nearly every bianch is too comprehensive in its means for one man to do justice to all its capabilities j hence a larger measure than usual of the judgment and taste necessarily shown in selection and adaptation is justly allowed to distinguish and elevate the artist. ^ Style ’ in the highest sense arises from the peculiar bias the artist takes in this selection and adap- tation. But ‘ style ’ is also applied to the several methods of painting materially considered ) for the painter is a curious combination of poet and mechanic, as his picture is a curious compromise ^ between a thought and a thing.’ There have been, in the history of art, four grand styles. INTllODUCTION. 3 taking the word in the last or material sense, of imitating nature — Tempera, Encaustic, Fresco, and Oil. These, to- gether with the minor modes of painting, we propose to arrange as nearly as possible in chronological sequence j but our design being to offer an explanation of the art derived from practical acquaintance, rather than attempt to give its his- tory, we shall confine ourselves principally to that portion of the history of painting necessary to elucidate the origin of the different practices which have obtained at different periods. We shall therefore give, in the first place, a full descrip- tion of each method of painting as historically introduced, together with explanations of its technicalities, and then add connecting notices, following always the order of time. In this way we shall trace Tempera from remote antiquity to the works of the later Roman painters. After long neglect, it will reappear in the thirteenth century, and prevail till supplanted by the introduction of Oil painting. Encaustic will furnish an episode at the period of the greatest refinement in Greece. The Byzantine school of Christian art must be estimated from Mosaics, which for some four centuries were almost the only form of art ; and for the Romanesque style and period we must dip into Missals. The fourteenth century gave us (genuine) Fresco, in which, in the sixteenth century, the noblest monuments of the art of painting were executed. The improvement effected at the commencement of the fifteenth century in oil painting by the Van Eycks having led to such remark- able results, the subject will engross a large share of our attention, more especially as recent research has thrown considerable light on questions connected therewith. The recently introduced Stereochrome or Water-glass is in reality the simplest and purest form of Water-colour painting, and, together with what we understand as Water-colour, and also distemper, is but a variety of tempera, taking the last word in its broadest signification. Our modern ‘ Water-colour ’ painting has, however, received such distinct and extraordinary development during the last fifty years, that it is entitled to the separate consideration we have given it. 4 PAINTINa POPULAELT EXPLAINED. fainting in V E place tempera first, because it is unquestionably the most ancient method of painting ; but we shall confine our attention in the first instance more particularly to the process employed by the painters of Christian art in Italy, and termed generally by the Italians painting d guazzo, both because their works are preserved and may be examined, and because they have of late risen so ra- pidly in public estimation. Merely from any dissimilarity in the appearance of the painting, it would occur to few ordinary visitors to a collection of pictures which included works by the earliest Italian painters, that these are not oil paintings at all. Indeed, it has been found impossible to distinguish between a painting executed with oil colours and a tempera picture which has imbibed the oil varnish. Yet, though sometimes not betraying the fact by any great peculiarity of outward appearance, before the introduction of the so-called invention of oil painting by the Van Eycks, all paintings were executed in tempera, or by some other method very dissimilar to that of oil. There have been many statements of impossibilities made, and contradictory opinions given, in reference to ‘ tempera : ’ these we shall endeavour to qualify or reconcile. Painting in tempera is so named because the colours are ^ tempered,’ or mixed with and diluted by a ‘ medium,’ * to a proper consistence, to be conveniently taken by and applied with the brush, and to adhere to the surface — this medium with the mediaeval painters being neither oil nor simply water. The Italian noun tempera admits, nevertheless, of the widest application, and would include any medium, even * A medium or ‘ vehicle,’ as it is otherwise called, is the fluid in which the colour is held in suspension whfc transmitted or conveyed to the picture. PAINTING IN TEMPERA. 5 oil; but in its most restricted and proper acceptation it means a vehicle in which yolk of egg (beaten sometimes with the white) is the chief ingredient, diluted as required with the milky juice expressed from the shoots of the fig- tree. This is the painting strictly termed d uovo by the Ita- lians. Vinegar probably replaced the fig-tree juice among the northern artists, from the difficulty of obtaining the latter, and in modern use vinegar is substituted. Haydon says vinegar should be used, to prevent the putrefaction of the yolk of egg ; but the early Italian painters preferred the effo- vehicle when it had been suffered to stand until it had become decomposed — hence the phrase, painting ‘ a The artist is often compelled to have recourse to very offen- sive media to make known his most refined revelations. On walls, and for coarser work, such as painting on linen, warm size was occasionally used; but the egg vehicle undiluted was generally preferred for altar-pieces on wood. For various purposes and at different periods, however, milk, beer, wine, and media composed of water and more or less glutinous ingredients, soluble at first in water, such as gums, &c., have also been used. Such are the media, or vehicles, described by the chief Italian writers as used in the days of Cimabue, Giotto, and Fra Angelico, and by the earlj^ painters before the invention and improvement of oil painting. Pliny also mentions milk and the egg vehicle as employed for ancient wall paintings. The finer egg tempera, in dry climates, has been found to attain so firm a consistence as to withstand ordinary solvents. The use of wine in diluting these glu- tinous vehicles was common for a long period. Buflfalniacco, of whom so many humorous stories are told by Boccaccio and Vasari, is related to have persuaded some nuns for whom he painted to supply him with their choicest wines, osten- sibly for the purpose of diluting the colours, but really to be slily imbibed by the thirsty painter himself. The northern artists were sometimes obliged to content themselves with beer. In the works of the northern tempera painters there are, however, very marked differences observable in their m- pasto or body of colour ; it is certain, therefore, that these painters employed media of different degrees of consistency. 6 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. In the ^ distemper ’ of scene painting (see note C in Ap- pendix) the medium is weak size of glue (glue dissolved), hut plaster of Paris, sufficiently diluted, is worked into the colours. This carbonate of lime, or whitening, is less active as a basis for colours than the pure lime of fresco; but.it is entirely destructive of transparency. When the more viscid media were employed by the tempera painters, the effect must, with their purer use of the colours (some of which, moreover, were transparent), have been very lustrous and powerful in comparison with modern scene painters’ ^dis- temper,’ and these qualities were heightened by the addition of a strong varnish ; still, however, tempera fell far short of oil painting in richness and transparency. GROUNDS, ETC. The ancients, it appears, were unacquainted with oil paint- ing : they painted in tempera (or part fresco and part tem- pera) and encaustic, on wood, clay, plaster, stone, parchment, and canvas. Few, however, of the great painters of Greece painted upon walls. Apelles never did ; and even the works of Polygnotus at Delphi are supposed to have been painted on panels inserted into the wall. As they were subsequently removed, the same may be inferred of the pictures of the Poecile at Athens. According to one account, canvas was not used until the time of Nero ; and though this statement appears to be doubtful, yet, as there is no mention of its having been employed by the Greek painters of the best ages, its use was most probably of late introduction. Pliny notices, as one of the extravagances of the time, that Nero had his portrait painted on canvas 120 feet high. Tempera pictures for the altar-pieces, triptychs, &c. (see note D in Appendix), of the Middle Ages, were generally executed on panels of wood. The painters of that period always used a Aground’ (or substratum on which the picture was executed) of pure white plaster of Paris (in Italian gesso) or washed chalk (whitening) with size : a prepara- tion which has been employed without change from remote antiquity, the ground of the paintings on Egyptian mummy cases being of this description. Such a ground, unless ex- PAINTING IN TEMPERA. 7 ceedingl}' tliin, becoming brittle with age, is evidently unsafe on canvas, especially if the picture should ever be exposed to be rolled for convenience of removal. The Venetians, therefore, who from the first preferred cloth or canvas* of fine texture, took the precaution of spreading the com- position of size and gesso as thinly as possible. The fine picture by Mantegna, in the National Gallery, and ^The Triumph of Julius Caesar,’ at Hampton Court, are in tem- pera on cloth. Wood, however, was frequently covered (particularly in the earliest or Byzantine pictures) with parchment, leather, or linen. Walls which were to receive paintings of a finer description appear also to have been prepared with cloth glued over the surface. Upon the gesso ground the old tempera painters were accustomed to apply a coat of Armenian bole mixed with glue, on which they spread leaf-gold; and though the prac- tice was gradually discontinued, it was occasionally adopted in oil painting in Italy; and in Flanders was continued even to a comparatively late period, it being considered that the gold ground gave great brilliancy to the colours. When the white ground was used, it was very carefully prepared ; and the tempera picture was frequently com- menced by tracing the design from a drawing or cartoon t on which it had been accurately studied, in a similar manner to that (which we shall fully describe) practised in fresco painting. Cennini, | however, does not speak of a cartoon, but recommends that the drawing should be first sketched on the white ground in charcoal (which admits of being readily obliterated), and then outlined in ink with a minever pencil ; the shadows to be afterwards washed in. * It may be mentioned that the words cloth, linen, and canvas are used indiscriminately, and simply in contradistinction to wood, stone, &c. t From the Italian cartone, stout paper or pasteboard. j Cennino Cennini wrote a valuable and interesting Treatise on Painting (1437), which describes the practice of tempera, secco, fresco, Ac., in Italy before the introduction of the improved oil painting. This treatise ( Trattnto della Pittura) has been translated, together with the excellent notes of the former editor Tambroni, by Mrs. Merrifield. Cennini was the pupil of Agnolo Gaddi, who derived the method he taught through Taddeo Gaddi from Giotto. 8 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. The effect of this insisting, as it were, upon the outline with ink, will partly account for the hard outlines and sharp edginess so conspicuous in these ancient* works. The mode of commencing a picture by tracing the outline was followed by the early oil painters without change, and even greater care. An example of this is presented in the original pen- and-ink drawing from which was traced the small picture by Raphael, ‘ The Vision of the Knight.’ The drawing is placed under the picture in the National Gallery, and the holes pricked in the outline by the tracing point are very plainly to be seen. From the thickness of the vehicle generally employed, and its unmanageable nature, the tints, as in fresco, were mixed to the required local hues,f or the colour proper to each particular portion of the object represented, as seen modified by light and shade (not the local colour^ which is the ^self-colour’ of an object, and what we mean when we talk of a G’ed coat’ or a ^ green field’). The practice of using these compound or mixed tints was commonly adopted by the early oil painters, and continued when the move- ments of the pencil became far more free, the blending being continued more or less on the picture when applied. Portions of the tempera picture were finished while the ground was left untouched elsewhere. Cennini directs that the head should be finished last. This practice of finishing parts separately was likewise adopted by the first oil painters, excepting that they did not reserve the flesh for the last. A picture by Leonardo da Vinci, in the Milan Galler}', has some parts nearly finished, with others merely * The word ‘ ancient ’ is now commonly applied to the ‘ old ’ masters and their works, in order to coincide with ordinary usage in the apposition of the words ‘ ancient ’ and ‘ modern.’ "The only objection to the substitution of the word ‘ ancient ’ for ‘ old ’ in this case is, that it may sometimes occasion ambiguity as to whether ancient be meant for classical. f Tints differ from each other in being simply lighter or darker, but hues differ in colour. Therefore, we may have many tints of one colour, and various hues of one particular degree of intensity in rela- tion to black and white. In ordinary usage, however, by ‘ tints ’ we frequently mean colours generally, and the word is often substituted for ‘hues.’ TAINTING IN TEMPERA. 9 outlined ; and the remarkable Holy Family, in the possession of the Right Hon. H. Labouchere, attributed to Michael Angelo by Hr. Waagen (as the second existing easel picture he executed), is in a similar condition. A mode of painting, ‘ transparencies ’ as they would now be called, on linen, appears to have been practised during the fourteenth century in Germany ; but more extensively, if not originally, in England. At all events, if the English method was not peculiar to the countr}", it was distinguished for its greater transparency when held before the light. The artists worked with water-colours on closely woven linen. The linen was saturated with gum-water ; when dry it was stretched on the floor over coarse woollen and frieze cloths, and the artist drew and coloured his subjects walking over the linen with clean feet, the superabundant moisture being absorbed by the woollen cloths underneath. When flnished, the semi- transparency of the linen was not lessened, as the colours had no body. It was common in the fifteenth century to hang rooms, instead of tapestry, with large works on linen executed in the ordinary tempera ; but as late as the begin- ning of the sixteenth century, a German mode of painting on cloth was distinguished for its transparency from the Italian tempera. For Vasari mentions, in his Life of Raphael, that a drawing sent by Albert Durer to the great Italian, was painted in water-colours on a fine linen cloth, which showed the transparent lights on both sides without white, water- colours only being added, while the cloth was left for the lights; ^ which thing appeared wonderful to Raphael.’ Sir Charles Eastlake, in his invaluable work with the modest title. Materials for a History of Oil Fainting, seems to be of opinion that the introduction of this German method of painting into Venice, influenced the schools of the north of Italy, and may explain the preference always given to canvas by the Venetians, that the linen was chosen fine in texture, and that their works were executed in a comparatively thin though not transparent tempera. Sir Charles instances, also, the studies of Squarcione, Leonardo da Vinci, Luini, and other of the pupils of Leonardo, as executed in this manner ; and says that the cloth of fine texture was frequently B 3 10 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. employed by them, even for tbeir finished pictures in oil. The great recommendation of this mode of tinting linen as opposed to the solid tempera, no doubt was, that in the humid climate of England and the Netherlands it was less liable to be affected by damp than colouring with more ^ body ’ or substance. Mrs. Merrifield, in her Ancient Practice of Painting^ thinks it not at all improbable that some of the early trans- parent paintings executed in Germany, France, and England may have been intended and used occasionally instead of glass for windows, when glass was extremely rare and costly. A practice prevailed also in England, previous to the introduc- tion of printing with blocks, of painting linen cloth intended for wearing apparel, as well as probably altar-cloths and hangings of apartments, with figures, flowers, and various devices, in imitation of embroidery. GILDING, ETC. The splendour of gold and gilded embellishment has been largely introduced into the arts of all nations. Mr. Layard tells us that the Assyrians were prodigal of its employment. The Egyptians used it, and we read of it frequently in the Bible. The solid precious metal was lavished by the Greeks in their chryselephantine (or gold and ivoiy) sculpture. Every school-boy can talk of ^ the golden house of Nero ; ’ and one of the principal features of the art and decorative work of the Middle Ages was the profuse employment of gold. The era from the earliest Christian period to the beginning of the fifteenth century may be termed literally (if not symbolic- ally) the golden age in art. In the ancient mosaics gold behind glass was used for the ground ; or, perhaps more properly speaking, background — the open-air being intended — and the dresses. The Byzantine and early Italian pictures, missals, and wall paintings were similarly adorned, though the gold is so thickly covered with dark varnish on some Byzantine pictures as to be scarcely recognisable. This decoration was retained, although kept more subordinate, long after the introduction of oil painting. Domenico PAINTING IN TEMPEEA. 11 Gliirlandajo was the first, according to Vasari, who dis- covered the method of imitating gold with colours. This is somewhat singular, seeing that this great master was originally a goldsmith.* One of the disadvantages of gold applied to pictures is, that it gives, especially when seen in situations where it reflects the light, a peculiar heavy leaden effect to the subjects or portions painted, and diminishes the beauty of the colours and destroys the harmony of the picture by its superior brilliancy. In the early pictures, the proportion of the surface covered with the precious metal far exceeded that over which the colours were spread. Even in the Augustan age, the indul- gence in the tempting richness of gold could scarcely have been carried so far as in the works of Christian art of the fourteenth century. The painters of this period used gold so generally, that figures in gold dresses with shining glories (see note E in Appendix) round their heads were placed upon gold backgrounds without any shadow ^ cast ’ from the figures. A most imposing example of the application of gold may be seen in the large altar-piece by Andrea Orcagna in the National Gallery. In the early Frankish or Carlo- vingian MSS. silver is frequently blended with gold. The backgrounds in the oldest Italian pictures (Sienese school) are pure smooth gold ; a characteristic borrowed from the most richly-illuminated MSS. of the same period : but sub- sequently the gold had patterns or diapers stained, embossed (as in bookbinding), or painted on it. When the back- ground was not gold, it was still diapered, as in the ex- traordinary painting preserved at Wilton House, believed, we know not upon what sufficient grounds, to be the work of a foreign artist, and which contains the most authentic portrait of our Richard II. The gold and diapered back- grounds have been revived by Hess and other modern * Many of the greatest sculptors, painters, and architects of the best period in Italy, either issued from the goldsmith’s workshop or successfully practised the goldsmith’s art. W e need only mention, in addition to Ghirlandajo, Brunelleschi, Lucca della Robbia, Ghiberti, Paolo Ucello, Antonio del Pollajuolo, Andrea del Verocchio, and Cellini. 12 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. painters of tlie German scliool j and in Mr. Holman Hunt’s picture, ‘ The Light of the World,’ the head of our Saviour is encircled with a golden nimbus. In Greek (Byzantine) works and the earliest Italian paintings, even the lights on the dresses of the figures are heightened with gold applied in lines. After the year 1400 all painters seem to have dis- carded the flat gold background, with the exception of Fra Angelico da Fiesole. In the north, open backgrounds in tempera pictures, before the time of Van Eyck, are extremely rare. In German art the nimbus is comparatively seldom seen ; where gold objects are represented in the picture itself, they are laid in with the flat leaf, then outlined, and the shadows, as it were, etched with pure black lines, such as we find in large early woodcuts, Sometimes the lines are crossed and sometimes dotted, as in the woodcuts of Albert Durer. The gilding on many old wall paintings is in such a re- markable state of preservation, that it is desirable to ascertain how the gold was applied. The gold-leaf itself was thicker, the number of leaves obtained from an equal quantity of metal having been gradually increased since the time of the Romans. The mordants * were of two kinds, one of which served for miniatures and places not exposed to damp ; the other and more durable being, according to some documentary evidence, an oil mordant ; but the most ancient was probably glutinous. Prof. Branchi, from a chemical analysis of some portions of the gold ground of the mural paintings by Benozzo Gozzoli and Buffalmacco, in the Campo Santo at Pisa, concludes that wax was the principal ingredient of the mordant there used. The gold was always supplied by the persons who ordered the picture j and when these were either unable or unwilling to pay for the precious metal, it was usual to substitute for it on wall paintings leaves of tin-foil covered with a yellow varnish (auripetrum). In order to economise gold, the old masters had another invention called ^porporino,’ a compo- sition of quicksilver, tin, and sulphur, that produced a yellow * 3Iordant, the adhesive matter used by gilders to secure the gold leaf ; also a substance used in dyeing or calico printing, to fix or hite in the colours— hence the name mordant, from morcleo to bite. TAINTING IN TEMPEEA. 13 metallic powder^ and whicli tliey employed instead of gold. A substance of a similar nature is used to this day in Eng- land as a substitute for gold on coloured woodcuts and chromolithographs. Silver likewise served as a foil over which yellow and other colours ground with oil were glazed ; it was also used in representations of armour, as may be seen in the remarkable picture of ‘ The Battle of Sant’ Egidio,’ by Paolo Ucello, in the National Gallery. Besides these, other decorations were introduced into the Italian pictures of the fourteenth century, such as stucco ornaments in relief; and actual gems (or imitations of them), termed Giouches,’ which were inserted where jewel- lery was to be represented, more especially in the raised diadems of saints. Such decorations, together with the draperies which we shall see later, were already executed in oil,* and the carved framework, tabernacle, or surrounding ornamento itself of the picture were completed first. The face and hands, which at this period were always in tempera, were added afterwards — at least after the draperies and background were finished. In early times the artist executed all the various operations connected with his picture himself. Hence the number of arts practised in the cloisters, and included in the practical directions given by the monks in mediaeval MSS. In later times the work was divided ; and Sir Charles Eastlake tells us that ‘ the decorator or gilder was sometimes a more important person than the painter. Thus some works of an inferior Florentine artist were orna- mented with stuccos, carving, and gilding by the celebrated Donatello, who in his youth practised this art in connexion with sculpture. Vasari observed the following inscription under a picture : Simone Cini, a Florentine, wrought the carved work, Gabriello Saracini executed the gilding, and * Tempera pictures of the fourteenth and beginning of the fifteenth century frequently exhibit an inequality of surface, some portions having thick edges and being considerably more raised than others. This generally results, as we shall see more particularly later, from the partial oil painting used for those portions, and the viscidity of the oil ; hut it may also have been occasioned, in some instances, by the different consistence of the tempera media employed for various colours. 14 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. Spinello di Lucca, of Arezzo, painted the picture, in the year 1385.” ’ ^ We may pause to consider for a moment,’ says a writer in the Quarterly Review (1847), in whom the reader will hardly fail to recognise the author of Modern Painters, * what effect upon the mental habits of these earlier schools might result from the separate and previous completion of minor details. It is to be remembered that the painter’s object in the backgrounds of works of this period (univer- sally, or nearly so, of religious subjects (was not the decep- tive representation of a natural scene, but the adornment and setting forth of the central figures with precious work ; the conversion of the picture, as far as might be, into a gem, flushed with colour and alive with light. The processes necessary for this purpose were altogether mechanical ; and those of stamping and burnishing the gold, and of enamelling, were necessarily performed before any delicate tempera work could be executed. Absolute decision of design was there- fore necessary throughout ; and hard linear separations were unavoidable between the oil colour and the tempera, or between each and the gold or enamel. General harmony of effect, aerial perspective [the effect of distance given by imitating the influence of atmosphere], or deceptive chiar- oscuro became totally impossible ; and the dignity of the picture depended exclusively on the lines of its design, the purity of its ornaments, and the beauty of expression which could be obtained in those portions (the faces and hands) which, set off and framed by this splendour of decoration, became the cynosure of eyes. The painter’s entire energy was given to these portions, and we can hardly imagine any discipline more calculated to ensure a grand and thoughtful school of art than the necessity of discriminating character and varied expression imposed by this peculiarly separate and prominent treatment of the features. The exquisite drawing of the hand also, at least in outline, remained for this reason even to late periods one of the crowning excel- lences of the religious schools. It might be worthy the consideration of our present painters whether some disad- vantage may not result from the exactly opposite treatment PAINTING IN TEMPERA. 15 now frequently adopted, tlie finishing the head before the addition of its accessories. A flimsy and indolent back- ground is almost a necessary consequence, and probably also a false flesh-colour, irrecoverable by any after apposition.’ The technical operations so characteristic of the Italian art of tliis period correspond greatly with what was the practice in England ; as, for instance, in the splendid decoration of St. Stephen’s Chapel, after it was rebuilt by Edward III. in the middle of the fourteenth century ; for the habits of the painters in England closely resembled those of the followers of Giotto. Nevertheless the practice of gilding, stamping ornaments, and the employment of mosaic, is thought not to have been indigenous to this country. The rarity of ex- amples in which such decorations occur, where the rest of the work seems English, points to the conclusion that they never formed so essential an element in English art as they did in Italian (see latter half of note D in Appendix). The latest modifications of gold and silver, glazed or lac- quered foil-grounds, appear in the works of Holbein and his contemporaries. The Italians did not paint on gold grounds after the time of Titian, though large yellow-coloured radi- ating glories are common in his works, as well as in those of Tintoretto and Guido, Murillo and other Spanish masters. HATCHING AND STIPPLING; FUSION OF TINTS, ETC. In the finishing of their pictures the tempera painters met with a difficulty that is, however, common to various branches of art. It was, we need not say, impossible to prepare as many tints as there are gradations, or as they are popularly termed, shades, in nature. The tints when laid, covered flatly certain definable patches and breadths. The vehicle dried too quickly to allow much blending or fusion of the colours on the surface of the picture, and for the same reason they could not be readily lightened or dark- ened in tone.* Therefore, for portions requiring verj^ delicate * Tone is either general or particular: it may mean simply the degree of light or shade in some specific part ; or it may refer to the 16 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. gradations— such, for instance, as the features, in order to convey the impression of relief, or that parts are raised or project beyond others, to do, in fact, on a flat surface what the sculptor does with his modelling — it was necessary to adopt the expedients of ^ hatching ’ and ‘ stippling.’ Hatching consists of lines — stippling of dots. By patiently placing these, one hy one, more or less closely together, or of more or less thickness, and with mechanical regularity, it is found that the most insensible or the most abrupt gradations can he obtained. Stipple gives its name to that species of en- graving brought to perfection by Bartolozzi, and employed in imitations of chalk drawings. ‘ Hatching ’ is a variation of the word ‘ etching/ through which it is derived from the German JEtzen. The methods are frequently mixed, stippling being used to soften and fill up spaces left by the crossed hatchings ; and both are of very general application, not only in tempera, but in engraving, drawing, oil, missal, miniature, water-colour, and fresco painting. One expla- nation will, however, serve for all. Hatching is the only method which can imply any know- ledge of forms beyond that distinctly developed by the appearances produced by the tinting. Several refinements, by which lines were rendered more descriptive, were intro- duced by the great masters in their drawings, and by the early Italian engravers, that were apparently unknown to the more ancient tempera painters. Such was the principle, derived probably from observation of striped draperies, that objects which are rounded have their rotundity best ex- pressed by curved lines ; and that those portions which recede above the level of the eye, or what is the same thing, the horizontal line, should have the lines arched like a bridge 5 while to represent the portions which recede below that line, the curves should be inverted, like the generic character and complexion, so to speak, of the whole picture. We may say indifferently of an engraving or a picture that it wants more tone — meaning, in the first, simply harmony of shading ; but in the latter we may also mean that it wants more general accord- ance with one individual hue, warm or cold, just as all the notes in a pianoforte are tuned to one particular key-note. TAINTING IN TEMPERA. 17 reflection of the bridge in the water. If we were to sup- pose a number of threads arranged like a stave in music or the strings of a harp, and held between the light and some irregular and rounded object, the shadows of the threads would follow the depressions and elevations of the surface on which they fell, and illustrate the practice to which we allude, and which is carried to perfection in line-engraving. Other conventional principles which have been established are, that lines, while assisting the ‘ modelling,’ should be crossed, in order, by forming reticulations, to prevent the eye following their direction j to remove the impression of the surface they are intended to describe being nolished ; and also to indicate the degree of roughness or smoothness intended, by drawing the lines to intersect at a more or less acute or obtuse angle. The tem- pera painters, on the contrary, seldom curved the stroke of their brush when at any distance from the outline, or allowed the lines to intersect, and probably never upon a scientific principle. The process of hatching may still be seen, after the lapse of from four to six hundred years, very distinctly in several of the tempera paintings, so many of which have lately been added to the National Gallery. Where the touch is large, as in a small ‘ Holy Family ’ by Pietro Perugino, the straight (vertical) strokes are very conspicuous ; but in others, as, for instance, the presumed portrait of Isotta da Pimini by Piero della Francesca, the lines (in this case oblique) are so fine as to be scarcely perceptible. Tempera, we shall see by-and-bye, was adopted as com- plementary to fresco, and when so used (to add at leisure force and gradation to the necessarily hastily executed groundwork of true fresco) hatching was indispensable; but hatching was also employed most extensively in the actual process of fresco painting. Here, however, as indeed in many other cases, it was serviceable not only for purposes of modelling and gradation, but to procure a flat tint (which is not eas}'- to obtain in fresco), and likewise to conceal the joinings in the mortar. The great works of Michael Angelo in the Sistine Chapel are all executed by hatchings (with lines which do not cross); an elaborate mechanical process, scarcely to be 18 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. expected from the painter’s impatient temperament. The simple straight lines of the tempera painters were derived from the practice of the Byzantine missal painters; hut even in etchings by Eemhrandt and other masters we fre- quently see a rounded surface represented by the same means. In the frescoes of Raphael in the Vatican there was, however, no hatching before they were ^ restored ’ by Carlo Maratta; nor is there in those of Correggio. But in the earlier oil pictures by Raphael the hatching is often very evident — witness the St. Catherine in the National Gallery. Leonardo da Vinci, in the minute stipple of his works, furnishes an example of an analogous method, and a method which was adopted by many other of the first Italian painters in oil, and has been continued to our day, as may be seen in the more recent works of the learned Pre- sident of the Royal Academy ; and also, though very dis- similar, in the pictures of our contemporary pre-Raphaelites. These modes of finishing were, however, never in favour with the northern painters, either in tempera or oil, at least it is not perceptible in their smallest and highly-finished pictures. In these the touch is either free from mechanical regularity, as, for a late example, in Teniers, or the tints are laid to appear as nearly as practicable like an even wash, as in the partially tempera pictures of Meister Stephan, in the National Gallery ; in the oil paintings of Van Eyck, and later of Mieris, and many other Dutch painters of cabinet* pictures. This is surprising when we remember the engraving and pen-drawing very often prac- tised ; and that some of them, including Van Eyck, were also illuminators, in which stippling is inevitable. For in missal painting, from the impossibility of spreading a fiat tint on the vellum of which the ancient books were com- posed, the illuminators were compelled to have recourse to what Fuseli calls the ^elaborate anguish’ of the system. The modern miniature painter is also placed under similar conditions, the hard smooth surface of ivory obliging him * Cabinet pictures are so named because thej^ are so small in size as to be readily contained in a cabinet. PAINTING IN TEMPEEA. 19 to finish, as it is pleasantly termed, with line, Mot and go one.’ Finally, many painters in water-colours choose these methods, because by them greater richness and finish can be obtained. We have said that the fig-tree juice was replaced among the German and English tempera painters by vinegar ; but this would not retard the rapidly drying vehicle sufficiently to explain the careful rounding of forms by fusion of tints observable in many of their works. This was effected, it appears, by the addition of honey. The more obviously laborious process with lines and dots was alone that which was, wdth few exceptions, known or practised by the earlier artists of. Italy. Vfter the middle of the fifteenth century the exceptions are less rare, but wax and other ingredients besides honey were probably employed at this period. The lines and dots of the tempera painters are generally of the same hue, though lighter or darker than the colour which they cover. Occasionally, however, as in one of the examples of Botticelli in the National Galleiy, we see some indication of a principle, invaluable for the attainment of purity and richness of effect, carried to perfection by Mr. W. Hunt and other water-colour artists j viz., the placing side by side separate touches of unbroken, but diverse colour, and leaving them for the eye to blend and unite. The system of shading with a ‘ self-colour,’ as pink with crimson, and light blue or yellow with deeper tints of the same colour, was afterwards shown in the Roman schools to be compatible with the most elevated style of painting, though not of actual imitation. In the very early works of the Sienese this system we find did not obtain: salmon- coloured lights are placed in the flesh over very dissimilar hue.s, not to speak of the ghastly contrast they present with the green shadows and pink cheeks of the faces. THE YAENISH. A short inquiry into the nature of the varnish used by the tempera painters at tlie end of the fourteenth century, acquires considerable interest for the general reader from the circumstance that, as we shall see in treating of Oil 20 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. Painting, it was, there is little doubt, in the search for a more eligible varnish, that Van Eyck effected the great im- provement in the vehicle of oil painting, by which tempera was finally everywhere superseded. It is probable that varnishes composed of resins dissolved in oil have been used in the most ancient times. It is be-, lieved that the composition of varnish was known in Persia, India, and China before the best period of painting in Greece j and it is, then, not to be supposed that the Greeks were un- acquainted with the means of preparing it. Yet such would have been the case, if we give credit to what may be in- ferred from a paragraph in Pliny, in which he tells us that the great painter Apelles was indebted for his unequalled colouring to the employment of a liquid which he calls ^atramentum,’ with which he covered his pictures when they were finished, and with which no other painter was acquainted. Pliny observes, ‘There is in the pictures of Apelles a certain effect that cannot be equalled,’ and that ‘ tone was obtained by means of atramentum, which fluid he passed over his pictures when the painting was completely finished.’ ‘ This liquid,’ we are further told, ‘ brought out all the brightness and fulness of the colours, and also pre- vented the dust or similar substances from impairing their lustre. It was so transparent that it was not perceptible until you were very near to it.’ One of its greatest advan- tages was, that the brightest colours under its influence, so far from dazzling the sight, seemed as if viewed from a distance, or through a glassy medium, which imperceptibly lowered tne tone of the most brilliant tints, rendering them more chaste and agreeable to the eye. Sir J. Reynolds thoiight he saw in this passage an authoritj; for glazing.* At all events the word atramentum would seem to imply that the transparent varnish was of a brownish tint; and Sir Charles Eastlake has even suggested that, as the var- nishes of the mediaeval painters were all of a red or brown * Glazing is effected by spreading thin tints of various transparent colours. This term is explained more fully in the article on Oil Painting. PAINTING IN TEMPERA. 21 tinge, their dusky hue was possibly traditionally derived from the best ages of Greece. We have a distinct mention of a varnish by Aetius, a medical writer of as early as the end of the fifth century. From the eighth century till the time of Van Eyck the mention of oil varnishes (linseed-oil from its more readily drying being generally preferred to nut-oil) occurs occasionally in MSS. ; sandarac and mastic resin being the ingredients commonly boiled in the oil, although oil alone, thickened to the consistence of a varnish, was used in the twelfth century. Such varnishes continued in use in Italy till the Raphael era, when the Italians began to employ varnishes prepared with the far more rapidly drying essential oils. Yarrish, in addition to its other use, was em- ployed by the early Venetian and other decorators in gilding the back of glass, and likewise for painting on glass, as dis- tinguished from glass enamelling, in which the colours are fired in. But the question remains to be determined — What was the nature of the varnish ordinarily employed by the tempera painters about the time of Van Eyck, and spoken of by Cennini and others under the familiar title of Wernice liquida ? ’ The derivation of the word vernix bears materially on the question. This word, variously modified, is proved by Sir Charles Eastlake, with much philological research, to have been, in its primitive form, ‘ Berenice,’ the original Greek name for amber. The possibility is even intimated that the name Berenice, or Pherenice, borne by more than one daughter of the Ptolemies, was the original word. Further — ^ The literal coincidence of this name and its modifications with the vernice of the Middle Ages, might almost warrant the supposition that amber, which by the best ancient authori- ties was considered a mineral, may at an early period have been distinguished by the name of a constellation, the con- stellation of Berenice’s (golden) hair.’ — Materials, &c.,p.230. If amber was the original material it was, however, con- founded with other materials, which gradually served either as substitutes or entirely superseded it. Among these were copal and sandarac resin. The latter resembles amber less than copal j but it is proved, from abundant and conclusive 22 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. evidence, that, on account of its greater cheapness and easier solubility in oil, it was the usual substitute for amber j and that, when dissolved by heat in linseed oil, it was the ^ Ver- nice liquida,’ the customary varnish for tempera pictures. Concrete turpentine (or the resin in its dry state), previously prepared over a slow fire until it ceased to swell, was some- times added to assist the liquefaction, first in Venice, where the material was easily procured (hence the name ‘ Venice turpentine ’), and afterwards in Florence. All varnishes are affected by air sooner or later, and this is less durable than amber or copal. In some old tempera pictures, the whole surface, or large spaces, may be observed freed from the original varnish, while it remains in detached dark-brown spots on others. This cracking of the varnish seldom affects the painting underneath, a proof that it was applied when the tempera was quite dry. The ‘ Vernice liquida ’ was sub- jected to long boiling, to render it more drying ; but the disadvantages of this mode of prepa.ration were not only that the varnish became so thick as actually to require to be spread with the hand, but also that by this long boiling it became at the same time so dark as to materially affect the tints over which it was passed. ‘It is not impossible,’ says Sir Charles Eastlake, ^that the lighter style of colouring introduced by Giotto may have been intended by him to counteract the effects of this varnish, the appearance of which in the Greek pictures he could not fail to observe. Another peculiarity in the works of the painters of the time referred to, particularly those of the Florentine and Sienese schools, is the greenish tone of their colouring in the flesh ; produced by the mode in which they often prepared their works, viz., by a green under-painting. The appearance was neutralized by the red sandarac varnish, and pictures executed in the manner described must have looked better before it was removed.’ The mediaeval painters were so accustomed to this red appearance in varnishes, that they even supplied the tint when it did not exist. PAINTING IN TEMPEPA. 23 THE COLOUES. Our knowledge respecting the colours used by the painters in classical times is derived chiefly from a few passages in ancient authors j but some information has been drawn from experiments on the colours in the remains of ancient paint- ings, and on pigments * that were found at Pompeii, and in vases beneath the ruins of the palace of Titus at Rome. On the authority of a passage in Pliny, it has been frequently stated that Apelles and other celebrated Greek painters used only four colours, viz., white, j^ellow, red, and atramentum ; but it must be a mistake to suppose that they were acquainted, only with these colours, or that they never used any others. Indeed, unless Pliny be supposed to point out a distinction in this respect between the practice of the earlier and later painters, the gossiping amateur contradicts himself 5 for in all he enumerates no less than five different whites, three yellows, nine reds or purples, two blues, two greens, and. one black (atramentum), which, moreover, appears to be a generic expression that includes bitumen, charcoal, ivory or lamp-black, and probably a blue-black, which thinned would supply a blue tint \ and a longer list might be made out from other authors. Most certainly, however, from the four colours named, innumerable hues and tints might be composed ; and Sir Humphry Davy says, very justly, in the account of his experiments on the ancient colours: ‘If red and yellow ochres, blacks and whites, were the colours most employed by Protogenes and Apelles, so they were likewise the colours most employed by Raphael and Titian in their best style.’ And it must be remembered that from the su- perior importance attached to design, great soberness in the use of colours prevailed for a long time in antiquity. ‘ Even the Ionic school,’ according to Muller, ‘ which loved florid * ‘ Colours ’ and ‘ pigments ’ are commonly confounded ; but pig- ments, or, as they are popularly termed, ‘ paints,’ are those substances possessing colouring power in so eminent a degree that they are used on account of that property. Pigments are, so to speak, material colours. ‘ Colours ’ have a generic signification, including the phe- nomena of colour, whether considered in the abstract or the concrete. 24 TAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. colouring, adhered to the so-called /our colours even down to the time of Apelles ; that is, four principal colouring- materials, which, however, had not only natural varieties themselves, but also produced such by mixing ; for the pure application of a few colours only belonged to the imperfect painting of the architectural works of Egypt, the Etruscan hypogea, and the Grecian earthenware. Along with these leading colours, which appeared stern and harsh to a later age, brighter and dearer colouring materials were gradually introduced .’ — Ancient Art and its Remains. The light tone of colouring so characteristic of most of the works of the later Christian painters in tempera, has, it has been observed, been referred to the allowance made for the darkening effect of the varnish. But there is another reason for the pale colouring of the period. The pigments in use had little intensity of tone ; the browns, for instance, were by no means dark. Hence, with the imperfect monotonous system of shading already described, those painters had no means of producing depth of effect. And it would appear that they sought to compensate for this by preserving the local colours in their full strength and purity. The delicacy which they seem in most instances to have aimed at in their flesh tints, may, however, have induced a similar treatment of the rest of the work. The tempera painters kept their pigments when ready for use in small earthenware saucers. |aratiit(!, C^ntausitt. NCAUSTIC having been a favourite method of painting in classical times, it is desirable to attempt to ascertain its nature before proceeding to offer an historical sketch of ancient art. The explanations given of the ancient wax painting are, however, almost inextricably confused and contradictory. There appear to have been three distinct methods, so en- tirely dissimilar that we shall best avoid confusion by de- scribing them, according to the best authorities, separately. Of the art of using colours prepared with wax, and of fixing pictures so executed by the aid of fire, the application of the term ^ encaustic,’ which strictly means ‘ burning in,’ is scarcely sufficiently descriptive. Yet, in whatever opera- tions wax was subjected to the action of heat, the process appears to have been considered by the ancients a species of encaustic. Polishing walls, for example, was denominated kausis, and the varnishers of statues were called encaustai. After the later pagan painters, the prevalence of encaustic painting among the Christian artists led to the gradual ap- plication of the term to all kinds of painting ; and even when it was superseded by mosaic, and the process itself scarcely survived, the term was still applied to other modes of painting. In illuminating, for example, the purple and vermilion used for the imperial signatures, and in caligraphy, received the name of ^ encaustic.’ Later, the more ordinary materials of writing were called by the mediaeval writers ^ incaustum ; ’ and this has finally degenerated into the ^ inchiostro ’ of the Italians, and the English ^ ink.’ According to Pliny,* ‘ there were originally two modes of • To Pliny alone, among the ancient writers, are we indebted for a connected and critical history of the fine arts. This is contained in the .34th, 3.5th, and 3Gth books of his Natural History. Pausanias r lates numerous facts and particulars respecting the fine arts and the ancient artists, in his account of the statues, pictures, and temples of Greece, but he does not furnish historically connected notices. C 26 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. painting in encaustic* the one with wax, the other on ivory, by means of the oestrum, or graver, till ships began to be painted. This was the third mode introduced, and in this the brush was used, the wax being dissolved by fire.’ As the brush is only mentioned in the last, it is evident that in the two former modes a metal instrument alone was* employed. In the first mode, then, we find that a heated metal in- strument called the rhahdion (which might have varied in shape, as brushes do now) or oestrum * (for the terms are employed sometimes indiscriminately), was used to blend the tints. The variously coloured wax pigments were prepared in cakes or sticks, like coloured crayons in the present day. The rhabdion vms used much in the same way as Turner and other painters have dexterously handled the palette- knife, drawing with the point and regulating the impasto, or body of colour, with the side of the instrument. The process was elaborate : hence it was only suited for works of limited dimensions, and its difficulty probably contributed to give the small encaustic pictures of Pausias, executed in this style, their proverbial value in the eyes of rich Komaii collectors. In the second method, the metal point, oestrum, or viri- oulum, as it was otherwise called, was used ^ but for the purpose of actually engraving, by means of encaustic out- lines on ivory and other substances. Sir Charles Eastlake, however, — whose descriptions of the different styles of en- caustic painting are the best with which we are acquainted, — thinks that even in this instance the word encaustic need not be taken literally, since forms burnt on ivory could not have been very delicate works of art. It may rather ffie supposed that the outlines were first drawn on waxed ivory, for the facility of correcting them when necessary ; that * The cestrum (/cecrTpoi^ a /cei/reio) was a pointed graver; but it must have been formed like the stylus, fiat at one end and sharp at the other ; since designs in wax executed with the point could only have resembled the (of the Itahans) on ivory; and there can he no doubt that the early wax pictures were much more finished.— Easti.ake, MaUrials^ &c., p. 149 WAX PAINTINa, OK ENCAUSTIC. 27 they were afterwards engraved like a seal, in a sort of in- taglio in the substance ; and that the finished and shadowed design was filled in with one or more colours ; being ulti- mately covered with a wax varnish by the aid of heat. The third style was termed pencillum encaustic, because brushes were substituted for the metal point. The colours were kept in pots mixed with wax, and the wax was dis- solved previous to painting, sufficiently to render the pig- ments fit to be applied with the brush. The wax crayons or cakes may also possibly have been used. But the chief characteristic of this third method was the use of the cau- terium. This instrument was a pan of live coals or some kind of charcoal heater. When the picture was in other respects finished, the cauterium was held before it till ‘ the colours frothed,’ and this regulated fusion united the whole surface.* This was the generally practised wax painting of the late pagans and early Christians, and is the chief authorization of the term encaustic. This style somewhat resembled the first. The artists painted on wood (larch being preferred for ail pictures) ; but ultimately sometimes on walls. Pau- sias, Nicias, and other painters who practised the first pro- cess, generally adopted this likewise. It is clear that, as the brush was used in this method, the wax must have been softened aTid dissolved in some other way than by heat, in order to fit it as a vehicle j for, merely melted by heat, although with friction serviceable as a varnish, it would cool much too rapidly for the application of the colours with the brush. But it is remarkable that, although the ancient mode of bleaching wax has been fully described by classic authors, no passage has been found which clearly describes the process of converting it into a vehicle for painting. From this uncertainty, innumerable controver- sies, theories, and experiments have arisen. * Hay don says that it was then rubbed with wax candles, and finally with white napkins, till the polish was exquisite. His prin- cipal authority for this was probably the passage in Vitruvius, 1. vii. c. 9. But here the wax candles, cum candelis linteisque puris, are only mentioned as a cerate, or nearly colourless varnish for polishing walls, c2 28 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. Plinj, we have seen, states that the third st}de of wax painting was first adopted for ships, and he adds that it w^as ‘ proof against the sun’s heat, the salt of the sea, and the winds.’ The common varnish for ships was, there is reason to believe, not pitch, but wax and resin, dissolved probably by an essential oil,* although the word ‘ zopissa ’ is used in- difierently for pitch and comparatively light-coloured resin. This varnish, more carefully prepared in order to render it as pale as possible, was, in all probability, the vehicle used, as it has the qualities enumerated by Pliny. Experienced chemical analysis has proved that the colours of a mummy cloth had been mixed with pure wax, and it is concluded that the wax was held in solution by a volatile oil, such as naphtha. We have seen, from the experiments of Prof. Branchi (see p. 12), that in the Middle Ages the mordant for gilding was wax; and the chemist inclines to think it was dissolved in an essential oil, rather than a fixed drying oil. The same Professor ascertained that wax had been also used either wfith or over the colours as a varnish in the early Pisan and Florentine pictures before the middle of the fourteenth century, and that from a resinous resi- duum it was probably dissolved by spirits of turpentine : wax was likewise used at this period in colouring statues, and as a cement for mosaics.* From a few passages in me- diaeval MSS., it appears that wax was also sometimes em- ployed as a vehicle, and that its solution was effected by a lixiviimi, tlmt is to say, by some agency which will allow the wax when ground, or in some other way united with the pigment, to be mixed with water. Potass and lime are mentioned as thus used, and a similar mode is still practised by the monks of Mount Athos, who retain many other Byzantine traditions. Alkaline reagents, which convert the pigments into a kind of soap, have had many modern advo- cates. No direct evidence in support of the employment of a lixivium, or the solution of wax by maceration, instead of its liquefaction by fire, can, however, be adduced from * The ancients, though ignorant of the modern mode of distillation, were acquainted net only with naphtha, but with a method of ob- taining the essential oil of turpentine. 29 WAX PAINTING, OR ENCAUSTIC. ancient authors. All that is distinctly mentioned is the solution of wax by means of heat in a fixed oil : walls and statues at least were certainly sometimes varnished with wax dissolved in olive oil, and afterwards polished by means of heat and friction, as already alluded to— the cloths re- moving the superfluous oil, as in the polishing of furniture at the present day. Of the more artistic kind of wax painting applied to statues we shall speak later. The wax painting of antiquity was valued for its dura- bility, resistance to moisture, and ordinary heat, and the gloss of which it was susceptible. The last was a great recommendation to the ancients, especially when encaustic was employed not only for painting on panels, but for mural decoration; for the walls of their sumptuous apartments were very carefully stuccoed, and polished like mirrors. When painted and varnished, no lodgment was afibrded for dust, and there was the utmost facility for cleaning the surface. Hence, upon the introduction of the larger style, wax painting was applied to ceilings, and, at a later period, even to the walls of baths. It is true that tempera pictures were varnished and had consequently a shining surface, but not, perhaps, when tempera was employed for wall painting ; and certainly we should venture to say the lime painting, either when fresco was employed alone — if ever it was so employed — or when it was combined with tempera, was not rendered superficially glossy. A higher quality, artistically speaking, was that the pencillum encaustic was susceptible of more depth and richness, and therefore of more force, brilliancy of colour, and gradation. And of this we are assured, that the later encaustic pictures of the Romans were estee.Led as much as the works of the great artists executed in the older method, notwithstanding that art was then declining. Encaustic certainly never had entirely favourable conditions for the development and appreciation of its resources. 30 TAINTING POPULAELT EXPLAINED. ftni|co aiA tfiuaitstk m Jintiqiuts aiiir lire lliiMf |s(s. AVING explained tlie principal processes of painting employed by the ancients and in the Middle Ages, a few connecting notices of the practice at different periods together with a glance at inferior branches of the art — such for instance as vase painting— are necessary to complete a general view of the subject. Of the origin of painting various theories have been entertained. Prof. Gottfried Semper and others seem to think it originated in the ornamentation of woven fabrics } while Muller believes it arose from the colouring of statues and reliefs ; and writers on ceramics follow the opinion of Pasiteles (quoted by Pliny), that pottery was the parent of the arts. Haydon says in one of his Lectures, and we would use the same words, ^ I shall not plague you or myself with a useless discussion as to where the arts first had origin, whether in India or Egypt, Italy or Greece, before the Flood, or after the building of Babel. According to my principle, the veiy first man born after the Creation, with such a peculiar and intense sensibility to receive impressions through the eye, on the brain, of the beauty of colour, light and shadow, and form, so as to be irresistibly impelled in his earliest child- hood to attempt the imitation of what he saw and felt by lines and colours to convey his innocent thought, and com- binations, in him originated Painting.’ 1. THE EGYPTIANS. Undoubtedly the oldest remains of painting are Egyptian; and the earliest, namely, those executed in the Pharaonic period, are by far the best, the arts having been constantly in a state of decline, from the earliest known examples, through the Ptolemaic period to the Roman. Three classes of paintings have been discovered in Egypt : those on the EGYPTIAN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 31 walls, those on the cases and cloths of mummies, and those on papyrus rolls. Of these, the paintings in the tombs and temples are first in merit and interest. The Egyptians were remarkably fond of vaiiety of patterns on the walls and ceilings of their houses and tombs, and on their hangings, dresses, furniture, and vases. Sir J. Gardner Wilkinson says, ^ some of the oldest ceilings show that the chevron (so common in Egyptian baskets and vases), together with the chequer, as well as the scroll and guilloche, ascribed too hastily to the comparatively modern Greeks, w^ere adopted in Egypt more than 2000 years before our era. An infinite variety of purely conventional devices had been invented and were in common use during the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties, long before the Trojan war, as ivell as the lotus and other ornaments, directly imitated from natural objects.’ Painting in Egypt was practised under peculiar condi- tions. Painters and sculptors were forbidden by a jealous priesthood to introduce any change or innovation whatever into the practice of their respective arts, or in any way to add to them. Thus art remained stationary from generation to generation. It was indeed considered a necessary part of the system that painting and sculpture should not be prac- tised by illiterate people, lest they should attempt anything contrary to the established order of things. The conse- quences were that art preserved many, so to speak, infantine characteristics.* Even the imitation of nature was not carried in painting beyond an outlined diagram, arbitrarily coloured j a generalization of human form was adopted by the Egyptian sculptors and painters, but they did not attain to that ideal beauty which the.Greeks were the first * ‘ The child and the uninstructed in art alike seem to consider it of the greatest importance to omit nothing which they are able to see. Continuity of form appears to them a point of first necessit}'. A boundary line studiously even and unbroken [the chief charac- teristic of Egyptian painting] of an object so situated as to afford the fullest view, is deemed the best and most natural expression of it. This impression is but conformable to the first notions enter- tained concerning the appearance of objects, such notions being entirely referable to the most familiar and habitual associations.’ — Fielding on the Philosophy of Painting. 32 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. to comprehend and emhodj. Nor did the Egyptians under- stand the beauty and true province of bas-relief like the Greeks : in their battle scenes they attempted to make a picture j and in order to obviate the confusion resulting from a number of sculptured figures one behind the other^ they placed them in all parts of the same field, regardless of the sky or of perspective, providing only against every- thing Tvhich might interfere 'with the hero of the subject — the king — who depended on colossal size, instead of art, for his importance. Everything being prescribed and predetermined in Egyp- tian art, we shall not be surprised to learn that there was a regular system of conventional proportions, and that pre- vious to commencing a painting the walls were squared out with lines. Accordingly, we find that the divisions pre- scribed by the canons or rules then in use are very com- monly found on unfinished works, and are sometimes to be detected under the paint in finished paintings and statues. We likewise possess in the British Museum an ancient tablet, on which is preserved an outline, exhibiting the canon of the proportions of the human frame, in use among the painters and sculptors of that country in the age of Amunopth III., about 1250 years before our era. The method of executing a wall painting has been thus described by Mr. Owen Jones : ‘ The wall was first chiselled as smooth as possible, the imperfections of the stone were filled up with cement or plaster, and the whole was rubbed smooth and covered with a coloured wash ; lines were then ruled perpendicularly and horizontally with red colour, forming squares all over the wall, corresponding with the proportions of the figures to be drawn upon it. The subjects of the painting and of the hieroglyphics were then dra'wn on the wall with a I'ed line, most probably by the priest or chief scribe, or by some inferior artist, from a document divided into similar squares ) then came the chief artist, who went over every figure and hieroglyphic with a black line, and a firm and steady hand, giving expression to each curve — deviating here and confirming there the former red line. The line thus traced was then followed by the sculptor. In EGYPTIAN TEMPEEA AND ENCAUSTIC. 33 this stage there are instances of a foot or head having been completely sculptured, whilst the rest of the figure remains in outline. The next process was to paint the figure in the prescribed colours ; and in some cases the painted line deviates from the sculptured line, showing that the painter was the more important workman, and that even in this last process no possible improvement was omitted. There are other instances where a considerable deviation from the position of a leg or arm has been made after' the sculpture was finished and painted : the part was recarved, and the defective portion filled in with plaster; which, having since fallen out, furnishes us with this curious evidence of thei practice.’ Exactly corresponding with this is the descrip- tion given by Belzoni of the executing and painting of the Egyptian bassi-relievi which he found in the Biban el Molouk, or Tombs of the Kings, at Thebes. The colours were mixed with dissolved glue, and appa- rently, sometimes, even with wax : there is an example in the British Museum of the colours being mixed with wax (mistaken sometimes for an oil painting), in a small funeral group of two figures. The ordinary colours seen upon the sculptures in paintings are red, yellow, green, and blue, of which there are two tints ; black also was used ; but for white, the white ground, which was prepared as fine as letter paper, was of course sufficient. These colours are sometimes modified by admixture with chalk, but they are always applied singly and unmixed together. Different colours were reserved for different objects. Men and women were painted red — the men of a darker tint than the women. Black men also frequently occur, and some captives of, pro- bably, a race with lighter complexions, are painted yellow, with black beards. According to the best chemical analyses of Egyptian colours, the hlues appear to be oxides of copper with a small intermixture of iron : none of them contain cobalt. Belzoni, therefore, who supposed the Egyptian blues to be indigo, appears to be in error. The reds are red oxide of iron mixed with lime. The yelloivs, which are sometimes of a pure bright sulphur colour, appear to be generally vege- table colours ; the greens are a mixture of this vegetable c 3 34 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. yellow with copper blue ; the vegetable, it has been sug- gested, might be the hemic plant, which is still used in the East for such purposes. The bluish -green which sometimes appears on Egyptian antiquities is a faded blue. The hlaeks might be from wine-lees, burnt pitch, charcoal, or soot. Painters and sculptors held in Egypt a rank similar to that of architects and professional scribes — indeed, painting, sculpture, and architecture were so intimately united that it is almost impossible to separate them. ‘ The same kind of wooden palette, or inkstand, was used by the limner in drawing outlines, as by the scribe in writing upon a papyrus ; and the same kind of reed pen was employed for both purposes. The inkstand contained two colours, black and red, the latter being used at the beginning of a subject, and for the division of certain sentences — showing this custom to have been as old as that of holding the pen behind the ear, often portrayed in the paintings of the tombs. Some palettes contained more than two colours — black, red, blue, green, and white. They were of the same long shape as the ordinary inkstand, with the usual case in • the centre for holding the pens, and some were of square or oblong form, made of wood or stone, with a larger cavity for each colour. Slabs and pestles [mullers] for grinding colours are also commonly found in the tombs of Thebes, as well as lumps of ochre, green, blue, and other colours. The sacred scribes were of the priestly order, but the royal scribes might be either priests or military men, and they were generally sons of the king, or of the chief men of the court. The public scribes were also men of great trust and conse- quence, to whom the settlement of public and private ac- counts was committed, and they assisted or performed the office of magistrates, in condemning defaulters to punish- ment.’ — Sir J. Gardner Wilkinson. For further information on this interesting subject, see this author’s work on The Private Life, Manners^ and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians. The Egyptians, besides painting the bas-reliefs, painted also detached statues : the group of the man, woman, and child, of sandstone, in the British Museum (No. 31), has been painted. They also painted obelisks, sarcophagi, and EGYPTIAN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 35 other similar objects. There is a painted sarcophagus in the Museum (No. 39), which has been varnished. Some of the Egyptian varnishes were made of glue, others appear to be resinous. A few words may be considered not out of place on the hieroglyphs (literally ^sacred sculptures’), the ^picture- writing ’ of the Egyptians. The hieroglyphs were generally coloured on the great monuments when complete; and three principal kinds have been remarked by M. Champollion : — 1. Sculptured, but not painted. 2, Sculptured and painted. 3. Drawn in outline with a pencil and then painted. Be- sides which, they may be classed as — 4. Polychrome, or painted with various colours. 5. Monochrome, or having only one tint throughout the inscription. As it is probable that all were painted, the first class can only apply to cer- tain inscriptions of which the colours have disappeared. The second was that in use for monuments of the highest importance. On these, by means of simple primitive colours and flat tints, the Egyptians endeavoured to imitate conventionally the objects which the hieroglyphs repre- sented : thus the heaven was coloured blue, the hills red, the moon yellow ; men with red flesh and white garments, the folds of which are sometimes traced in red, &c. Some idea may be formed in the Egyptian Court of the Crystal Palace of the beautiful appearance which the tombs pre- sented, and the gay and artistic eflect produced by lines of these pure hieroglyphs, appropriately coloured with simple colour to imitate the objects they represent. Alphabetic writing compared to it is as mean and tasteless as the ^ Frank ’ dress compared with the Oriental costume. It is evident, however, that so elaborate a system of writing was not calculated for monuments, unless they were of the greatest importance. Consequently, for the books or rolls of papyri and other objects, such as sarcophagi and tablets, another kind of hieroglyphs, to which the term linear has been applied, were used. These were engraved with a pointed tool when cut, and traced with the reed when written in black or red ink ; and either by tracing the out- line of the object, or by giving the principal characteristics 36 PAINTING POPULAKLT EXPLAINED. in one thick line. The linear hieroglyphs are indeed capable of many minute divisions and subdivisions of style, accord- ing as they approach to, or recede from, in their finish, the pure hieroglyphs. They are generally black, but the lead- ing words of the chapters and direction pages are written in red like the rubrics of prayer-books; and sometimes the work is accompanied throughout by vignettes, one to each chapter, elaborately painted like those of missals.* Yet, with undeniable mechanical merit, scarcely a single principle of art is illustrated in any kind of Egyptian paint- ing yet discovered, if we except perhaps one or two of the small cedar portraits which have been found in mummy cases, and in which we see, in addition to the outline, the relief distinctly expressed by light and shade. In no Egy ptian painting is there the slighest indication of a knowledge of perspective. 2. THE ASSTKIANS. Mr. Layard tells us that traces of colour and gilding were found upon nearly all the bas-reliefs discovered at Nineveh ; thus showing that the Assyrians, like other nations, painted their sculptures and the architectural ornaments of their buildings. The art displayed in the sculptures, although - rude and primitive, was distinguished by considerable truth of outline and elegance of detail, and was in some respects superior to the Egyptian. It has now taken its place amongst other styles of ancient art, and is easily recognised by its peculiar characteristics, especially in the treatment of the human form, marked by the strong development of the limbs and muscles ; in the nature of its ornamentation fre- quently distinguished by considerable grace and beauty ; and in the conventional mode of portraying natural objects, such as mountains, trees, rivers, &c. The colours employed, as far as they have yet been analysed, were mineral pigments. There are, however, grounds for believing that vegetable * For further popular information on the various kinds of writing, as the hieratic, or sacerdotal manner ; the demotic, or enchorial-, the popular, or epistolary, see Mr. Samuel Birch’s Introduction to the Study of the Egyptian Hieroglyphs. GREEK TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 37 colours were not unknown to the Assyrians, but were extensively used in decorating the walls of their palaces: being, however, subject to more rapid decay than the mine- ral pigments, they have disappeared. The colours discovered in the ruins were a blue of great brillianc}^, derived from copper j red, yellow, white, black, and green. These colours, with several hues and tints, may be seen on bricks brought from the ruins, and preserved in the British Museum. The dark black outline is a distinguishing feature of Assyrian art. As on Egyptian monuments, colours were probably used conventionally — that is to say, the same colours were always employed for a certain class of objects. From the drawings made from painted walls at Khorsabad, recently sent to Paris, it would appear, however, that human flesh was closely imitated in colour. The Assyrians seem also to have been fond of using" only two colours, such, for instance, as yellow and blue, in very elaborate decorations, combining them so as skilfully to produce a very pleasing effect. 3. THE GREEKS. Painting is said to have passed through several stages in Greece, commencing with simple skiagraphy, or shadow- painting ; by which is meant giving the exterior outline, or shape of an object, without any intermediate lines. Accord- ing to the well-known pretty fable, the origin of painting is attributed to an effort in skiagraphy — viz., that of the Greek maiden to trace the outline of the shadow of her departing lover on the w^all. The monograi)hic style con- sisted also of lines, but the inner lines or markings were given as well as the exterior outline. In the ancient mono- chromatic compositions, as is intimated by the derivation of the word, one colour only was used (the black designs on the vases were probably considered monochrome paintings) while in polychromy several colours are, of course, employed. Finally, appears to have been the full art of paint- ing to the life, and applying colours duly subordinated to the laws of light and shade. Painting was later than sculpture in becoming an indepen- 38 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. dent art in Greece, partly because the Grecian worship stood in little need of it. JFor a long time all paintings consisted in colouring statues and reliefs of wood and clay. Homer speaks only of red-prowed and purple-prowed ships j he alludes, however, to elegant and elaborate embroidery as something not uncommon, and this is painting in principle, though not actually in practice ; it is textile painting, or painting with the needle, and this is what it is termed by the Romans ; such expressions are used by Cicero, by Virgil, and by Horace. But of painting itself there is little to be said before about 500 b.c. Aristotle mentions a very re- markable piece of embroidery, which was made for Alcis- thenes, one of the luxurious natives of Sybaris. A descrip- tion of this shawl, which was the wonder of the Heliots, will be found in Grote’s History of Greece. By the Greek artistic traditions, the first advances in painting are ascribed to the Corinthians and Sicyonians, who are mentioned with- out much credibility, however, as the inventors of outline drawing and monochrome painting. At Corinth, ‘the city of potters,’ painting was certainly very early united with the fabrication of vases ; and the connexion of this city with Tarquinii might have been the means of conveying the antique style of vase painting to Etruria, for the Etruscans probably borrowed their art from the Greeks. The manu- facture of vases was from an early period divided into two main branches: the light yellow vases without gloss, of broader and more depressed forms, with red, brown, and violet figures, which, for the most part, represent animal shapes of an arabesque character ; and the dark yellow vases, which were better varnished and of a more tasteful form, with black figures, chiefly of a mythological nature. Both were fabricated in Greece and Italy. The archaic, or oldest painted vases, furnish, by the rudeness and clumsi- ness of their figures, the most distinct idea of the stages through which the art of design must have passed before it could arrive at an established and regular national style. See Birch’s Ancient Pottery, 1858. Erom about 600 b.c. to 400 b.c. may be dated the period of development in painting. The essential qualities of form GllEEK TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 39 and expression were exhibited in historical painting, consti- tuting what has since been called High Art. Cimon of Cleone, who by some is believed to have lived nearly a century before Polygnotus, is the first Greek artist of importance. He made great progress in the perspective treatment of subjects. He is recorded as the inventor of foreshorteniny* or the first to make oblique or inclined views of the figure, ohliquce imagines, which the Greeks, according to Pliny, termed Catayrapha. He is said also to have been the first to mark the articulations, indicate the muscles and veins, and give natural folds to drapery. Vase painting remained more restricted in its resources. The art had been at this period introduced from its two metropolises Corinth and Athens into Italy and Sicily, but was still less advanced in these countries. The Chalcidian Greeks in Lower Italy (Magna Grecia) took Attic models as their ground-work, both in subjects and forms. Black figures on reddish-yellow clay were now the prevailing characteristics ; but the earlier peculiarities were broadly retained. Thus we find the chief muscles and joints excessively prominent, the drapery stiffly adhering or regularly folded, the postures constrained and abrupt. Owing, however, to the facility of exercising this art, there was a great variety of styles or manners, peculiar to particular places of manufacture, often with an intentional striving at the bizarre, or caricature. The origin of Sceno- yraphy or perspective scene-painting, is ascribed by Aristotle to a painter of this period named Sophocles, after whom it figured as a separate art. From 460 b.c. to 366 b.c., that is to say, from Pericles down to Alexander, painting reached in three great stages a * Foreshortening is the apparent diminution of the length of an object in proportion as the direction of its length is brought to coincide with the direction of the visual rays. Hitherto, in the history of art, we have had no foreshortening, but only the profile view of objects, placed, as it were, flat on the wall. Foreshortening was therefore a bold invention. Correct foreshortening is one of the greatest difficulties in art, and almost peculiar to painting, for the sculptor does not require a knowledge of its principles, excepting in bas-relief. Michael xVngelo was perhaps the greatest master of fore shortening. 40 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. degree of perfection which made it^ at least in the opinion of the ancients — and surely they were qualified judges — a worthy rival of the plastic art (sculpture) even in the age when Phidias produced those marvellous works, the very dilapidated fragments of which, the Elgin marbles of the British Museum, so much excite our astonishment and ad- miration. Ancient painting appears, however, to have long remained more closely allied to sculpture than the modern. Forms predominated over the effects of light ; the design was sharp and distinct ; different figures were separated in order not to confuse their outlines j the light was uniformly distributed, clear illumination being preserved throughout j and violent foreshortenings were avoided, notwithstanding considerable knowledge of linear perspective. Polygnotus was the first painter of great renown. Accu- rate drawing and a noble and distinct manner of character- izing the different mythological forms was his great merit ; his females were graceful and attractive, and he w’as an excellent colourist. His works were arranged according to symmetrical and architectural principles. He decorated some of the principal temples of Delphi and the Athenian Acropolis. His most important performances were those. in the Lesche, a public hall or portico (such as are called loggie by the Italians) near the temple of Apollo at Delphi. ‘ ‘‘ As Homer,” says De Pauw, was the founder of epic poetry, so was Polygnotus the founder of historic painting.” From Polygnotus may be dated the commencement of subjective style in painting; that is, its subjective treatment. Subjective is here used in contradistinction to Objective ; a work of Art may be said to be subjectively treated when it is characterized more by the peculiar aesthetic * or idiosyncratic development of the artist himself, than by the ordinary condition of the object or objects treated.’ f Dionysias, Micon, Panaenus, and * Aesthetics is a term derived from the Greek, denoting feeling^ sentiment, imagination. The term, like some others used in art, was originally adopted by the Germans, but is now regularly incorpo- rated into our own vocabulary of art. By it is generally understood ‘ the science of the beautiful.’ f Wounum’s Epochs, &c., p. 51. GREEK TEMRERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 41 others are mentioned, together with Polygnotus, as distin- guished painters of the temples and porticoes. Prize con- tests in painting were now instituted in Greece. Apollodorus of Athens was the first great master of light and shade, and of their effects on colour, and Plutarch attributes to him the invention of tone. He received the surname of the Shadotve?', from the force and effectiveness of his chiaroscuro. He has been termed the Greek Rembrandt. As art now became established, it gradually assumed a more dramatic and less sculpturesque character. With Zeuxis (born not later than 450 b.c.) began the second phase of Greek painting. For though the peculiar excellence of Zeuxis was a grand style of form, he united with it a higher execution, and arrived at illusion of the senses and external charm. He was also equally distin- guished for the representation of female beauty j his most celebrated work being his ‘ Helena ’ at Crotona, said, like the Venus of Milo the sculptor, but upon questionable authority in both cases, to have been painted from the selected charms of five beautiful girls of that place. But he is allowed to have been surpassed by Parrhasius of Ephesus. Parrhasius gave great beauty to his contours (outlines), and excelled in the drawing of extremities — a severe test of draughtsmanship. He is said also to have combined in some of his works the effect of Apollodorus, the design of Zeuxis, and the invention and expression of Polygnotus. There are several hardly intelligible stories of illusive pictures by the last two painters — as that of the ^ Grapes,’ which de- ceived birds, by Zeuxis ; the picture representing a linen curtain^ which Parrhasius brought forward in his contest with Zeuxis, and which Zeuxis himself mistook for a real curtain j and the tradition bearing on this, that Zeuxis laughed himself to death over the portrait of an old woman painted by himself. These stories, taken alone, might con- vey the impression that mere illusion in painting was esti- mated by the Greeks beyond its true value. But so far from this being the case, in the highly-extolled grand style of Polygnotus it could not possibly exist ; and there is scarcely a passage out of Pliny — and he was certainly one 42 rAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. of the least criucal of ancient writers — in which the quali- ties which produce illusion are eulogised. That illusive effects were produced proves, however, that the execution of this period, and all the technical parts of the art, were brought to great perfection. The story told by Seneca of Parrhasius crucifying an old Olynthian captive, in order to paint more truly the agony of Prometheus chained, in a picture of that subject, is highly improbable, and is in all likelihood as utterl}- without foundation as are the similar stories told of Giotto and Michael Angelo. The numerous pictures by Parrliasius of gods and heroes (as his Theseus) attained a canonic consideration in art. He was, however, defeated in a prize competition at Samos b}’’ Timanthes of Cythnos. This ingenious painter Timanthes, at another victorious competition (with Colotes of Teos), produced a picture containing a device which was greatly admired by the ancients, but has been the occasion of perhaps more criti- cism than any other pictorial incident. The subject of the picture was the ^ Sacrifice of Iphigenia,’ and the painter represented her father Agamemnon concealing his face in Ins mantle, in order, it has been assumed, to convey the ex- pression of an intensity of grief at which art OJily dared to hint, Fuseli remarked, however, that the picture no doubt gave the moment that preceded the sacrifice, and that therefore Agamemnon could scarcely be represented in any other way ; for, although many considerations why he should sanction the deed might render his presence at the sacrifice absolutely necessaiy, still he could not be expected to have the fortitude to look upon his daughter’s immolation — it would be unnatural. The Asiatic school, as it was called, formed by Zeuxis, Parrhasius, and his followers, we have seen, was distin- guished from the older Grecian school, the chief seat of which was at Athens j and now an essentially difierent school, that of Sicyon, was established by Eupompus, his pupil Pamphilus, and others in the Peloponnesus. Scientific cultivation, artistic knowledge, and the greatest accuracy and ease in drawing, were its distinguishing characteristics. GREEK TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 43 This school brings us to the time of Alexander, which lias been termed the period of refinement. Varieties of elfect and execution now distinguished the various masters, and ultimately were permitted to supersede the more essential qualities of art : conventional and artificial grace indicated the tendency to decline ; sentiment was merged in the sensuous, and the spirit or essence was lost in the form. The whole course of Grecian art so much resembles the history of modern art in Italy, that any attentive observer might draw a very exact parallel between them. At this period encaustic painting was cultivated ; but, according to Pliny, it had been already exercised by Polygnotus. The school of Pamphilus, already mentioned, acquired great celebrity : among his pupils were Apelles, Pausias, and Melanthius. The course of study, which occupied ten years — nor would Pamphilus take a pupil for a shorter period — comprehended instruction in drawing, arithmetic, geometry, anatomy, and painting in all its branches. The school of Thebes produced two very celebrated painters — Nichomachus, whose execution was remarkably bold and vigorous, and wlio, according to Pliny, was the most rapid painter of his time; and his younger brother, Aristides, who was considered to be the greatest master of expression among the Greek painters.* * Pliny mentions a picture by this painter at Thebes of the sack of a town, which so impressed Alexander the Great when he saw it, after the storming of Thebes, that he took it for himself, and ordered it to be sent to Pella. The chief incident of this picture is one that has been closely imitated by Poussin, in his ‘ Plague of Ashdod,’ in the National Gallery. A wounded mother was lying with her infant near her at the point of death, and the expression of her face was remarkable for the intense agony she felt lest the child should suck blood instead of milk from her.breast. Aristides received apparently very high prices for his works, and after his death they rose to an enormous value. Mnason, tyrant of Elatea, paid him for a Persian battle a sum not much short of 4,000Z. sterling. About two centuries later, or about 146 b.c., Attalus 111., King of Pergamon, gave six times this amount for a single picture by Aristides. This same king bought from the plunder of Greece b}’’ Mummius another picture by this master for nearly 6,000/. ; but this price appeared so extravagant to the uninitiated Roman soldier, that, suspecting the picture pos- sessed some hidden value, he withlield it from Attalus, and sent it to Rome, where it Avas dedicated in the Temple of Ceres. 44 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. But before all was ranked Apelles (from about 350 to 310 B.c.) ; though his real superiority is not very clearly ap- parent. Playdon attributes it to the circumstance of his having been a ^ fashionable ’ portrait-painter. Certainly he painted very ^flattering ’ portraits of his master Alexander; as, for example, that famous one in the temple of Diana at Ephesus, in which Alexander is represented wielding the lightnings of Jupiter, ‘ his hand,’ says Pliny, ‘ standing quite out of the picture ; ’ and he was paid accordingly, receiving no less than fifty talents of gold (upwards of 50,000/.) from the royal treasury. But the fact of his having been a por- trait-painter does not lessen his claim to be considered a great artist. On the contrary, the greatest masters have been distinguished as portrait-painters ; and Apelles’ style was evidently that of the highest • historical ’ portraiture. A still more celebrated work was his picture of Venus Anadyomene, or Venus rising out of the Waters, taken from the people of Cos by Augustus in lieu of one hundred talents tribute. Plis works were principally distinguished for a certain cAa/’/s or grace’, but he allowed that Protogenes equalled him in all respects save knowing when to leave off.* Protogenes, whose too careful finish is here alluded to, was a comparatively self-taught artist ; yet who, by faithful study of nature, rendered his works invaluable, The anecdote told of Apelles, that finding Protogenes w*as not appreciated by the Ehodians, he offered to purchase the unsold pictures of his brother-artist at his own price — that when Protogenes named a sum far below their value, * Other well-known sayings are attributed to Apelles. It is said to have been a rule with him never to spend a day without in some way or other exercising his pencil : hence his maxim — nulla dies sine linea. Again, it was the custom with Greek painters to expose their pictures when finished to the public view, in the front or in the porches of their houses; and Apelles having in this way ‘exhibited’ a picture, a cobbler found fault with the sandal of one of the figures of Apelles, a criticism to which the painter carefully attended ; but the cobbler perceiving the fault corrected on the following day, was bold enough to venture to criticise the leg also : when Apelles came out and indignantly said, in the words of Pliny, Ne supra crepidam sutor judicaret, which have supplied_ the English proverb — ‘ Let the cobbler stick to his last.’ GREEK TEMPERA AKD ENCAUSTIC. 45 Apelles fixed fifty talents, allowing it to be reported at Rhodes that he intended to dispose of them as his own, and thus opened the eyes of the Rhodians to the merit of their painter, and induced them to secure the pictures for themselves at the price named— is highly honourable to the generous Grecian. But much more within the scope of this book is the story of the celebrated contest of lines between these painters, which has given rise to much discussion. The anecdote is given to the following effect by Pliny : Apelles, upon his arrival at Rhodes, immediately sought out the studio of Protogenes, who happened to be from home ; but an old woman was in attendance, and a large panel was standing ready prepared on the easel. When the old woman inquired what name she should give to her master upon his return, Apelles answered by taking a pencil wet with colour, and drawing a line (linea) on the panel, saying, simply, ^ His.' When Protogenes returned, the old woman mentioned what had happened ; and when Protogenes saw the panel, he instantly exclaimed, ‘ Apelles has been here, for that is the work of no other hand.’ W^hereupon he took a pencil, and drew upon the same line or panel a still finer line, and going away, gave orders to the old woman, that when Apelles returned, she was to show him ‘ that,’ and tell him it was whom he sought. Apelles returned, and blushing to see himself surpassed, drew a third line between or upon these two (secuit lineas), in a third colour, and attained the ultimatum of subtlety, leaving no possibility of being surpnssed. When Protogenes returned a second time, he confessed himself vanquished, and immediately sought out Apelles. This panel, continues Pliny, was handed down a wonder for posteiity, and particularly to artists; for, notwithstanding it contained only those three scarcely visible lines, still it was the most noble work in the gallery of the Imperial Palace on the Palatine, although surrounded by the finest paintings of the most renowned masters. Now this gallery was destroyed by the first fire w^hich consumed that palace in the time of Augustus; the picture was, therefore, not seen by Pliny, and he must consequently have described it, either from a written account or from some 46 •PAINTING POPULAIILY EXPLAINED. other indirect source ; and to this circumstance, perliaps, is owing much of the obscurity of this subject. It is just possible to conceive, as many antiquaries have believed, that the word linea may be interpreted quite literally, as a simple line ; supposing the throe lines to have been one within the other. The feat then would have been, in the first instance, the drawing a line with mathematical nicety. But this performance was surpassed by drawing anotljer line so subtle as to be contained within the former: and still more surprising would be a third and final con- tained line, because of its transcendent delicacy. The three colours would be absolutely necessary to distinguish each separate effort, and the third line may be strictly said to have cut the other two (secuit Uneas). The command of hand necessary to trace with a brush three lines (the last, at least, of which must have been nearly invisible) one within the other, would be most extraordinary. It is true that this implies mere manual dexterity, which is not espe- cially calculated to excite the admiration of painters now; but the difficulty was in this case certainly enormous, and a panel with such a singular history of two of the greatest masters of their art attached to it, might have been an especial object of wonder to painters, and by a kind of esoteric process it might even come to be considered the most noble work (omnique opere nohilioretii) of the Palatine collection. However, if the text of Pliny will not allow us to inter- pret the linecB as three distinct rival sketches, it is far more probable to suppose that Apelles made outlines of some part of the human figure according to the ideal standard of anti- quity, which was improved upon by Protogenes, whose line was in its turn surpassed by the second effort of Apelles, the final faultless line passing both upon and between the' ori- ginal line of Apelles and the correcting line of Protogenes : thus the two former lines were intersected, but all three w^ere easily distinguishable because executed in distinct colours. It is greatly in support of this view that we know the ancients paid extreme attention to delicate and finely undulating outline drawing; in which long preparatory GREEK TEMPERA AND ENCAU8T1C. 47 exercises, both with the style or stylus {yraplm), and hrusli {pencillias'), sometimes with black on a white ground, and sometimes with white on a black, were considered necessary before the scholar was permitted to use colours. Fuseli remarks, also, that, instead of imagining superhuman facility of execution in sweeping in the figures on vases without any guiding design beneath, we need only admire the care and dexterity with which the preparatory outlines must have been executed. The fact that in this contest the painters used different colours, favours, likewise, this explanation ; for, had not the lines been intermingled, there would have been no occnsion for different colours. Of this Protogenes, who was a famous animal painter, is told the somewhat apocryphal story, that, having tried unsuccessfully over and over again to represent foam on the mouth of a dog, he threw a sponge at the dog’s head in a fit of impatience, which, to his astonishment, obtained the desired effect. Another story is more probable, viz., that, having introduced a bird into a picture, and finding, from the excellent manner in which it was painted, that it attracted attention from more important parts of his work, the artist for this reason effaced it. Pliny states that a pic- ture of Jalysus, by Protogenes, was painted over four times, in order that, should the uppermost picture be destroyed, another might be found underneath uninjured. The reason assigned by Pliny seems too absurd to require comment j in the ‘four times’ we may perhaps see, how^ever, a resem- blance to the modern method of dead colouring, first and second painting, glazing, &c. Another famous painter of this period was Euphranor. He painted in encaustic, and was equally celebrated both as sculptor and painter. Pausias and Nicias were, however, the two greatest encaustic painters. Pausias distinguished himself by his figures of children, his animal and flower pieces, and (which began with him) the painting of lacu- naria — that is, the decorative ceiling pictures, afterwards common, consisting of single figures, flowers, and arabesques. The ornamenting of lacunaria with painted stars and the like, had previously been practised in temples. Nicias 48 TAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. declined to sell his masterpiece to Ptolemy I. of Egypt, for a sum offered of about 14,000/. ; he presented it to the city of Athens. The subject of this picture was the ^ Eegion of Hades/ from the Odyssey. Athenion (another encaustic painter), Echion, Theon, and Asclepiodorus were also celebrated. The glorious art of this period is lost to us : yet even the pictures on vases (with thinly scattered bright figures) give us an exalted idea of the progress of art, if from the productions of generally little more than common handi- craftsmen we draw conclusions as to the works of the first artists. Among the excavations at Volci were found nu- merous specimens of vases, illustrating different styles j but, of those discovered at Nola, the mass are of this later date, and some exhibit exquisite ease, delicacy, and grace. From the time of Alexander (or, at least, from about 300 B.c.) art rapidly deteriorated, scarcely another name of note occurring. The subjects chosen prove the decay of the higher branches. Caricatures are common, and rhyparo- graphy, still-life or genre f makes its appearance, Pyreicus being its most famous master. Scenography was applied to the decoration of the palaces of the great. The love of magnificence even demanded the decoration of painting for floors ; whence mosaic art arose, and soon became so deve- loped that great combats of heroes and battle-scenes were represented. Vase painting died out during this period, and soonest in the mother country. Pillage and devastation now commenced with the victories of the Eoman generals, till the porticoes and temples at Rome were filled with stolen works of art. * Still-life is the exact imitation of immobile objects, such as fruit, flowers, eatables, and dead animals. Genre is a French word applied to those subjects for which there is no other name, and which are, therefore, classed as of a certain ‘genre’ or kind. The subjects of genre painting need not be low, as in Dutch pictures, but they must be comparatively familiar or domestic. A genre picture, though it may not admit of being otherwise classified, yet may parta& of something of the qualities of all. The want of patronage for the stricter historical style in England has led to a compromise — the historical genre, of which some of Mr. E. M. Ward’s pictures are illustrations. GREEK TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 49 Two questions are often asked in reference to both the painting and sculpture of ancient Greece : Did the artists work from any prescribed system or established canon of the relative proportions of the human figure ? and, ’Were they acquainted with anatomy ? In regard to the first question, it may be affirmed that the ancients certainly did consider a standard of human form desirable ; and they recognised at least one statue, viz,, the Lance-bearer of Polycletus as canonical. Vitruvius, also, takes human proportion as a measure of perfection, applying its rules to architecture, and indeed to every object of taste. The text of the canon preserved in the third book of the Treatise on Architecture by Vitruvius, is, however, obscure and unimportant. But Mr. Bonomi, in a little pamphlet on the Proportions of the Human Figure^ states that there exists in the library of the Academy of Venice a drawing by Leonardo da Vinci, and a translation into Italian by that celebrated artist, of that part of the treatise of the ancient architect which clears up the obscurity in all the existing editions, in a way that makes it probable Leonardo must have had access to some copy of Vitruvius which has not come down to us. The drawing of a man inscribed in a circle and a square, together with the translation of Leonardo, are given by Mr. Bonomi, but perspective would certainly render these and similar rules in many cases of limited application in painting. Flaxman remarks, however, that ‘ It is im- possible to see the numerous figures springing, jumping, dancing, and falling in the Herculaneum paintings, on the painted vases, and the antique bassi-relievi, without being assured that the painters and sculptors must have employed geometrical figures to determine the degrees of curvature in the body, and angular and rectilinear extent of the limbs, and to fix the centre of gravity.’ Nevertheless, in the face even of this authority, we believe that the general experience of those who have drawn the human figure will be found to be, that a few simple measures of various parts of the human figure are all that are really available in practice, and tliat the advantages of such geometrical figures would necessarily be limited, if, indeed, not alt''gether problematical. D 50 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. In answer to the second question — Were the ancient Greek masters acquainted with anatomy ? — we may reply, not necessarily, if, by anatomy, is merely meant dissection. In the dead subject all that can be learnt is the origin and insertion of the muscles — knowledge to be obtained sufficiently without dissection.' The muscles themselves become too flaccid, and too much unlike the living fibre, to render the study of them indispensable to the artist. But anatomy, we have seen, was in some way taught in the school of Pamphilus, and Haydon believed that the Greeks dissected. Sir Charles Bell — the best authority we can adduce — says, however, that ^Although in Greece the dead were burned, and no artists dissected the human body, yet they certainly had the means of learning the nature of a bone, muscle, and tendon. No more was necessary j the rest was before them. Fine as their athletse were in youth, they were subject to the decay of age. Now, in comparing the frame of a man advanced in years, especially if in earlier life he had been remarkable for thews and sinews,” with the young and active, everything essential to the painter and sculptor may be observed. If the Greeks had before them the most admired forms of youth and manhood, they had also the ^Hime-honoured wrestler,” who in old age exhibited, almost as in the dead anatomy, every muscle, origin, and insertion, every tendon and every vein. I know how far this manner of demonstrating the anatomy may be carried. Having in my lectures on surger}'^ taken the living man, the academy model, to illustrate the practice in frac- tures and dislocations, I was accustomed to introduce a powerful muscular fellow to my class, with this appeal : ‘‘ In the exercise of your profession you have to judge of the displacement of the limbs, and the joints disfigured by dis- locations, fractures, or tumour ; but not one of you, perhaps, has ever looked on the natural body itself.” In giving these lessons, I became aware how much of the structure of the muscles and articulations might be demonstrated wfitli- out actual dissection .’ — Anatomy of Expresmon^ p. 205. This passage seems to us to dispose of this second query. It may be mentioned here, that it is no longer a question GREEK TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 51 whether the Greeks did or did not apply polychromy to architecture and sculpture. From existing traces and re- mains, it is certain that such decoration was added to many parts of their architectural details ; at all events, to the intaglio parts of reliefs, the concave parts of capitals, flutings, &c. Some English and modern German and French writers on the subject are of opinion that the raw colour of the new marble was not merely tinted and toned, but that the entire surface was covered with a thin coating of stucco, and coloured. With regard to the colouring of statues, it is established upon indisputable historical evidence, that the Greeks did paint their statues, although the practice may have been not universal. There is, in particular, one passage in Pliny which appears of itself decisive. Speaking of Nicias (lib. XXXV. cap. 11), Pliny says, that Praxiteles, when asked which of his marble works best satisfied him, replied, ^ those which Nicias [the encaustic painter] has had under his hands.’ ^ So much,’ adds Pliny, ^ did he prize his circum- litio ’ — tantum circumlitioni ejus trihuehat. It has been sup- posed by some that the word circumliiio meant simply a finish to the marble, or a coating of some kind. It is, how- ever, incredible that any services of a painter of eminence should be called in requisition except those of his par- ticular art. Nor does the word seem to have been applied only to a coating of coloured wax rubbed in by the aid of heat, as others have suggested. When Vitruvius mentions this latter process (see note, p. 27) — the Kavaiq of the Greeks — he does not apply to it any term similar to cir- cumlitio ; and that the word signified ^ painting ’ is proved by the ‘ pictura in qua nihil circumlitum est ’ of Quintilian (viii. 5, 26) ; by Seneca’s saying (Ep.lxxxvi. 5), Gllis (mar- moribus) undique operosa et in picturcB modum variata circumlitio prsetexitur ; ’ as well as by the frequent use, in later times, with reference to 'painting^ of derivatives from the verb lino. The difilculty v^e have in believing that the ancients coloured their statues — -many of them at least, but not all, as we might quote authorities to prove — has arisen from seeing antique statues invariably deprived of whatever D 2 52 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. colouring they may originally have had; though- agreeably toned by the cunning hand of time. Throughout the Middle Ages polychromy was applied to the painting of the statues and reliefs in marble, stone, and wood, of our Saviour, the Madonna, saints, &c., used so extensively in the Roman Catholic church. 4. THE ETRUSCANS. Etruscan painting generally is only a branch of the Greek, though the particular form of mural painting seems to have been practised in Etruria sooner than we hear of it in Greece. Numerous sepulchral chambers, especially at Tar- quinii, are painted with figures, the colours of which are laid almost pure and unmixed on the stucco with which the walls are coated, and although not true to nature, are har- monious. The style of drawing passes from a severity and care, which show an affinity with early Greek works, into the hasty and caricature-like manner which prevailed in the later works of the Etruscans. Greek vase painting, we have said, was earlier known to the Etruscans ; but it is probable that the Greek pottery was either introduced by commerce, or that Greek artists visited the country. The comparatively few vases, inferior in artistic value, which are inscribed with Etruscan characters, can alone afford a sure criterion by which to distinguish Etruscan and Greek productions. 5. THE ROMANS. The Romans seem scarcely ever to have cultivated the higher branches of painting, though they were the greatest ‘ collectors ' of ‘ old masters ’ — Marcellus taking the initia- tive. Fabius (Pictor *) is the earliest painter of consequence. At the end of the Republic, however, the art treasures of Rome rendered it ‘ one vast wonder,’ and the city was full of artists, many of them Greelcs, but nearly all portrait painters or decorators. Ludius was a very celebrated decorator * Pictor [painter'], the cognomen of a Roman painter, usually kiiown by the entire name Fabius Pictor. ROMAN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 53 of halls and corridors, and also a landscape painter, in the time of Augustus. These decorations were exceedingly arbitrary ; architecture, figures, vegetable and other forms, being strangely combined with villas, gardens, streams, and all sorts of comic situations, producing a pleasing and light, though fantastic, efiect. This is the origin of arabesque or moresque* A picture of Minerva, by Fabullus, in Nero’s Golden House, was admired, because the goddess appeared to look at every one from whatever situation the eyes were directed towards her. This effect might have been increased through the picture being in a dark situation ; though many persons with a lively imagination fancy, whenever eyes are painted looking anything like straight out of the canvas, that the representation has this effect. It is very fallacious, however, to make this the great test of a good portrait, as is often done. Nevertheless, although fancy has frequently much to do with this impression, there seems to be a real optical and perspective phenomenon in this effect, and it has been explained by Dr. Wollaston in one of the papers of the Philosophical Transactions, Pliny, in the time of Vespasian, justly regards painting as a perishing art. Painting was then only employed to * This description of decoration discovered at Pompeii and else- where constitutes the principal remains of ancient painting. The Arabians borrowed this style of ornament, and thus it acquired its name ; but they were obliged to suppress the forms of men and animals, the representation of them being forbidden by Mahomet ; and in the place of fanciful convolutions, they substituted exact geometrical forms. The most wonderful monument of Moorish arabesque is, we need scarcely say, the Alhambra. The old Roman style was, however, revived by Raphael, from the admiration excited in him by the discovery, in his time, of the paintings of this descrip- tion in the Baths of Titus. But in the famous Loggie of the Vatican, he not onl}’- improved upon the beauty of his model, but, by intro- ducing the element of allegory, he gave poetical meaning, and there- fore far greater interest to the composition. In France, in the time of Louis XIV., the love of splendour and gaudy display was par- ticularly manifest in the arabesques, the ornaments being loaded till meaning and propriety were entirely sacrificed and the eye insuffer- ably wearied. Arabesques of great excellence have been painted by several modern German fresco-painters, particularly by Kaulbach and Neureuther, the former at Berlin, the latter at Munich — in the Glyptotliek, or sculpture gallery. 54 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. minister to luxury or vanity. Their vanity the Romans gratified in portraiture, applying portraits painted or sculp- tured to many purposes since unheard of. At an early period it was usual, among both Greeks and Romans, for portraits of warriors to be carved on their shields, and de- dicated in the temples either as trophies or memorials of the deceased. (See Appendix, note E.) But the Romans placed wax busts of themselves in the most conspicuous part of their own houses; and the custom obtained for some time for the relatives upon the decease of the original, to convert his bust into a full-length effigy, which they carried and deposited in the temple with great ceremony and state. We have seen the estimation in which thre Greeks held their artists, and Julius Caesar, Agrippa, and Augustus were also great patrons of art; but painting was, from the common decorative character it assumed, at length almost left to be practised by slaves, and the painter ranked according to the quantity of work he could do in a day. Novv, as art is appreciated, so, naturally, is the artist held in estimation ; the converse, likewise, no doubt, holds good ; we may easily infer, therefore, the extent of the ^ decadence des Remains.’ In the age of Hadrian, painting must, however, have revived with the other arts, nation, who belonged to this age, is ranked by Lucian among the greatest artists, especially for his charming picture of ^ Alexander and Roxana.’ From this time, however, painting continued steadily to decline, till all that in its prime distinguished it may be said to have ceased about the end of the third century of our era. Upon the foundation of Constantinople (the ancient Bjzantium*), Rome was in its turn despoiled to embellish the new capital, and nearly all of what was left was destroyed by the incursions of the barbarians. Every- where, also, ignorance produced neglect and indifference, and religious fanaticism contributed greatly to the destruc- tion of the remains of ancient art. The establishment of Christianity was, in addition, a great check to the practice * The artists who practised at Constantinople were Greeks, and they preserved traditionally, if not the ancient art, the ancient name of the city where they painted : hence the ‘ Byzantine ’ style. REMAINS OF ANCIENT PAINTINO. 55 of art ; for the purity of the new religion contrasted so greatly with heathen corruption, that its professors naturally looked with little favour upon arts which were identified with pagan idolatry so intimately as to be scarcely possible to disunite them, not to mention that a branch of art had long been depraved to gratify the lowest sensuality. More- over, cupidity had a share in the general destruction : things which could be melted down, such as the bronze statues, were thus disposed of ; and, finally, numerous collections were destroyed by accidental fires. 6. REMAINS OF ANCIENT PAINTING. We have incidentally mentioned some remains of ancient painting, but it has been remarked that the great works of painting of the best ages of antiquity are entirely lost to us : all that remains consists of mere decorative painting, and for the most part the commonplace productions in a second- rate city of the inferior artists of an inferior age. Yet it is to be suspected that from these works a false impression of the merits of the ancient painters has been conveyed to the popular mind. It should, however, be remembered that the style of the paintings to which we more particularly allude — those discovered in the excavations at Pompeii and Her- culaneum — is condemned strongly by Pliny and Vitruvius. The designs on the ancient vases afibrd a greatly superior idea of the excellence of their more important works. Never- theless, even in the remains at Pompeii and Herculaneum, modern painters see sufiicient*to confirm the probability of the justness of ancient criticism, which esteemed the works of their painters equally with those of their sculptors. From these remains Sir Joshua Reynolds himself formed a very high opinion of ancient painting. Many of the single figures, such as the floating forms of dancing nymphs, centaurs, and bacchantes, are indeed deserving of the highest praise ; and in groups, the composition is frequently equally admirable. The mosaic of the Casa del Fauno, or House of the Great Mosaic, at Pompeii, discovered in 1831, and supposed to represent the battle of Issus, or some other of Alexander’s 66 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. batiles, is the most important illustration of the composition of the ancient painters. It displays thorough understanding of perspective and foreshorteningj and is probably the copy of some celebrated picture. A painting found in the house of the Tragic Poet at Pompeii, and now deposited in the Museo Borbonico, is, however, considered the most beautiful specimen of ancient painting which has been preserved to modern times. The subject is '^Achilles delivering Briseis to the Heralds of Agamemnon.’ ‘The scene,’ says Sir William Gell, ‘seems to take place in the tent of Achilles, who sits in the centre. Patroclus, with his back towards the spectator, leads in from the left the lovely Briseis arrayed in a long and float- ing veil of apple-green. Her face is beautiful, and, not to dwell upon the archness of her eye, it is evident that the voluptuous pouting of her ruby lip was imagined by the painter as one of her most bewitching attributes. Achilles presents the fair one to the heralds on his right ; and his attitude, his manly beauty, and the magnificent expression of his countenance, are inimitable. The tent seems to be divided by a drapery about breast high, and of a sort of dark bluish-green, like the tent itself. Behind this stand several warriors, the golden shield of one of whom, whether intentionally or not on the part of the painter, forms a sort of glory round the head of the principal hero.* It is pro- bably a copy of one of the most celebrated pictures of anti- quity. When first discovered, the colours were fresh, and the flesh particularly had the transparency of Titian. It suffered much and unavoidably during the excavation, and something from the means taken to preserve it, when a committee of persons qualified to judge had decided that the wall on which it was painted was not in a state to admit of its removal with safety. At length, after an exposure of two years, it was thought better to attempt to transport it to the Studj at Naples, than to suffer it entirely to dis- appear from the wall. It was accordingly removed with * For several reasons there is not the least doubt this was don designedly. See Appendix, note E. REMAINS OF ANCIENT PAINTING. 57 success, in the summer of the year 1826, and it is hoped that some remains of it may exist for posterity. The painter has chosen the moment when the heralds Talthyhius and Eurybates are put in possession of Briseis to escort her to the tent of Agamemnon, as described in the first book of the Iliad. The head of Achilles is full of fire and anima- tion.’ The sudden admission of the fresh atmosphere after it had been excluded for so many centuries, was the cause of a large number of paintings perishing immediately afterwards. Among these was a most curious representation of a painter’s studio, in which all the figures were grotesques. Fortunately, however, Mazois th^ painter was present, and secured a copy with his ready pencil, which is included in his ‘ Pompeii.’ Several valuable and costly works have been published on the remains of Pompeii. Foremost is the great work of Zahn, containing coloured representations of the originals. Sir William Gell’s Pompeiana, and the work on Pompeii published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Know- ledge, may also be particularized. Besides the very ancient paintings in the Etruscan tombs already mentioned, other works of this class, of the time of the Emperors, if not earlier, have been found in various parts of Italy. When Kaphael and Giovanni da Udine saw the beautiful arabesques discovered in the Baths of Titus, which they imitated in the Vatican (see note, p. 53), they stood, it is said, motionless with astonishment. One of the most beautiful series of ancient paintings is the ‘Life of Adonis,’ discovered in 1668 in some ruins near the Coliseum. These pictures, admirable for their chaste simplicity, were engraved by Pietro Santi Bartoli, for his work, with text by Bellori, on the Subterranean and Sepulchral Paintings of Borne.* This work likewise contains engravings from the paintings of the tomb of the Nasoni (the family of Ovid), which are good examples of the decorative taste- of the period. The vase painting of antiquity may be studied to great advantage in the noble collection of vases in the British Museum. ” Le Pitture Anticlie ddle Grotte di Roma, e del Sepulchro de' Nasoni. D 3 58 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED, 7. CHRISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC, As Christianity gTadually became in the third and fourth centuries dominant o.ver paganism, so the prej udices against art became relaxed ; but from apprehension lest Gentile con- verts should, if images were introduced, again relapse into idolatry, the early Christians, before the time of Constantine, f.j used symbols only. Such were the cross, the monogram of ij Christ, composed of the first two Greek letters of the name 1 X and P, but variously written ; the alpha and omega, the || fish (a curious, but favourite emblem of Christ and his disci- ; | pies), the dove, the lamb, the cock, the phoenix, the peacock, ' the ship, the vine, the palm, the lyre, &c. To the not un- ^ 1 reasonable dread also of approximating to the forms and appearances of the pagan idols which still existed in great > numbers, may be attributed the very unnatural and purely [ representative style adopted when sacred personages were | permitted to be chosen as the subjects of art. | Even when art was accepted, it was not accepted as such. J The object was not to excite pleasure and produce effect, but f ' to inculcate certain religious principles. Thus, as soon as the ' person of Christ was introduced, he was almost invariably i depicted as the Good Shepherd. ^ But he was not repre- ■ sented beautiful : for not only was it essential that the mind should not be led into idolatry by forgetting the t/iing rep's^ sented in the representation, but in respect particularly to our } | Saviour, he was regarded as essentially differing in his earthly __ i form from the ideal beauty of the heathen deities : they re- membered how he was announced by the prophet : ‘ He hath no form nor comeliness ] and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.’ ^ His visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men.’ That a combination of outward circum- stances led to a false view of the function of art, we need hardly stop to remark ; for there is surely no reason why religion should compel us to do violence to that instinct of beauty which the Creator has implanted in us. However, the typical style, first adopted from religious prejudice, became sanctioned by use, and ultimately from habit regarded CHRISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 59 a3 almost sacred. A few of tlie pagan forms, and even some of their more negative and innocent legends, such, for instance, as that of Orpheus, and Cupid and Psyche, were, notwithstanding, introduced in early Christian paintings, and on the bas-reliefs of sarcophagi. Nevertheless, the aversion to the arts continued very vio- lent, first in the Western or Romish church, and afterwards in the Eastern or Greek church, long after the time of Ter- tullian (the second century),who wrote with great zeal against artists, as persons of iniquitous occupations. The carvers of graven images were looked upon as the servants and emis- saries of Satan. Whoever carried on this hateful calling was declared unworthy ^f the cleansing waters of baptism ; who- ever, when baptized, returned to his old vocation, was ex- communicated. The Gnostics appear to have been the first who had recourse to the use of images. A bishop of Pol a introduced paintings into two churches, which he built at the close of the fourth century ; and this must have been one of the earliest instances of the kind in Italy. In the fifth century the practice was common, and the general ignorance of this period favoured the commencement of the grosser form of Christian idolatry. From the fifth to the ninth cen- tury mosaics were, however, preferred for church decoration on account of their great durability. Encaustic painting had continued to be much practised in the second and third centuries ; but, like tempera, though occasionally employed (the latter more particularly in missal painting), it was eventually superseded entirely by mosaic for wall painting. Some extremely interesting remains of Christian wall paintings of the time of the Empire discovered in the Cata- combs of Rome * require, however, to be noticed. The grandest and most impressive of these were found in the * ‘ The Catacombs of Rome, most of them lying at a short distance from the city gates, were originally, and probably from the time of the Republic, pnzzolana pits. They were also early made use of as places of sepulture for the lowest classes of the people, and for slaves. For these and other reasons, being avoided and decried, thej^ were chosen by the persecuted Christians as places of resort and conceal- ment, and more especially also as places of burial for their martyred brethren; Christ having condemned the heathenish custom of burning 60 PAINTI^^G POPULARLY EXPLAIA^ED. Catacomb of San Callisto, on the Via Appia, under the church of S. Sebastian, called after St. Calixtus, who was Pope from 219 to 223 a.d. One chamber contained an ‘ Ado- ration of the Kings;’ but the Virgin and Child, and a town (Bethlehem) in the background, are all that remaia. Lower down is a man pointing upwards, supposed by the late emi- nent German critic, Dr. Kugler, to be the prophet Micah, and to have reference to the words — ‘But thou, Bethlehem Eph- ratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is 'to be ruler in Israel,’ &c. Other subjects are, ‘ Moses striking the Bock;’ ‘Daniel in the Lions’ Den;’ the ‘Ascension of Elijah;’ ‘ISIoah looking out of the Ark;’ the ‘Raising of Lazarus ; ’ Orpheus (an emblem of Christ) ; besides single figures of Job, Moses, and several symbols. On the ceiling is a bust portrait of Christ, the neck and bosom uncovered, with the exception of some drapery hanging over the left shoulder, which is supposed to be the earliest portrait of Christ, and to indicate the type subsequently preserved for others.* * The face is oval, the nose straight, eyebrows arched, the dead, which, independent of this, had already much declined since the establishment of the Empire, several excavations of this kind; which had been abandoned for generations, and probably for- gotten, were secretly enlarged by the Christians into extensive and intricate labyrinths, composed of narrow intersecting passages, along the sides of which sepulchral recesses were disposed. Many of these passages terminate in small, architecturally -shaped, vaulted spaces, where, in periods of persecution, divine seiwice, and especially the festivals of the martyrs, were held. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when a new impulse was given to the Catholic [Romish] church, these resting-places of the martyrs were again opened and eagerly examined, when the sides and roofs were found to be covered with a great variety of paintings. Since then, these have, unfortu- nately, been almost obliterated by the admission of the air and by the smoke of torches, while such engravings as were taken from them at the time give us no adequate conception of their style.’ — Kugler’s Handbook of Pahitlng, vol. i. p. 13. * The resemblance is, of course, purely imaginary ; for notjhe least reliance can be placed on the numerous legends respecting the actual bodily appearance of our Saviour, although the painter of this portrait probably followed a traditional type, for it differs materially from the Grecian ideal. A letter, describing the person of Christ, was pretended to have been written to the Roman Senate byLentulus; but it appears for the first time only in the writings of Anselm. Arch- CIIKISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 61 the forehead rather high and smooth ; the expression serious and mild ; the hair parted on the forehead, and flowing in curls on the shoulders j the beard not thick, but short, and divided. In other of the Catacombs may also occasional!}" be traced the habits of the early Christians. They are seen assembled bishop of Canterbury in the eleventh centurj". The letter referred to runs thus : ‘ A man of statel}^ figure, dignified in appearance, with a countenance inspiring veneration, and which those who look upon it may love as well as fear. His hair, rather dark and glossy, falls down in curls below his shoulders, and is parted in the middle after the manner of the Nazarenes ; the forehead is smooth and remarkably serene ; the face withuut line or spot, and agreeably ruddy ; the nose and mouth are faultless ; the beard thick and reddish, of the colour of the hair, not long, but divided ; the eyes bright, and of a varied colour.’ Two traditions respecting the ‘holy true image’ are de- serving notice for their connexion with works of Christian art. The first is related by Evagrius, a Avriter of the sixth century, and is as follows : ‘xVbgarus, King of Edessa, in Mesopotamia, who was confined by sickness, Avhich his physicians could not relieve, having heard of the miracles performed by Christ in Judea, sent a messenger to him to invite him to come to Edessa, to cure him of his complaint. This messenger was a painter named Ananias, and the king ordered him that, if he could not persuade Christ to come to him, he was at least to bring his portrait. Apanias delivered his letter, but, on account of the crowd, retired to an eminence close by, and there attempted to make a drarving of his face. This he found impossible to do oAving to Christ’s repeated moA’ements, or, as a later authority says, the refulgence of his countenance. Christ himself, however, accomplished his purpose ; for, having called for Avater to Avash his face Avith, he Aviped it Avith a napkin, Avhich he gave, Avith an ansAver for the king, to Ananias, who found a likeness miraculously imprinted on it.’ Abgarus, as he anticipated, Avas cured by this portrait, and it became an object of universal veneration at Edessa, until it Avas remoAmd to Constantinople b}" Nicephorus Phocas, in a.d. 964. It was subsequently carried to Rome, and is claimed to be identical with the painted head of the Saviour preseiwed in the church of S. SilA^estro in Capite ; although another account states that it wms taken to Genoa, and deposited in the Church of S. Bartolomeo ; and although this andAmrious other images of Christ, still held sacred in the Romish church, have been repeated!}" declared spurious in coun- cils of the same church. The other tradition is, that a woman pre- sented a handkerchief to Christ to Avipe the perspiration from bis face as he passed to Calvary, and that upon this handkerchief the Redeemer left his likeness. This woman Avas canonized by Leo X., under the name of Sta. Veronica, and the handkerchief is said to be preserA’ed among the four ‘great ’ relics of St. Peter’s ! A represen- tation of this kind — the head of the SaA'iour on a cloth, and called a ‘ sttdarium ’—is common in the Avorks of early painters. 62 PAINTII^G POPULARLY EXPLAINED. for their ^ love-feasts/ celebrating baptiams and marriages, and congregating together for the purposes of instruction. We have noticed only some paintings of earlier times; but as the Catacombs for many centuries after Constantine the Great remained open to the public as places of veneration, and as such continued to be decorated in the taste of the day, it follows that the paintings extend to much later periods. ‘ The Virgin Mary,’ says Kugler, ^ occurs so seldom in the earlier paintings of the Catacombs, and then onl}^ subordinately, that in those times no particular type had been established for her : ’ this was reserved for the ‘Mario- latry ’ of a later period. It has been noticed that the grosser forms of Christian idolatry may be dated from the fifth century. The great mass of the people were unable to read, and sunk in igno- rance. With the inseparable concomitant of ignorance- superstition — it was not surprising that they did not cor- rectly apprehend the nature of the images, even if their bishops had a more intelligent intention in setting them up. Instead, therefore, of regarding them as exemplary records of fortitude and piety, or spiritual symbols incentive of devotion, they worshipped them as holy images, material saints, and mediators. Notwithstanding that this idolatry had been foreseen and warned against by the earlier prelates, resisted by contemporary dignitaries of the church, and for- bidden by the edicts of several councils against the adoration of images, their use gradually prevailed; and, surviving all the efforts of the Iconoclasts in the eighth and ninth cen- turies, finally triumphed throughout the whole of Christen- dom both in the Western and Eastern churches. The Iconoclasts (or image-breakers) of the Eastern church commenced their systematic destruction of works of art in 728, and it was continued with slight interruptions for up- wards of a century. The productions of ancient art were not directly involved in the general demolition — although they must have suffered : the zeal of the Iconoclasts was directed against Christian images, viz., the images of Christ, the Virgin, and the saints, as idols. The popes of the West, however, at this time encouraged their use; and the con- CimiSTIAxN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC, 63 sequence was, that a contest arose which convulsed the whole Empire. Eventually the party in favour of the use of images triumphed through the influence of the Empress Irene, the widow of the Emperor Leo IV., though the con- tention still continued, and the Emperor Theophilus (829- 842) protected the Iconoclasts. In the ninth and. tenth cen- turies the images were finally tolerated in the Greek Church, Yet, although the Greek artists were frequently perse- cuted and dispersed, Constantinople apparently remained throughout the \vhole of the Middle Ages the capital of the arts. The works of art here suffered, however, still further devastations by the Crusaders, and more especially in the great fires of 120C and following year, when the city was taken by the Venetians. But to this Latin conquest, which opened an intercourse with the Venetians, has been gene- rally attributed the first impulse towards the revival of the arts in the West. The Greek artists poured into Italy, at Venice, and Palermo, and also at Pisa, which was then a flourishing seaport. And to the schools thus established at Venice, Pisa, and Siena, although the Byzantine character- istics were for some time broadly preserved, has been re- ferred the growth of modern Italian art; for it has been assumed that the seed sown in a fresh soil rapidly fructified in greatly increased luxuriance and beauty. But Dr. Kugler is of opinion that the first germs of a purely Western mode of conception are discernible not only contemporary with the influence supposed to be traceable to the works of these last emigrants from the East, but at a considerably earlier period. ‘ After the close of the eleventh century, that epoch of national prosperity dawned upon the distracted country which, sooner or later, never fails to in- fuse into art a fresh and higher life. The Roman church arose from a long-continued state of degradation, for which she was herself partly accountable, to be mistress of the West. She reinstated Rome as the centre of the world, and restored to the Italians a sense of national existence. . . . . The Byzantine style was, at that time, so utterly sapless and withered, even in its native land, that it could as little resist as rival the innovating principle, though 64 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED, individual painters occasionally made the attempt/ The amalgamation, then, of the Byzantine style with the old native Longobardian of Italy, produced a new school, which is known as the ‘ Romanesque,' or Romano-Greek. However, to the Greeks the Italians were at least in- debted for the methods of preparing pigments, and other technicalities. Byzantine art, we have seen, became a regular traditional system; technical methods descended as property from master to apprentice, and the manufacture of pictures was as regularly organized as that of any other article of constant and regular demand. In fact, in the Eastern empire, and even in Italy long after the revival of painting, the artist was generally confounded with the workman (see p. 13), and only the ^ master of works,’ or architect — who, however, was sometimes a painter — was held in esteem, or liberally re- warded. But where the higher qualities of art are neglected, and any innovation regarded as a species of heresy, we may yet easily imagine it possible for the mechanical departments to be very successfully cultivated. And that this was the case mediaeval manuscripts afford abundant and conclusive evidence. Of these we may mention two treatises in parti- cular, De Colorihus et Artihus Romanorum, by Eraclius, and Diversarum Artium Schedula, by the monk Theophilus. These are well known to antiquaries ; but respecting their date there is considerable diversity of opinion among their several editors, Raspe, Mrs. Merritield, De I’Escalopier, and Hendrie. They are, however, certainly not later than the end of the twelfth, or beginning of the thirteenth century. The most complete copy of Eraclius is that transcribed, with others, by Jehan le Begue, in 1431, and edited, together with many other valuable MSS., by Mrs. Merrifield.* Nothing is known of the personality of Eraclius and Theo- philus ; but it is highly probable they w^ere of some country north of the Alps, and therefore represent the northern followers of the Byzantine school. All that is positively known of Theophilus is that he was a monk, and that * Original Treatises on the Arti of Painting, 2 vols. CliKISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 65 Theophilus was not his right name. Lessing, one of his editors, in vain seeks to identify him with Tutilio (891-921); a famous painter, sculptor, and gold-worker of the cele- brated monastery of St. Gall in Switzerland. In the treatise of Theophilus, amid many empirical formulae and traditions, embodying, possibly, some of the symbols of alchemy, there is much that is interesting and important ; and by it we obtain a curious insight into the various arts practised in the cloisters. After a kind of apostolic form of greeting common in such works, we have the following passage in an introduction, which concludes with a pious benediction and prayer : — ^Should you carefully peruse this, you will there find out whatever Greece possesses in kinds and mixtures of various colours; whatever Tuscany knows of in mosaic work, or in variety of enamel; whatever Arabia shows forth in work of fusion, ductility, or chasing ; whatever Italy ornaments with gold, in diversity of vases and sculpture of gems or ivory ; whatever France loves in a costly variety of windows ; what- ever industrious Germany approves in work of gold, silver, copper, and iron, of woods, and of stones.’ The reader will remark the reference to Greece as the source of the ‘ kinds and mixtures of various colours ; ’ and a further confirmation of the opinion that the Italian artists owed at least their knowledge of technicalities to the Greeks is afforded by the resemblance the contents of this treatise bear to the curious Byzantine MS. discovered by M. Bidron in a convent of Mount Atho§. The knowledge of art being confined to the religious fra- ternities, we need not be surprised that the pilgrim monks carried in their various missions the practice of art into the remotest corners of Europe where they penetrated. Thus may England and Ireland, even as far back as the time of St. Augustine and St. Patrick, have gained a knowledge of art, in addition to the Homan or native traditions that might have been preserved. Certainly the Irish and Anglo-Saxon manuscripts of the seventh and eighth centuries display, though rude in taste, extraordinary elaboration. However 66 PAINTING POPUP AKLY EXPLAINED. this may be, certain it is that, after the year 1000, art made so sudden a«id simultaneous an advance throughout Europe, that the various countries were placed almost on a level. The Roman and Byzantine influence is thus traced to England by Mr. Hendrie : ‘ We find that, previously to the edict by which Charlemagne resolved to encourage the va- vious arts to the utmost of his power, Wilfred, Bishop of York, and Biscop, his friend, had already availed themselves of the assistance of foreign artists, in order to decorate the cathedral of St. Peter [York Minster], before the year 675. Biscop undertook a journey to the Roman States, and brought home many pictures with which the churches of St. Peter and Weremouth were ornamented. The second visit of Alfred to Rome with Ethelwulf, although undertaken at an early age, would, doubtless, not be without its influence on such a mind. The painted chamber at Westminster, in which Edward the Confessor died, the renown of St. Dimstan as an accomplished painter and a skilful contriver of instru- ments, the remains of the Saxon chased and enamelled work, which was esteemed on the Continent as early as the seventh century, and the manuscripts which are yet extant, prove that, in this country at least, the arts, as introduced by the Romans, were never wholly lost. Records exist of Alfred the Great having summoned workmen from all parts of Europe to assist in the construction of the edifices he pro- posed to erect, and it is probable many Byzantine traditions may thus have been acquired for England.’ We may now without further digression glance at the great revival of painting in Italy in the thirteenth century, which immediately followed two of the most important events in the history of the world — the discovery of gunpowder and the invention of printing — events which ultimately entirely changed the constitution of society. This revival consisted first, objectively, in a closer imitation of nature, although for nearly two centuries, till the time of Massaccio, there was little individuality in the imitation, and many (modified) Byzantine conventionalisms were for a considerable time CiriUSTIAN AET IN TEMPEEA AND ENCAUSTIC. 67 preserved; and, secondly, s'uhjectively, of a more earnest religious vitality and sentiment in the Unotives.^* At the head of this revival, which commenced in the Florentine or Tuscan school, the name of Cimabue has been usually placed; but artists preceded him who gave some indication of independent feeling. Of these, (Tuido da Siena and Giunto da Pisa may be named : Margaritone d’Arezzo also preceded Cimabue ; but his works are more purely Greek, and he murmured bitterly at the innovations of the latter. (See his picture in the National Gallery.) Nevertheless Giovanni, of the noble family of Cimabue, was the first painter of renown (6. 1240, d. after 1300), One of his earliest and best-known works is the colossal Madonna, still in the church of Santa Maria Novella, to which it was carried in triumphal procession from the house of the painter — an event which gave the name of Borgo Allegro, or the ^ gay quarter,’ to that part of the city. But the talents of Cimabue are exhibited most conspicuously in the large dis- temper wall paintings ascribed to him in the upper church of S. Francesco at Assisi, some of which still exist. Giotto * ‘ The use of this word in a new and technical sense, as applied to works of art, becoming general in our own, as it is already in other languages, a definition may be offered. The word may often be ren- dered intention, but it has a fuller meaning. In its ordinary applica- tion it means the principle of action, attitude, and composition in a single figure or group ; thus it has been observed, that in some antique gems which are defective in execution, the motives are frequentljifine. Such qualities in this case may have been the result of the artists’ feeling ; but in servile copies, like those of the Byzantine artists, the motives could only belong to the original inventor. In its more ex- tended signification the term comprehends inventions generally as dis- tinguished from execution. Another very different and less general sense in which this expression is also used, must not be confounded with the foregoing ; thus a motive is sometimes understood in the sense of a. suggestion. It is said, for example, that Poussin found the motives of his landscape compositions at Tivoli. In this case we have a sug- gestion improved and carried out; in the copies of the Byzantine artists we have intentions not their own, blindly transmitted.' — Sir C. Eastlake : note to Kugler’s Handbook, \o\. i. p. 18. In the last case the difference of the sense is perhaps more apparent than real — ■ the ‘ suggestiveness ’ is only an accident ; intention has also something restricted and not essential in its signification ; hence, in fact, the advantage in using the word motive in the new sense. 68 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. completed the extensive decorations both of the upper and lower church. This church is highly interesting for having been erected by foreign architects in the first half of the thirteenth century, in the ‘ Tedesco/ as the Italians called the German or Gothic style, then foreign to Italy ; but more particularly for its connexion with the Order of St. Francis, the first of the great artist orders. The Benedictines being chiefly engaged in literary pursuits, it remained for the Fran- ciscans and Dominicans to inspire a new feeling for art in Italy. Some of the ornaments introduced in these paintings by Cimabue approach almost for the first time to the antique. Duccio di Buoninsegna was somewhat younger than Cima- bue, and advanced far more from the Byzantine traditions. He executed a large altar-piece for the Duomo (cathedral) of Siena, which is said to have been carried in triumphal procession like the picture by Cimabue. It was originally painted on both sides, but is now cut in two, and is a truly remarkable work for the period : Dr. Kugler’s eulogies, however, almost border on extravagance. With the opening of the fourteenth century an original style is at length developed. The final enfranchisement of the artist from the trammels of Byzantine superstition, and the commencement of the first great epoch of modern painting, together with the establishment of the Florentine school, are to be ascribed to Giotto, who surpassed his master, Cimabue,* far more than Cimabue had surpassed his predecessors. It is true that the outlines of Giotto are hard, his light and shade fiat and ineffective, and that perspective is little regarded ; yet his expression is greatly superior, and, for the first time since the decline of ancient art, we observe a successful attempt at composition, or the regular disposal of the subject in the space allotted. His originality is further apparent in the introduction of portraiture, and * It is scarcely necessary to relate the old legend that Giotto was originally a shepherd boy, and one day he was discovered drawing a sheep upon a slab of stone hy Cimabue, who, astonished at the boy’s talent, asked him to go and live with him, and become his pupil; an invitation which, with his parents’ consent, he accepted with delight, and followed the great painter to Florence. CHRISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 69 the infusion of a didactic or allegorical spirit into liis works. The latter is due, perhaps, to the influence of his friend Dante’s great poem. We read of the general acquirements and character of Giotto in the works of Dante, Petrarch, Doccaccio, Sachetti, &c. Many stories are told of his humour, which he showed as a hoy : that, for example, of the pupil painting a fly on the face of a picture in the master’s absence, and the subsequent attempt of the master to brush it off, is first told of Giotto and Cimabue. There is a saying. Bounder than the 0 of Giotto, which originated thus : — Boniface VIII. wishing to decorate St. Peter’s, sent an envoy to Florence and Siena for artists, of whom he required specimens. Giotto’s specimen was a circle drawn without the aid of compasses, with a brush charged with red colour. This appeared more wonderful to the Pope than anything else sent to him, and in the event Giotto fully justified the preference in the eyes of the Roman Court. A peculiarity in the figures of Giotto is the long almond-shaped eyes set close together. The tempera vehicle he employed was more fluid than that hitherto used ; it allowed greater freedom of hand, and has also darkened but little with time. Many of the works of Giotto have disappeared ; but a most interest- ing discovery, or rather recovery (for it was known to exist), of a youthful portrait of Dante by Giotto, was made in 1840, on removing the whitewash from the wall of a chapel at Florence. Giotto was sculptor and architect as well as painter : the elegant detached Campanile (or bell-tower) of Florence is his work. So many, it will be seen, besides Giotto, of the greatest masters have distinguished them- selves in more than one branch of the fine arts, that the suspicion naturally suggests itself whether the modern custom among artists of confining the attention to one specialite is not a mistake. If technical superiority is in this way arrived at, are not the grander and broader principles of art left unattained ? The most exact idea of the style of Giotto to be gained in this country, may be obtained from the series of tracings and woodcuts published by the Arundel Society, taken from the paintings in the Chapel of the Arena at Padua, 70 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. representing the life of our Saviour, and the life of the Vir- gin. The figures in the life of the Virgin, especially those in a ^ sposalizio ’ (or espousals), possess considerable grace. In the church at Assisi, Giotto painted a series of subjects from the life of (the patron saint) St. Francis. The life of this saint, it has been well said, is ^ One of those mediaeval melo- dramas (if the term may be used), in the form of biography, which furnish the most interesting and beautiful subjects a painter can desire. The curtain rises on the youth of St. Francis, and, as the plot thickens, his strange hallucination — his quarrel with his father in the market-place on account of his passion for poverty — his giving his cloak to a poor person on the wayside — his institution of tlie order — his appearance before the Pope — his ecstasy — his stigmatiza- tion, follow in succession, until the catastrophe is reached in the death of the saint.’ These and similar biographical and historical series, exe- cuted in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, had special uses among a people who, even to the present day, have comparatively little benefited by the invention of printing. It has been justly remarked that painting in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries was at once a means of noble decora- tion and a manner of conveying information, thoughts, and ideas, not then, as now, to be got at through literature. Pictures were the books of the unlearned, and the unlearned were five-sixths of the people. The decorative purpose of pictures was effected mainly through colour. Hence it is that, apart from colour, we cannot estimate those early works aright as decoration ; and apart from their sequence and connexion in town-hall or chapel, we cannot read them book-fashion, or in any way comprehend the reality of their significance. Giotto painted in various cities from Naples to Milan, and his works doubtless had an indirect infiuence in all parts of Italy. The scholars and imitators of Giotto are so numerous, that we can only mention a few of the principal. Among these, Taddeo Gaddi, the son of Gaddo Gaddi, the mosaicist, was one of the most important. The son of Taddeo, Angiolo Gaddi, was a good colourist, and the master of Cennino CHRISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 71 Cemiini, who was apprenticed to him in 1376. In the Trattato della Pittura of Cenuini (see p. 7, note) we accord- ingly find a description of the practice of the fourteenth century, although it would partly appear that the original MS. was not finished till 1437. Tommaso di Stefano was called Giottino * from his successful imitation of Giotto. The humorous Butfalmacco was a contemporary of Giotto. For a century after the time of Giotto his followers did not considerably progress beyond the point he reached ; and his influence is very perceptible in the paintings executed during that period in the Campo Santo at Pisa. This cele- brated cemetery takes its name from having, it is said, been filled with earth brought from the Holy Land. The walls of the arcaded building, which surround this sacred earth, are covered with paintings, quite invaluable as illustrations of the art of the fourteenth century, though now unfortu- nately greatly decayed. Among these, two of the most re- markable are by Orcagna, viz., the ‘ Triumph of Death ’ and the ‘Last Judgment.’ The attitudes of Christ and the Virgin in the latter were afterwards borrowed by Michael Angelo in his famous ‘Last Judgment.’ Later painters have also taken Orcagna’s arrangement of the patriarchs and apostles as their model, particularly Fra Bartolommeo and Raphael. Orcagna was a still greater architect and sculptor than painter. He designed the elaborate and beautiful Tabernacle of the Virgin in Or’ San Michele at Florence. Contemporary with' Giotto, a celebrated painter, Simone di Martino (improperly called Simone Memmi), flourished at Siena. He is the subject of two of Petrarch’s sonnets, and is said to have painted the portrait of Laura ; but no- thing is known of this picture. A small specimen of this master is preserved in the interesting collection of early works belonging to the Liverpool Institution. Painting made nearly equal advancement in other parts of Italy as in Tuscany ; but the only names we need recall are those of * The Italian diminutive hw is often eniplo}'ed in this way for scholars, even should they greatly surpass their masters. 72 PAINTITO POPULAELY EXPLAINED. Pietro Cavallini * and Gentile da FabiianOj of the early Roman, or, as it was termed at this period, Umbrian school. One Florentine painter, however, remains to be noticed ; for although contemporary with the great innovations made by Massaccio early in the fifteenth century, he j^et in essen- tial points adhered to, or rather consummated, the types of the fourteenth century. We allude to the Beato Fra f Giovanni da Fiesole, or, as he has been generally called, Fra Angelico (the Angelic), from the great piety to which his life and works equally bear testimony. Fra Angelico never painted for money. He never began his work with- out prayer ; and so entirely did his subject fill his soul, that he was frequently interrupted by tears when representing the sufferings of the Redeemer. It is not surprising that he considered what he painted with such intense feeling as a kind of inspiration, and therefore never ventured to re- touch or attempt to improve what he had once finished. Profound serenity of feeling, confiding devotedness, a pure and holy frame of mind, form the never-failing character- istics of the paintings of Fra Angelico. ‘ He knew’ nothing of human anxieties, of struggles with passion, of victory over it j it is a glorified and more blessed world which he endeavours to reveal to our view. He seeks to invest the forms he places before us with the utmost beauty his hand could lend them ; the sweetest expression beams in all their countenances j aharmonious grace guides all theirmovements, particularly where the action is expressed by the treatment of the drapery. The most cheerful colours, like spring- flowers, are selected for the draperies, and a profusion of golden ornaments is lavished over the whole : every auxi- * It was conjectured by Yertue and Walpole that Cavallini was the architect of the crosses erected to Queen Eleanor and of the shrine of Edward the Confessor in Westminster Abbey. The Petrus Eomanus Civis mentioned in the inscription on the tomb may possibly have been Cavallini ; but the date ( 1 279 or 1280) would make him only twenty j’^ears old, according to Vasari. Vasari is, however, so frequently incorrect in dates, that no reliance can be placed upon his statements. j- Or heatijied brother ; the beatification of a holy person was ah honour solemnly conferred by the Romish church, and only inferior to canonization. CHRISTIAN ART IN TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC. 73 liary lias been employed that could give a new glory to these holy subjects. With a peculiar religious awe, he ad- heres scrupulously to traditional types, and ventures on none of the innovations which were already introduced into art at Florence : these would have been a disturbing element to the child-like serenity of his mind. Of all artists, Fiesole is the most perfect example of this style ; but in him like- wise it appears most decidedly in all its restrictedness. He is inimitable in his representations of angels and glorified saints ; weak, timid, and embarrassed when he introduces man in his human nature. Not merely the rancour and hatred of the foes of Christ, but all determined action is feebly expressed ; his figures, even when in momentary repose, are deficient in apparent power to act, though the act to be performed may be the highest and the holiest. Thus, his representations of Christ, in whose form human power and divine sanctity should be equally prominent, are every- where unsatisfactory, frequently unworthy. These faults are the result of a defective knowledge of the organization of the human body, the lower limbs of which are generally destitute both of that truth of action and position which Giotto especially had attained.’ * Fra Angelico’s first efforts were in miniature illumina- tions, and the peculiarities of this style are apparent in his numerous small panel pictures, and also in those of his pupil Benozzo Gozzoli. But the large compositions with which he adorned the cloisters of his order, in the monastery of S. Marco at Florence, show greater freedom of execution, espe- cially his chef-iV CBUvre, the ^ Crucifixion.’ ‘ The taste for studying the history of early Italian art is not a recent development in our own country alone ; it is a novelty even in Italy itself. A century ago the Italians seemed to regard Perugino, the master of Raphael, as the Ultima Thule to which point investigation might be carried ; and even Ghirlandajo, the teacher of Michael Angelo, with his fine frescoes in the Sassetti Chapel of the Trinita at Florence, and compartments of the Sistine Chapel at Rome, * Kuglkr’s Handbook^ &c., vol. i. p. 165. E 74 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. •was overlooked. Two energetic men, Ottley in England, and Lasinio in Italy, laboured bard to make the interest of this field of investigation more generally felt. Lasinio, the appointed conservatore of the Campo Santo at Pisa, exerted his utmost to save it from destruction during the revolu- tionary period, and removed coats of whitewash and mural tablets that even then, in classic Italy, obliterated the pic- tures and disfigured the walls. At the same time he pub- lished a magnificent series of large engravings from the paintings which decorate the ambulatories, as far as time had then spared them. The conservatore had in his youth spent years upon the study of these old neglected paintings ,* he recognised in them illustrations of former history, the past glories of his country, to which he was so attached, and which at that time lay so abased. He quoted the merry stories of Boccaccio about Buifalmacco, as he traced the few lines yet remaining from his pencil ; and saw in Giotto’s frescoes relating to the history of J ob scenes of Italian life, with all the richness and festal luxury which distinguished the nobles in the days of Dante j and beheld also, in many of the priestly functions, the ecclesiastic paraphernalia of Pope Boniface himself. Lasinio, by his energy and industry, made these works known, and, in the capacity of cicerone to the English visitors, who always flocked tD the Campo Santo, he contributed in no slight degree to the prevalence of the taste now so general among us. Ottley, the Englishman, at the same time enjoying a certain independence of means, imbibed from his intercourse with Lasinio a similar taste, and made careful drawings of the more important frescoes, both at Pisa, Florence, and Assisi. These he published in a series of bold engravings, but, from unavoidable costliness, they have never had any extensive circulation. D’Agincourt, in Paris, also did much to diffuse a wider knowledge of the history of Italian art by collecting drawings of all available “ monuments,” including the sketches of Ottley and Lasinio, and arranging them in chronological order. Lanzi, too, a writer of high order, contributed much to spread a taste for the study of the history of art by his delightful volumes upon the various schools in Italy ; a work which has been tempera and encaustic in modern times. 75 made equally popular in England by tbe well-known trans- lation of William Roscoe. It is not a little remarkable that seven years ago we had no translation of Vasari’s Lives of thePamters in the English language. Mrs. Foster’s version, therefore, published in Bohn’s Series, in 1850, was of note- worthy importance; and the more remarkable, as Vasari had for many years been translated into almost every other European language.’ — Mr. Scharf, jnn.^ on the Paintings hy Ancient Masters in the Art Treasures Exhibition. The end of the fourteenth century is remarkable for the introduction of genuine fresco painting, and, as the most important works of immediately succeeding artists consist of wall paintings, we may examine them to greater advan- tage after some inquiry into the nature of ^ fresco buono,’ as it is termed. At the same time it must be remembered that many mural paintings were still executed in distemper, and panel pictures, of course, in the ordinary egg tempera, until the introduction of oil painting. To adhere, however, to chronological order, as nearly as our plan will permit, we must offer some account of mediaeval mosaics, miniatures, and glass painting before confining our attention to fresco painting. But, before concluding the present subj ect, we may mention that distemper was employed as complementary to fresco ; and that up to the present day, as will be seen in the next section, oil pictures are frequently executed partly in tempera — taking the word in its largest signification, and making it include water-colours, distemper, &c. 8. TEMPERA AND ENCAUSTIC IN MODERN TIMES. Various attempts have been made to re-introduce wax painting; but the art oi pencillu7n-encaustic, as practised by the ancients, seems to be lost. Wax painting, in the first centuries of the Christian era, appears to have superseded all other processes, except mosaic. In a manuscript of the eighth century wax painting, however, meets with little attention ; and the art was almost forgotten during the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries, the original process being quite lost, judging from the slight descriptions E 2 76 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. in the extremely rare notices of wax painting known to exist. A document in the records of the Duomo of Orvieto mentions a wax vehicle or varnish as having been used by Andrea Pisano in 1345, but only for colouring marble statues of the Virgin. Mrs. Merrifield, however, mentions a picture, reputed to be painted in wax, of the ‘ Martyrdom of St. Simon the Younger,’ by Andrea Mantegna, in the possession of Signor Vallardi, at Milan. ‘The vehicle,’ says Mrs. Merrifield, ‘ whatever it was, appeared to me to have been as manageable as that of Van Eyck.’ The same collection, we are told, contains a modern pic- ture, which may also with propriety be said to be in encaustic, since the colours are melted in by the application of a hot iron. In the attempted revival of wax painting in France and Germany (more especially at Munich), the principle of dissolving the wax in an essential oil has been adopted, the vehicle being consolidated by the addition of resins. The efforts of Montabert were most prominent in introducing this method ; but Taubenheim and others recommend the solu- tion of wax in a drying oil. A method of wax painting, invented by Count Caylus, about the middle of the last century, was highly extolled at the time, though beset by grave inconveniences. At Parma as well as Munich, a method of wax painting is now practised, and, in repainting the pictures by Sir James Thornhill, Mr. Parris, the artist, is represented to have used a wax vehicle, his own ‘ marble medium.’ We have said that oil pictures have been and are fre- quently executed partly in distemper. This partial use of water-colours, which is generally confined to the preparatory stages of the picture, recommends itself by enabling the artist to advance with greater facility through those stages, and also by the increased purity it secures in the super- imposed colour. Nearly all the Venetian painters are be- lieved to have used this mixed method. It is known that the invariably clear blues in the pictures of Paul Veronese were painted in distemper and afterwards varnished. Upon this subject we venture to quote, as the opinion of a practi- cal authority, the following valuable passage from Burnet’s Essays on the Fine Arts. TEMPEllA AND ENCAUSTIC IN MODERN TIMES. 77 ^ Until the time of Correggio and Titian, the peculiar beauties of oil painting were unknown. The power of repre- senting the variety of textures and surfaces in nature, the art of giving to the light the means of reflecting back that luminous body unimpaired, and the conduct in the shadows so as to swallow up and absorb all reflexion and refi’action of light, were soon discovered to be its advantages over fresco ; and Correggio and Giorgione availed themselves of such discovery : hence the impasto, and absence of oleaginous substances in the light portions of their pictures, and the unctuous and transparent properties in the shadows. ^ The effect of such treatment can only now, in a manner, be guessed at; for though the lights remain in a degree unaltered, the rich glazings of the shadows have become dried up and blistered by the effects of time and heat. We can easily imagine that the water-colour, in the first in- stance, when the change took place, was not sufficiently charged with size or some resisting fluid; so that, on the application of oil glazings, the work darkened in a very great degree ; and though colours laid on in distemper and glazed with oil pigments, will produce a much richer effect than either process separately, we trace a gradual approxi- mation to the effect of water, or the luminous character of fresco painting, through the works of Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. ^ The truth and force of nature produced by a union of the peculiar properties of the two modes, have been felt and ac- knowledged by all painters *up to the present time ; and though Rubens, who laid the foundation of the art in Germany, finished his works principally in oil, yet, from adopting a white water-colour ground, he preserved in a high degree the fresh and brilliant effects of the Venetian mode of painting; and by Velasquez it was carried into Spain, and by Vandyke into England, but gradually sunk into a leaden and dull arrangement of colour, until revived by the indefatigable exertions of Sir Joshua Reynolds. So anxious was this celebrated artist to combine the luminous qualities of the Venetian style with the rich transparency of Correggio and Rembrandt, that half his life was spent in 78 PAINTINa POPULAELY EXPLAINED. trying experiments on the various modes of producing this union^ and which has occasioned the decay and destruction of many of his works ; for though water-colour will support oil painting, yet, when washed over it, so as to recover the freshness of the original ground, it contracts and tears the work to pieces : hence the deep and multifarious cracks and fissures in the background of most of his best coloured pictures.’ Turner also carried this principle too far, combining and varying the two methods in the most reckless manner. ^ In Etty,’ Mr. Burnet continues, ^ we have the true Vene- tian crackly substance of water-colour with the rich and transparent glazings of oil, and Wilkie had part of the quality for which we are contending in a very high degree. His pictures possess that peculiar stearine substance found in the works of Watteau, and which cost Reynolds a long life to acquire ; but the other requisite is absent, the fresh water-colour look we find in Watteau.’ Since the introduction of oil painting, pictures have oc- casionally been executed with the old tempera egg vehicle. In the Colonna Palace at Rome there are several fine land- scapes by Gaspar Poussin, said to be a uovo ; and in the different collections throughout Europe tempera pictures may be found which have been painted as designs for fresco. 79 Hosaic fainting. persons who have not seen any of the great A mosaic works in the ancient churches of Italy could imagine the sumptuous effect produced by immense walls covered with figures, often of colossal proportions, coloured in variegated hues of crystalline brilliancy, set in backgrounds of gold and purple and azure, and surrounded with many-coloured marbles. If the intention of Sir Christopher Wren had been carried out, and the inside of the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral had been ^decorated with rich and durable mosaic,’ like the cupola of St. Peter’s at Pome, we should have had a higher idea of the capabilities of the art than can be formed from the inspection of snuff- boxes, or, at most, a few cabinet pieces. We are glad to know, however, that there is at length a prospect of the design of the great architect being completed. A number of mosaics are among the decorations now proposed for St. Paul’s; and a design for the first, to be placed in the three compartments of the half-dome of the apse at the end of the choir, has been approved, and only awaits sufficient funds for execution. The subject is ‘The Transfiguration,’ and the designer was Baron de Triqueti. Mosaics are also to be placed in the Memorial (Wolsey) Chapel to the late Prince Consort, in St. George’s, Windsor. Mosaic, called opus musivum, musaicum, mosaicum (from polished, elegant, or well-wrought), and of which there are various kinds, is, in the widest sense of the word, any work wdiich produces a design, with or without colour, on a surface by the joining together of hard bodies. Though, seemingly, too mechanical to rank as a style of ‘ painting,’ yet it is generally and justly considered entitled to the distinction. For, it must be remembered, whatever may be thought of the means, that the principle of painting is involved, and it is as necessary to prepare a cartoon for an original composition in mosaic as for a fresco, or the 80 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. most elaborate picture — in fact, it is not merely as necessary, but in this instance it is quite indispensable. At the present day in Italy the most celebrated pictures are copied with perfect accuracy. And even this copying must require a very considerable knowledge of art, and a correct appreciation of the different schools, to do justice to works thus invested as it were with immortality. There is a studio expressly devoted in the Vatican to the manufac- ture of the beautiful mosaics of St. Peter’s. The number of enamels of different tints and hues preserved for the purposes of the work, amounts to no less than 10,000 ; and many of the large copies from Raphael and Domenichino in various parts of the building have occupied from twelve to twenty years in their execution. The art having never been lost, we may best describe the more mechanical part by referring to the present practice in the establishment in the Vatican, especially as it is here more perfectly con- ducted than it was among the ancients : — The method is simple enough. The slab upon which the mosaic is made is generally of Travertine (or Tibertine) stone. In this the workman cuts a certain space, which he encircles with bands or cramps of iron. Upon this hollowed surface mastic, or cementing paste, is gradually spread as the progress of the work requires it, this forming the adhe- sive ground, or bed, on which the mosaic is laid. The mastic is composed of calcined marble and finely powdered Travertine stone, mixed to the consistence of paste with linseed oil. Into this paste are stuck the smalti, or small cubes of coloured glass, which compose the picture, in the same manner as were the coloured glass, stone, and marble sectilia and tessera of the ancients. These smalti are vitrified but opaque, partaking of the nature of stone and glass, or enamels j and are composed of a variety of minerals and materials, coloured, for the most part, with different metallic oxides. They are manufactured in Rome in the form of long slender rods, like wires, of different degrees of thick- ness, and are cut into pieces of the requisite sizes, from the smallest pin point to an inch. When the mastic has suffi- ciently indurated (and it acquires in time the hardness of ANCIENT MOSAICS. 81 Stone), the work is susceptible of a polish like crystal Care must be taken, however, that by too high a polish the entire effect of the work is not injured, as innumerable reflected lights in that case would glitter in every part of the picture. When the design is to be seen at a very con- siderable distance, as in cupolas or flat ceilings, they are generally less elaborately polished, as the inequalities of the surface are the less distinguishable, an i the interstices of the work cannot be detected by the spectator. On ascending the dome of St. Peter’s the visitor is invariably astonished at the coarseness of mosaics which appear from below of the utmost delicacy and tinish.* The age of a mosaic may be determined by the composi- tion, the drawing, and the nature of the materials employed ; and if of the Christian period, as a general rule, the more numerous these are, the more modern the mosaic. Many antique mosaics, which were supposed to consist of coloured stones, are found to be of glass, or vitreous. ANCIENT MOSAICS. The employment of mosaics is traceable to the most ancient periods, and seems to have had its rise among the eastern nations. In the book of Esther (ch. i. v. 6) we read of ‘ a pavement of red and blue, and white and black marble.’ The invention appears to h-ave been transmitted through the * The works in Pietre Dure and Pietre Commesse, so extensively carried on in Tuscany (and hence called Florentine mosaics), differ from the preceding mosaics in the materials, execution, and subjects chosen. Both are employed for merely ornamental or decorative purposes, and represent fruit, birds, flowers, &c. The pietre dure work gives the objects imitated in relief in coloured stones, and is generally used as a decoration for coffers or the panels of cabinets. The pietre commesse of the finer sort consists of precious stones inlaid, and is employed for caskets, cabinets, &c. The stones are cut into thin veneer, and the various pieces are sawn into shape by means of a fine wire stretched by a bow, aided by emery powder, and afterwards fitted at the lapidary’s wheel. The materials are exclusivehmatural stones, as agates, jaspers, lapis lazuli, &c., the colours of which serve the purpose of delineating various ornamental natural objects. The walls of the chapel of the Medici attached to S. Lorenzo at Florence are lavishly decorated -with this costly material. K 3 82 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. Egyptians to tlie Greeks, from whom it was stolen by the Romans, as they stole their arts, sciences, and gods. Mosaic received its first great development in the sumptu- ous Alexandrian age, during which a prodigality of form and material began to corrupt the simplicity of Grecian art. At first small cubes of stone and terra-cotta were employed, but later, vitrified substances of various colours. Mosaic was first applied as an ornament for pavements, and commenced in the close imitation of inanimate objects, such as broken food and scattered articles lying apparently on the floor. It thence proceeded to large historical compositions (see p. 55). Splendid works were made of stone as well as clay cubes, as early as the Alexandrine period j and under the first Emperors the art attained the highest technical development and refinement. Mosaic pavements became general, and they were even made portable. Caesar carried the pave- ment as well as the canvas of his tent with him, whether from the love of the art or a dry fioor is somewhat doubtful. Cicero caused such pavements to be placed in all the por- ticos of his house. Under the protection of the Roman dominion this peculiar art spread itself over the ancient world, and was executed in the same manner upon the Euphrates, on Mount Atlas, and in Britain. Wherever the Roman arms were carried the mosaics followed, and hundreds have been found in Gaul, Germany, and Britain. There were several varieties of mosaic among the ancients, but the mention of the following may sufiice : 1. Floors formed of pieces of stone of different colours, cut geometri- cally and cemented together — pavime^ita sectilia. 2. Floors inlaid with small cubes of stone forming a coloured design, such as were usual in antiquity, not merely in rooms, but also in courts and terraces — opus tesselatum, pammenta tes- selata (tesselated pavement). 3. The finer mosaic, which essayed to come as near as possible to painted pictures, and usually employed coloured pieces of clay, or glass; but also the very costly material of precious stones, where the imitation of numerous local colours was required — called opus vermiculatum (piqjus and medium), crustce ver- miculcB. In the time of the Emperors the employment of ANCIENT MOSAICS. 83 glass cubes in the decoration of apartments first made its appearance, and quickly came into great request. There are many remains of this kind of mosaic, of Which a few may be pronounced artistically excellent. The art seems, however, to have long been employed principally for pavements, and till the end of the third century there is only slight mention of its having been transferred to the walls and ceilings. But historical mosaic painting of the grander style seems to have had a sudden development in the course of the fourth cen- tury. 4. Outlines and intaglios were, according to Muller, engraved in metal, or some other hard material, and another metal or enamel melted into it, so that figures in so-called niello resulted from the process.* Besides these, the forming designs for windows with pieces of coloured glass appears to have been known at least to later antiquity, and this may be considered a species of mosaic. We find accounts also of what are called, though somewhat vaguely, mosaics in relief. These were thought to have been the invention of Pompeo Savini of Urbino, but they are considered by some to be of ancient date ; and are supposed, under the Empire, to have superseded the bas- reliefs of painted clay, common in the times of the Republic. The practice, if it obtained, was borrowed from the Greeks j for, according to M. Raoul-Rochette, the Ionic capitals of the Erectheum at Athens were adorned with an incrustation of coloured enamel. The fountains discovered at Pompeii had a covering of mosaic in coloured paste. In the Villa Hadriana the entire vault of .a crypto-porticus was covered with bas-reliefs in a very hard stucco, said to be incrusted * This description of work we have found in modern times to lead immediately to engraving, and something of the kind— some means of multiplying impressions — seems to have been not unknown to anti- quity, judging from the much-commented on passage in Piinv, XXXV. 2. Marcus Varro, says Pliny, made {aliquo inudQ') and in- serted in his writings the portraits of seven hundred distinguished men, and dispersed them to all parts of the world ; and this he did for the gratification of strangers. The process, whatever it was — and Pliny s allusion is so concise, that any explanation of the means can be merely conjectural— must have been transient and imperfect, or some traces of the art would have been preserved, or some men- tion of it made. 84 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. with a paste of glass or enamel, in imitation of bas-reliefs of wax painted in natural colours. The cubes employed were of every possible tint, and were set up by the workmen much as the types are by our printers, or rather, compositors. Many were gilt, and such were extensively employed afterwards in every description of mosaic by the Byzantines, who placed their figures on gold grounds. The gold leaf was applied at the back of the cube, where it was fixed by a mordant covered with pounded glass, and fired in a furnace. CHRISTIAN MOSAICS ; THE LATER ROMAN STYLE. It is in relation to the history of art, and especially of Christian and mediaeval art, that mosaics assume their ex- treme interest and importance. For nearly a thousand years — from the fourth century till the revival of tempera in the schools of Cimabue and Giotto — mosaic was most exten- sively employed for mural decoration, and during at least four centuries — viz., from the fifth to the ninth — seems to have almost entirely superseded other methods for such purposes. But for mosaics, then, the art of these long ages would be lost to us, saving and except the knowledge we might glean from missals. The loss of such art would possibly be, for its own sake, not much to be regretted, but with it would have disappeared a perfect epitome of the religious ideas of those ages ; clues to innumerable symbols and legends and much which throws light upon the introduction of some of the peculiarities of Bomanism — such notably as the gradual elevation of the Virgin Mary to virtually divine honours. Fortunately, however, of so durable a nature is mosaic, that from existing remains, not only is all this preserved, but every change of style in art, and every phase of manner, may be distinctly traced. There are mosaics near Rome of the fourth or fifth century in almost perfect preservation, and at Ravenna they are still as fresh as in the days of .Justinian. Domenico Ghirlandajo might well say it is the only painting for eternity. St. Mark’s at Venice is of itself a complete museum of the works of the mosaicisti for several CHKISTIAN mosaics: LATER ROMAN. 85 centuries, commencing with the Greek artists of the eleventh century. The Christian mosaics which decorated the ^ triumphal arch ’ and apse of basilicas, the cupola of baptisteries, and other parts of the interior of buildings, consisted of cubes of coloured glass, the older specimens being generally inlaid either on a white or blue ground, as in the Roman school, or on a gold ground, as in the Byzantine school — at St. Sophia, Constantinople ; at St. Mark’s, Venice; at Rome, after the seventh century, and elsewhere. The only remain- ing specimen of Christian mosaic executed in the antique manner appears to be the curious incrustation on the waggon-roof of the ambulatory of Santa Constanza, the bap- tistery erected near Rome by Constantine. It represents a vine ; it is, in fact, a pergola, and has, introduced among the leaves, many Christian symbols. The style is the mixed opus tesselatum and vermiculatum {majiis and medium) of the ancients, and has none of the characteristics of the various kinds subsequently employed. This is believed to be the earliest and only Christian mosaic of the fourth century. All other Christian mosaics may be included in three classes. 1. Glass mosaic, called opus musivum — pictorial and imitative, used for walls and vaulted ceilings. The Oriental taste for splendour had shown itself among the Romans, as we learn from the gold-ground mosaic of the late monuments of Pompeii ; the transition was, therefore, insensible in this respect to this rich Christian glass mosaic, in which the ground is nearly always gold. The pieces of glass were of very irregular shapes and sizes, and of innu- merable colours and tints. The execution is always large and coarse, and rarely approaches in neatness of joint and regularity of bedding to the larger style of the ancients, the opus majus vermiculatum. 2. Glass tesselation, called opus Grecanium — conventional, generally inlaid in church furni- ture. 3. Marble tesselation, called indifferently, Grecanium and Alexandrinum — conventional, formed into pavements. The principal defect in mosaics, artistically speaking, is the general want of expression, although the faces fre- quently have a peculiar dignity. This defect is owing to 86 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. tlie medianical manner in which they are executed from the cartoon. Nevertheless, from the necessary restriction of this branch of art, as far as possible, to large and simple forms, in order to insure general distinctness, and the consequent renunciation of rich and crowded compositions, has resulted a certain breadth and grandeur of style which, no doubt, has exercised an important influence over the whole pro- vince of art, but manifested particularly in fresco. In addition to the mosaic of the fourth century, already mentioned incidentally, there is another, which is said to belong to this early date. This mosaic was found originally in the cemetery of S. Callisto at Rome, and is now preserved in the Mumum Christianum of the Vatican. Lord Lindsay, in his Sketches of the History of Christian Art, observes that in it we find the first appearance of the peculiar Byzantine character of the head of the Redeemer, which for centuries after became the established type. ‘This primitive type consisted of a half-length placed within a wreath, and gene- rally in the act of blessing with the right hand [if in the Latin church, the thumb and the first and second fingers extended, sym.bolical of the Trinity], and holding the cross or the globe in the left,* and is to be often met with in the basilicas successively built at Rome, and elsewhere in Italy.’ At a later period this arrangement became popular through- out Europe, the representations frequently including the whole figure of the Saviour placed upon a throne. Over the doors of Norman churches, for example, we find a bas- relief of this subject. The Virgin Mary is also represented similarly enthroned. The word Maesta {Anglice ‘ Majesty ’) is applied to these representations. In the fifth century we meet with a sudden and extensive adoption of mosaic in baptisteries and basilicas. The rite of baptism was anciently performed in a separate building, or baptistery, and this being generally circular or polygonal, and the decoration chiefly confined to the cupola, it was natural that the centre subject should represent the baptism * Frequently also the Saviour holds a book (the New Testament), on which are inscribed the words, ‘ Ego sum lux mundi ’ — I am the light of the world, CHRISTIAN mosaics: LATER ROMAN. 87 of Christ, round which the figures of the apostles formed an outward circle. Of the basilica, and its decoration, we borrow the following description by JDr. Kugler : ^ This form of church building had generally obtained in the East. It consisted in a principal oblong space, of three or five aisles, divided by rows of columns, the centre aisle loftier than the others, and terminating in one or three semi-domed tribunes or apsides ; before which, in some instances, a transept was introduced [thus forming the Latin cross as distinguished from the regular Greek cross.] ^The chief apsis behind the altar, as the most sacred por- tion of the building, was almost invariably reserved for the colossal figure of the standing or enthroned Saviour, with the apostles or patron saints and founders of the church on either hand. In later times the Virgin Mary was introduced next to Christ, or even in his stead. Above the chief figure appears generally a hand stretching out of the clouds, and holding a crown, an emblem of the almighty power of the Father. . . . Underneath, in a narrow division, may be seen the Agnus Dei [Lamb of God], with twelve sheep, which are advancing on both sides from out the gates of Jerusalem and Bethlehem — a symbol of the twelve disciples, or the faithful generally. Above, and on each side of the arch which terminates the apsis, usually appear various subjects from the Apocalypse referring to the Advent of our Lord. In the centre, generally, the Lamb, or the book with the seven seals upon the throne ; next to it the symbols of the Evangelists,* the seven candlesticks, and the four-and- twenty elders, their arms outstretched towards the Lamb. ^ In the larger basilicas, where a transept is introduced * As believed to be intended by Ezekiel, vii. 1-10, viz., a man (St. Matthew), a lion (St. Mark), a bull (St. Luke), and an eagle (St. John). Various other symbols are of frequent occurrence, such as stags approaching a vessel, which stand for the souls of the faithful thirsting after the living waters. These souls, while here below, appear in the shape of doves ; after the resurrection, and in a glorified state, in that of the phoenix — also an emblem of eternity. In this form they are often perched in the branches of a palm, symbolical of the tree of life. Subsequently the disembodied spirit was represented as a new-born infant, and we often see it thus borne to heaven in a napkin by angels. 88 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. before the apsis, it is divided from tbe nave by a large arch called the arch of triumph. In this case the subjects from the Apocalypse were usually introduced upon this arch. In addition to this, the clerestory of the centre aisle, and the spandrils of the arches over the columns, were seldom left in the larger and more splendid basilicas, without decoration.’ The most numerous and valuable mosaics of the fifth and following centuries are found in the churches of Rome and Ravenna. Among the most remarkable mosaics of the fifth century are the following : the internal decorations of the baptistery of the cathedral of Ravenna ; the numerous but now much restored mosaics in Sta. Maria Maggiore ; the rich decoration of the monumental chapel of the Empress Galla Placidia (SS. Nazaro e Celso) at Ravenna, the har- monious effect of which is incomparable ; and the mosaics on the arch of triumph in S. Paulo fuori le Mure, Rome. Of the sixth century the finest mosaics of ancient Chris- tian Rome are those of SS. Cosmo e Damiano ; and although classical influence had almost died out, a figure of Christ may be regarded as one of the most marvellous specimens of the art of the Middle Ages. Countenance, attitude, and drapery combine to give him an expression of quiet majesty, which for many centuries after is not found again in equal beauty and freedom. Here, already, St. Peter is depicted with the bald head, and St. Paul with the short brown hair and dark beard, by which they were afterwards recognizable. At Ravenna, in the celebrated church of San Vitale, are two large processional and ceremonial representations, on a gold ground, of the Emperor and Empress, Justinian and Theo- dora, which, as among the very few surviving specimens of a style which preserved many of the higher features of pagan painting, are of great interest, and as examples of costume quite invaluable. In the mosaics of S. Apollinare Nuovo, upon a throne surmounted by angels, the Madonna is perhaps for the first time represented as an object of reve- rence. In the seventh century all appearance of life and more noble expression ceases; and with the general pre- valence of the Byzantine style, a statuesque rigidity, a moroseness of expression, a settled traditional convention- CHRISTIAN mosaics: BYZANTINE. 89 ality, and total absence of tbe plastic element (or modelling) succeed. CHRISTIAN mosaics: THE BYZANTINE STYLE. The mosaics of S. Vitale above-mentioned have been claimed as Byzantine, from the circumstance of the occupation of Ravenna in 539 by the Byzantians ; but they are clearly of the late Roman class, and there is no reason to believe that the artists belonged to a more Eastern school. The Byzan- tine style ■was in truth only a transformation of the Roman through succeeding stages ; and till the seventh century the art of the East and the West -was essentially the same, for the ancient Roman models had been carried east-ward with the migration of the court. Local considerations, however, render it perhaps more convenient to treat of this style as if it could be originally identified with that Byzantium from which it derives its name ; and where, after the city had received a new designation from Constantine, it was so extensively and systematically cultivated. Constantine, the first Christian Emperor of the Roman race, when he removed the seat of empire from Rome to Byzantium, about 330 a.d., carried with him the arts of the former empire, and applied them to the enlargement and embellishment of the new city. From these arose, in pro- cess of time, that combination of Roman, Greek, and Oriental traditions which were united m the Byzantine style, and diffused proportionately •with the extent and influence of the Eastern Empire. Blit of the period from the time of Con- stantine to the middle of the sixth century few examples remain. Most of the existing Byzantine monuments date from the time of Justinian to the eleventh century. After this period, till the final conquest of Greece by the Turks, in the fifteenth century, the influence of the style gradually decays, and a European, and more especially a Venetian, character is visible. It is then, dating from the commencement of the sixth to the eleventh century, that we find those monuments of the Byzantine style which ultimately affected not only the styles adopted in Italy, France, Germany, and Great Britain, but 90 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. penetrated widely among tlie Sclavonic and Oriental races, and was carried by the conquering Arabs through all the north of Africa and the greater portion of Spain. In Italy this is precisely the period of the deepest decline of art. After the Ostrogoths had succumbed to the armies of Justi- nian, and Italy had submitted itself to the Eastern dominion, it was next invaded by the Longobards, who brought about the most singular division of the country ; for while the great mass of the centre of the land fell into their hands, the important coast regions, such particularly as Ravenna, remained in the possession of the Byzantines. The earliest as well as greatest example of Byzantine art and architecture is the celebrated mosque of St. Sophia at Constantinople, built by Justinian, who ascended the throne in 527. Contemporary with this was the erection at Ravenna, the capital of the Exarchate, of S. Vitale, founded by Julian, the treasurer of Justinian, about 530, and especially interest- ing as having furnished the model after which Charlemagne caused his cathedral at Aix-la-Chapelle to be built. We have already alluded to the remarkable mosaics of S. Vitale, but of the far more elaborate and sumptuous decorations of St. Sophia at this period, scarcely a trace has survived the effects of wars, fires, and Mahomedan fanaticism. The natural desire of the Eastern church to convert the Jews and Mahomedans, both of whom reproached the Chris-- tians with idol- worship, led to the great Iconoclastic perse- cutions (see p. 62), and the final severance of the Eastern and Western churches, when Gregory II. formally excom- municated all Iconoclasts, including the Emperor Leo III. himself, in the year 726. One effect of these persecutions was to drive out over Europe a multitude of artists, who thus planted a taste for art in districts in which it might otherwise not have taken root. In Germany, under Charle- magne, the Greek artists from Constantinople and their productions were in the greatest favour. But one curious effect of this persecution upon the Byzan- tine style itself remains to be noticed. The Iconoclasts did not direct their zeal so much against pictures as against the more literal ‘ images ’ of sculpture. The consequence was. CHRISTIAN MOSAICS: BYZANTINE. 91 that the Byzantine artists, in order to give no offence, not only avoided the imitation of nature generally, and deprived their representation of all attractiveness, at least of form, but especially shunned any approach to the appearance of relief (particularly in the face), or anything that might re- call the hateful modelling of the sculptor. Most of the other , characteristics of the style have been already adverted to in various places. Byzantine painting, therefore, from various causes, ultimately lost every spark of vitality, and became as stationary as Chinese art. The causes similar to those which led to the settled character of Byzantine, and, as we have noticed, also ot* Egyptian painting, have probably pro- duced the long-continued conventionality of the painting of the Chinese, Indians, Persians, and other Oriental nations. Indian painting, however, like the Egyptian, has constantly been declining, the oldest specimens being by far the best. Thus, one portion after another of the Byzantine figures became rigid, and the countenance assumed a suffering, stricken expression. At the same time, a singular pretension to correctness of anatomy forms a more odious contrast to the departure from nature in all other respects. Figures, in which no one limb is rightly disposed, have still,' as far as the form is seen, the full complement of ribs in the body, and a most unnecessary display of muscle in the arm, such as could only be seen on dissection. The ‘ figure ’ sometimes measures in length no less than thirteen heads, which is five more than antique statues ; and the classical proportions are somewhat taller than nature.' Another peculiarity is, that the face is always represented in the full view, the profile being utterly unknown to this art. In fact, the Byzantine artist had sunk into a luxurious handicraftsman, who sought to make up for his incapacity for all original composition by the splendour of his materials. He rested satisfied with a mere conventional type for we find it identical throughout Europe; and this, as soon as established and traditionally communicated, invariably comes to be regarded with super- stitious reverence. Accordingly, in one of the arguments adduced by an advocate for images in the Nicene Council, A.D. 787, it is distinctly asserted that ‘ It is not the invention 92 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. of the painter which creates the picture, hut an inviolable law, a tradition of the Catholic church. It is not the painters, but the Holy Fathers, who have to invent and to dictate. To them manifestly belongs the composition, to the painter only the execution.’ The church, then, having once decided upon the most fitting representation of any sacred subject, there existed no grounds for ever departing from it ; we need not, therefore, be surprised to find that the painters of the Greek church to this day scrupulously submit them- selves to the ^ dictations ’ of the ‘ Holy Fathers.’ No church would, of course, have ventured to dictate to a really living art, whatever other persecution might be attempted; and the deadness of the Byzantine school was as much the cause as the effect of such ecclesiastical interference. Perhaps the first mosaics in Rome which distinctly show Byzantine influence are those in the tribune of Sta. Agnese fuori le Mure (625-638) ; but the style is still more evident in the very extensive mosaics in the Oratorio di S. Venanzio, a side chapel of the baptistery to the Lateran (640-642). To the latter part of the seventh century belong the last mosaic decorations of importance in Ravenna, viz., those in the splendid basilica of S. Apollinare in Classe. The Exarchate, upon which the Longobards had encroached, was now seized by the Franks under Charlemagne, and made over to the Papal chair. From this time Ravenna, sinking into insigni- ficance, confined itself to a few solitary decorations and to repairs ; and to this circumstance we are indebted for the preservation of some illustrations of the art of the early Middle Ages not to be equalled elsewhere in the whole world. In the eighth and ninth centuries Roman mosaic sank, as regards expression, almost into barbarism. Some extensive and splendid works were, however, executed, and among these the mosaics in Sta. Prassede, on the Esquiline Hill, are in remarkable preservation. After the close of the ninth century the art seems almost to have ceased in Italy. Meanwhile, however, as the influence of Rome in matters of faith increased among the new nations, so some of her arrangements prevailed also, as, for instance, the plan of her churches, so diflerent from the Eastern form ; and this plan CHRISTIAN mosaics: BYZANTINE. 93 '^as assimilated, as the design easily could be, with tlie old Roman monuments still existing throughout Europe— monuments which would naturally be chosen as objects of imitation. Indeed, in many cases, the materials, columns, &c., of the ancient edifices were incorporated in the new structures in other parts of Europe as well as Italy. Never- theless, the influence of Constantinople would be felt, if only commercially. From the sixth to the tenth century Con- stantinople was undoubtedly the capital of the arts of the world ; and numerous works of. ornamental art, such as wood and ivory carvings, richly woven and embroidered stuffs, illuminated manuscripts and panel-pictures, and ornaments in the base and precious metals, were carried by traders, as well as the pilgrim monks and others, throughout Europe. Then, again, from shortly after the death of Theodoric the Ostrogoth, in the year 526, till the conquest of Italy by Charlemagne, in 774, the kingdom of Italy, with the excep- tion of the Exarchate of Ravenna, was held by the Longo- bard or Lombard sovereigns ; and, although they invented an original style, which has deserved to be separately distin- guished as the ‘ Lombard,’ they certainly derived their taste in art rather from Constantinople than Rome. Moreover, Charlemagne, who put an end to the dynasty of the Lombards, adopted in a great measure their style and naturalized it, in connexion with Byzantine models, in the buildings of Aix- la-Chapelle and along the banks of the Rhine. The Lom- bardic style received, however, its chief development in northern Italy, commencing -with the remarkable group of ecclesiastical buildings at Pisa (1063), extending subse- quently its influence to Lucca, and merging into the Romanesque during the thirteenth century at Florence, Siena, Parma, Modena, Piacenza, and Ferrara. Retracing our steps, we find, in the tenth century, some activity in the arts, notwithstanding that they had arrived at the lowest point of degradation, in consequence of the disasters which had befallen them, and their neglect from a universal belief in the approaching end of the world ; and the persecuted Greek artists were employed in various parts of Europe. In Sicily and Southern Italy, in Rome and 94 PAINTINa POPULAELT EXPLAINED. Venice, they found a home. In France their style was spread through a Venetian colony at Perigueux, and after- wards at Limoges. Germany, also, and Greece itself, preserve many monuments to recall the fact of their presence. Their influence, likewise, extended to Asia Minor, Armenia, the Caucasian provinces, and among all the Sclavonic races. But in the eleventh and twelfth centuries a curious compli- cation is brought about in Apulia and Sicily by the strange advent of the Normans. From the conquered Greek and Saracenic races the Normans adopted the arts those races (more particularly the former) cultivated ; hut at the same time blended with the Byzantine a character partly Lom- bard, yet still to some extent peculiar to themselves. Greek artists were, however, principally employed in Sicily, though the pointed arch, a feature then of common occur- rence in Saracenic buildings, was appropriated by the Normans from the Saracens. The most splendid specimens of the Norman -Byzantine paintings are the very extraordi- nary mosaics in the Cathedral of Monreale at Palermo. The centre apse contains an unusually colossal half-length figure of Christ. The Byzantine type is, however, preserved with far greater distinctness in the exceedingly elaborate and exten- sive series of mosaics in the church of St. Mark, Venice, the earliest wall and cupola pictures of which go back to the eleventh, and perhaps to the tenth, century. This un- modified preservation of the style is explained by the cir- cumstance of the Venetian republic being under the nominal protection of Byzantium while the mart for the empires of the East and the West; and, even after all political con- nexion with Constantinople had ceased, the active commerce which was maintained became a constant bond of union. We need not describe the gorgeous luxury of the mere materials employed in the construction of St. Mark’s ; suffi- cient for our purpose to say, that the upper walls, waggon- roofs, and cupolas, comprising a surface of more than forty thousand square feet, are covered with mosaics on a gold ground; a gigantic work, which even all the wealth of Venice spent six centuries in patching together. No con- CHRISTIAN mosaics; BYZANTINE. 95 sistent plan has been adhered to in these decorations ; and every style of art, therefore, which flourished during these centuries, is recognisable in this edifice. Many of the mosaics were executed in the sixteenth century, and Titian supplied cartoons to one of the two celebrated mosaicisti — the brothers Zuccato : Tintoretto and. other great painters likewise furnished designs for these works. It has been remarked that the Byzantine style is preserved unaltered since the tenth century in the modern Greek church, and its important branch, the Bussian. The tradi- tional and religious superstition with which Greek pictures came to be regarded was likely to recommend them to a rude, ignorant people; and the imitative instincts of the Sclavonic races were favourable to the dissemination of a purely mechanical art. The Bussian churches of the pre- sent day are covered from floor to roof with paintings; but the chief splendour is concentrated upon the pictures of saints which hang on the high screen, or iconostasis, which separates the altar from the rest of the church. The artists are all monks and nuns. Thus the Bussian peasant thinks this style of art something identified with and inseparable from Christianity, and the picture itself becomes sacred be- cause its established forms are sacred. Pictures therefore take the place of charms, amulets, fetishes, and household gods. They are indispensable in every room, and the Bussian thinks he can never have enough of them — rich peasants possessing whole collections. This explains why so many small Byzantine pictures were found upon the bodies of the Bussian soldiers during the Crimean war. The modern French archaeologist, M. Didron, made some very interesting researches in 1839 into the present Byzan- tine art of the East, particularly on the sacred Mount Athos (with its 935 churches, chapels, and monasteries), where the tradition of art, according to all evidence, has been preserved with Egyptian pertinacity in one unbroken course during thirteen hundred years. The object of the French traveller was to throw light upon the subject of early Christian symbolism and iconography; ?rd this he attained in the 96 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. discovery of a MS. * evidently compiled from the most ancient authorities, and copies of which were in use in all the con- vents. In this manuscript formal receipts are given for the designing, grouping, and distribution on the walls of every saint, symbol, or device which may either occur singly or compose the prescribed sacred subjects and scenes which alone admit of orthodox representation — these receipts being as strictly followed as the practical and technical formulse of the actual process of painting. Mount Athos, it appears, has been for the last few centuries a general academy of Greek art. Almost every Greek artist pursues his studies there ; and thence innumerable pictures on wood are trans- ported to Greece, Turkey, and Russia. Mosaic work, how- ever, is now seldom heard of ; but the quantity of frescoes is almost incredible. To show with what rapidity these are produced, M. Didron relates that he saw with his own eyes a monk and five assistants paint a Christ and eleven apostles, the size of life, within an hour, and without car- toons or tracings. To explain this apparent artistic feat, we are told that these painters bring no thought whatever of their own to the task. Not only the range of their sub- jects, hut the mode of representation, even to the smallest details, is supplied them by tradition and old patterns. Their ‘ studies ’ begin by making tracings from the works of their predecessors, and by degrees they learn every compo- sition and figure, with their accompanying accessories, so entirely by heart, that they work with the utmost rapidity, and without the slightest exertion of thought. Individual genius or character would be only a hindrance, and neither appreciated nor understood. The painter being the instru- ment of one common process, is of course quickly forgotten in Greece, though his works may be innumerable.! * Published, under the title of Manuel slightly modified with red, and ^ Imperial purple^ when we J may mean red, scarlet, or crimson. The mixture of two secondary colours successively produces the tei'tiaries Citrine, ^ Olive, and Kusset. These colours, for the most part, are known as — Broivns. Asphaltum, or bitumen, is a species of pitch or | mineral oil solidified. Bitumen is collected on the surface of the lake Asphaltites (the Dead Sea), and is called ^ Jews’ |j pitch ; ’ but there are several kinds of asphaltum and bitii- f minous earths used in the arts. The power and intensity of asphaltum, when employed for glazing shadows, render its use very, tempting. To its use, however, is attributed the ^ innumerable cracks and constantly widening gashes in the ; works of Sir Joshua Eeynolds, Wilkie, and so many other English artists. Asphaltum is, therefore, now generally j discarded. And yet it would appear that the mischief must T have arisen partly from impure or adulterated specimens ' ' having been chosen, or from some mistake in their prepara- : tion or use, for it is certain that this pigment was used by ; the old masters of every school and climate. Vandyke Brown — hardly less celebrated as a pigment than ; the great painter whose name it bears — is a species of peat ; or bog earth of a fine, deep, semi-transparent brown colour. ■ Mr. Field says, that ^the pigment so much esteemed and ! used by Vandyke is said to have been brought from Cassel ; ; , and this seems to be justified by a comparison of CasseU earth with the browns of his pictures. The Vandyke browns in use at present appear to be terrene pigments of a similar m kind, purified by grinding and washing over.’ P PROCESSES AND MANIPULATIONS. I Glazing. A glaze is a film of transparent colour which is « in general so clear as to have the effect, when spread, of ay sheet of tinted glass held before the picture. All colours * which, when mixed with suitable vehicle, are transparent, S PROCESSES AND MANIPULATIONS. 223 are termed glazing colours. In considering simply wLat con- stitutes tlie true manner or scheme of effect of each school, i and of the several masters, so far as regards merely their technical process, we perceive that the entire code may be t| reduced to two points, viz., transparent and opaque painting. 1 ; The Venetians, Titian especially, carried transparent glazing I; to the highest perfection. They advanced their pictures as far as possible with pure red, white, and black only, and upon ; this preparation they glazed repeatedly the richest and ; purest colours. To the extreme facility of glazing, oil ' painting owes its supremacy over tempera ; though glazing was to a certain extent practised in the latter. Glazing forms a distinct series of tints, without which it is [j impossible to represent transparent objects. By it shadows [; are strengthened, and warmth or coldness given to their 1 hue ; by it also lights that are unduly obtrusive are subdued, j or additional colour and tone given to those that are deficient ; in force and richness. The processes of glazing, we have observed, is generally effected by the application of diluted transparent colour ; but occasionally semi-transparent colours ! are used, when rendered sufficiently transparent by the admixture of a large proportion of vehicle. Such glazings are useful to modify parts of the picture, or produce par- ticular effects, such as representations of smoke, dust, mists, and the like. Glazing, when used injudiciously or in excess, jl produces that ^ horny’ uniform dulness of surface and I Geathery ’ discoloration so offensive to the eye, which till i recently was the common characteristic of the modern t Continental schools. Impasting (Ital. impastdre, to knead, cover with plaster) is the opposite of glazing. The shadows or dark portions of a picture are thinly and transparently painted, but the lights are Golidly’ painted with opaque colour — that is to say, with colour mixed more or less with white. Impasting gives ^ texture ’ and ^ surface.’ In the foreground, and in parts not intended to Getire,’ Gmpasto’ should be bold; but in the more brilliant lights it can scarcely be ^ loaded ’ too much. This loading of thick masses of colour upon the picture, so as to make them project considerably from the 224 PAINTINa POPULAELY EXPLAINED. I surface, is done with a view to their being strongly illu- 1 1 minated by light impinging on these prominences, and thus S ■ mechanically to aid in the production of roundness and iH relief; or to give a sparkling effect to polished objects or glittering points. Reynolds greatly admired and imitated | [ri the gem-like impasto and textural richness of the old masters, I I r- comparing its appearance to cheese or cream. There is, how- ever, a reasonable limit to the practice of loading : for actual I ; v protuberances of solid paint will in certain lights project a false shadow, and therefore give an unnatural effect. These { | protuberances also produce a coarse and vulgar air, and ^ defeat their own object by affording in the inequalities a lodgment for dirt and varnish, which appear the more con- 5 spicuous from occurring in what should be the brightest and ■ i most unsullied passages. Pictures in oil, as in tempera, may, of course, be t/iinly painted throughout, or they may be executed with a con- I siderable body of colour ; impasto is therefore in all cases relative and comparative. But a picture, especially if on cloth, is, as may be supposed, more liable to change, when thinly painted, from the effects of air, damp and dust, on both sides. Thin painting was very generally preferred in the early Flemish school ; but that pictures so executed are calculated to retain their freshness much longer on panel , than on cloth, the following may be considered to provejif it were not in itself apparent. In thinly painted oil pictures, which have not been lined, the colours are sometimes in a very perceptibly better state of preservation where the bars of the stretching-frame behind afford a greater protection to the cloth, the better condition of the surface frequently cor- responding exactly with the form of the wood-work. And i when the picture is varnished, the portions thus protected I ^bear out,’ while the rest of the picture becomes compara- tively dead. Scumbling resembles glazing in that a thin coat is spread ' lightly over the work; but opaque instead of transparent colour is employed. It is used to modify certain portions of t a picture which may require to be rendered cooler, greyer, i and less definite; and it gives air and distance to objects PEOCESSES AND MANIPULATIONS. 225 whicli seem too near. An excess of scumbling produces a ^ smoky ’ appearance. After a time tbe scumble partially sinks into the colour over which it is laid; and this is cal- culated upon by portrait painters to produce some very charming effects. Thus a pearly grey passed over a carna- tion will ultimately permit the warm colour to show through just as the blood blushes beneath the semi-transparent and downy epidermis. When colour is spread thinly and rapidly, it is occasionally said to be ‘ driven.’ Di'y Touching, or Bragging, is the addition; when the pic- ture is dry and in other respects finished; of a few feathery touches, on lights which have sufficient texture to retain the colour only on the projecting points. By this process spirit is communicated, but its abuse produces what is technically called ^mealiness,’ the colours appearing as if sprinkled with meal. The Bead-colouring is the first or preparatory painting, and is so termed because the colours are laid cold and pale to admit of the after-paintings, which gradually enforce the effect, establish the character, and discriminate the expres- sion j and the final glazings, which impart the full warmth and animation of colour. The first painting of some of the old masters was more properly speaking ^priming,’ asunder- stood by house painters ; thus flesh colour was in the first instance primed with a full deep green, and parts intended to be green were laid in with a reddish colour. When the painting of a picture is divided for convenience into certain stages, they are sometimes called the first, second, third paintings, and so forth. On comparing the different modes of painting, the simplest are decidedly the most durable. Mr. Leslie says, ^ it is evident that by methods extremely simple many of the great colourists have produced their finest works, and among these may be named Titian himself. I have seen exquisitely coloured pictures by Jan Steen, as perfect in their surface and as free from the slightest change as if they were painted but yesterday, evidently from the use of virgin tints only, tints not produced either by glazing or scumbling. And the same simple method seems to have been the general L 3 226 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. practice of Paul Veronese. Not that transparent colours were excluded, but that a thin filmy method of obtaining the tints was avoided.’ We may add that Mr. Leslie has illustrated his opinion in his practice : most of his numerous works in the Sheepshanks’ collection are executed in the manner he has eulogized. W e have already explained the method of transferring by tracing or calking. In copying, when the copy has to be made larger or smaller than the original, the reduction or diminution is frequently effected by a scale of reticulation, the squares being proportionately larger or smaller. Some of the drawings of Kaphael are covered with squares. Handling is that part of the mechanical ^ execution,’ or ^ manipulation,’ of a picture which exhibits the pencilling or play of the brush, and is most essential in the foreground representation of the different textures of objects, such as fo- liage, wood, water, &c. The first principle in the application of paint is to avoid unnecessarily mixing, or, as it is called, ^ troubling,’ ^ saddening,’ or ^ tormenting,’ the tints : the in- evitable consequence of neglecting this precaution being a spiritless effect, a waxy surface, and muddiness of colour. When these defects are avoided, the touches are bold and distinct, the peculiar idiosyncrasy of the artist is indicated, and his particular handling is as certainly recognisable as is almost every person’s handwriting. This individual charac- ter constitutes ‘ style ; ’ but the abuse of facility of handling degenerates into ^ manner,’ as a free and ornamental hand- writing may be merely a vehicle for nonsense. ^ Manner ’ takes refuge in generalizations and ideals, which are not the product of independent and original thought, but the convenient screens for want of observation and hasty exe- cution. Pre-Eaphaelism, though open to the charge of mannerism, was a revulsion and protest against the unmanly conventionalisms into which a portion of the English school had fallen. The want of character in the foliage of even such masters as Gaspar Poussin and Gainsborough we may select as instances of mannerism. The various styles and manners of artists enable us to discriminate an original painting from a copy. ^ Every touch of a great artist on PROCESSES AND MANIPULATIONS. 227 ^ the leading points of any object is a separate thought. A copyist, not being inspired by original thinking, cannot give : to his chisel or pencil that air of the touch accompanying the \ thought which an original work always has.’ — {Haydon^ I Some painters are, however, naturally deficient in the free- dom of hand which gives individuality. The execution of ; Leonardo da Vinci is very laboured, and it is related that I his hand shook so much on setting to work that he could not paint for some time. In truth, nothing is more > , treacherous than the power of rapidly placing conventional [; lines and touches 5 yet this is often all that is taught by I ordinary ^drawing masters.’ What, however, would be ! thought of a child who had been taught to run over the keys of a pianoforte without any definite meaning ? > Style is an elevating and invaluable attribute of art, I which in some measure compensates for her inability to '! represent the infinity of nature. Style is a highly suggestive |1 epitome ; manner is a plausible but empty symbol. At the ! same time it must be remembered that the meaning of the word ^ style ’ is frequently indefinite, and ^ manner ’ is often convertible with ^ style.’ Thus we often speak of the dif- ferent descriptions or modes of painting as so many styles ; and yet we talk of the first, second, and third manner of Raphael. Smooth painting is perhaps less apt to be mannered than ^loading,’ yet the latter is far more stimulating to the imagination ; and this was probably the reason why it was more generally adopted by the Italians, who were in their conceptions far above the mechanical unimaginative Dutch. Again, in the unfinished drawing chance strokes are evidently intended to play their part in the effect. In the work that is obviously hastily performed, whatever appears wrong is very readily construed into a lapsus pennce. But the unfinished sketch derives its prin- cipal merit from the fancy of the observer. Some of the appearances of nature, such as gleams of light, and gentle gradations of sky and cloud, are so vague and so indeter- minate in their character, as to admit of frequent and even striking instances of resemblance from purely accidental causes. 228 PAINTING POPULAELT EXPLAINED. In the works of some artists we find a breadth of hand- ling, apparently utterly oblivious of form, and as incom- prehensible as so many chance blots and blurs when viewed near j yet, owing to the truth of the general efiect, and the wonderful power of our binocular vision— so beautifully illustrated in the stereoscope — assume at the proper distance a startling appearance of reality, almost of relief. But such artists are often betrayed into making their pictures merely coloured hints, too slightly indicative of natural facts. They consequently acquire meaning only in propor- tion to the degree of knowledge and vividness of imagina- tion of the spectator. This, taking the spectator, as it were, into partnership, however, very subtly flatters his amour- propre, and hence the frequent afiectation of pretending to see more in such performances than there really is. Who has not, in a similar manner, amused himself by making out objects and ‘ faces in the fire ’ ? Who has not felt vain at deciphering a handwriting not legible to others ? It must never be forgotten, however, that the handwriting is none the better for being illegible to many. An excess of handling is, moreover, an evidence of bad taste. What is called ^ spirited execution,’ carried through- out a picture, is like the great drum and trumpet in full play all through a musical performance. In the thinly painted works of Teniers we see, perhaps, the happiest union of hard and soft markings. The style will, however, vary, according as the subject is grave or gay, lively or severe. Keynolds calls execution, very finely, ^the genius of mechanical performance.’ ‘ Yet,’ says he, ^ he that does not express particulars expresses nothing.’ This leads us to the vexed question of the degree of Jinish proper to a work of art ; and the great problem of the union of breadth and finish. The degree of finish will be regulated by the size of the picture, the nature of the theme, the character of the object imitated, and, above all, by the distance at which the representation should properly be viewed. True finish does not consist in any kind of smoothness, nor in minute detail, but in the complete expression of character. And there is TROCESSES AND MANIPULATIONS. 229 a legitimate charm in the use of apparently inadequate means, provided the effect is entirely satisfactory upon lengthened examination. ^ There are,’ says Haydon, ‘in all objects great charac- teristic distinctions that press on the senses and affect the imagination ; these the man of comprehension views, sees, transfers, and hits off by touches, leaving the aggregate of useless particulars to the imagination of the spectator : while the man of narrow understanding dwells only on the aggre- gate of particulars, deceiving himself that the leading points will come. Never was a greater delusion. . . . Painting is an optical delusion, acting on the eye through the medium of atmosphere, which softens, flattens, and unites the pores of suiffaces. In looking into the face of the greatest beauty, it is anything but smooth j but at the given distance, the pores of the skin are united^ and the skin has the look of the polished pearl-like cheek, soft, tender, and beautiful. Ivory is the re- verse of flesh — it is smooth near, but hard at a distance : the atmosphere has nothing to act on, therefore the invisible pores are rendered still more invisible, and the effect is one of a smooth hardness j while skin, having something for atmo- sphere, has the real look of softness. Vanderwerf, Denner, Mengs, and David are instances of this laboured smoothness, looking anything but fresh, on the above principle. One of the greatest evidences of genius is the use, more or less, a man makes of atmosphere. A power of calculating the effect of atmosphere is one of the great attendants of the highest genius. It was the characteristic of Phidias in sculp- ture ; and Michael Angelo, Titian, Rubens, and others in painting. ... In Rembrandt and Reynolds surface is too artiflcial ; in Rubens it does not predominate ; but in Titian it is perfection ; unobtrusive, but existing — relishing, but retiring. There it is, nobody knows how ; but take it from Titian, half the charm goes with it; and yet it is hardly perceived except by its consequences.’ ^The touchers’ — to again quote the same writer — ‘ Michael Angelo, Raphael in his cartoons, Titian, Bartolommeo, Giorgione, Tintoretto, Veronese, Rubens, Velasquez, David Teniers, Rembrandt, Reynolds, Wilson, Wilkie, Gainsborough, Vandyke, are 230 PAINTING POPULAELT EXPLAINED. tlie great men who had discovered the optical principles of imitating nature to convey thought. The polishers are the little men who did not see a whole at a time, but only parts of a whole, and thus vainly essayed to make up the whole by a smooth union of parts.’ To these graphic passages we may add, that there are many phenomena in nature, as a storm, which it is impossible to represent other- wise than suggestively. Among the masters most remark- able for precision or rapidity of handling are Eubens, Tintoretto, Teniers, and Velasquez. Eubens painted his very celebrated work, the ^Descent from the Cross,’ in nine days. The change from Leonardo da Vinci to Titian was great ; but the rapid and dexterous movements of Eubens’ pencil rendered nearly everything apparently stationary that had preceded him. ^Eubens,’ says Sir Joshua Eeynolds, ^ was, perhaps, the greatest master in the mechanical part of the art, the best workman with his tools that ever exercised a pencil.’ Tintoretto, from the rapidity of his execution, received the nickname of IlFurioso ; Sebastiano del Piombo said, that Tintoretto could paint as much in two days as would occupy him two years. Mengs, speaking of a picture by Velasquez, executed in his later style, says that he ap- pears to have painted it with his tuill only, without the aid of his hand. Of the important branches of execution, stippling and hatching, we have already treated in the article on Tempera. A few remarks on the distribution and care of paintings, and on picture-cleaning and restoring, are offered in the Appendix, note B. 1 . OIL PAINTING PEACTISED BEFOKE THE VAN EYCKS. Probably every person who sees for the first time a picture by Van Eyck, if not at all surprised at its antiquated treat- ment or quaintness of expression, will be very much-aston- ished to find that the work of the reputed inventor of oil painting has preserved its brilliancy of tone after the lapse of more than four centuries far better than most pictures executed within the last hundred, or even the last fifty years. OIL PAINTING BEFOEE THE YAN EYCKS. 231 By ‘ brilliancy of tone ’ we do not mean the force and depth, the luscious richness of colour and fulness of effect, which are the principal charms of painting in oil, as exhibited par- ticularly in the Venetian school ; but that the colour of Van Eyck, though quiet, will still be vigorous and fresh; that it will have limpid transparency, and an almost illusive vacuity of space. In addition to this, it will exhibit an amount of truthful realization of the most minute and ex- quisitely delicate detail which is scarcely ever found united with the same imperishable durability elsewhere. These characteristics distinguish more or less all the early Flemish pictures ; and from persons habitually engaged in restoring them we learn that the colours of these pictures are mostly of a harder body than those of a later date : they resist solvents much better ; and if rubbed with a file, they show a shining appearance, resembling a picture painted in varnish. Examination of the pictures themselves, and the researches of several learned writers within the last few years, leave no room to doubt that their durability is attri- butable chiefly to the vehicle employed, and that the colours were used not simply with oils, but with an oil- varnish of the kind we call ‘ hard ’ — or, in other words, an oleo-resinous vehicle, such as might be employed strictly as a varnish over a picture when finished. Our immediate object, however, is not to discover the nature of the vehicle, but to ascertain what claim the brothers Van Eyck have to be considered as the absolute inventors of the art of oil painting. If the vehicle, the use of which they were long reputed to have introduced, had been merely oil, popularly understood, with no native properties prejudicial to its employment — had been easy of preparation, simple in its composition, and affected by few conditions in its mixture with different colours, and without any inherent qualities tending to restrict its application to any surface or extent — we could without difficulty suppose that the Van Eycks might have stumbled on the discovery, and quickly realized in a more eligible medium, what would still have been, though in an inferior degree, the distinctive artistic qualities of their 232 PAINTING POPULAKLT EXPLAINED. painting, had they continued the practice of tempera, glass painting, or illuminating. But we have already seen that the vehicle of oil painting is precisely the reverse of what might be considered possible or likely to have been suddenly discovered. It is now known, from the frequent allusions to them, that, during three centuries antecedent to the technical perfection displayed in the works of the Van Eycks, there were what we may consider tentative efforts in oil painting. So distinct is the evidence of the practice of oil painting long before the beginning of the fifteenth century, that the invention or discovery of the Van Eycks, even understood restrictedly, has been denied altogether. Dr. Raspe pub- lished, as early as 1781, a dissertation, maintaining the attribution of the discovery to the Van Eycks as erroneous, and only allowing the possibility of their having introduced amber varnish and poppy oil. Haydon makes some sweep- ing observations to the same effect, and with less reservation, in his Lectures^ published as late as 1844. There must, however, be some foundation for the tradi- tional ascription of an honour no rival schools have opposed, and which Vasari, the sufficiently vain historian of the great Italian painters, has not merely not disputed, but, on the contrary, acknowledged — confessing that his own countrymen failed in their efforts to improve the vehicle of tempera. As might therefore have been expected, recent research has shown that the Van Eycks are entitled to our gratitude, not indeed for having created the art, but for re- moving disqualifications which imfitted it to compete with, much less supersede, the ordinary tempera. It has been remarked, that it may be considered fortunate that the process of the Van Eycks was not altogether their own dis- covery ; for had it been so, the method which has stood so well the test of time might still have remained a subject of conjecture ; but as such is not the case, if we ascertain the principles commonly acknowledged before their time, it will be comparatively easy to trace the direction of their inquiry and the nature of their improvements. The total absence of all even incidental reference among OIL PAINTING BEFOKE THE YAN EYCKS. 233 classic authors to oil painting may he considered conclusive evidence that they were unacquainted with the art. We have seen, however, that oils of some kind entered into the composition of varnishes from the remotest antiquity j and this is all which can he established. Oils having drying properties (which are indispensable in the practice of oil painting even in the warmest climates) were also probably known. Olive oil, so plentiful in Greece and Italy, never dries ; but several ‘ drying ’ oils, such as walnut, poppy, and castor oil (used by the painters of the twelfth century as^a varnish), together with modes for their preparation, are mentioned by the writers of the first three centuries of the Christian era — as for instance Dioscorides (who is supposed to have lived as early as the time of Augustus), Pliny, and Galen. These notices, however, occur only with reference to medicinal or culinary purposes. The first mention of a drying oil in connexion with works of art is made by Aetius, a medical writer of the fifth century. Sir Charles Eastlake was the first to point out this interesting passage, which runs thus : ‘ Walnut oil is prepared like that of almonds, either by pounding or pressing the nuts, or by throwing them, after they have been bruised, into boiling water. The (medicinal) uses are the same [alluding to a description of linseed oil] ; but it has a use besides these, being employed by gilders or encaustic painters ; for it dries, and preserves gildings and encaustic paintings for a long time.’ On the evidence of a MS. at Lucca, we are to refer the important introduction of linseed oil into the arts to the eighth century : the oil principally used centuries after by varnishers and decorators, and later by painters, especially of the north of Europe. It is certainly surprising that, although the modes of bleaching and thickening oils in the sun, as well as the siccative or drying powers of metallic oxides, were known to classic writers ; and though there is evidence of the careful study of these authors soon after the tenth century, yet that oil painting was not suggested for so many ages. The monks, who explored the buried knowledge and arts of antiquity, finding the great reputation which tempera and 234 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. encaustic enjoyed, would, however, at first rather labour to restore these methods than invent a new one. No record is preserved of the first immixture of solid or opaque colour with oil or varnish ; but about the time of Cimabue, that is to say the end of the twelfth century or begin- ning of the thirteenth, the process is frequently mentioned in MSS. which are certainly of this date. From these and similar later sources, it is perfectly demonstrated that oil painting, at least in the lower sense of applying colours mixed with oil on surfaces of wood and stone, was common in Italy, France, and England in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. That the progress of the arts at this period was nearly equal in this as in other countries of Europe, is to be explained by the intercommunication and the bond of union which sub- sisted between the members of the different monastic orders. In the records of W estminster and Ely, which are full of reference to decorative operations, oil is frequently mentioned in connexion with painting. A mandate in the account- rolls of the decoration of the Queen's Chamber at Westminster, commissioned by Henry III., and originally published by Walpole, refers to the purchase of ‘ oil, varnish (vernix), and colours,’ and this mandate bears date 1239. It was ima- gined by Walpole that this mandate alone furnished con- clusive evidence that oil painting was practised in England at this early period. But such is not the case ; for already it has been remarked that where the word ^ vernix ’ occurs alone, it] simply means dry resin ; * requiring, therefore, to be dissolved in oil before it would furnish a varnish : the oil and ^ vernix ’ mentioned in the monkish Latin of these rolls might, consequently, have been employed merely for varnishing tempera pictures. f The records in connexion * It was only in the sixteenth century that the word, in the form of vernice, was applied to liquid compositions. f One curious circumstance connected with the English polychromy of the thirteenth century is the partiality exhibited in all the royal records of the period to use green as a preponderating colour, and as a gromid for other decorations. The recommendation of the white- lead and verdigris (vert-de-Grece) used, was that they were both ‘ dryers ; ’ and, therefore, even when mixed with oil — as they probably often were— the oil paint would quickly dry. OIL PAINTINO BEFORE THE VAN EYCKS. 235 with the decoration later in this reign of the celebrated Painted Chamber at Westminster, are also not clear as to whether the oil mentioned was used for mixing with the colours or to make a varnish for the tempera wall painting. The coloured remains of the Painted Chamber yielded easily to the sponge, when examined in 1819 ; it may therefore be inferred that they were size paintings, and that the varnish had possibly become decomposed by the damp of ages. Nearly the same obscurity exists even in reference to the splendid embellishment, in the reign of Edward III. (1352- 1358), of St. Stephen’s, Westminster. But there are other proofs that oil painting of some kind was employed at Westminster. Methods of oil painting are also particularly described by Theophilus and Eraclius (see p. 64). The records of Ely, of the same date, mention the same mate- rials ; and are almost conclusive as to the immixture of oil with the colours. The gradual improvement of the early oil process may be distinctly traced. Stone surfaces were primed * with white- lead mixed with linseed oil, applied in successive coats and carefully smoothed when dry. Wood was planed smooth, or, for delicate work, covered with leather made from horse-skin or parchment, then coated with a mixture of white-lead, wax, and pulverized tile, on which the oil and lead priming was laid. In the successive applications of the coats of this priming the painter is warned by Eraclius of the danger of letting the superimposed coat be more oily than that beneath, the shrivelling of the surface being a necessary consequence. This is certainly one of the causes of a wrinkled and shrivelled surface, but it is also so common an eifect of the use of an oil varnish that the appearance is considered sufficient evidence of its employment. Merimee says : ^ I have had occasion to examine closely the fine picture by Giorgone which is in the Museum [of the Louvre], No. 1011. This work is drawn into wrinkles in several places, which * the house-painters’ terra for the first or primary coat or coats of paint, or the preparatory oil ground for the finishing coat. 236 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. proves that the artist employed an oil varnish, for it is the constant effect of this vehicle to run into wrinkles in drying. The difficulty encountered by the early painters in render- ing their oil paint sufficiently drying is evident from the directions which follow those already given by Eraclius — that before the application of the second coat, and also before the varnishing, the first coat should be carefully dried in the sun, or by the aid of heat. Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle, in their valuable work on the Early Flemish Painters, speak of a houche-h-ardoir as used for this purpose. Hence painting in oil was frequently limited to wood, because movable panels could be dried in the sun. It was necessary to dry even the varnish for tempera pictures in the sun j and the consequent splitting of a panel is said to have led to the improved oil painting of the Van Eycks. The practice of carefully drying each coat of paint was, it is true, continued in the best periods of art j but with a view to check the yellowing tendency of the oil, as well as to secure perfect dryness before varnishing. In the MS. of Eraclius, and the records of our English cathedrals, no restriction, however, in the employment of oil paint is implied. Oil is mentioned as used for the painting or varnishing of columns and interior walls. And, in one copy of Eraclius, a distinct description of a drying oil, as understood in the mature practice of oil painting, occurs j white-lead and lime being added, and the oil thickened by exposure in the sun, as was also the universal practice in Italy. The drying, or siccative ingredients ultimately em- ployed in oil painting, were however^ originally used in mordants only. It remains to inquire the kind of works in which and with what degree of refinement the system had been applied. The mere process without reference to its application was undoubtedly more successfully employed in England than elsewhere during the fourteenth century. The passages in Eraclius refer to ornamental work, imitations of marble, &c. In the records of Ely Cathedral, however, occur the words pro ymaginibus super columnas depingendis, which has been supposed to refer to painting figures pictorially. But the OIL PAINTING BEFOKE THE VAN EYCKS. 237 figures were no doubt only 'painted reliefs ; and all that can be clearly determined from these and other English (and also foreign) documents is, that these applications of oil painting were merely decorative. The largeness of the quantities of oil supplied is very remarkable, and indicates the coarseness of the operations. Theophilus, indeed, men- tions tints for faces — mixturas vultuum ; but we have seen that the liquid oil which he used required to be dried in the sun, and it is expressly stated that he was dissatisfied with the process for pictorial purposes (on account of the slow drying of the vehicle) in the words which follow the directions given — quod in imaginihus et aliis picturis diutur^ num et tcediosum nwiis est (such a process is too slow and too laborious for painting pictures). The tints for faces it is, moreover, to be observed, are only mentioned in a pass- age describing a method in use of depicting various objects on a gold, or imitation gold, ground— the translucida of the Middle Ages. The usual auripetrum ground (tin- foil lacquered yellow), for such works, was varnished, and the superadded painting must consequently have been in oil. For the subordinate, complementary, and decorative parts of pictures — such, for instance, as draperies and accessories — oil painting was, however, adopted. But no examples of figures or pictures, in the modern sense of the term, entirely executed in oil before the time of the Van Eycks, can be proved to exist j nor is there a distinct record of such works having been executed. The process of oil painting was also used for the purpose of colouring standards, banners, and pennons, on which were represented the heraldic devices and arms of those for whom they were prepared. It was customary in Flanders, and even in the best periods of art in Italy, for the painter to be engaged in the court or suite of monarchs and princes, and to receive a stated salary. The colouring of the armorial bearings and devices of his patron was then the remains of feudal suit and service. The painters in the pay of the Dukes of Burgundy were classed as ‘varlets,’ though their duties were not menial ] for, on the contrary, they were served in their own persons by domestics in livery. Art 238 PAINTINa POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. in Flanders in various otlier of its applications rose from the requirements of luxury as much as from those of religion ; and this partly explains, as Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle have shown, why the pictures of the Flemings lack that elevated sentiment which can arise alone from the deepest fervour and a strong religious sentiment. ‘ The oil generally employed was, as we have said, thickened to the consistence of a varnish, ^ equally applicable,’ in the words of a Venetian MS., Ho pictures, or for varnishing crossbows.’ Delicacy of execution was therefore entirely precluded. Eraclius tells us, the longer the oil remains in the sun the better it will be. In Italy the process was always less complicated, fewer precautions being necessary in such a climate to ensure the drying of the oil j yet Cennini directs that it should be kept in the sun till reduced one-half. Colours in such a vehicle must have been almost unavoid- ably spread in hat tints only. The probable reason why the vehicle was not thinned with essential oils (the art of dis- tilling which was introduced in the thirteenth century) was that, if used in sufficient quantity for the purpose, the essen- tial oils would have produced a ^flatted,’ dull, or unshining surface, which would not only have rendered the picture more liable to harbour dust, but also have destroyed the glossy appearance which was considered the peculiar merit of the vehicle. This thickened oil had, however, merits which recommended its use for certain purposes, even in the best ages of painting. It was well calculated to exclude the air from colours which would rapidly change if exposed to i damp. Its greater drying tendency rendered it fit for the t generally slow-drying, dark pigments, whose hue would not a be materially affected by the darker tint oil acquires in the ] process of boiling or thickening. This explains the pro- a minent ‘ darks ’ in early Italian oil pictures. I 2. THE IMPKOYEMENT OF YAN EYCK: IN YTHAT IT « CONSISTED. i There has been much controversy in respect to which of the brothers Van Eyck, Hubert or John, should be awarded 'it I THE IMPROVEMENT OF VAN EYCK. 239 ■whatever honour is due for the improved oil painting they both illustrated in their practice. Van Mander, in Lives of the Painters, gives 1366 as the date of the birth of Hubert; and the painter’s interesting epitaph, formerly preserved, together with the bones of the artist’s right hand and arm, in the church of St. John (now St. Bavon, the cathedral), Ghent, determines that of his death : — ^ Take warning from me, ye who walk over me. I was as you are, and am now buried dead beneath you. Thus it appears that neither art nor medicine availed me. Art, honour, wisdom, power, affluence, are spared not when death conies. I was called Hubert Van Eyck — I am now food for worms. Formerly known and highly honoured in painting ; this all was shortly after turned to nothing. It was in the year of the Lord one thousand four hundred and twenty- six, on the eighteenth day of September, that I rendered up my soul to God in sufferings. Pray God for me ye who love art, that I may attain to His sight. Flee sin ; turn to the best [objects] : for you must follow me at last.’ The younger brother, .John, appears by sufflcient evidence to have been born between 1390 and 1395 ; and as all writers agree that the improved oil painting was introduced about 1410, the probability is greater that the system had been dis- covered by Hubert, who was the elder by at least twenty- four years, than by a youth of between fifteen and twenty. No works by Hubert alone are, however, in existence whose execution by known priority of date would fix the discovery upon Hubert. The only undoubted specimen of painting by the elder brother is the upper portion of the celebrated great altar-piece at Ghent, of the ^ Adoration of the Mystic Lamb.’ The lower portion was finished by John. That Vasari should attribute the invention to John (Giovanni) is accounted for by the circumstance, that the works of the younger brother, which were in technical merit equal, if not superior, to those of Hubert, were alone known in Italy ; and Antonello da Messina, who communicated the Flemish process to the Italians, had known John Van Eyck only : Hubert (whom John survived nearly twenty years) he had never seen. However, it is a much more important question what the 240 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. improvement actually was which permitted a degree of technical perfection in many respects not since surpassed. We may premise that there exists a primd facie proba- bility that the greatest improvements in the materials of painting would be made where, as in the Netherlands, it was most necessary to counteract the effects of a humid atmo- sphere on painted surfaces by hydrofuge or waterproof pre- parations. To the influence of climate may be attributed the greater prevalence, mentioned by Cennini, of oil painting ' in the north than in Italy ; and likewise that the northern artists seldom attempted mural painting. Even the tempera vehicles used in the north of Italy itself were less thick in consistence than those used in the south. Climate, also, no doubt, induced the readier adoption of oil painting in Venice than in southern Italy, and caused the preference for canvas of thin and pliant texture. Vasari, who was born nineteen years after the death of ! Antonello, and who wrote about a century after the death of John Van Eyck, could necessarily give only traditionary information respecting the actual improvement of the Van Eycks : yet he supplies the most direct evidence which can be adduced. It is to be remarked, however, that, although ^ frequently incorrect in dates, Vasari, from having been a painter himself, is generally to be relied on in practical ! matters. Notwithstanding this, the description he gives of the improvement of Van Eyck is, if not carelessly worded, certainly more embarrassed and meagre than might have been expected, making every allowance for ‘ Time’s effacing finger.’ The account referred to occurs in Vasari’s life of Antonello da Messina. The Italian biographer assumes in the first place, that painters were universally desirous of discovering some method which would admit of blending the tints with greater facility than could be effected in tempera by hatching with the. point of the brush. But in this assumption he for- gets that the union had been effected with the medium of the later tempera painters, and that the Italian painters generally were very tardy in adopting the new system. We are then told that Giovanni da Bruggia (John Van Eyck), THE IMPEOVEMENT OF YAN EYCK. 241 being fond of alchemy (as chemistry was then called) made experiments to prepare various oils for the composition of varnishes and other things. That, having finished a tempera picture on panel, varnished it, and placed it in the sun to dry as usual, the heat opened the joinings ; and that the artist, provoked at the destruction of his work, ‘ began to devise means for preparing a kind of varnish which should dry in the shade, so as to avoid placing his pictures in the sun. Having made experiments with many things both pure and mixed together, he at last found that linseed oil and nut oil, among many which he had tested, were more drying than all the rest. These, therefore, boiled with other mix-‘ tures of his, made him the varnish which he — nay, which all the painters of the world — had long desired.’ Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle justly remark that ^it would be wrong to infer from this passage that the drying qualities of linseed and nut oils were unknown to Van Eyck and the world previous to the experiments here re- ferred to 5 and it is almost impossible that Vasari should have intended to convey such a meaning, when we know that he was perfectly acquainted with the treatise of Ghiberti (vide Ghiberti ” in Vasari), in which it is affirmed that Giotto painted on the wall, painted in oils, and painted on panel.” Nor can we consider him to have been ignorant of Cennini’s Treatise on Tainting, in which so many chapters are exclusively devoted to the subject of oils, used in colours, though evidently without any knowledge of Van Eyck’s discoveries. He must have intended to express, not that Van Eyck discovered the qualities of linseed and nut oils ; but, after repeated experiments, found that none were more drying than these — a fact of which he was not previously certain. His efforts would, therefore, be at first in one particular direction 5 namely, to make linseed and nut oils as siccative as possible. When he had obtained this, he mingled these oils with certain mixtures, and he obtained a more drying varnish. Thus the first grand step was gained.’* * The Early Flemish Painters, p. 42. M 242 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. Vasari proceeds in tlie following words : — ^ Continuing his experiments with many other things, he saw that the immixture of the colours with these kinds of oils * gave them a very firm consistence, which when dry was proof against wet ; and, moreover, that the vehicle lit up the colours so powerfully, that it gave a gloss of itself without varnish ; and that which appeared to him still more admirable was, that it allowed of blending [the colours] infinitely better than tempera. Giovanni, rejoicing in thi& invention, and being a person of discernment, began many works.’ The whole of this description is sufficiently indefinite, for we are only informed of what led to the new and more im- portant of Van Eyck’s discoveries in the evasive words, ^ other mixtures of his.’ The incongruities in Vasari’s state- ment may be partly explained by the fact of the Flemish system of painting having become obsolete in Vasari’s time ; the great Italian painters finding that oils and vehicles of less body than those used by their northern brethren favoured the rapidity of execution desirable in the larger scale of their works. The importance of Vasari’s description consists, how- ever, in the one fact of which it puts us in possession, and with respect to which there is every reason to believe it trust- worthy — viz., that it was in search of a varnish to cover pictures when finished, which would dry in the shade, that Van Eyck not only succeeded in his immediate aim, but also in rendering the varnish he had obtained more suitable for mixing with his pigments in the actual process of painting than any vehicle hitherto known. This last, then, is the great discovery, and its importance cannot be too much in- sisted upon. The new vehicle was not only recommended by its improved drying properties ; but, as the works of the Van Eycks and their scholars prove, it was thinned at will by a diluent, so as to allow of infinitely greater precision of execution than the thickened oil previously in use. It was * That is to say, the oils which had been converted into a varnish by the other ‘ mixtures of his’— that this is Vasari’s meaning is apparent from many considerations, which as they are indicated in various places, it is unnecessary to state in detail here. THE IMPKOYEMEjJ^T OF VAN EYCK. 243 not so dark as to sully the colours with which it was mixed, as would the customary varnish for tempera pictures ; and it gave not only extraordinary durability to the colours from being so intimately combined with them, but also communicated a transparency and lustre, without any sub- sequent operation, unattainable by the ordinary vehicles of tempera, with all the assistance of the final coat of varnish. We have remarked that fixed oils alone, when thickened, become half resinified, and may be used as varnishes j but that, when oils so prepared are sufficiently thinned with essential oils to ser\e as vehicles, they lose the gloss upon their surface. But varnishes can also be made of fixed oils combined with resins, which may be thinned without this effect, provided the object of hastening the drying of the oils is attained by other means than the excessive thickening of the oils. This, it is found, may be effected by the addition of what are called ^ dryers.’ The other ‘ mixtures of his,’ then, no doubt point to the discovery of a good dryer; and this was, therefore, one important part of Van Eyck’s improvements That Van Eyck’s vehicle also contained a resin, we shall find yet additional proof to that already given. But it will be desirable previously to ascertain the nature of the varnish {yernice liquidd) in use for protecting tempera pictures, and which the Flemish painters spread over the memorable panel.. Upon referring to pages 19-22, the reader will find it stated that the finer description was made with amber or copal, but that sandarac was commonly employed. There were,, however, in Flanders, local facilities for obtaining amber ; hence the varnish containing this ingredient was called German varnish. This is a very firm resin, and the most competent judges have concluded, from examination of the works of Van Eyck, that such a resin was used. And varnish, made with amber, is mentioned in the oldest documentary evidence relating to the practice of early Flemish painters. There is, notwithstanding, every reason to suppose that, among these painters, the quantity of the resinous ingredient was varied for various purposes. Other resins, such as copal and sandarac (the substitute for amber and copal), mastic and purified (dry) turpentine, also, no 244 PAINTIN& POPUI AELY EXPLAINED. doubt, in many instances replaced the amber ; for the dis- ' . similar appearances of the works of the earliest masters of ' ! the school point to this conclusion, ; J The natural inference is, that there was no ^secret ’ in the i school that would infallibly produce, without the requisite j intelligence, the same result. It may be assumed that Van Eyck was acquainted with the best processes for rendering the amber varnish as light in colour as possible •, but we have the important conclusion arrived at by Sir Charles ' Eastlake, after the most patient and lengthened investigation, that 4t is not to be supposed that modern chemists would have any great difficulty in obtaining results as successful j nor is it imagined that there was any particular secret in the operation which has been lost ; or for which, if lost, an equivalent could not be found.’ By known means, a varnish may be made from amber firmer than any prepared with | the ordinary resins, and equally light in colour. One reason why Van Eyck retained amber as a constituent part of the new vehicle, arose probably from observing that it imparted the same polished appearance to the surface of the painting as when used for a varnish. The gloss com- municated to pictures by the lustrous varnishes of the Middle Ages, was considered an essential quality, and may ! have been traditionally admired from the estimation in which it was held among the ancients. At all events, this - ? recommended encaustic and mosaic in the early periods of j Christian art j thickened oil was no doubt chosen in the first | attempts at oil painting with a view to this same effect ; and | | it has ever remained a characteristic of the works of the ^ Dutch and Flemish masters. i; j J Van Eyck did not, we may reasonably conclude, at once ^ j ^ succeed in properly thinning as well as lightening his vehicle. i | He would, therefore, probably, in the first instance, mix his • k j| vehicle with the dark and more flowing transparent colours, , j ^ thus carrying a step further the tinging of varnishes already S f || practised by tempera painters. The great leap (though ||1 timidly made) by which Van Eyck cleared the conventional ' |i bounds imposed on painting, was, however, the substitution i i i of opaque for transparent colour on the lights^ and this \i OIL PAINTING : EARLY FLEMISH AND GERMAN. 245 affords the final test and evidence of his improvement, implying, as it does, that the varnish was entirely changed both in colour and consistence. By recapitulating, we arrive, then, at the following infer- ences : First, that Eyck, seeking for a varnish that would dry in the shade, perfected the methods of dissolving amber in oil, and then discovered a good dryer.* In this consisted a great part of the material improvement. Secondly, that, as the varnish obtained, having been subjected to no long process of boiling, was nearl}" colourless, he might not only use it with the transparent colours, but cautiously and gra- dually mix it with the opaque ones also — finding their purity little affected by this transparent vehicle, especially when thinned, as, from the appearance of his works, it probably was for the lighter colours, in order to prevent their yellowing. And, finally, as the thickness of the varnish was an obstacle to precision of execution, he would increase the proportion of its oil to its amber, or add a diluent, as occasion required. The protection afforded by eleo-resinous media has, sub- sequently, always caused them to be held in greater favour in the humid climates of the North than in Italy. The lighter-bodied mastic varnish was, however, used by later Flemish painters — Vandyke in particular. 3. OIL PAINTING : EARLY FLEMISH AND GERMAN. Greater obscurity exists respecting the early history of the art of Northern Europe than that of Italy; and the panel pictures of cis-Alpine countries probably fared worse at the hands of the iconoclasts of the Keformation than would have fared wall paintings if mural painting had flourished as extensively in those countries as it did in Italy. The Carlovingian missals are, however, preserved ; though no remains of the mural paintings which adorned the palace of Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle have descended to our own time.’ The Byzantine trammels, judging from MSS., * White copperas is known to have been generally used by early Flemish painters. 246 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. seems to have been thrown off in the North earlier in the thirteenth century than in Italy. But the earliest distinct development of the German style occurred towards the ' end of this fourteenth century, in the school of Cologne. William of Cologne is the earliest (tempera) painter of this school, and the oldest German painter to whom existing panel pictures are attributed. Meister Stephan is a more distin- guished (tempera) painter, and his celebrated altar-piece in the Cathedral at Cologne is considered the masterpiece of the school. A later master of this school has been, on insufficient grounds, confounded with Israel von MecheneUf a contemporary goldsmith and engraver. The chief work of this painter is a representation of the ‘ Passion,’ which was in the now dispersed collection of Herr Lyvershurg, at Cologne ; and the painter is known from this circumstance as the ^ Master of the Lyvershurg Passion.’ This and other pictures of the school have gold backgrounds, but the characteristics are in other respects those which for ages we observe with remarkable uniformity in northern art. The northern artists imitated nature earlier than the Italian ; but they never succeeded, like the latter, in the representa- tion of the beautiful and the ideal. They never ^ disclosed the one great mystery, and placed before us the inward sentiment and the outward form as one and indivisible.’ Their faces are nearly always, full of character, but their drawing and modelling of other portions of the figure, particularly of the extremities, exhibit structural ignorance. They never generalize; but concentrate their attention upon the minutiae of detail, and the accessorial ornaments they delight to introduce ; imitating them with illusive faithfulness, but leaving an impression of stillness and life- lessness, which is aggravated by the stiffness and angularity of their draperies. Yet in all technicalities they pre- eminently excel, and they are almost invariabl}'- fine colour- ists. In composition they are inventive, but their creations are singular and fantastic, and full of that roynantic element which finds expression in their so-called Gothic architec- ture, and which is attributed to the influence of climate and the great features of northern nature. OIL TAINTING: EAKLY FLEMISH AND GERMAN. 247 The school of Westphalia, a similar school to that of Cologne, produced a painter known as the Meister Von Lieshorn. There are specimens of the works of this artist, and also of Meister Stephan, in the National Gallery. But the most celebrated northern school of the fifteenth century was the Flemish school of Bruges, established by Hubert Van Eyck, and upheld by his brother John after the death of Hubert. There is little known of these masters beyond what has already been given. The whole of the upper portion of the celebrated altar-piece in the cathedral of St. Bavon, at Ghent, was by Hubert; the lower portion was completed by John. The entire altar-piece was a polyptych * (consisting of several panels), and comprised two principal pictures, one above the other, each with double wings painted inside and out. When the wings were opened, which occurred only on festivals, the subject of the upper centre picture, consisting of three panels, was the Triune God, with the Virgin on one side and the Bap- tist on the other. On the adjoining wings were angels, who with music celebrate the praises of the Most High. At the extremities were Adam and Eve, the representatives of fallen man. The lower central picture shows the Mystic Lamb (Agnus Dei) of the Kevelation, whose blood flows into a cup ; over it is the dove of the Holy Spirit ; angels who hold the instruments of the Passion, worship the Lamb, and four groups of holy martyrs, male and female, and priest and laymen, advance from the sides. On the wings are coming up other groups of soldiers of Christ, righteous judges, hermits, and pilgrims. When closed, the upper part represented the Annunciation, and on the lower were single figures in chiaroscuro. The two central panels are all that now remain in St. Bavon. The celebrated copy made by Michael Cocxie, for Philip II. of Spain, is likewise dispersed. f The finest of John Van Eyck’s * The exact arrangement of the entire altar-piece is described in note D of the Appendix. t -A.n ancient copy of the ‘ Adoration of the Mystic Lamb,’ formerly in the Aders collection, was exhibited in the Art Treasures Exhibi- tion at Manchester, 1857 . 248 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. own works is the altar-piece of the Santa Trinita, in tke Museum of Madrid ^ but the style of the master can scarcely be seen to greater advantage than in the picture in the National Gallery, containing, probably, the portraits of the artist and his wife. The following are among the principal scholars or painters of the school of the Van Eycks : Van der Meire, Hugo Van der Goes, Justus of Ghent, Antonello da Messina (who introduced oil painting into Italy), and Van der Weyden of Brussels (Roger of Bruges). The existing masterpiece of the last painter is the very large altar-piece of the ‘ Last Judgment,’ in the hospital at Beaune, in Burgundy. A picture by Antonello da Messina, representing the ^ Cruci- fixion,’ is in the museum of Antwerp. Hans Memling (formerly improperly spelt Hemling and Hemmelink), is, however, next to the founders, the most celebrated master of the school. His most important works are the ^ Vision of the Apocalypse,’ and the paintings on the reliquary or chasse of St. Ursula, in the hospital of St. John at Bruges 5 and the ‘ Joys and Sorrows of the Virgin,’ and the ^ Journey of the Three Kings from the East,’ at Munich. At Louvain Dietrich Stuerbout painted two remarkable pictures, now at the Hague. The influence of the school extended over Germany and Holland. Martin Schon, of Colmar, was an excellent painter, and also a distinguished early en- graver. His most celebrated work is the Wirgin in the Rose-bush,’ preserved in the cathedral at Colmar. Hans Holbein the elder, of Augsburg, was a younger contem- porary of Schon. At the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the six- teenth century, the peculiar character of Northern art was carried to its highest perfection by Albert Diirer, as the^t of Italy v/as at the same time by Raphael. Albert Diirer was born at Nuremburg, in 1471, and in 1486 was placed with Michael Wolgemuth, the best artist of hisnative city ; in 1538 he died. Albert was the most celebrated German artist of his age, and almost equally distinguished as painter, sculptor, and engraver. Raphael and Diirer exchanged drawings, to show each other their respective styles. 'Albert visited OIL PAINTING : EARLY FLEMISH AND GERMAN. 249 Venice, and complained that the Venetian painters abused his style, because it was not after the antique, although they subsequently praised his colouring. Among the most celebrated of Diirer’s paintings is the ‘ Trinity surrounded by the Saints and Spirits of the Blessed,’ at Vienna ; but the artist’s grandest work is his representation, in two companion-pictures, of the four apostles, ^ John and Peter,’ * Mark and Paul.’ These "figures form perhaps the first complete work of art produced by Protestantism. Albert died shortly after their completion, and Kugler says : * Well might the artist now close his eyes — he had in this picture attained the summit of art ; here he stands, side by side, with the greatest masters known in histor3^’ * Albert Altdorfer, also distinguished alike in painting and engraving, was the most original of all Diirer’s scholars and imitators. A picture by this artist, of ^ Alexander’s Battle of Arbela,’ at Munich, contains a countless number of figures all painted with marvellous minuteness and finish. t * The fame of Albert Diirer rests, however, principally upon his en- gravings ; in which we do not know whether to admire most the sur- prising richness of invention, or the wonderful delicacy of execution. It is a disputed point whether Albert ever engraved on the wood him- self ; but his woodcut designs are, though far coarser in execution, like his copper-plate engraving, fall of fantastic invention. The following are the most remarkable woodcuts and engravings of this manlj" and prolific genius ; and they are enumerated in the order of their pro- duction. The woodcuts illustrating the Revelation of St. John; the engraving of the coat of arms with Death’s head ; the engravmg of Adam and Eve ; sketches of the sufferings of Christ y an excellent woodcut of a Penitent, and another of Death seizing an armed warrior; two great series of woodcuts known as the Greater and Lesser Passion of Christ ; and another well-known series of the Life of the Virgin ; the grand woodcut composition of the Trinity ; the very celebrated engraving of The Knight, Death, and the Devil — which has been considered ‘ the most important work which the fantastic spirit of German art has ever produced ; ’ the allegorical engraving of Melancholy', an engraving of St. Jerome in his study; the large woodcut, the Triumphal Arch of the Emperor Maximi- lian ; the series of woodcuts which form the triumphal car of the Emperor Maximilian ; and, lastl}- , the remarkable engraved portraits of some of his distinguished contemporaries, including Melanchthon and Erasmus. f Altdorfer, as an engraver, is one of the best of the so-called German ‘ little masters,’ from the smallness of their prints and cuts ; the French call him le petit Albert [Diirerl. 51 3 250 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. Lucas Cranacli headed the contemporary school of Saxony, and enjoyed almost as great a reputation as Albert himself. One of his masterpieces is the ^ Mystical Ciuci- fixion,’ in the church at Weimar. He was an excellent portrait painter, and this altar-piece contains an admirable portrait of his intimate friend Luther. Cranach frequently painted mythological subjects, and also studies of the female figure — representations we seldom find in early northern art. He also executed numerous woodcuts and some engravings. Another contemporary school, that of Holland, produced Lucas Van Leyden, a very excellent engraver but not to be ranked with Albert Diirer, or the Italian Marc Antonia.* Lucas was also a painter of great merit ; but his pictures are very rare. Germany at this time gave us Hans Holbein the younger ^ the son of, and a far more important artist than, the Hans Holbein already named. This very distinguished portrait painter was honourably received and patronized by Henry VIII., and spent the latter portion of his life in England. The finest portraits by Holbein are in Windsor Castle, and at Longford Castle. The large composition by Holbein, in the Barber Surgeons’ Hall, represents ^ Henry VIII. pre- senting to the Company of Barber Surgeons their New Charter.’ There is another picture of the same kind in Bridewell. The most beautiful specimen of Holbein is the ^ Virgin as Queen of Heaven,’ in the Dresden Gallery. The woodcuts which form the celebrated ^ Dance of Death,’ by Holbein, are too well known to require description. Quintin Metsys, the blacksmith of Antwerp, who turned from the anvil and taught himself painting in order to win the hand of a painter’s beautiful daughter,t is another re- markable artist of this period. The so-called ^ Two Misers,’ at Windsor, of which there are several repetitions and * Some of tbe engravings of Lucas Van Leyden — as, for instance, his Eulenspiegel (a notorious clown), are among the very greatest rarities of print collectors : there are not more than half-a-dozen impressions extant of the print we have named. f The words Connuhialis amor de Mulcihre fecit Apellem are written on his monument, erected at Antwerp one hundred years after his death. OIL PAINTINO; EAELY FLEMISH AND OERMAN. 251 copies, is universally known ; but the most important work by Metsys is an altar-piece in the Academy at Antwerp. The talent of Mabuse is illustrated to advantage in the great picture at Castle Howard, of the ‘ Adoration of the Kings, ^ which formed one of the prominent attractions of the Art Treasures Exhibition at Manchester, 1857. Other artists of some consideration were Schoreel and Antonio More (who was employed to paint Queen Mary of England before Philip’s marriage); but northern artists, in the second half of the sixteenth century, gave themselves up to the imita- tion of the great It.ilian masters, whose fame had extended beyond the Alps ; and, as an inevitable consequence, paint- ing lost not only its national features, but other also of what should be its best characteristics. A few additional remarks upon the technical characteristics of the Van Eycks and their scholars maybe added before we conclude this part of our subject. Upon the pure white ground of the tempera painters the design for the oil picture was traced in a similar manner, and then fixed by being retraced with the brush. The light and shade of the picture were also usually expressed with the pen, and with the greatest possible care. Over this a coat- ing of size was applied, thus rendering the ground non- absorbent (see p. 215), contrary to the universal opinion of writers upon the processes of painting; for it has been supposed that the use of the gesso ground was, by absorbing the oil, to remove in some degree the cause of yellowness in the colours. That the ground was not absorbent is proved (by various circumstances; but especially in the ingenious process employed of late years for transferring pictures from panel to canvas. This is effected upon a principle similar to that described as employed for fresco (see p. 142) : the panel is planed away, and when the ground is arrived at, it is found to be not in the least stained with oil. The true function, then, of the white ground was, by shining through, to impart the freshness and transparency we so much admire in the works of the early Flemish painters. With a view to the preservation of this transparency, a warm, transparent, oleo-resinous priming was passed over the 252 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. design — tlie ground being thus cut off from contact with the oil. The shadows of the picture were next strengthened to their full force, and the half-shades indicated with a uniform, rich, transparent brown. In modern practice the shadows have been frequently painted in colours comple- mentary to the lights. The more solid or opaque, but still thinly-painted portions, were added last. Every precaution was, therefore, taken not to neutralize the effects of the ground by the careless embroilment of transparent and opaque tints. In the later practice of oil painting, lights were more and more loaded, and afterwards occasionally glazed ; white was also introduced into the cool, grey half- tints, the shadows being still left in untouched transparency; but, contrasted as they were with the more solidly painted lights, they acquired much greater depth and beauty. This is the superior method of Eubens, and also of Teniers, par- ticularly in his more sketchy style. Kembrandt, likewise, with all his loaded colour, leaves in some portions the ground partially apparent. The methods of the great Vene- tian colourists afforded a still wider scope for diversifying effects, for they laid opaque colours even into the shadows, and recovered transparency by ultimate glazings. The Van Eycks, Sir C. Eastlake thinks, adopted their principle of colouring from their practice as glass painters. < They knew the value of light behind colours, and that the foulest mixture through which light penetrates is more brilliant than the purest colour lighted superficially. The most essential attribute of the mere materials of oil painting being depth, they secured this quality in the very highest degree by preserving internal light.’ Their fine feeling for aerial perspective contributed also to the same result. The analogy between a glass painting and an oil painting is not, however, complete, and the highest lights of the Van Eycks fail to tell as such, and to give the full attainable relief, from not being sufficiently loaded. The superiority of later practice consisted, among other merits, in permitting a suggestive freedom of handling, and the display of power of drawing in the touch itself in the opaque lights, which we do not find in the dry inlaid and OIL PAINTING INTRODUCED INTO ITALY. 253 minute detail of the earliest masters. The hand was, how- ever, disciplined in the school of the Van Eycks to great correctness and exactitude of drawing in the preparatory • study.’ Indeed, in many instances of unfinished pictures, the design was wrought out with a care and finish which might seem altogether supererogatory. The fact that the most important part of the picture was executed with the point and not with the brush explains the partiality for etching and engraving in this early school. 4. INTRODUCTION OF OIL PAINTING INTO ITALY. The method of the Van Eycks was, according to Vasari, made known in Italy by Antonello da Messina.* Vasari’s relation, which appears to be true in the main, is as follows : Antonello saw, in the possession of the king Alfonzo I. of Naples, about the year 1442, when he was twenty^eight years of age, a picture of the ‘ Annunciation’ by 'John Van Eyck, which so struck him by the vivacity of its colouring and the beauty and harmony of the painting, that he set out immediately for Bruges, in order to discover by what means it was produced. He obtained the secret from John Van Eyck, and remained some time in Flanders until he had perfected himself in the method. He returned to Italy, and arrived in Venice about 1445, where he communicated his secret to Domenico Veneziano, who in turn confided it to Andrea dal Castagno ^ the Infamous j ’ so named, because he murdered Domenico, as it is said, to become the exclusive possessor of the secret. After two visits to his native Sicily, Antonello finally settled in Venice till his death, about 1493. * Although the honour of introducing oil painting into Italy is ascribed, probably with justice, to Antonello, yet not onl}’' were speci- mens of the Flemish method imported before the return of Antonello from Flanders, but pictures were actually painted in Italy by some Flemish artists ; amongwhich were Roger of Bruges (Roger Van der Weyden), and Justus Van Ghent. The latter resided for several years at Urbino, and painted works in oil there ; but as the native artists, such as Giovanni Santi (the father of Raphael), continued to paint in tempera, the inference is that the Flemish painter contrived, like other of his countrymen, to keep the secret of his process. 254 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. The first oil pictures known to have been executed in Italy by Italian artists were those by Domenico Veneziano and Andrea dal Castagno on the walls of the Portinari chapel in Sta. Maria Nuova at Florence: they are no longer in existence. Other of the first Italian oil painters were Giovanni Bellini, Giorgione, Leonardo da Vinci, Perugino, and Francia. Little credit can, by the way, be given to the story that Giovanni Bellini .introduced himself into the house of the Messinese disguised as a Venetian cavalier desirous of having his likeness taken, and that Antonello mistook the artist for the character he assumed, and thus be- trayed his secret. The Flemish system was quickly modified in Italy, the works of one master — Titian, for example — fre- quently exhibiting a great variety of technical methods, and it was not long before the northern process was forgotten altogether. As Italian influence also became felt in the north, many of the southern technicalities were adopted : some of the original materials and processes (such, for ex- ample, as the white ground and the use of varnish with the colours) were however preserved in the works of Bubens and Teniers ; and it may be said that many of the Van Eycks’ principles were carried to perfection by the former. The following is represented and, partly from unfinished pictures, ascertained to have been Titian’s method of con- ducting a picture in his mature style. The subject being drawn, the effect was wrought out as far as possible with pure white, red, and black only, the shades being left very cold. To check the yellowing of the oil, and to anticipate every contracting or expanding influence, the picture was then exposed to the sun and dew until perfectly dry and hard. Many months were generally allowed to elapse before the surface of this dead or first colouring, or ahozzo^ as it is called by the Italians, was rubbed down with pumice- stone, until quite smooth. This being done, the first painting was examined and corrected, fresh colours and the glazings were then applied, and these additions and glazings were frequently repeated seven, eight, or nine times, until the master was satisfied with his work. But, however numerous these repetitions, a long period was suffered to GERMAN, FLEMISH, AND DUTCH SCHOOLS. 255 elapse between each fresh application of colour, and in the interval the picture was exposed to the sun and the dew. Titian is said to have constantly laid on the paint with his fingers, particularly on the flesh and in glazing. When a broad glaze, or, as the Italians term it, velatu7'a, had to be spread, the colour was, in order to cover the surface thinly and evenly, frequently rubbed on with all the fingers or the flat of the hand. When a smaller space had to be glazed, as the soft shadows of the flesh, the finger or thumb only was dipped in the colour and drawn once along the surface to be painted with an even movement. Such touches were called sfregazzi. It has been believed that Titian frequently glazed the whole surface of the picture, except the white linen, with asphaltum ; but many maintain it was a yellow varnish ; while others, again, attribute the yellow tone of his works to the use of oil in the glazing. The method of Paul Veronese is opposed to that of Titian. Veronese usually painted ^ alia prima,’ that is to say, sought almost the full effect at once by direct means and simple mix- ture of tints, seldom repeating his colours, and using few glazings. He, however, employed a generalizing colour for all the half-tints, as well of the draperies and the architecture as the flesh. When the picture was advanced this way, he covered the whole with a thin coat of varnish, to bring out the colours, and then retouched the lights, and enforced the shadows with the boldest and most dexterous touches. 5. THE LATER GERMAN, FLEMISH, AND DUTCH SCHOOLS. In the north a revival of painting in the seventeenth cen- tury, not very dissimilar to that in Italy at the same period, was effected chiefly by the great artist of Antwerp, Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640). Yet we find in this movement no very strikingly original characteristic ; for the style of Rubens was derived principally from his study in Italy of the Italian, and especially the Venetian, masters. Rubens had one set palette for every kind of subject, grave or gay, sacred or savage, mournful or mirthful. Fuseli justly ob- serves : ^ What has been said of Michael Angelo in Form, 256 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. maj be said of Eubens in Colotjk : they had but one. As the one came to Nature and moulded her to his generic form, the other came to Nature and tinged her with his colour — the colour of gay magnificence.’ The earlier ■works of Eubens are the best : the later works attributed to him are more mannered ; the result, probably, of having been generally executed in great part, if not entirely, by scholars from small coloured sketches by the master. Our limits will admit of a mere enumeration of a few only of the prodigious number of picture in the various galleries which bear the name of Eubens. Antwerp still possesses his greatest, or at least his best known work — the ^ Descent from the Cross.’ The original of the copy in the National Gallery, by Vandyke, of ^ St. Ambrose refusing to admit the Emperor Theodosius into the Church,’ is in the Gallery of the Belvedere, Vienna. At Munich the small sketchy * Battle of the Amazons,’ — a wild host of Amazons pursued by Greeks pouring over a bridge — and a small ^ Fall of the Angels,’ are highly extolled. In allegory Eubens chiefly fails — his ^ History of Marie de’ Medici ’ in the Louvre, to wit. Perhaps the most celebrated of his portraits is the * Chapeau de Paille,’ in Sir Eobert Peel’s collection. The almost unequalled portrait (or study of a head), known as ^Gevartius,’ in the National Gallery, and called a Van- dyke, is considered, with apparently good reason, to have been painted by Eubens. In landscape Eubens is also seen to great advantage. For the ^ Eainbow Landscape,’ Lord Hertford gave, five years since, 4,550/. Eubens visited England, and undertook the great paint- ings for the ceiling at Whitehall, which were finished after his return to Flanders. The ^ Eape of the Sabines,’ in the National Gallery, is a perfect nosegay of colours, and a fine illustration of Eubens’ technical principles and luxuriance of conception. The larger works of Eubens are especially remarkable for the boldness with which pure colours are placed side by side and left for distance to blend. Vandyke (1599-1641) is the most celebrated of the scholars of Eubens. In his early works Vandyke even ex- aggerated the peculiarities of his master ] but he afterwards GERMAN, FLEMIiSH, AND DUTCH SCHOOLS. 257 adopted a less cumbrous type of form, and formed a style peculiar to himself ; in wbicb the tasteful, the exquisite, the refined, and the sentimental, sometimes border on the affected. Vandyke is chiefly distinguished as a portrait painter, and in this difficult branch of art is scarcely inferior to Titian. The last nine years of Vandyke’s life having been spent in England, this country is very rich in portraits from his hand ; the principal collections are the Royal Collection, and those at Blenheim, Althorp, the Grove, Gorham- bury, Worksop, Petworth, and Wilton. Perhaps the best knov^n single pictiu’e is the ‘ Charles I. on Horseback,’ at Windsor. In Holland a reaction against Italian influence set in about the beginning of the seventeenth century, and became very distinctly developed in every branch of art. In portraiture this was first evidenced by extreme faithfulness and literal resemblance, as in the portraits of F. Hals and B. Van der Heist, although the latter inclined rather to Vandyke’s manner. But this movement, or rather an entirely new style, is most peculiarly identified with Paul Rembrandt van Ryn (1606-1674, or more probably 1664). He certainly, in his portraits, could never have flattered — could never have ^treated,’ as it is called, the peculiarities of his subject; but in historical painting he evinces a positive predilection for imitating vulgar nature, and seems to have chosen the most ill-favoured models in order to show how much he could effect by rich impasto and texture, masterly handling, and above all, by the magic of chiaroscuro and its effects upon colour. In all, indeed, that relates not to form, Rembrandt was, perhaps, the most original and creative genius in the history of painting. The striking effects of Rembrandt are obtained by concentration of light; con- trasted with large masses of shadow, which are broken up with the utmost subtlety of graduated shade and reflected light. Among Rembrandt’s finest works must be ranked a portrait composition in the Museum of the Hague. The subject is the celebrated anatomist, Nicholas Tulp, ^de- 258 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. monstrating ’ on a dead body in the presence of several hearers. The private collection of Van Sixt (a descendant of the burgomaster of that name, Rembrandt’s friend and best patron) at Amsterdam contains other excellent works of the same kind. The ^ Woman taken in Adultery/ in the National Gallery, is one of the best of Rembrandt’s earlier performances on a small scale. A famous picture of his later time is the so-called ‘Night Watch,’ a colossal work ill the museum at Amsterdam, representing a party, with their arms, marching out to fire at a mark. The same museum contains the Staalmeestres (a council of one of the guilds of Amsterdam), which is considered by some as Rembrandt’s masterpiece. Rembrandt applied his princi- ples of light and shade to his very celebrated etchings,* and also to landscape : the landscape in Lord Lansdowne’s col- lection, known as ‘Rembrandt’s Mill,’ is a notable instance of the latter. The most distinguished of Rembrandt’s pupils was Gerard Douw ; but he afterwards abandoned the manner of the school for ‘genre.’ Other distinguished scholars were Eckhout, F. Bol, G. Flink, P. de Koning, S. Van Hoogstraten, and N. Maas. In the subordinate branches of painting, classed together as genre (see p. 48, note), and which were generally pic- tures of a small size, the Dutch painters so greatly ex- celled, that genre and the Dutch style are almost synonymous. Minute and exact imitation — even to the point of illusion — ■ of familiar and frequently vulgar subjects, is at once the principle and the characteristic of these artists. Only actual acquaintance with these works of the masters will, however, afford the power of discriminating their great * The marketable value of Rembrandt’s etchings has of late years risen amazingly. The ‘ Christ Healing the Sick,’ called ‘ The Hun- dred Guilder Print,’ as having once fetched that price, about lOZ., then considered enormous, would now command, if a good im- pression, perhaps as many guineas as guilders. The presence or absence of scarcely perceptible appearances in the impressions indicating the exact state of the plate, will cause the most startling differences in the value. Of the portrait of ‘Rembrandt with a sword,' hence called ‘ The Sabre Print,’ only four impressions are known, and for one of these Mr. Holford is said to have paid 400 guineas. GERMAN, FLEMISH, AND DUTCH SCHOOLS. 259 artistic and various teclinical and mechanical merits ; we shall, therefore, content ourselves with recalling the follow- ing names only of the most important. Peter Breughel, called ^Peasant Breughel,’ on account of the scenes he represented, and to distinguish him from his son, known as ‘ Hell Breughel,’ from the subjects he delighted to paint; David Teniers, the elder, who also painted ^ Temptations of St. Anthony,’ and the like ; his son, David Teniers the younger, the head of the ffe?ire painters, and who, besides similar scenes of diablerie, represented tavern subjects, guard-rooms, &c. ; Adrian Van Ostade, second among the low humorous painters; Adrian Brouwer, and Jan Steen, also very able masters in this style ; J ean le Ducq, distin- guished for his pictures of soldier life ; Terburg, who painted the life and manners of the upper classes ; * Gerard Douw, the painter of simple domestic life, artists’ ateliers, &c. ; Gabriel Metzu ; F. Mieris ; Netscher ; Schalken, who excelled in lamplight scenes; and Peter Van Hooghe, re- markable for the effects of light in his interiors. Landscape, also, is a department in which the northern painters, and especially the Dutch, greatly distinguished themselves, as the mention of a few names will show. John Breughel, generally called ‘Velvet’ Breughel, from his high finish, or ‘ Flower ’ Breughel, from the quantity of flowers, fruit, &c., ‘ picked out ’ in his landscapes, is the represent- ative of the first style. This style was, however, superseded by that of Rubens. Some northern artists, viz., Paul Bril and Adam Elzheimer, caught the Italian spirit from paint- ing in Italy. The most important Italian impulse com- municated generally to landscape painting originated in the school of the Caracci ; but is only fully apparent in the finely composed and classical landscapes of Nicholas Poussin, in the stormy, aerial effects in the works of Gaspar Poussin, and in the serene beauty and sunshine of Claude — all three, painters of French extraction. This ideal or * The creator, as Dr. Waagen says, of ‘conversation-painting;’ and, as Sir Edmund Head calls him, the painter of ‘ genteel com edy.’ 260 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. poetic style had considerable influence on the artists of the north. Claude, in particular, found imitators (with a diflerence) in Both, Pynacker, and Cuyp. Berghem and his pupil, K. du Jardin, usually preferred the forms of southern nature •, Adrian Van der Velde generally depicted pastoral subjects; Philip Wouverman found in the representation of hawking scenes subjects almost peculiar to himself. Many, however, of the northern artists do not display any of the romantic element in their landscapes; but adhere to the imitation of the features of nature around them, with generally only the ordinary effects of daylight upon them. Among these artists Hobbema is entitled to special mention; Paul Potter’s men and cattle are also equally simple and faithful. Other painters chose the grander forms of nature, or communicated a peculiar feeling to their representations ; as Buysdaal, in his storms and solitudes, and Van der Neer in his twilights. The greatest of all Dutch marine painters is William Van der Velde the younger ; Backhuisen is also distinguished in this department. Among architec- tural painters,' Peter Neefs and Van der Hey den may be instanced. Of all the animal painters, Snyders, the friend of Bubens, is decidedly the greatest. Hondekoeter excelled in poultry ; and Bidinger, of Augsburg, in hunting scenes. Dutch artists delighted likewise in representations of still life, and especially of eatables. Flowers, also tastefully arranged, were admirably painted by Seghers, de Heem, Bachel Buysch, Weenix, and Van Huysum. 6. THE SPANISH SCHOOLS. John Van Eyck was sent upon an important mission to Portugal, and the earliest development of Spanish art was due to the political connection of Spain with the Low Countries. The ^ German style,’ as it is called by the Spanish, did not, however, long prevail. Italian taste, as represented more particularly by the Venetian masters of colour and execution, and the Neapolitan naturalisti, was diffused throughout the Peninsula, and continued paramount till rendered subordinate by the native characteristics exhibited in the seventeenth century in the works of THE SPANISH SCHOOLS. 261 Zurbaran, Velasquez, and Murillo. But the influence of religion upon art was felt in Spain more in every way than in Italy. The jealous bigotry and intolerance of the Inquisi- tion prescribed the exact manner in which sacred personages should be depicted, and forbade any approach to representa- tions of the nude — a restriction which accounts for the comparative weak drawing of most of the Spanish painters. A certain sternness in the Spanish character, joined to religious enthusiasm in most of the artists themselves, combined also to give a peculiarly sombre and ascetic, and, from the subjects chosen, a frequently repulsive, character to Spanish art. Till within the last few years great ignorance existed in respect to Spanish art generally. This has been dissipated, however, by the excellent Handhooh for Spain, by the late Kichard Ford, and by the works of Mr. Stirling and Sir Edmund Head. But — although the subject is attractive — as the Spanish practice exhibits very few original features, we shall curtail our remarks. Titian spent a few years in Spain in the reign of Charles V.; his pictures seem, however, to have had no great influence. The principal existing works in Spain date from the time of Philip II. : many were executed by Italians, and the best Spanish painters studied in Italy. We shall confine our at- tention more particularly to the truly national painters. Antonio del Bincon (about 1446-1500) is the first distin- guished Spanish painter but a somewhat later artist, Luis de Morales, belongs to an equally early period, in virtue of the sentiment in his works — which has led to Morales being called the ‘ divine ’ and the Spanish Perugino. Louis de Vargas (1502-1568) was the founder of the higher school of art in Seville. He is said to have been a pupil of Perino del Vaga, and he certainly imitated the style of the Italian. Vicente Joanes (1523^1579) is, similarly, the 'caposcuola, or head of the school of Valencia. Joanes is sometimes called the Spanish Baphael. A. S. Coello was a distin- guished portrait painter of this school ; a branch of art in which he was instructed by Antonio More whilst this artist was in Spain. In what is called by Sir Edmund Head the 262 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. middle period of Spanish art — ‘ when the Italian character was giving way to a certain national feeling, but the full power of Murillo and Velasquez had not yet burst forth ’ — there were some distinguished masters of the school of Castile ; among whom one of the most eminent was Juan Fernandez Navarrette, surnamed El Mudo^ or ^ the Dumb.’ An attack of disease deprived this artist of hearing at the age of three; he consequently never learned to speak — hence his name. Theotocopuli, commonly called ^ El Greco ’ (the Greek), ‘ a strange but admirable master,’ is said to have been a pupil of Titian : his great study was colour. Federigo Zuccaro was one of a number of masters who were brought from Italy to assist in the decoration of the great Escurial Palace erected under the auspices of the gloomy bigot Philip II. The prominence (compared with those of Aragon and the north of Spain) of the schools of southern Spain — viz., of Valencia and Seville — was still, in the latter part of the six- teenth century, supported by the following artists. The great painter of the Valencian school was Ribalta, whom Mr. Ford describes as the Spanish Domenichino and Sebastian del Piombo combined. J. G, de Espinosa was an excellent painter, and is said to have studied under Ptibalta. Josef de Pibera, or Lo Spagnoletto, though born in Spain, may more properly be said to belong to Italy. He went to that country very young, adopted the style of the powerful works of Caravaggio and the naturalisti, and died at Naples. The school of Seville had several great masters. Pablo de Cespedes studied at Rome, and was considered one of the best fresco painters there in the time of Gregory XIII. He returned to his native Cordova, and distinguished himself as ‘ a great imitator of the beautiful manner of Correggio and one of the best colourists in Spain.’ Juan de las Roelas has left works in Seville which prove him entitled to rank as a great painter, yet he is scarcely known out of his own country. Some of his works are considered equal to Do- menichino and others to Guido. ‘ No master,’ says Mr. Ford, ‘ ever painted the sleek grimalkin .Jesuit like Roelas.’ Francisco de Herrera el viejo (the elder) is said to have been THE SPANISH SCHOOLS. • 263 the first master who introduced into the school of Andalusia the vigorous and sparkling touch adopted by Velasquez, Alonzo Cano was eminent as sculptor, painter, and architect. As a painter he is soft, rich, and pleasing. His works some- what resemble those of Correggio, and form a singular con- trast to the hauteur and violence of his character as a man.* By Sebastian de Llanos y Valdes, who was wounded by Cano in a duel, there are only two known pictures; but these are of great excellence. Pedro de Moya was a suc- cessful imitator of Vandyke. Francisco Zurbaran (1598-1662) is one of the greatest names in Spanish art. He has been called the Spanish Caravaggio; but Mr. Ford says, with truth, that he was far greater and more Titianesque painter.’ He excelled in the ^ cast ’ of his draperies — a rare merit in Spanish pic- tures. Philip IV. is said to have stooped one day to look at him whilst at work in the Buen Eetiro ; and laying his hand on the artist’s shoulder, saluted him as Pintor del Rey y Rey de los Pintores (Painter of the King, and King of the Painters). A Franciscan monk kneeling in prayer and hold- ing a skull, in the National Gallery, is a fine example * Of this artist the following, among other amusing anecdotes, is related : In 1658 Cano received a commission to carve a statuette of St. Anthony of Padua for an Oidor or judge of Granada. When finished, the judge came to see it, expressed himself pleased, and in- quired the price. The answer was one hundred doubloons. This ex- cited astonishment in the patron : he therefore ventured to inquire how many days the artist had spent upon it. To this Cano replied, five-and-twenty days. ‘ But,’ said the calculating Oidor, ‘ that comes to four doubloons a day.’ — ‘ Your lordship reckons wrong,’ answered Cano, ‘ for I have spent fifty years in learning how to execute it in twenty-five days.’ — ‘ That is all ver}’’ well,’ replied the other ; ‘ but I have spent my patrimony and my youth in studying at the university, and in a higher profession, and now here I am Oidor in Granada, and if I get a doubloon a day it is as much as I do.’ The artist scarcely stayed to hear him out. ‘ A higher profession, indeed ! ’ he exclaimed. ‘ Why, the king can make judges out of clods of the earth, but it is reserved for God alone to make Alonzo Cano.’ Upon saying which, he took up the figure and dashed it to pieces on the floor. The judge, in the utmost alarm for his own safety, rushed away from a man who could thus demolish a saint. The ofience was indeed a capital one, but appears never to have reached the ears of the Inquisition. if 264 PAINTING POPULAKLT EXPLAINED. j of this master. Francisco Pacheco, though not a remark- [ able painter, is deserving of conspicuous mention as the * best writer of his country on the art he practised, and as having established the school in Seville, from which came f Alonzo Cano and Pacheco’s great son-in-law Velasquez. ‘ Diego Velasquez de Silva (1599-1660) is the most original of all the Spanish artists. The boldness of execu- tion for which he is chiefly remarkable he learnt from ‘ Herrera, his flrst master ; from whose school, however, he quickly removed to the more peaceful and orderly school of < Pacheco. But, as Mr. Stirling says in his valuable life of 5 the great painter, ^ he discovered that Nature herself is the * artist’s best teacher, and industry his surest guide to perfec- tion. He very early resolved neither to sketch nor to colour any object without having the thing itself before him.’ The early manner of Velasquez, which was formed before his flrst visit to Italy, and seems not to have been • influenced by the journey, is harder, especially in the out- j lines, than the style of his later works : The ^Adoration of | the Shepherds,’ in the National Gallery, is in this early | naturalistic manner. As a portrait painter Velasquez ranks j with Titian and Vandyke. It is to be regretted that we have no authentic portrait by Velasquez in the National Gallery; the ‘Boar Hunt,’ however, gives a good idea of ' the painter’s later handling ; and in Dulwich there is one of the small repetitions of the celebrated portrait of the | Infant Don Baltasar Carlos on horseback. Few painters | had so prosperous a career as Velasquez. Of his great | patron Philip IV. there are numerous portraits by him. j Velasquez had his studio in the royal palace, and the king i kept a key by means of which he had access to it when he 1 pleased. Nearly every day Philip used to come and watch | him at work. All the stiff Spanish etiquette was relaxed f in favour of the artist; he had all sorts of honours and ^ emoluments conferred upon him, and received the most | extravagant encomiums in the verses of contemporary poets. I He was the only artist with whom Rubens became intimate ^ on his visit to Madrid. Velasquez was commissioned by b Philip to make a second j ourney to Italy to collect works of THE SPANISH SCHOOLS. 265 art; and while at Eome he painted a noble portrait of Innocent X. The Royal Gallery at Madrid contains no less than sixty-two pictures by this great master. His historical cJief-d* oeuvre is the ^ Surrender of Breda ; ’ ‘Velas- quez painting the Portrait of the Infanta Margarita ’ is a celebrated portrait composition ; and the ‘ Borbedones/ or ‘ Drinkers/ is another very fine work. Murillo (1618-1682) is beyond all comparison the best- known Spanish painter. His simple, unaffected imitation of nature, the presence of no recondite artistic quality in his execution, and the softness and beauty of his colouring, have gained him universal popularity, and even a large share of admiration from artists ; although the latter are generally disposed to prefer the more learned style and brilliant handling of Velasquez. The early works of Murillo incline, like those of his great contemporary, to the manner of Caravaggio, but later in life he adopted a softer outline and more mellow colouring. Most of his great pictures were painted after he was fifty years of age. In his own Seville there are still many of his finest works. England is very rich in Murillos ; and the well-known pictures in the Na- tional Gallery are fine specimens of the master. The ‘ Flower Girl ’ at Dulwich is also a genuine specimen of a class of works (beggar boys, &c.) which in many cases are only the productions of pupils. In the Spanish Gallery of the Louvre the Murillos are very excellent \ but the most famous work of the master is the great picture of the ‘Immaculate Conception’ (a very favourite subject with Spanish painters), from the Marshal Soult’s collection, and now in the Old Gallery of the Louvre ; for which it will be remembered the Emperor of the French paid 23,000/. In the Lansdowne collection there is an admirable portrait by Murillo. Iriarte is one of the best landscape painters ; but landscape never acquired much development in the art of Spain. Juan de Valdes Leal is the best painter after the death of Murillo. The Italian Luca Giordano, who came to Madrid in 1692, is charged with corrupting Spanish art by his able but specious facility of execution. Palomino is remembered N 266 PAINTINa POPULAKLT EXPLAINED. far more as a biographer of Spanish artists than as a painter. Mengs, the tame academical Saxon painter, is the last name which need he particularized in the degeneracy of more modern Spanish art. 7. THE FRENCH SCHOOL. French art, viewed historically, is a branch of the Roman school. Giotti and Memmi, though they painted at Avignon, left no trace of their influence. Nor did Jean Fouquet of Tours, the miniaturist ; nor King Rene of Anjou, who painted in the Flemish manner ; nor Francois Clouet and Jean Cousin, who had similar characteristics, leave any impression, although the last has been termed the founder of the French school. The true Italianized French school dates from the time of Francis I., who invited the Italians II Rosso {Maitre Roux, as the French call him), Piimaticcio, and Niccolo delT Abbate, to decorate the gallery at Fon- . tainebleau, Simon Vouet was the flrst distinguished native artist of this school. He was a painter of naturalistic tendency, but he is chiefly remembered for having had as scholars Le Brun, Le Sueur, and other of the most eminent French painters. Nicholas Poussin (1594-1665) has exerted a most im- portant influence upon the arts of his country, although not immediately apparent in the decorative theatrical age of Louis XIV., or the tawdry and heartless times of Louis XV. Much of the stilted extravagance, the classical affectation, and disagreeable colouring of David and his school, may be traced to Nicholas Poussin. Unquestionably, however, Nicholas was a genius, and a painter of reflned taste j yet it is not a little remarkable that Sir Joshua Reynolds should have so highly praised his works, and those of similar French painters, at the expense of the gi’eat Vene- tians, when, at the same time, his own practice was opposed to the principles which would be consistent with this admira- tion; and when Englishmen in general And so little in French art down to the time of David that is congenial to their feelings and natural predilections, and that they can un- constrainedly relish. Nicholas Poussin lived and painted THE FHENCH SCHOOL. 267 ' almost entirely at Kome. There he formed his style upon the antique bassi-relievi and the ancient painting known as the ^ Aldobrandini Marriage.’ He has been styled the ^ Learned Poussin/ from the knowledge displayed in his compositions, and the familiarity with ancient customs shown in his favourite mythological subjects. Besides the excel- lence of his composition, Poussin’s design is very correct, though monotonous, from uniform imitation of the antique ; and his attitudes are frequently theatrical. His colouring has generaiMy a brick-like tone, arising partly from the darkened red priming showing through ; and the red and blue draperies in his pictures have a spotty effect. His con- stant study of bassi-relievi caused the general want of unity in his light and shade. In landscape Poussin holds a most distinguished place : his ‘ classical compositions’ have, how- ever, little in common with contemporary English land- scape art. The characteristics ot this master may be seen to almost as great advantage in the National Gallery as in the Louvre. Two sets of the ‘ Seven Sacraments,’ one at Belvoir Castle, and the other series, together with ^ Moses striking the Bock,’ in the collection of the Earl of Ellesmere, and the ‘ Plague of Athens,’ in the possession of Mr. Miles, of Leigh Court, are famous works of the master. Caspar Hughet, the great landscape painter, was a pupil of Nicholas, and is generally known by the name of Caspar Poussin, which he adopted after the marriage of his sister with his master. He was born of French parents at Borne, and lived and painted in Borne. We have alluded to this master elsewhere. In his earlier works he adopted the severe forms of his brother-in-law, but a more genial feeling per- vades many of his later landscapes. He paid especial atten- tion to what we may call meteorological rather then aerial effects. Aerial perspective, that is to say, the true influence of atmosphere in conveying the impression of space and dis- tance, was first interpreted by his great countryman, Claude (Gel4e), the humble pastry-cook of Lorraine, who, some very few years only after being engaged at Borne as servant to the landscape painter Agostino Tassi, appears to have far surpassed his master in Tassi’s own profession. Claude’s N 2 268 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. landscapes are less severe in character than those of Gaspar Poussin, and are distinguished by their pure and beautiful, though somewhat mannered, luminousness. Pierre Mignard, surnamed ‘le Remain,’ also spent the greater part of his life at Rome. He has been called by Dr. Waagen ^ the Sasso Ferrate and Carlo Dolce of the French school united in one person.’ His portraits, particularly that of Madame de Maintenon, are well known. Nicholas Mignard ^ d’ Avig- non,’ the elder brother of Pierre, is also celebrated as a portrait painter. Sebastian Bourdon was another artist who visited Italy, and became an imitator of Poussin. He re- turned, however, to France. In genre, portraits, and land- scape Bourdon is, perhaps, seen to greater advantage than in historical works. Eustache Lesueur is the greatest master who can be strictly claimed as French : yet, though he never went to Rome, it is remarkable that he is one of the most Italian of the French painters. He has been called the French Raphael — ^much as Klopstock has been termed the German Milton.’ His great work is the series of the ‘ Life of St. Bruno,’ now in the Louvre. Jacques Callot is better known by his prints of the ‘ Miseries of War,’ and the ^ Temptation of St. Anthony,’ than by his pictures. Philippe de Cham- paigne evinces clear perception of character and fidelity in his portraits. Antoine and Louis Lenain show a feeling for nature in their works, which is rare among the French. Charles Le Brun is the generalissimo of the host of French artists (query in many instances) who have painted the acres of battle-pieces which cover the walls of that palace at Versailles with the modest inscription ‘ A Toutes les Gloires de la France.’ Le Brun’s chief performances are the five vigorously composed ^Battles of Alexander,’ painted in direct adulation of his master Louis XIV. Jacques Courtois II Borgognone ’), and his pupil Joseph Parrocel, are also distinguished battle painters. Other artists of the Louis- Quatorze era were Dufresnoy,* Michel Corneille, Claude Better known through his poem, De Arte Graphicd, which has THE FKENCH SCHOOL, 269 Lefevre, Bon Boullongne, Noel Coypel, Jean Jouvenet, Be Largilliere, Hyacinthe Rigaud (the portrait painter), Jean Baptiste Monnoyer(the flower painter), and Louis Laguerre, who came to England, and is immortalised in Pope’s line — * Where sprawl the saints of Verrio and Laguerre.’ Antoine Watteau, the painter of Louis XV. frippery, afiectation, and false refinement, stands at the head of the painters of what were called fetes galantes ; and whatever may he thought of the subjects, the style of this painter is exactly suited to their characteristic expression, and first- rate of its kind. B.it Boucher is the most notorious painter of the tinselled debauchery and indecency of his time. Diderot thus characterizes him : ^ I know not what to say of this man. The debasement of taste, colour, composition, character, expression, and drawing has followed step by step on that of morals.’ Jean Baptiste Vanloo came to England, was patronized by Walpole, and became a fashion- able portrait painter. Joseph Vernet, the prolific and ex- cellent painter of sea-pieces and views of French ports, was the grandfather of the celebrated French painter, Horace Vernet, who recently died. Greuze, despite enamelled sur- face, and a certain taint of conventionality, is deservedly a favourite in this country, in virtue of the simple homeliness of his themes and his careful study of nature. ‘ L’ Accordee de Village,’ the subject of which is a father who has just paid the dowry of his daughter, is an admirable picture by Greuze, in the Louvre. Perhaps the most remarkable painting of the eighteenth century, in France, is the ^ Apo- theosis of Hercules,’ by Fran9ois Lemoine, on the ceiling of the Salon d’Hercule, at Versailles. Anticipatory of, and corresponding with, the gigantic and tempestuous political reaction of the Revolution, was the revulsion in art, initiated by Vien, the master of David, but effected chiefly by the latter and his scholars. By strict adherence to the outward forms of the antique, by cor- had the honour of translation by Dryden. Dufresnoy is also the subject of an epistle by Pope, and the text for some valuable notes by Reynolds. 270 PAINTINGS POPULAELY EXPLAINED. rectness of design and composition, and severity of colour, these artists believed they should embody the stern virtues and classical spirit of the ancients j and thus forcibly, though tacitly, protest against the unmanly degeneracy of a nearly effete age. But the general result, although in many respects more healthy and indicative of a purified atmosphere, was repulsiveness of colour, a pedantic display of drawing and classicalisms, a want of genuine natural feeling, and a fresh development of the besetting national vice of theatrical ex- aggeration. The most celebrated of David’s works are ‘ Le Serment des Horaces,^ painted for Louis XVI. ; the ‘ Sabine Women’ and ^Leonidas,’ purchased by Louis XVIII. ; the ^Serment du Jeu dePaume;’ the ^ Death of Marat;’ the great picture of the ‘Coronation of Napoleon,’* for which the Emperor paid 105,000 f. ; and the portrait of ‘ Napoleon crossing the Alps ’ on a white horse. The last is, of course, a fictitious representation, for the First Consul really, and could indeed only have ridden over St. Bernard on a donkey or mule. David excelled, however, in portraiture, and his portrait of ‘ Pope Pius VII.’ is a much finer work of art than any of his historical pictures. Gerard was a prominent follower of David : he was an excellent portrait painter, and his ‘ Entry of Henry IV. into Paris,’ now at Versailles, is a remarkable picture. Gros, Abel de Pujol, Drolling, and Drouais were also distinguished painters of the same school : the masterpiece of the last artist is ‘ Marius at Minturnge.’ The most coldly classical, but at the same time, however, the most elegant painter of the school, was Guerin. The ‘Shipwreck of the Medusa,’ by Gericault, the initiator of ‘ romanticism,’ and Girodet’s still more horribly detailed picture of the ‘ Deluge,’ leave an indelible impression upon all visitors to the Louvre. The great merits of the Italian scenes by Leo- pold Robert, and of the works of Granet, Horace Vernet, Paul Delaroche, Ingres, Delacroix, Ary Scheffer, Decamps, Gerome, Meissonier, Flandrin, Edouard Frere, Breton, Hen- riette Browne, Auguste and Rosa Bonheur, and many other * This enormous picture is larger by three feet than the ‘ Marriage at Cana ’ by Paul Veronese. THE BRITISH SCHOOL. 271 of the more recent painters of the present century, are too well known to require note or comment. 8. THE BRITISH SCHOOL. The most important early works of painting in England were those executed in the reigns of Henry III. and Edward III. in the Painted Chamber and St. Stephen’s Chapel, Westminster. These are noticed in several parts of this volume, and may, therefore, with simple mention, be passed over in our slight sketch of painting in this country. The zeal of the Reformers and Puritans has deprived us of nearly every vestige of early English painting and sculpture ; yet the beautiful monument to Richard de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, in St. Mary’s Church, Warwick, proves that in the reign of Henry VI. we possessed in William Austen, its designer, at least one native artist hardly inferior to his famous Italian contemporaries, Donatello and Ghiberti. The very remarkable sculptures in the west front of Wells Cathedral are also believed by Elaxman, Cockerell, and the best authorities, to be the work of native artists, though contemporary with Nicolo Pisano, the restorer of sculpture in Italy. We have, however, scarcely any record of English painters previous to the reign of Charles I. Foreigners were engaged for every important work in painting ; and, in fact, foreign artists were preferred even down to the time of Hogarth and Sir Joshua Reynolds — from whose time the English school properly dates. During several successive reigns chiefly German and Flemish masters were patronized in this country. Henry VII. employed, among other foreign artists, the distinguished painter .Ian Mabuse. The despotic successor of this monarch displayed a comparatively enlightened appreciation of art. The visit of Hans Holbein to the court of Henry VIII., in 1526, has already been mentioned (see p. 250). This eminent artist remained in this country until his death in 1554, painting numerous portraits re- markable, evidently, for unflattering fidelity.* * It would appear, however, from the anecdote told by W alpole, 272 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. The Flemish master, Sir Antonio More, as elsewhere stated, painted the portrait of Queen Mary. Queen Elizabeth employed Federigo Zucchero and Lucas de Heere, and also the celebrated native miniature painters,Sir Nicholas Hilliard, and his far more eminent pupil, Isaac Oliver (see p. 112). Peter Oliver, the son of Isaac, was likewise distinguished in this branch of art. In the reign of James I., we have to chro- nicle the foreign names of Van Somer, Cornelius Jansen, and Daniel Mytens — the last an admirable portrait painter. The best English artist of this reign was Nicholas Stone, the sculptor. Charles I. was the most intelligent collector of pictures, and the most liberal patron of art, of all our English sovereigns. To him we are indebted for the possession of Kaphael’s cartoons, and of several fine works of art, notwithstanding that this was not always the character of his works. Holbein was sent by Cromwell, the king’s minister, to take a miniature portrait of Lady Anne of Cleves ; and, says W alpole, in his Anecdotes of Painting, ‘ by practising the common flattery of his profession, was the im- mediate cause of the destruction of that great subject [Cromwell], and of the disgrace that fell on the princess herself. He drew so favourable a likeness that Henry was content to wed her ; but when he found her so inferior to the miniature, the storm which really should have been directed to the painter, burst on the minister, and CromweU lost his head because Anne was a Flanders mare, not a Venus, as Holbein had represented her.’ This interesting miniature, together with that of Henry sent to Anne, was in the Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition of 1857. We think that one glance at the portrait of Anne would exculpate Holbein from the charge made by Walpole. The miniature has certainly a delicacy of finish commen- surate with its extremely minute size, but it has also that striking individuality and palpable honesty which, although unknown to the portrait painting of the time of Walpole, and rarely tolerated in our own, distinguishes all the genuine works of Holbein, and indeed is so remarkable, that one might in every case asseverate the faithfulness of the likeness. The face of Anne is in point of fact almost as far removed from the ‘ Venus ’ of Walpole as it is from what the king’s coarse brutal comparison would suggest. The miniature does net give the figure, but the expression of the features, and the known character of the king afford apparently to us sufficient clue to the catastrophe. Meekness, inclining almost to inanity, or a tem- perament unsusceptible of lively and sympathetic emotion, however capable’of constancy and devotion, would be little appreciated by the exacting imperious Henry. A shrewd observer might actually gain considerable insight into an interesting historical episode from this miniature of Anne. THE BKITISH SCHOOL. 273 that many pictures were dispersed at the Eevolution, and many destroyed in the fire at Whitehall. In this reign the principal native painters were William Dobson, some of whose portraits are equal to Vandyke; Eobert Walker, also scarcely inferior to the Flemish painter ; George Jameson, called the Scottish Vandyke ; Francis Barlow, known by his pictures of hawking ; Gibson the dwarf ; and Henry Stone, the son of the sculptor already named, and commonly called Old Stone, to distinguish him from his brother Henry. Old Stone was an excellent copyist of Vandyke. The foreign artists, are still more numerous, including Eubens (see p. 255), Van- dyke (see p. 256), My tens, Petitot (see p. 112), Honthorst, Abraham Diepenbeck, Sir Balthazar Gerbier, Abraham Van-? derdort, keeper of the king’s collections, and many others— the list, it will be perceived, comprising some of the greatest painters of the age. Till the painting of the Whitehall ceiling, it is a significant fact that nothing but portrait painting had found any encouragement in this country since the time of Edward III. \ and after the death of Charles I., there long continued to be scarcely any demand for other branches of art. Sir Peter Lely succeeded Vandyke, and imitated his style, though with far more affectation and much less ability, Lely painted first in the reign of Charles I. ; then veering With the times, he took the portrait of Cromwell ; and lastly became the favourite painter of the frail beauties of the dissolute court of Charles II. Other foreign artists employed at this period were Antonio Verrio, Gerard Zoust, and the two Van der Veldes, the excellent marine painters. The only native artist of very great merit was Samuel Cooper the miniature painter (see p. II2). Following in every sense in the wake of Lely, as Lely did of Vandyke, came Sir Godfrey Kneller, in the times of William IH. and George I. John Eiley was the most distinguished English contemporary of Kneller. From the long-continued neglect of using any means for fostering native talent, art in England had sunk about this period to apparently the lowest point to which it can descend in a civilised nation, A better era, however, dawned with n3 274 PAINTING FOPULAKLY EXPLAINED. the Georges, although certain stories are told betraying the utter want of taste of especially the first George. At all events the immigration of foreigners was checked by finding that the market was forestalled by Englishmen with whom they could not compete. Almost the last foreign artists we have to mention, or worth mentioning, as visitors, are Denner, Canaletto, Zincke (the enamel painter), Laguerre, Vanloo, Michael Dahl, Giacomo Amigoni, and Bernard Lens, the miniature painter. The following British artists flourished in this age of bigwigs : Charles Jervas, Thomas Flatman, William Aikman, Sir James Thornhill, Joseph Highmore, Thomas Hudson (the master of Reynolds), and Jonathan Richardson.* The first grand monumental work of painting entrusted to a native artist was the decoration of the interior of the dome of St. Paul’s by Sir James Thornhill. But for the patriotic interference of the Earl of Halifax, this com- mission would have been given to Sebastian Ricci. The Italian would, in all probability, have produced a finer series of paintings; but the Englishman succeeded as well as might have been expected, and it was necessary to make a bold effort of this kind in order to remove prejudice and turn the current of patronage into its natural channel. No immediate effect, it is true, succeeded, simply because the effort was not consistently followed up. The best of Thornhill’s decorative works are the well-known paintings in Greenwich Hospital. William Hogarth (b. 1697, d. 1764), the son-in-law of Sir James Thornhill, t is the first great name in the history • Jonathan Eichardson was one of the best critics and writers on art whom we have had in the English language. The perusal of his Theory of Painting awakened the ambition of Keynolds when a boy to become a painter. f The union of the daughter of Sir James Thornhill with Hogarth (then in his thirty-second or thirty-third year) was without the consent of her parents : and Sir James, the rich, prosperous, and highlj -honoured artist, was, very excusably, not easily reconciled to the match, considering the youth of his daughter, then barely eighteen, and the slender finances of her husband, who was as yet ‘ all unknown to fame.’ The marriage seems, however, to have been a great stimulus to Hogarth’s genius, for immediately after it he began his celebrated series of the ‘ Harlot’s Progress,’ Mrs. Hogarth now contrived, at her mother Lady Thornhill’s suggestion, to have some of THE BKITISH SCHOOL, 275 of British art. Unlike his great contemporary, Sir Joshua Reynolds, he had, however, little direct influence upon the artists of his time ; to Sir Joshua, therefore, has long been assigned the honour of being the head of the British school. Yet we are very much disposed to think that posterity will recognise in that indomitable genius, William Hogarth, the real founder of our school ; insomuch as he is the great and as yet in some respects unequalled exemplar of its most pre- vailing characteristics. For, while the influence of the style of Reynolds’s painting, and the high-art doctrines pro- pounded in his Disnou7'seSj have already comparatively died out, an entirely new and essentially national description of genre was originated by Hogarth, and may fairly be considered to have been derived from him through Wilkie, Leslie, Mul- ready, and many more, by the host of living painters of Hogarth’s pictures introduced into Sir James’s dining-room as a surprise. This being accordingly done, when Sir James learnt they were the productions of his son-in-law, he merely said, ‘ the man who can produce such representations as these can maintain a wife with- out a portion.’ He soon afterwards, however, became both reconciled and generous to the runaway couple. The young lady Hogarth had married, though bred in comfort and affluence, made the poor painter a truly excellent wife. In the International Exhibition (1862) there was one portrait, and in the Manchester Exhibition of Art Treasures (1857) there were three portraits by Hogarth of this estimable woman. The first of these last represented her young and pretty, as she may have been soon after the marriage ; the second, in matronly middle- life — both indicated a sensible, kindly, amiable nature ; in the third (with the features somewhat idealized), she appeared as ‘ Sigismunda’ holding the urn with her husband’s heart. This last portrait illus- trates a curious passage in the artist’s history. A ‘ Sigismunda,’ be- lieved to be by Correggio, but now attributed to Furini (a far in- ferior painter), had been sold at Sir Luke Schaub’s sale for 4007. This price, fetched by a poor specimen of an ‘ old master,’ so excited Hogarth’s indignation (who was wretchedly paid for his best works, and had just received only 160/. for his series of six pictures of ‘ Marriage a la Mode,’ now in the National Gallery), that he is said to have resolved to paint in competition this picture for Avhich his wife served as model. Be this as it may, Hogarth — who after all did not over-estimate his high-art qualifications so much as Walpole and Reynolds have given the cue for supposing — would not sell his picture for a smaller sum than the 400/., and charged his wife not to part with it for less than 500/. after his death — an injunction which - she obeyed during twenty years of widowhood, the declining circum- stances of the latter part of which were relieved by a small pension from the Royal Academy. 276 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. domestic incident. The very extraordinary originality and the wonderful satirical and humorous invention displayed in the works of Hogarth, and the acknowledged value of his pictures as records of life, manners, and costume, have led many to depreciate his very high technical merits as a painter. Against this unjust estimate he has, however, been ably vindicated by the kindred spirit, Mr. Leslie, and by a concurrence of recent critical opinion. Hogarth was bred an engraver of crests and ciphers on silver salvers, sauceboats, and spoons but he preferred to gain a scantier subsistence by engraving prints for book- sellers, and he often sold his plates for little more than the value of the copper. As a portrait painter, however, he was more successful. His own portrait in the National Gallery, that of Captain Coram in the Foundling Hospital, and Garrick as ^ Richard III.’ in Lord Feversham’s collec- tion, prove his ability in this department. But his fame will rest as long as good painting is appreciated, wholesome satire relished, unequalled originality esteemed, or reverence entertained for one, at least, of the great founders of the British school, and one of the most courageous champions of ‘ modernism ’ on the great series of ‘ Marriage a la Mode ’ (in the National Gallery), the ^ Rake’s Progress,’ the ‘ Harlot’s Progress,’ and the four ‘ Election ’ pictures in the Soane Museum. Owing, perhaps, to his defective education under Hudson, Sir Jo"hua Reynolds (1723-1792) never distinguished him- self in his drawing of the human figure ; but after his three years’ residence in Italy, he displayed on his return to Eng- land qualities of colour and effect and a technical originality then unknown in this country ; — where, with the single exception of Hogarth, mannerism universally prevailed, and where Kneller in painting was placed on a level with Shakspeare in poetry. These qualities, as beautiful as they were new, but still more his brilliant success as a portrait painter, and his subsequent elevation as first President of the Royal Academy, founded under the auspices of George III. — an elevation which the painter justified equally by his pencil, his admirably written Discourses, and the general THE BKITISH SCHOOL. 277 urbanity with which he upheld the ‘ dignity of the dying art’ — obtained for Reynolds so much consideration with Burke, Johnson, Goldsmith, and many other of his chief contemporaries, and secured him so many followers, that to him, as already remarked, has been assigned the honour of being head of the British school. It is not all the works of Sir Joshua which justify the encomiums of his biographer Northcote. Though Titian and Rembrandt were his models in colour and chiaroscuro, he very rarely united so much richness with breadth as did the great Venetian, and he did not equal the force and effect of the Dutch master. His most successful (at least his best preserved) effort in colour is the portrait of ‘ Nelly O’Brien,’ in Lord Hertford’s collection ; other masterpieces are the magnificent portrait of ^ Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse,’ in the Grosvenor collection, an inferior replica of which is in the Dulwich Gallery, and the portraits of Lords Heathfield and Rodney, the former in the National Gallery, the latter in St. James’s Palace. The taste and fancy of Reynolds are seen to especial advantage in his portraits of women, and of the childi’en whom the old bachelor loved so well — and painted as they have never been painted j as, for example, in the large por- trait composition in the National Gallery, representing three sisters decorating a terminal figure of Hymen ; in the ^ Straw- berry Girl,’ ‘ Puck,’ ‘ Miss Boothby,’ and other portraits of children, familiar from having been in the International Exhibition of 1862. For the beautiful glazes, and the rich and creamy imp asto he so much coveted, Reynolds paid dearly. Half his life was spent in experiments j and Northcote tells us that he deliberately scraped away and destroyed Venetian pictures of value in order to discover their technical secrets. He endeavoured to unite the best methods of the Flemish and Venetian masters ; but his practice usually inclines, like that of the English school generally, to the traditions of the former. The decay of so many of his works is attributed to his introduction of wax and other incongruous ingredients and mixtures ; to the use of lakes, (yellow) orpiment, and other fugitive colours j and to the varnishing of glazes of asphaltum which were not dry — cracking being the inevitable 278 PAINTINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. consequence. This last practice is^ unfortunately, apparent in its results in most of Wilkie’s pictures. The use of wax to gain substance and texture was a novelty which has found very few imitators. It is probable, however, that the vehicle of Keynolds had little to do with the rapid deteri- oration of many of his works. At all events, it will not explain the destruction of so many modern pictures j for, as Mr. Redgrave remarks, in his Notes on the Sheepshanks Collection, ^ there are numerous pictures in a perfectly sound state, though known to have been painted with totally ditferent media. In our own time we believe Mulready paints with copal, Landseer with a mastic maguilp, Leslie with the same [using freely, it would appear, essential oil diluents] ; and other media are employed by artists whose works show no incipient flaw or defect.’ In one of his Discourses Reynolds eulogizes Gainsborough (1727-1788) as a landscape painter j but seems hardly ever to have fully recognized his very high and rare merit as a portrait painter. Now, however, public opinion has placed the famous ‘ Blue Boy,’ the ^ Mrs. Graham,’ ^ Lady Ligonier,’ ^ Mrs. Siddons,’ and other well known portraits by Gainsborough, on a level with anything produced by the President himself. In pictures of rustic children, and in landscape, Gainsborough has also left some works of almost incomparable sweetness and beauty. Romney superseded Reynolds as a portrait painter for a short period, even in his lifetime ; but Romney’s very great excellence in this branch of art seems to us not to have received due recognition since his death. Benjamin West, as an historical painter, is already com- paratively forgotten ; and if he deserves to be remembered it is chiefly for the courage he displayed in the picture of the ‘Death of General Wolfe,’ in breaking away, even against the advice of Sir Joshua Reynolds, from the absurd practice then prevalent of representing the actors in modern events in ancient costumes. Barry’s efiTorts in high art, in the Adelphi, we have already mentioned (see p. 180). His writings on art, together with those of Fuseli — another wayward genius -are, notwithstanding occasional extra- THE BRITISH SCHOOL. 279 vagance, valuable. Other deceased historical painters were Opie, an almost self-taught Cornish artist ; Northcote, the pupil and biographer of Reynolds j Copley (father of the late Lord Lyndhurst), the painter of the admirable ^ Death of Major Pierson, at Jersey, 1780 j’ Harlowe ; Westall j Briggs j Hilton, the painter of large religious works j Haydon, an artist of great but very irregular powers ; and Etty, a splendid colourist, and our first histori- cal painter in the ^ high classical ’ sense. To these may be added the name of the promising young painter, Cross, who died a few years since. Martin, the inventor of the ^ material sublime ; ’ E. Danby, who painted similar subjects j Fuseli ; and poor Blake — a painter of rare genius, but genius ‘ to madness near allied ' — may be placed in a group apart. Besides the foundation of the Royal Academy, other im- portant encouragement of the higher branches of art was afforded about the end of the last century, by the formation of the Society of Dilettanti, by the private enterprise of Boydell in the Shakspeare Gallery, and by the establish- ment of the British Institution. Sir Thomas Lawrence took the place of Reynolds in por- traiture, and, though a painter of far less genuine ability, was equally successful. Compared to Reynolds, the taste of Lawrence, especially in expression, is decidedly meretrin cious, and in colour he is poor and cold. Nevertheless, thei portrait of ^ the beautiful ’ Duchess of Devonshire, and some others, have a certain grace which lifts them much above the mere fiimsy prettiness of many of his followers. Hopp-** ner, Owen, Raeburn, and Jackson were also distinguished portrait painters. Raeburn has been called the Scottish Velasquez, and he founded the manly Scotch school of portraiture, at the head of which now stands Sir Watsom Gordon. In genrey Bird, Smirke, Stothard (chieffy known, however, as a designer), Collins, and Newton deserve respectful mention j but their contemporary Wilkie is, of course, pre-eminent. Wilkie’s ^ Blind Fiddler’ and the Willage Festival,’ in the National Gallery — the / Village Politicians,’ the ^ Rent Day,’ and ^ Blindman’s Buff’ — will bear compa- ^80 PAINTINa POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. rison with any productions of the Dutch school. The genial and charming Leslie, and the recently deceased patriarch of English art, Mulready, some few of whose works are unsur- passed in exquisite perfection of execution, bring the list of deceased English genre painters down to the present day. In landscape the English school, taking into consideration merely the works of deceased masters, is unquestionably the first in Europe j supported as it is by such names as Wilson, Gainsborough, Old Crome, Constable, Calcott, P. Nasmyth, Morland, Muller, Bonington, and, greatest of all. Turner. The works of Turner are now, however, so universally appreciated, and they have been criticised so exhaustively by Mr. Ruskin, that any attempt on our part to give an estimate of them would be supererogatory. The very sudden rise of the British school — the almost simultaneous appearance of such men as Hogarth, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Barry, Wilson, and Romney — was not the least extraordinary of the great events which marked our national history in the latter half of the last century. And little less remarkable is the rapidity of the increase both of the supply and demand of works of art within comparatively the last few years. The paintings executed in the course of the century during which the British school has been esta- blished, have exhibited almost every kind of excellence ; and the selection gathered with the other Art Treasures at Man- chester in 1857, and again in the International Exhibition of 1862, would, we believe, lose little, if at all, by com- parison with a similar collection of the productions of any Continental school during the same period. At the present time we see, on all hands, a happy promise of artistic activity— in public appreciation— in Government Schools of Design taking root all over the land — in the questions created by the introduction of photography — in the opposite principles involved in the practice of artists — and last, and perhaps not least, in the differences of critics and con- noisseurs. 281 laintitwf in Maiti: Cnlonrs. « T has been seen that tne use of, more particularly, earths and minerals of different colours, diluted with water alone, or water with which some ingredients not olea- ginous has been combined, and applied for pictorial and ornamental purposes, is of the highest antiquity, and that painting with oils, or oleo-resinous vehicles, is a compara- tively modern invention. The modes of water painting to which we allude are, of course, tempera, encaustic, and fresco. Water colours have also been extensively used even in the execution of oil pictures, of which practice our own Turner affords a notable instance. But many, especially of the Flemish and Dutch oil painters, from the earliest period arrived at considerable technical excellence in the separate practice of water-colour painting. Adrian Ostade, and that universal genius Albert Durer, have left us several examples in the shape of detached studies 5 and portfolios of Rem- brandt’s drawings are preserved in the British Museum. These, and even the distemper cartoons of Raphael and Mantegna are, however, little more than simple washes of water colour : the more recent processes by which effects are obtained nearly equalling the depth and power of oil painting, and which seem to promise to render water-colour painting the rival of oil in its age, as it was in its infancy, were then unknown. THE PAPER.’ Water-colour painting surpasses oil in the purity and clearness of its tones, which arise from the transparency of its medium j it therefore excels in expressing the freshness, vivacity, and brilliancy of nature. But its most distinctive 282 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. merit is seen in the realisation of aerial effects and varied depths of distance. These peculiar excellences — the re- freshing brightness and pervading sense of atmosphere — which can be obtained by a tyro in water colours almost as successfully as a Pynaker or a Claude could secure the same effects on canvas, result chiefly from the textural and absorbent properties of the paper employed to receive the colours. The surface of paper is granulous ; that is to say, it pre- sents so many little hollows and projections, which, while receiving general flat washes of colour, still maintain an alternation of light on the latter and half-light in the former. The minute cavities of the paper permit the eye, as it were, to penetrate the flat surface and follow the vanishing colour ; and thus the eye receives illusive im- pressions of intervening air and distance ; while the little prominences of the grain, receiving less colour (if a wash), and therefore retaining their reflective lustre, afford the truthful and beautiful luminousness which water colour shares in common with fresco. The facility of obtaining effects of aerial perspective has, however, tempted artists to render them too prominent in this medium by forcing them also in the colour. We And, for instance, the most distant objects, through various gra- dations of cold colour, too often represented with the bright- est blue, and looking like so many holes in the picture. A tendency to rawness and crudeness, and the want of the mellowness of tone of oil, are indeed the commonest faults of painting in water colours. Paper is used from the greatest extremes of roughness to hot-pressed smoothness ; the latter seldom, however, not having the recommendation of texture. The paper is also sometimes tinted, as in many of Turner’s water-colour paintings. There is, in fact, paper of scarcely any surface or texture which this great artist did not employ. Nothing came amiss to him : and some of his drawings are executed upon pieces of crumpled brown paper which had probably enfolded a parcel. Card, or Bristol board, like hot-pressed paper, is seldom used, on account of its smooth- WATER colours: THE PAPER. 283 ness ; but Cattermole has boldly covered with bis opaque sketches some of the very coarsest millboard.* Altei'ationSj Corrections^ ^c. There are other secondary advantages resulting from the grain of the paper. Rough surfaces, such as walls, gravel and sand, are imitated very felicitously by merely scraping the projecting granula- tions of the paper with a knife, rubbing them with sand- paper, or passing over them a wet cloth or sponge ; by which operations different degrees of roughness are given with the removal of more or less colour from the projections, or by the driving it into their interstices. The hardness of the paper used will admit of these operations, and also of repeated dampings and complete immersions, without be- coming what is called ^woolly.’ So that, if to these be added the greatest facility in erasing or effacing — even the power of cutting out a spoiled portion and inserting clean paper in its place ; the use at will of transparent or body colours, either mixed or separately, or the one upon the other ] together with all the styles of execution common to oil, such as hatching, stippling, scum- bling, glazing, or spreading an opaque tint — it will be suffi- ciently evident, contrary to what is generally supposed to be the case, that the painter in water colours can make altera- tions and modifications in his work with as much success as the painter in oil. Sketches. The artist in the progress of his work is gene- rally beset with unforeseen difficulties: for a thousand purely • The paper most generally used is of what is called ‘ Imperial ’ size (30 in. by 21 in.), underwliich name the best and greatest varieties of texture and thickness can be obtained. For large drawings, car- toons, and engineering plans, colossal cartridge paper, as it is termed (manufactured by Fourdrinier’s ingenious process), maybe purchased 4 ft. 6 in. wide, and more than long enough to reach doubled from the top to the bottom of the Monument. Graduated tinted papers are also sold of vai-ious groundwork preparatory hues, for daylight, moonlight, and other effects, and from which the ‘ lights ’ of the paint- ing are scraped out. Papers of Whatman’s manufacture are esteemed for possessing sufficient hardness to resist moderate friction. That the paper should be properly sized is of great importance. If sized too strongly, colour will not float or work well upon it, but will look hard and streaky. If sized too little, the colour will be absorbed into the fabric, and appear poor and dead. 284 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. accidental circumstances occur in tlie course of the material realization of his idea. The colour, for example, dries irregu- larly, or collects in unsightly blots •, or his brush is too play- ful, thoughtless, and disobedient, or too stiff, formal, and mathematically exact; his eye wanders, or sees either too much or too little, and his hand quivers with nervousness, or is cramped with rheumatism. These accidents the young artist, intent upon the exact imitation bit by bit of what he sees, believes to be unmitigated evils. Gradually, however, he becomes more certain of his ability of surmounting the obstacles thus presented, and with experience he can more readily anticipate the ultimate effect of the union of the various parts ; his attention is therefore more at liberty to examine the nature of these unforeseen effects — when, to his great astonishment and delight, he finds the accidental blots and blurs may be easily ‘worked in,’ and often suggest beautiful little passages, which excite his imagination, and enable him with a little tact to snatch ‘ a grace beyond the reach of art,’ at least of commonplace mechanical art. He will find, for a single instance, that if he wants a firm out- line, he can obtain it by applying the colour in a very liquid state and waiting for the dark edge which it forms in drying ; and he knows at the same time that colour thus laid suddenly, and confidently left to dry, preserves a much greater beauty and purity of tint than if dragged about and ^disturbed. But nothing is found to contribute to variety of accidental effect more than the inequalities of the surface chosen for rpainting. The taking advantage of such effects permits the more rapid completion of a sketchy generalised resemblance of an object. This is the reason, also, why very rough paper is always chosen for sketches in water colours. But the rough paper has another recommendation for this purpose ; which is, that the inevitable imperfections of a sketch are hidden, and an appearance of general harmony and finish given by the recurrence at regular intervals of the granula- tions of the very coarsest paper. Besides this, water colours are much better for sketches than oil, for another reason — namely, because sketches in oil, though kept in portfolios^ WATER colours: THE PAPER. 285 undergo great discolouration in a sliort time, owing to the quantity of oil necessarily used to enable the artist to paint with sufficient freedom and rapidity; while water-colour sketches so protected will remain unchanged for an indefinite period. Hanging. There are yet other considerations connected with the effects resulting from the texture of the paper which remain to be mentioned. The artist works, as already stated, with the light above and on one side — generally the left, in order to avoid the shadow from the brush falling in front of him on his work. Consequently, he looks at the paper in a lateral light, which brings out all the inequalities of its surface very forcibly. To illustrate the effect of this in the completed work, we will suppose the artist to make a sketch and a small highly-finished portrait of the same person ; the former executed in fiat washes, and the latter receiving a great quantity of minute stippling in the flesh — each touch possibly no larger than each little protuberance of the paper’s grain. When both are ready for inspection, the artist’s subject arrives, and looking at them on the easel, thinks one (the sketch), a mere daub, and the other equal to a highly-finished miniature. He then takes both in his hands, and turns to the artist, with the intention possibly of com- plimenting him, when lo ! the highly-finished portrait of himself looks, to his unpleasant surprise, nearly as coarse as the sketch : he turns back to replace them, when, as if by magic, the minute finishing he has so much admired is all again restored — the sketch remaining the same throughout. A similar effect occurs when persons make fresh arrange- ments in a room, and find a pet little drawing of this kind in its new pla^e loses half its charm without any assignable reason. Now these effects are all attributable to the grain of the paper. The highly- wrought picture is finished by the artist with the point of the brush, and every little summit of the granulation, from its prominence, the more readily catches and retains the comparatively dry colour employed in the stippling process; and not only this, but the painter in- voluntarily works on the projections. For, let the paper be 286 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINER. magnified, and it will be found that each of these little hills,, so to speak, receives the slanting ray on the acclivity next the source of light, and throws its shadow into the adjoining valley, so that the surface is a chequer-work of light and shade j and as every point of light attracts the eye, the artist insensibly and involuntarily, in finishing with the point of the brush, touches these slopes of light till they disappear and become blended with and as dark as the shadows they cast. But the necessary consequence, when the picture is reversed, and the light falls from the opposite side, is that not only the original coarseness of the paper is restored, but it is greatly aggravated by every slope upon which the colour basked in light, being now in turn enveloped in shadow, with, in addition, this shadow deepened by unilluminated paint. A sketch, on the contrary, upon which the colour is broadly fioated, it will be readily understood, is not liable to much variation. Of course finish, with no other object than that of obtain- ing mere smoothness, is very contemptible; but our motive in attempting to give the rationale of some water-colour paint- ings looking so different in different lights, is to draw the attention of the possessors of such works to the importance of hanging them as nearly as possible in the same position in reference to the light as that in which they were painted. Artists, knowing the importance of this, often inscribe in the corner of the work the professional directions— ^'owr a droite, or jour d gauche, according as the light should be on the right or left. But when these are absent, the right position may be easily discovered in almost every case by ob- serving from which side the light is gradated. It is also very desirable to observe this gradation of the light as a guide for the hanging of oil pictures.* A landscape, for * Mr. Ruskin, however, in the Appendix to his eloquent Notes on the Turner Gallery, says : ‘Even interiors, in which lateral light is represented as entering a room, and none as falling from the ceiling, are yet best seen by light from above ; for a lateral light, contrary to the supposed direction of that in the picture, will greatly neutral- ize its effect, and a lateral light in the same direction will exaggerate it. To the last observation we must certainly venture to dissent ; for an WATER COLOURS: THE PAPER. 287 instance, may ^Jiave the sky very tenderly gradated from left to right (having been painted with the light on the left) ; but if this picture is hung with the light from the opposite side, the gradation of tone will be partly neutralized. And, further, the effect of the surface and texture of the oil paint demands attention to the rule. For it will he observed, that where the artist has ^ loaded ’ his colour in order to give brilliant ^ catching ’ lights, when the illuminating rays impinge at a different angle, much of the spirit and feeling with which these have been touched will he lost ; and, even if the sur- face has been clogged with varnish, either a shadow is‘ pi'ojected instead, o” the light altered in position, and the whole work rendered more coarse and rough. ' Such contingencies as these — so prejudicial to the artist — i together with the still more injurious one, in a general ex- hibition, of the j uxtaposition of unforeseen colour in neigh- bouring works (which the most careful collocation of pictures cannot prevent) — these and such like agencies have so powerful, though unsuspected, an effect upon the eye, and consequent misleading influence upon the judgment, that they should be frequently pointed out to the public, for few but artists themselves are sufficiently sensible of their existence. Even miniatures, which, from the perfect smoothness of the ivory on which they are painted, might be supposed to be free from the variable effects at least of grain and texture, are yet found by miniature painters to be not beyond their influence. For, though the texture is so dense and the sur- face so perfectly smooth, yet in the substance of the ivory itself, especially those parts of the sheet not sawn out of the very heart of the tusk, there is a kind of wavy striated appearance resulting from the alternation of layers or threads (somewhat resembling the grain of wood), of more or less transparency. And as in miniatures the soft tone of the ivory is seen through the more thinly painted passages — as in the artist would naturally, and in the case of water-colour paintings almost (as we have seen) necessarily, paint in a light coming from the same direction as that in the representation, and could not, if he would, paint for the picture to look better in any other light. 288 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. face — one becomes, upon close examination, just sensible ci \ an effect analogous to that of paper, though in a less degree. • F(Dr a few additional remarks on the subject of ‘Hanging,’ ■ see Appendix, note B. PIGMENTS, BRUSHES, ETC. The Pigments. The same great distinction obtains in water colours as in oil between the transparent and the opaque colours ; and the former may be converted into the latter by the addition of white. Colours thus rendered opaque, together with those pigments in their own nature opaque, are (as already observed), from their greater so- lidity and substance, termed body colours. The permanent earthy and mineral colours were chiefly used in ancient works ; and these, together with a few transparent colours, such as sepia, indigo, and Indian ink, satisfled the early water-colour artists of this country. As the art advanced, richer as well as more delicate, though less permanent, colours were quickly added 5 and as the demand increased, various improvements were made in the preparation of water- colour pigments by the artists’ colourmen. Chemistry has supplied many entirely new colours, several of which are as fugitive as they are beautiful. It is, indeed, somewhat strange that in the wonderfully rapid advance of this science it has not discovered any means of rendering permanent such colours as the beautiful transparent vegetable yellows, the splendid red, carmine, and other tints obtained from the cochineal insect — colours which are almost indispensable in flower painting. The necessity for the use of the colours from cochineal no ! longer exists, however, in such force since the introduction ' of the improved methods of preparing pigments from the colouring matter of the root of the madder plant. The colours extracted, called rubric or madder lakes, though not very i vivid in abstract power of hue, vary in tint from the most delicate rose to the deepest purple ; and being more trans- parent and far more permanent than the old lakes, and ( working well both in water and oil, they are exceedingly } \ I •( WATER COLOURS : PIGMENTS, BRUSHES, ETC. 289 valuable to tbe painter. These pigments, now so extensively used in dyeing and the industrial arts, we owe to the inves- tigations of science. The artist is likewise indebted to the chemist for another pigment, pre-eminently serviceable as a water colour. We allude to the white* prepared from zinc, called ‘ Chinese white.’ This, though a metallic white, appears to be quite permanent, unlike all the whites pre- pared from lead, which when used with water are changeable even to blackness, sully other tints with which they may be brought in contact, and are far from innoxious to the person using them. This pigment, so eligible in other respects, has hitherto not been prepared with sufficient ‘ body ’ for use in oil. It has, however, been stated recently that a Mr. G. Lewis of Philadelphia has succeeded in giving the requisite opacity to this white oxide of zinc, by subjecting it to powerful pressure while grinding in oil. ' Now, the use of white constituting, as we have seen, the great distinction in practice termed ^ body-colour ’ painting, ^ and nearly all that is characteristic in the water-colour art of our own time, in so far especially as it is imitative of oil painting, being attributable to the abundant use of white, it is evident that an eligible white pigment is extremely desirable. The leaden blackness which we often find in the place of the highest lights in old water-colour paintings proves that the whites then used cannot be relied upon. And although the terrene and barytic whites have enough body to allow of being applied in thickness and quantity sufficient to imitate the embossed effects of oil painting, yet the terrene whites, from their alkaline nature, are injurious to many colours in water, and barytic white does not work pleasantly — does not, from its clogging, pasty nature, deposit itself on the paper freely, following the lithesome play of the * As may have been observed, we have for greater convenience occasionally nsed the terms colour and pigment as convertible. However, ‘ the term colour is equivocal when attributed to the neutrals white, black, and grey ; yet the artist is bound to regard them as colours, and in philosophic strictness they are such latently, compounded and compensated, for a thing cannot but be that of which it is composed, and the neutrals are composed of and compre- hend all colours.’ — Field. 0 290 PAINTING POPULAELY EXPLAINED. brush ; and therefore does not admit of competition -with the fascinating freedom of handling we admire so much in the oil pictures of, for example, Teniers and Wilkie. Barytic white — called ^ constant white ’ by the colourmen — dries, moreover, many degrees lighter than when wet, so that the artist cannot easily calculate upon the ultimate pitch of his tones. Its extreme brilliancy, however, when used alone, sometimes recommends its use for the very highest lights. But Chinese white is undoubtedly the nearest approach to the desiderated white water colour — that colour which should be generally serviceable ; which, while permanent itself, should not attack other colours when united with them ; which should maintain the same tone when wet as it had when dry ; which might be applied in opaque washings, and would cover and conceal a ground darker than itself ; which should have so much strength and body as to afford, if required, actual relief to each touch, and yet be susceptible of extreme tenuity — a colour, in fine, which, like gold itself, should he precious from its own intrinsic beauty, and yet capable of receiving at the hands of the artist the greatest possible amount of extrinsic value, whether wrought and fashioned in dense masses, or scattered in airy waifs, or spread out in floating films. Pigments, when employed with water, differ very much more than when united with oil in their several working qualities. Unfortunately the most permanent are the most unmanageable. The beautiful transparent but fugitive vegetable colours may be laid in even washes with the utmost facility ; but the opaque earths and minerals, having greater specific gravity, will not float so readily; their particles remain where left by the brush, and yet are too coarse to penetrate the pores, so to speak, of the paper. The general rule, that a much purer compound hue may be produced by passing one tint of different chemical character over another than by applying them mixed together, holds good with more force in water-colour painting than in oil. In such operations, however, as the earthy and mineral colours will not bear friction, they must be applied last.* * The pigments are prepared for use in three forms : viz., as dry WATER COLOURS : PIGMENTS, BRUSHES, ETC, 291 Brushes. The smaller kinds of brushes are still sometimes termed ^ pencils;’ but the use of the word ^pencil’ instead of ‘ brush,’ as distinctive of and peculiar to water-colour painting, has become almost obsolete ; and with reason, for to cover rapidly w’th floating colour the large surfaces of modern works in water colour, requires brushes almost as large as those needed for painting ordinary pictures in oil ; although, to avoid abrading the more delicate texture of paper, the brushes must not be made (at least for all ordinary practice) of anything so coarse as hog’s bristles. The word ^pencil’ still, however, retains its place in a semi-metaphorical “^iense, as generally allusive to the artist’s work, whether he be painter or draughtsman, and in a still cake colours, as moist colours in earthenware pans, and in the com- partments of tin boxes, and in a still softer state enclosed in metal collapsible tubes. The first is the earliest of the modern modes of pre- paration ; but cake colours wer-e long subject to many objections, such as drying and crumbling with age or in warm climates : with more careful grinding, however, and other improvements in their manufacture, they are now less liable to crack ; and from being hard and gritty, they have become comparatively smooth and yield a firmer body of tint. A numerous class of artists consider them to have advantages over the moist colours, as regards purity of tone and perfection of wash, and to be therefore especially suitable for miniature and flower painting-. When the colours are required for use, the suppl}’^ is obtained by dipping the cakes in water and rubbing them on china palettes, or, when a larger quantity is wanted, in the troughs of china tiles, in plates or saucers. The moist colours are now very extensively employed for ordinary water-colour painting. For sketching from nature, from the readiness and facility with which an inexhaustible supply of powerful colour may be obtained, they supersede all others. They are especially convenient and advantageous for the learner. The colour is obtained by gentle friction with the point of the brush charged with water directly on the pigment itself. The colom’s prepared in tubes are still more moist, and necessarily so for moderate compression to be sutficient to eject them from their collapsible receptacles. These metal tubes are precisely of the same description as those which contain oil colours, and the water pigments in them are of, as nearly as may be, the same consistence as those in oil. Water colours so prepared are only needed for large works, and when a very considerable bod\^ aud breadth of colour is required to be laid on in a short time. When used, the top of the tube is unscrewed, and the pigment pressed out till it forms a little hillock, as large as needed, on the nalette : the whole is, in fact, simply borrowed from the practice of oil painting. o 2 292 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. more figurative manner it is applied to anything delicately marked, as ^ pencilled eyebrows.’ Brown sable is the hair generally used, being pliant, yet firm; but brushes made of red sable, and also of the squirrel — or ^ camel hair,’ as it is called — are useful for some purposes. Brushes of brown sable are generally made by the insertion of the hair into quills ; hence the size of the brush is recognized by the various names of the birds which supply the quills employed — as eagle, swan (of various sizes), goose, duck, and crow. The eagle brush is very large and expensive, and seldom used. The duck and crow sables are employed for delicate markings, as in branches, foliage, and architectural details. Flat brushes, in German-silver ferules, are likewise employed ; round brushes are also similarly enclosed, and they have the recommendation of not splitting like the quills. LEGITIMACY OF PRACTICE. Few subjects in art have been more contested than that of legitimacy of practice in water-colour painting. We have already seen the distinction of ‘ body ’ colour, and for and against its use the contention has been principally raised. To show the diversity of opinion maintained, we may quote from two or three writers on the subject in question. Mr. Frank Howard, Colour as a Means of Art^ says to this effect : ^ It is to be regretted that, in some few, and those popular instances, the advantage of transparency arising from the legitimate use of water colours should have been thrown away without obtaining any equivalent other than that of hiding or correcting blunders, and that attempts should have been made, by the use of opaque body colours and a similar method of working, to imitate the effect of oil painting. It is true, that opaque water colours are supposed to have an advantage over oil colours in light and brilliant parts, and particularly in distances, in consequence of the tendency of the oil to come to the surface. On this account they are said to be used by Turner in distant parts, when he desires to attain great clearness and purity of WATEK colours: LEGITIMACY OF PRACTICE. 293 colour. But used for water-colours, the only advantage of water colours is abandoned without obtaining the equiva- lent of richness arising from texture in oil, and the purity of the one art is lost without obtaining the force of the other.’ A somewhat similar view is taken by Mr. Burnet in the following remarks, from his Praotical Essays on the Fine Arts : ‘ The freshness, the luminous property in fresco painting, is a charm which no water-colour drawing ought to be deprived of, and which no oil picture can contend with. The strongholds of oil painting lie in the deep-toned darks, and those juicy shadows where lighter half- tints are seen floating half-way down. The characteristic .beauties of water colour are in the pearly lights, and in those flat washes unattainable in oil colour without giving an inferior look to the whole work The power, then, of re- taining and giving back lightis the peculiar property of water colour, or rather of the paper, which ought therefore, to be preserved at any sacrifice, as the artist has not the rich, pulpy, and unctuous glazings to give in compensation for its absence.’ Then Mr. Burnet adds : ^ And though the genius of Girtin and Turner did wonders in removing water-colour drawings from mere topographical achievements, it is only now that the capabilities of water-colour paintings are beginning to be perceived and spread over England. The drawings of Lewis, Cattermole, Harding, and [W.] Hunt, show what can be done in effect, texture, and colour j and we shall regret if the introduction of so perishable a material as body colour, or a meretricious perversion of talent, for the sake of attracting applause, destroys all remains of simplicity and truth.’ * Mr. Buskin, on the contrary, says, in his Elements of Drawing, that he is inclined to think there should be no touch without white, and in several passages in his works * There appears to be an inconsistency, or a non sequitur, here, seeing that at the date when these Essays were published (1848), three out of the four artists last named employed almost exclusively body colours. Mr. Burnet probably intended to allude to the earliest practice of those artists, when we believe they all worked in washed tints, and used opaque colours sparingly. 294 PAINTING POPPLAELT EXPLAINED. speaks higlily in praise of body colour. The earliest artists themselves, long after they had emerged from their sepia iat washes, generally, however, considered the use of opique colour illegitimate. Turner was one of the first to break through this, as all other material restraints. ^To this master, in fact, is owing,’ it is observed by (the late) Mr. Holmes, ^all the great improvements which have taken place of late years in water-colour drawing; for, in the course of his career, he introduced the use of warm tones into the shadows in the picture, and gradually discarding the use of the vegetable colours, he attained even a higher degree of brilliancy in his work, by reintroducing the use of those which are formed from mineral bases, and which we have seen in the instances of the pictorial representations on the most ancient monuments, still, after many ages, preserve their brilliancy unimpaired. Turner’s works, however, are strictly examples of water-colour drawing ; but since his time a style has arisen which appears to set aside the careful execution by which he and his contemporaries gained their effects, and to charge the drawing with heavy and unneces- sary masses of material.’ Contemporary artists, we may add, sometimes boldly sacrifice, as well as often virtually increase, the texture of the paper by scraping and other manipulations. In this, however, they resemble Turner : Mr. Euskin thinks it even probable that in some of Turner’s elaborately completed drawings, textures were prepared by various mechanical means over the general surface of the paper before the drawing of detail was begun. From the foregoing we find that writers, having ap- parently elaims to speak authoritatively, yet differ so much as to compel us to think for ourselves. The question, then, appears to us simple enough. It is presumed that there can be no disputing the fact that a water-colour drawing is executed upon paper for some ad- vantage exclusively possessed by the paper — else why not paint on some other material ? Now, the peculiar and dis- tinctive quality of the paper is, no doubt, the luminousness of its granulous texture. It should then be asked. What particular effects in nature will this distinctive quality afford WATER colours; leoitimacy of practice. 295 better than can be furnished by other means? And when we know what these are, we contend, that to preserve them is the only limit we ought to place to legitimacy — these effects should never be altogether surrendered— they should always give a character to the finished work, whatever besides might be borrowed as auxiliary. Well, then, we have seen that the effects of light and atmosphere are those obtained with washes of colour more readily on paper than on any other surface. These washes need not, however, consist invariably of transparent or semi-transparent colours, for frequently an opaque wash will afford the happiest effect of light and air in the distance, through, be it especially observed, in a great measure, not being laid thick enough to obliterate the grain of the paper. We do not see the necessity, moreover, to restrict the use of body colour to these pearly washes. On the contrary, the effect of the granulation of the paper may be heightened, in some respects tenfold, by stip- pling ; especially if the colour in nearly a dry state is merely touched on the prominences of the paper, and lodged as delicately as the bloom on a plum, and each little atom applied in a pure state, for the eye with its wonderful un- conscious facility to blend into harmonious hues — as we see in the admirable works of Mr. W. Hunt. Again, in foregrounds there are, of course, no breadths of aerial gradations; and therefore body colour may be used with advantage on account of the greater vigour of handling and variety of marking it favours. It is also particularly eligible for rendering the minutiae of orna- mental or other detail, from the crispness and sharpness which the artist can communicate to each touch. A re- markable example of this is afforded in the really mar- vellous water-colour works of Mr. John Lewis. Where, however, this definiteness of touch and body of paint is apt to give unnatural hardness and fixity, as it is if used in modelling the face, and where the artist does not aim at expressing or suggesting intervening atmosphere, but rather seeks to obtain the transparent glow of flesh, the use of body colour is ^ illegitimate,’ if we choose so to term it. But where we see the evident intention of rivalling the 296 PAINTINa POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. distinctive qualities of other technical appliances, merely for the purpose of exciting astonishment at the success of the rivalry, irrespective altogether of whether it be the best mode of imitating nature — where we see the artist wilfully resign all that is so peculiarly fresh and brilliant and lovely in water colour, for the sake of obtaining the powerful impasto and intense glazing of oil painting — it is there the cry of illegitimacy may be fairly raised, because it is a manifest waste of means. The same objection may be made to those miniature painters who sacrifice the exquisite semi-transparent surface of the ivory ; and to those oil painters who stain their canvases with pigments diluted to the neutral pallor of water colours. A water-colour painting may be worked with or without the glossy appearance inseparable from a varnished painting in oil ; and the employment of gum for thus deepening and adding lustre, particularly to the shadows, is frequently con- sidered illegitimate. We have given our reasons (p. 198) for believing in the legitimacy of the use of varnish in oil paintings. The same principle is here involved, but only so far as the glaze of gum may be used in passages where the grain of the paper is already with good reason sacrificed ■ — its use is not necessary elsewhere. PEEMANENCY AND PKESEKVATION. It is singular as well as painful to reflect that there is only too much reason to expect that in a few years by far the greater part of the beautiful water-colour paintings which gladden our eyes in the annual exhibi- tions will have become pale miserable ghosts of what they were ; while certain simple efibrts in water colours as ancient as the Pyramids preserve their freshness to this day j and wall paintings of two thousand, and some minia- tures of not much less than one thousand years old, are still in excellent condition. With such permanency as this, oil paintings can hardly compare ; for the oldest and most permanent are surely, though perhaps slowly, hasten - icg to decay — losing in the first place transparency in the WATER colours; PERMANENCY AND PRESERVATION. 297 shadows, to end, however, with the obscuration of the whole picture. Such being the excellent state of preservation of many ancient works, we naturally inquire how it happens that the works of our own time are so fugitive. One great cause of the fading of the early water-colour paintings of the present century (as also of miniatures) was, as already remarked, the reckless employment of vegetable colours. The manner in which missal paintings are protected no doubt in a great measure accounts for their preservation ; and it was the observation of this which was probably one of the recommendations of the use of folding triptychs,* &c. (See Appendix, note D.) But those missal minia- tures, it is found, are in the best condition which were almost entirely painted with colours of mineral or earthy extraction. Mr. Buskin says, that ‘ any painter may get permanent colours from the respectable manufacturers if he chooses,’ by which we presume can alone be meant — if the painter selects those of known permanency. Some pigments, such, for instance, as indigo (a colour of very extensive use in modern water-colour paintings) and similar blues, appear to have their natural want of perma- nency greatly increased by the conversion of the vegetable mucilage with which they are prepared into an acid by the action of air. Many portions of Turner’s paintings in which indigo has been used, either alone or mixed with yellow, to form a green, are turned to a rusty red ; while in the midst of this unnatural hue, a part which has been accidentally covered is found to be pure blue or green. The importance of any change in a colour employed so universally as blue in skies, water, and mixed with yellow for the greens of foliage, will be immediately understood. But this same change of the mucilage into an acid will render even the permanent water colours mechanically fugitive, that is to say, they return to their original powdered condition. The greatest present cause of deterioration appears, * In Italy curtains are often drawn over pictures to protect them from the sun. 298 PAINTINa POPTJLAELY EXPLAINED. however^ to reside in tlie paper used. Mr, Kuskin, sn one of his publisked lectures on the Political Economy of Art, says, in his usual graphic way, speaking of the common disregard whether either the colours or the paper will stand : ^ In most instances neither will. By accident it may happen that the colours in a given drawing have been of good quality, and its paper uninj ured by chemical processes. But you take no t the least care to ensure these being so. I have myself seen the most destructive changes take place in water-colour drawings within twenty years after they were painted : and from all I can gather respecting the recklessness of modern paper ma- nufacture, my belief is, that though you may still handle an Albert Durer engraving, two hundred years old, fearlessly, not one-half of that time will have passed over your modern water colours before most of them will be reduced to mere white or brown rags 5 and your descendants, twitching them contemptuously into fragments between finger and thumb, will mutter against you, half in scorn and half in anger, ^ Those wretched nineteenth century people ! they kept vapouring and fuming about the world, doing what they called business, and they couldn’t make a sheet of paper that wasn’t rotten.” ’ Mr. Buskin adds, with much assumed naivete, that he hopes to see a paternal government, one of the functions of which will be ^ to supply its little boys with good paper.’ The chief cause of the deleterious preparation of paper is the use of chlorine as a bleaching agent, and which is never wholly washed out. We should, therefore, always be sus- picious of very white paper. The old missals were executed on vellum, and consequently not exposed to this source of deterioration. The paste used for ^ mounting ’ water-colour paintings often has alum in it, or has become acid with age j in either case it should carefully be avoided. THE RISE OF MODERN WATER-COLOUR PAINTING. Painting in water-colours has received such unrivalled de- velopment in this country, is so extensively practised, and so generally patronised, that we naturally look upon it as a KISE OF MODERN WATER-COLOUR PAINTING. 299 peculiarly national school of art. The art as now understood is almost of contemporary origin, and can hardly be said, therefore, to have as yet a history. The honour of founding the English school of water-colour painting is generally claimed for Paul Sandby, who was born in Nottingham in 1732, and died 1809. He was certainly the reformer of mere topographical art, and not only studied much from nature, but probably, also, from the water-colour paintings of the Dutch masters, for he used considerable variety of method. He ordinarily, however, brought forward his drawings with Indian ink alone, afterwards staining them with a few tint.? of thin colour. The drawings of Paul Sandby deserve notice chiefly as ‘ showing the ocean of flat washes out of which modern water-colour art has risen, as bright as Aphrodite, with all her environing splendour of sea- foam, sea-colour, and sea-shell.’ Such works as these of Sandby, being little better than studies of light and shade, we can readily understand how paintings in water colours came to be called simply ^ drawings,’ a denomination they still retain.* In the early catalogues of the Royal Academy Exhibitions they are designated ‘ water-tinted drawings, or ‘ water- washed drawings.’ By degrees improvements were effected : a little blue was mixed with the ground-work tint, and the foregrounds were worked out in sepia ; and upon this tints of colour were struck over the whole, commencing with a generalizing tint of some warm colour. An innovation was then made by John Cozens in substituting a mixture of indigo and Indian red as a neutral tint for the shading of his paintings, and with this sombre hue he produced works of great effect, and frequently of romantic grande ur.f This principle was long retained of using a mixed colour, or neutral tint, for the shadows of every kind of subject and * The term ‘ drawing ’ is, however so little adapted to express the elaborate processes of the present system of water-colour painting that we have throughout this section ventured generally to substi- tute the words ‘ painting’ and ‘picture.’ f Cozens was a grandson of Peter the Great. His father was the son of the young Drury Lane actress with whom the Czar lived while working at Deptford. The works of Cozens were passionately admired by Constable. 300 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. season^ whether the picture was to represent a land ox sea- piece, stone or brick buildings, evening or morning, sunshine or storm, summer or a winter snow-piece. The neutral tint was laid in first, and generally left untouched for distances, while every kind of object, from the clouds to the foreground, such as trees, water, cattle, sheep, and the bronzed faces of their attendant shepherds, was most impartially shaded with neutral tint. In general the artists of those days followed the theories of the schools of oil painting in breaking down the warm lights with colours of the opposite quality, and represented shadows by cold tints only. For the finishing, these early practitioners trusted to the feeble lines of the lead-pencil, or the coarser markings of the reed pen. Girtin, though a close student of Cozens, was, however, the great pioneer of modern practice, for he was the first to break through the trammels of the old school by painting objects at once with the tints which they appeared to possess in nature. With him Turner was closely associated ; and in the works of this, the greatest master of the art, every stage of development may be distinctly traced up to a degree of per- fection which can scarcely be surpassed, and we can hardly hope to see equalled. Turner is even greater in water colours than in oil ; but several other eminent oil painters have dis- tinguished themselves also in water-colour painting. The following are some of the principal deceased masters of this branch of art, viz. Paul Sandby, Cozens, Girtin, Rowlandson (the caricaturist), Bewick, Stothard, Clennel, Chambers, Blake and Dadd (who both died insane), Robson, Barrett, Varley, Samuel Prout, Turner, Dewint, Copley Fielding, David Cox, and J. D, Harding. 301 V E have endeavoured to show that fresco painting should, theoretically speaking, he a perfectly durable description of painting ; it has (though more rarely than is commonly supposed) proved a permanent form of painting in Italy ; yet the frescoes in the New Palace of Westminster, and a large proportion of those in Germany, afford conclusive evidence that the method has not in northern Europe withstood the effects of time and climate nearly so well as painting in oil would have done under the same circumstances. The irretrievable decay of nearly all the early frescoes at Westminster, in the Poets’ or Upper Waiting Hall, and in the House of Lords, may be partly attributed to ignorance of the old methods of preparing the lime and colours. Another mischievous agency has probably been the improper preparation of the wall — the painting not having been cut off from possible absorption of moisture, which has so destructive an influence in northern climates. This last defect we would say en passant has been avoided in the more recently executed works ^ Mr. Herbert, R.A., Mr. E. M. Ward, K.A., and we believe other artists, having placed their couch of plaster upon a bed slightly detached from the actual^ wall, or upon slabs of slate. Keturning to the causes of decay, we may add the probable circumstance — indeed, the fact has been betrayed by the pictures themselves — that some of the works were not wholly executed in true fresco — the huon fresco already described — finishings in tem- pera having been added, which quickly blacken in an impure and are dissolved in a humid atmosphere. One of the most eminent of the painters engaged at Westminster has also expressed his belief to us that a particular pigment freely used ih the early frescoes at the palace has had a most 302 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED, damaging influence. Terra-verte, the pigment alluded to, and the use of which is as tempting to the fresco painter as bituminous preparations are to the painter in oil, is said by our authority to form a pellicle which will not combine in that crystallization which, if it once unite the colours with the basis of fresco, must absolutely form one of the hardest and -most durable substances in nature. But after making all possible allowance for the failure of the earliest attempts at fresco painting in this country, there can, we think, be little reasonable doubt, after the researches and evidence of the many witnesses summoned before the various Royal Commissions oh the flne arts, and after the lengthened experience of the artists themselves, that everything relating to the proper management of the material is now understood. And yet, not only are some of the early frescoes already complete wrecks, but even in the best pre- served, the best situated, and the most recently flnished, there are some traces and symptoms of incipient decay. What is, then, the conclusion which seems, however, reluctantly forced upon us ? Can we do other than infer, despite every presumption to the contrary, that fresco is not adapted for a damp climate, as it is not likely to remain unchanged for the centuries that mural paintings, from their very situation, are intended to endure ? The absence of ancient frescoes and the early substitution of oil painting for tempera in the north of Europe, with the importance attached to the drying properties of the new vehicle, point to the same conclusion. And it is further borne out by the fact that where the colours have been applied as thinly as possible, as in Mr. Herbert’s scene from ‘ King Lear,’ ‘ Lear disin- herits Cordelia,’ which is the best preserved early fresco at Westminster, though peculiarly exposed from bad drainage — there the surface remains least affected by mould and fungus. For our part, however, we do not permit the evidence, strong as it is, to shake our belief in the theo- retical inference that water can never alfect a fresco in the least if once the colours and lime of the plaster are com- bined in the crystallization of which we have spoken. There are frescoes in the open air in Italy, and we also STEKEOCHKOME OR WATER-GLASS PAINTING. 303 know that Mr. Herbert has thrown quantities of water over his fresco of Learj yet it is quite clear, whatever may be the real cause of the decay, that our best artists have been unable to execute their works in such a way as to ensure their resisting the attacks of a humid atmosphere, perhaps more insidious in Londen and on the banks of the Thames than elsewhere. Mr. Maclise, E,.A., among other mural painters, long since felt the necessity therefore for a more permanent medium. Accordingly this artist proceeded in the autumn of 1859 to Germany, to inform himself of the merits of stereochrume or water-glass painting, which had been adopted by Kaul- bach in his great works in the Berlin New Museum, by Kuhlmann at Lille, and many other German artists. Mr. Maclise returned fully satisfied of the greater suitability of this method he has wrought in it with perfect success in his vast picture in the Royal Gallery, Westminster, the ^Interview of Wellington and Blucher after Waterloo,’ and the artist is now painting the companion picture on the opposite wall of ‘The Death of Nelson,’ by the same method. We must pause for a moment to remark that these great pictures will certainly mark an era in the his- tory of British art. Each forty-seven feet long, and each containing or to contain upwards of fifty life-size figures, their merit will assuredly be considered fully commensurate with their size. From the finished picture, and from the progress already made with its vis-a-vis at the date of our going to press, we may unhesitatingly predict that these great works will rank as the noblest examples of monumental painting commemorative of national military and naval achievement hitherto executed in England, and fully equal to anything of their kind in Europe. Returning to the method by which Mr. Maclise executed his great Waterloo picture, we may mention that Mr. E. M. Ward is already a convert to the new process, and Mr. Herbert intends to adopt it as a final fixing agent.* Mr. Ward has * Mr. Herbert’s very remarkable picture, to which we have referred, p. 182, is executed by a method peculiar to the artist. It is in some S04 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. employed it successfully in a portion of his last picture in the Commons’ Corridor, the ^Escape of Charles II. ; ’ and he is now using it alone for the next painting, the ^ Landing of Charles II.’ But we must hasten to describe the process itself. Stereochrome, or water-glass, is then, chemically speaking a tetra-silicate of potash, a compound of silica, otherwise called silicic acid, and potash. It was the discovery, or the invention, as we might more properly term it, a process of reasoning having led up to it, of the late Dr. Johann Fuchs of Munich. The inventor shared the common fate of having his invention slighted and misunderstood. It was con- founded with a bi-silicate, and even the ^ liquor silicum,’ which is a mono -silicate. Now, however, it is acknowledged that there are few other bodies capable of being put to so many various applications. It is said to have been successfully applied in Germany to the preservation from decay of the stones of buildings exposed to the open air. Experiments upon the durability of water-glass have been made in exposed situations in Germany, and have proved perfectly successful. At Berlin a crucial experiment was made by suspending a stereochrome painting for ’twelve months in the open air under the principal chimney of the New Museum, during which time it was exposed to sunshine, mist, snow and rain, but nevertheless retained its full brilliancy of colour. The late Prince Consort was one of the very first to bring this invention before the English public, he having translated and allowed to be published in the Journal of the Society of Arts the pamphlet which Fuchs wrote shortly before his death, and left as a kind of legacy. The water-glass method of painting is extremely simple. A surface of stone, slate, or cement is prepared in a manner to receive colours which are levigated with water. The colours are applied with no other vehicle or medium than pure distilled water ] the brushes being the same as those respects analogous to ‘ fresco secco,’ but Mr. Herbert has covered his plaster with a coating of flour of zinc, which prevents any subsequent action of the hme in the plaster upon the colours, and secures a brilliancy greater than huon fresco itself. Over the picture when finished the water-glass is to be syringed. STEREOCHBOME OR WATER-GLASS PAINTING. 305 used for similar paintings in oil. It is, in fact, thus far the purest and simplest form of tempera or water-colour painting. When the painting of the subject is finished, the picture is fixed on the wall or surface by means of the liquefied glass (or tetra-silicate of potash in a state of solution), which gives the name to the process. This is simply syringed on, and left to dry. The numerous minute holes of the syringe ad- mit of the water-glass being ejected on to the picture in an almost impalpable form, half vapour, half mist, and in any quantities, little or much. The object is, of course, simply to fix the painting j not to continue depositing the water-glass till it shall perform the function of a varnish j because this would give the surface the glossiness which is one of the disadvantages of large oil paintings, and the absence of which is justly prized in fresco. In a short time after the water- glass has been carefully and in moderation syringed on, the carbonic acid of the air, and the earths in the surface, throw down the silica, or fiint; the alkali partly combines or efiloresces out, when it is easily washed oflP, the picture remaining adherent and only removable by mechanical dis- integration. The advantages of water-glass over fresco are manifold. Besides its grand recommendation of apparently perfect du- rability, it allows the use of all those pigments which would suffer from the action of lime. The range of the pigments which may be employed appears, indeed, to be quite in- definitely extended. It admits, unlike true fresco, of any rate of execution, and also of any number of alterations, correc- tions, and retouchings. We understand, for example, that Mr. Maclise has washed out whole figures and groups during the execution of his Waterloo picture. There is consequently less necessity for the preliminary cartoon and coloured sketch, which are almost indispensable in fresco j though a ^ study ’ of a large composition is always extremely desir- able, by whatever method the work may have to be executed. It will, in short, be perceived that the greatest diffi- culties and disadvantages in fresco, namely, the necessity of painting the picture piecemeal, of executing only that piece for which the plaster was freshly prepared for the day's 306 PAINTING POPULAELT EXPLAINED, work, the inevitable, and in an elaborate subject the very numerous, joinings this involves, and the impossibility of retouching without cutting out a portion of plaster entirely, - are thus altogether removed or obviated. The advantages afforded by water-glass of permitting the artist to work at any time, and as unhurriedly as he pleases, can hardly be too much insisted upon. We have said that the glory of real fresco is that it compels a primary at- tention to the essentials of art. But practically we find that its severe limitations are very frequently betrayed in exaggerated breadth, emptiness, slightness, and incom- pleteness, and very rarely made the best of by simple purity of outlines and tones, and a noble indication of expression. We naturally applaud when difficulties are vanquished; and when the conditions of an art are perfectly understood, any attempt to evade them should meet with the strongest con- demnation. Yet every limitation in the vehicle of art is per se an evil, not a good. The artist should never be a slave to his mere material. The more time you give a poet and the richer his vocabulary, the riper and the more choice will be the fruit of his genius. In the same way, the more time you give a painter and the more varied the means of ex- pression you place within his reach, the more comprehen- sive and complete will be the reflection of his heart and brain and soul on wall or canvas. It is something almost pathetic to see an artist with a lofty conception of his subject and extreme conscientiousness struggling in the fetters or fresco. There is really a touching instance of this now at Westminster. Mr. Herbert — who is devoted to his art with the whole energy of a most enthusiastic nature — is known to have knocked out portions of his illustration of King Lear four and five times before he would allow him- self to be satisfied with the harmony and permanency of those passages of his work. And beneath the flooring of the great picture of ‘ Moses bringing down the Tables of the Law,’ which Mr. Herbert is on the point of finishing, there are buried the debi'is of two years’ continuous toil. From the commencement of the cartoons in 1856, till the anticipated completion of this picture, the artist is known to STEREOCHROME OR WATER-OLASS PAINTINO. 30 7 have been engaged upon it, with some very trifling interrup- tions, ro less than seven years— the time Michael Angelo was occupied on ^ The Last Judgment ’ and Titian, as is supposed, on the ‘ Peter Martyr.’ We may venture to say — and it is hardly more than might be expected — that Mr. Herbert’s picture is an assured triumph in the most elevated walk of art fully as exceptional in this country and in modern Europe as«re in their kind the neighbouring achieve- ments of Mr. Maclise. In the belief that our artists are now in possession of a simple, comparatively easy, and durable method of wall painting,we hope to see that application of art which is of the highest national and educational importance receive a new development. Why should not the walls, not only of our churches, palaces, and museums, but of our universities, schools, and railway stations, and also — if not before all — those of our courts of justice, hospitals, prisons, and worJ> houses — be covered with appropriate and noble paintings, historical, religious, or moral ? If the reader will turn to page '*83, he will see that not only in the met’^opolis, but in various and remote parts of Great Britair a demand for mural paintings has sprung into existence. This is in a measure a natural consequence of truer knowledge and taste in architecture ; but on all sides, also, we see indications of a recognition of the educational as well as the decorative value of art. And now that the public has begun to evince a large and liberal appreciation of the noblest functions of painting, the government will, not im- probably, be induced to extend the patronage hitherto con- fined to Westminster. It is true that occupation will still be furnished for years to come to some of the artists now engaged at the New Palace, but other signal opportunities for state encouragement of mural painting will occur at no distant periods. First, we shall have the noble pile of new government offices ; and perhaps a still finer and more appropriate occasion will arrive when all our courts of law are united in one great palace of justice — a project which can hardly be much longer delayed. It is surely incumbent on the government to be well informed of the growing 308 PAINTING POPULAELT EXPLAINED. demand for mural painting for churclies and the mansions of private patrons. But especially does it behove artists to prepare themselves to meet creditably the severe require- ments of this class of work. We are satisfied that ability would be forthcoming, but organization would be much needed in the event of numerous cyclical or epical subjects being proposed for execution, similar to those undertaken in the Italian schools during three centuries, and in those of modern Germany. In a series of paintings, however vast, if closely related in meaning or intention, there should be unity of conception, and the ideas of one great designer should give consistency and keeping to the whole. To do this the artist must either devote great part of a lifetime to one series of works (as we have discovered at Westminster), and then perhaps leave them unfinished, or he must betimes gather round him a body of trained pupils. This latter system, though unknown in this country, has much to recommend it, and is we know approved by some of our best mural painters. To be carried out effectually, how- ever, it should be attempted only, of course, by eminent artists. It would be of the greatest importance, too, that these painters should be perfectly independent, quite free to follow their own judgment in all things, and not subject to interference from any quarter; otherwise, the scheme would certainly fail. Two of our most thoroughly competent masters — Messrs. Herbert and Maclise — are, we believe, not unwilling to undertake the formation of schools of monumental painters, arduous as the task would be at first. An experiment of more importance to the future of British art could not be devised : and we cannot close our labours with a sincerer wish than that the attempt may be made, and, when made, crowned with success. 309 Note A. — On Photography and Coloured Photographic Portraits. S HE extensive patronage given by the public to coloured photographv, is sufficiently proved by the number of establishments for its supply in all our thoroughfares. In the occupation thus afforded, a number of artists are neces- sarily engaged, indeed the great body of ordinary miniature painters have been gradually absorbed. As far as mere pecu- niary remuneration is concerned, we believe the artists them- selves have no reason to complain at this change of employment; but we cannot help regretting a consequence which has already begun to ensue, namely, that the hona fide art of miniature painting — that pleasing art in which our countrymen have al- ways distinguished themselves — will be comparatively neglected. The practice of colouring photographs, it will be readily under- stood, almost precludes real artistic advancement in any direction. Whatever merit the colourist may display must have been gained in other employment. The peculiar hue of the photograph vitiates the eye for correctly appreciating colour without the ac- customed groundwork ; and power of drawing is necessarily lost from its never being called into requisition. Thus the photo- graphic colourist, after a time, when left to his own resources, must find how insidiously injurious and delusive is the influence of his employment upon his character and progress as an inde- pendent artist. The value of photography when kept perfectly distinct, as an auxiliary to the artist, is, however, unquestionably great, though only beginning to be duly and correctly appreciated. Our younger artists have naturally been the first to submit to its teaching and suggestions, and although by it they also occasion- ally allow themselves to be misled, their works indicate already some few important results from its study. Even in historical painting stricter regard to detail does not always attract the attention from higher qualities according to the old-established opinion ; but, on the contrary, frequently helps the realization of the subject and incident. In landscape painting, however, its influence has hitherto been most conspicuous. It is only quite recently that an effort has been made to unite perfect 310 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. topographical accuracy with the leading spirit of a scene, aul thus give the representation of remarkable or sacred localities historical, or, so to speak, documentary value, as well as artistic importance. Photography has, in fact, incited artists to make renewed efforts to solve that most difficult of all art-problems — the harmonious union of breadth and finish. In portrait painting, also, photography is of service, though it should be scrupulously kept separate and subordinate. It is impossible that the photograph can ever supersede the work of art, for the simple reason that the unthinking camera cannot usurp the artist’s highest prerogative — that of choosing the best of the subtle and ever-varying traits of expression. But though, in regard to expression, photography is far more likely to lead astray than to direct, it can furnish the painter with trustworthy data for the logic of his drawing and proportions, and supply him with memoranda of accessories which will leave him free to concentrate his attention upon more essential facts. In all — and there is much — that in art is comparatively speaking mere mechanical copying, its assistance is invaluable, and the more it borrows of the painter’s principles, the more abundant interest will it repay him. ‘ Photography,’ as Sir David Brewster has well said, ‘ in place of being a rival, as was once imagined, is an auxiliary to art, giving it new powers and new fields of operation, and receiving from it in return the most valuable aid.’ We have alluded to the principal defect of photographic por- traiture — the inability to choose the most characteristic and agree- able expression ; and this becomes painfully evident from the impossibility most people feel of commanding a natural expres- sion when 'posed in the photographer’s chair, and in momentary consciousness of being caught alive in that mysterious camera. And, even in the drawing — that stronghold of photography — though the artist cannot approach its mathematical accuracy, still, if he has secured the general resemblance, he, with his playful pencil, sets our imaginations more pleasantly at work, and we follow his lines with a pleasure the other cannot afford : and although we detect them here a little within, and there a little beyond, the exact truth, still the eye, with wonderful and unconscious facility, supplies the happy medial line, and at the same time receives an impression of motion, vivacity, and life which nothing else affords.* This power in the eye no doubt explains * This phenomenon — for it is no less — is no doubt due, like the marvels of the stereoscope, to the beautiful ordering of our binocular vision ; although the effect is totally dissimilar, for in the stereoscope all is preternatural stillness. Apropos of the stereoscope, there is, we may remark, a growing tendency to exaggerate the effect of relief in stereoscopic pictures, for the purpos epalpably of exciting vulgar APPENDIX. 311 why the most imperfect of pictures — a mere slight sketch — will sometimes convey a more striking impression to the mind than even the most perfect photograph. ‘ Untouched ’ photographic portraits are, nevertheless, invaluable to relative or friend ; because they supply a plan, chart, or map of the face almost as correct as honest; and upon this groundwork of fact memory may supply what a stranger would not suspect could exist. We have just said advisedly ‘ almost correct,’ because the different focal distances of objects and the convexity of the lenses prevent absolute truth of forms. We need scarcely allude to other defects equally inseparable from photography. Where we see the art comparatively success- ful in portraiture, it must assuredly be admitted that the pho- tographer is entitled to great praise; for certainly no o%’ect presents him with so many difficulties as the few square inches of the human face — most especially if that face is young and beautiful. For example ; from the blue rays which enter into the composition of light possessing so much photographic power in the ‘ negative ’ the deep blue eye comes out in the positive colourless as skimmed milk, and for the same reason the delicate bloom of youthful epidermis, and the atmospheric tints which soften the lines of age, are absent. The yellow rays, on the con- trary, are greatly intensified, so that ‘ freckles ’ appear to be cruel traces of small-pox ; hair looks dyed if golden or red ; and worse, exactly in proportion as it is more carefully combed and greased. But this later defect arises from the great activity of all shining lights, which make their size in the photograph much beyond their extent in nature. And to this, likewise, is due the exaggeration of the spectrum, or point of reflected light in the eye, which frequently gives a vacant stare ; while the blanched lifelessness of the lips results from their greater smoothness of texture and nearer approach to a shining or polished surface. Seeing, then, with all its merit and marvel, that the photograph before the application of colour has certain inevitable defects, we have next to consider the advantages, if any, of the colouring process. In the first place, it must be premised, and we think it will be readily conceded, that at least the broad characteristics of the photograph have to be preserved. But, further than this, we may venture to assert that, whether desirable or not, many like- wise of the peculiarities of the photograph cannot be obliterated wonder : we have seen an arm and a leg apparently project forwards several yards. This is, of course, the effect of placing the two cameras much farther apart than the distance which separates our two eyes ; thus altogether falsifying nature. In some books on practical photo graphy tWe are directions for placing the cameras at so many feet or yards apart for distant objects ! 312 PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. or evaded ; except indeed by the most unconscionable and alto- gether unjustifiable application of opaque colour. The coloured photograph, therefore, cannot legitimately possess the distin- guishing qualities of a work of art ; it cannot exhibit largely the mind, the poetical suggestiveness conveyed by artistic selection and adapt>>tion of form and expression, nor many of the more delicate beauties of colour. The coloured photograph can, for ex- ample, possess scarcely any of the charming transparency in the fiesh which we so much admire in the miniature on ivory. This arises from the opaque ground and necessity of using body colour, in order, by its opacity to ‘ kill ’ — using the painter’s phrase, or hury, to suggest another metaphorical expression — the unpleasant hue of the photograph. Transparent colours, if used in quantity sufficient to effect this interment, would insensibly lead to what Mr. Ruskin would call ‘ saddened colour and sorrowful heaviness of tone;’ and it is found that on the prepared paper a ‘forcible’ effect involves less labour and is more showy and generally taking than a quieter, though richer effect, albeit possessing the additional merit of preserving more faithfully the original photograph. As for the so-called photographic miniatures on ivory, the dis- advantageous effect upon the colour produced by the photograph showing through must in the very nature of things be visiWe, if indeed the photograph be used at all. But in no instance that we have seen is the soft, true, delicate milkiness of the ivory pre- served, if the photographic image has actually been fixed on its surface or sunk into its texture ; for the solution (or whatever it may be or is called) which renders the ivory photographically sensi- tive, converts it at the same time into something resembling horn, and totally ineligible fr>i the artist’s operations. If, again, the ivory is reduced sufficiently thin for the purpose, and is only used as a medium to transmit the photographic representation, the former objection of course recurs. But though we have not seen one successful coloured photograph ‘on’ ivory, we have seen passed off as such a mere coloured copy on ivory traced or taken from a photograph. We do not wish to make invidious remarks, but the public cannot be expected to detect misrepresentations which require a knowledge of many minute petty technicalities to expose. Nevertheless, we freely admit that it is far more desirable to have a good photograph than a bad picture ; but we have had, and still have, in view a work of real art-value in our comparison. There is, then, in addition, this further prima facie objection to a coloured photograph, that it is a nondescript production — neither picture nor photograph — having neitbf^r die higher beauty of art nor the approximate truth of science; and therefore, as a matter of individual taste, many persons infinitely prefer, to its generally dauby meretriciousness, the photograph pur et simple. APPENDIX. 313 But this consideration, it may be said, is somewhat beside the real question. A few coloured photographs we have seen are, in point of fact, undoubtedly effective, pleasing, and passably truth- ftil ; but in this case the art element preponderates, and an artist of very considerable ability must have been employed to render them so attractive. Whether the chemical nature of the photo- graph as a substratum will have any effect in hastening the fugitiveness of the colouring or its inevitable gradually-increas- ing discordance, we are not prepared to say ; and until we are assured of the permanence of the photograph itself, it does not much signify. But, in regard to the statement involved in what we have said above, ‘ that the approximate truth of the photograph is sacrificed in the colouring process,’ we can confidently assert that the mo- ment a photograph is touched with colour, it at once loses its fine scale of light and shade ; and, however careful the artist may be, he will insensibly efface some of the exactitude of the forms and detail. Generally, in fact, the artist works upon a very faint 'positive ‘ impression ’ (to use the term borrowed from the printer’s and engraver’s art), and entirely covers it with body colour, or still more opaque oil paint, with the express intention of con- cealing the tone of the photograph, using as a guide another and darker ‘ positive.’ Here, then, it becomes apparent (if we are to admit the compromise at all) how necessary it is that only competent and experienced artists should be employed in order that the product of the camera should not be altogether falsified, but, on the contrary, receive all the compensating advantages it may derive for the loss of much of its own proper merit, by being passed through the nobler alembic of the artist’s brain. This is recognised in some respectable photographic establishments ; but, as ability of any kind commands its price in the market, so, for the better description of coloured photographs, a high price is necessarily demanded — a price, indeed, little short of that which was formerly paid for an average miniature — say from five to twenty guineas for a head, and thirty, forty, or fifty for a full- length. From this very circumstance, however, there is much temptation to practise deception, which the public should be warned against. We strongly suspect that many photographers who ask a low price for the additional colouring, employ a far supe- rior artist to colour their ‘ show pictures ’ than they would engage for their actual commissions. Photographs are, however, simply ‘ tinted ; ’ and this rapid process need not greatly enhance the price. Note B. — The Distribution, Hanging, Framing, and Care OF Pictures; and on Picture Cleaning and Restoring. When apartments are devoted entirely to the exhibition of pic- tures, two or three large works may be placed, as in the picture P 314 PAII^TING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. gallery of the Vatican, in one small room : but in private houses, and for domestic decoration, they should always have relation to the dimensions of the chamber in which they are placed. As large pictures then apparently diminish the size of a small apart- ment, smaller easel and cabinet pictures have been with good taste preferred for our contracted English interiors. In the spacious entrance halls and corridors of country mansions, large hunting and sporting subjects and whole-length portraits of an- cestors, are, however, appropriately placed. In dining-rooms, also, from the more massive and simple character of the furni- ture, a few life-size portraits, together with, of course, subjects of a cheerful and festive character, are admissible. In all eases the juxtaposition of oil pictures, water-colour paintings, and en- gravings should be avoided ; as they greatly injure each other’s etFect. For the drawing-room, subjects of a refined and elegant character would naturally be chosen ; and water-colour draw- ings would form a fitting decoration for a boudoir^ or an inner drawing-room ; while framed prints might be reserved for sleeping apartments. We see no reason, however, why the possessor of pictures, who has a separate apartment for his books, and a conservatory for his flowers, should not also have a gallery with a suitable light for the proper display of his pictures. At all events, due atten- tion should be paid to the important facts already mentioned (see pp. 285-288) relating to the hanging of pictures. The paper of the wall against which pictures are suspended should have no strongly-defined pattern, and be of one uniform colour (red in- clining to crimson, or tea-green, are the best colours); and if borders are introduced they should not contain flowers. Bright carpets and all gaudy colours are likwise injurious. Pictures, indeed, should, if possible, be painted for their situation. As a general rule, the centre of the picture should not be much above the level of the eye. In an exhibition the pictures in this most favourable situation are said to be on the ‘ line.’ If the work be a landscape or a portrait with a background, the hori- zontal line will require to be so placed. The artist, be it re- membered, when painting his picture fixes this line (at least theoretically) on a level with his eye — in fact, the two things, the horizontal line and the level of the eye, are identical — and he paints accordingly. If the spectator, therefore, does not regard the picture from the same relative position, much of the work will be foreshortened, and the general effect consequently falsified. Paintings on ceilings are, of course, not subject to these condi- tions, though they often show a very arbitrary use of the horizontal line. Hanging pictures low has the additional recommendation of increasing the apparent height of an apartment. In viewing pic- tures, the proper distance, which is determined by their size and the character of the execution, should also be strictly observe!. APPENDIX. 315 The extension and repetition ,of form so conducive to harmony is taken advantage of in the boundary line; thus the head of a child, or a group, consisting of an assemblage of curved lines, reaches the eye more agreeably through a circular frame; so likewise with the repetitions of form in the square or oblong aperture. Frames should harmonize in style with the other orna- ments of the apartment, particularly the mouldings and cornices. Frames which project much appear to contract a room. Massive frames convey a painful impression of suspended weight ; but this is partly obviated by ‘ open work’ patterns. In apartments with lateral light, the pictures should never slant as if toppling over. Pictures should not be suspended from one nail ; the diagonal lines formed by the cord have a very discordant effect. Two nails and two vertical cords, or, what is far more safe, pieces of wire cordage, should be used. There is an admirable contriv- ance for concealing the attachment of pictures, and allowing them to be slung forward into the room so as to receive the full liglit- For water-colour paintings it is especially important that the frames should not be heavy or too profusely ornamented. A massive frame will almost destroy the effect of delicate work in water colours. Burnishing small points of the frame is, however, from the greater vivacity of water colours, less objectionable than when the frame is intended to enclose an oil picture. The glass of the frame should not touch the face of the painting. The ‘ mount,’ or margin intervening between the water-colour paint- ing and its frame, is almost invariably white ; though it might not unfrcquently with great advantage be tinted, especially if the painting is merely a vignette. For all delicate work light in tone, a paper mount is preferable ; and for such, a simple gold bead frame with a gold edge to the mount next the picture is very suitable. But more powerfully and intensely-coloured water paintings, especially if warm in tone, might often be ren- dered far more effective and harmonious by substituting a gold mount. In all cases, however, we recommend to allow the artist to select or advise the choice of frame for his own work ; or to let him know if it is desired that the frame for his picture should match others, in order that he may paint with a view to the in- fluence of the frame. Where large collections are to be framed, useful suggestions will be found at the end of Mr. Buskin’s notes to the Turner G-allery, and examples may be seen in that gentle- man’s arrangement of the Turner collection. Pictures require light and air ; the habit, therefore, of cover- ing up pictures in town houses during the many months that families are away is very injurious. Washing pictures should be undertaken on a warm, dry day, and nothing but clean cold water should be used. The surface should be wetted with a p 2 316 PAI^’TINa POPULARLY EXPLAINED. sponge or soft leather, hnt the water should never be allowed to float, and all moisture should be carefully removed by gentle friction with an old silk handkerchief. The hacks of pictures should be frequently cleaned, and it is desirable to protect them with sheets of tin-foil or oil-skin. The relining of pictures is often an excellent precaution for their preservation. Some re- marks on the use and abuse of varnishing have already been offered (see pp. 208-209). The operation of transferring pictures from panel to canvas is too delicate and tedious to be undertaken except for valuable works. The ‘ Raising of Lazarus,’ by Se- bastiano del Piombo, in the National Gallery, has been transferred from panel to canvas. ‘ Pictures, like ourselves, are not only subject to the inevitable decay of age, but to a variety of diseases, caused by heat, cold, damp and foul air. Many (and they, too, are among the most delicate and beautiful) have, like Leonardo’s “ Last Supper,” and a large proportion of the works of Watteau, of Reynolds, and of Turner, unsound constitutions given to them by the authors of their existence, and are thus subject to premature and rapid de- struction. These liabilities, and the many accidents to which they are exposed, have made picture restorers as important a class in art as physicians and surgeons in life ; and, as might naturally be expected, there are many unskilful among them, and many ignorant quacks.’ — Leslie’s Handbook. Picture doctors are, however, a necessary evil, and to choose men of well-known respectability is the only advice we can offer the public, when it is necessary to entrust paintings to their tender mercies. But ‘ restorations ’ and ‘repaintings’ should be avoided as much as possible. The oil in old pictures has undergone all its changes ; not so the oil in the new tints, which are made to match the old ; but, as the changes must take place, after a time the restorations and repairings must necessarily cease to match, and become apparent from their discordance. Note C. — Scene Painting; Dioramas, Panoramas, etc. Scene Painting is an extensive and peculiar work of art, with its own laws and practical and scientific rules. The scene painter should be well able to decide on the effect of those colours he employs by d.ay, when they shall be subjected to a strong artificial light ; and it is of the highest importance that he should be well versed in linear and aerial perspective. He uses chiefly water colours, on account of their operating promptly, and presenting no glossy surface. One of the difficulties which the scenic art cannot overcome is, that the perspective is frequently violated by the actor moving about at the very back of the stage ; when all those objects placed there, which, whilst the performers kept in front (where everything is suited to his actual size) APPENDIX. 317 appeared in due proportion, lose their verisimilitude, and appear insignificant and disproportioned. The man becomes as tall as a rock or tree, and the imagination of the spectator has not power sufficient to preserve the illusion of the scene. This can only be obviated by the actor remaining as little as he can at the back of the stage. In the early days of the English stage, painted scenes were not displayed before the audience. Inigo Jones was the first who introduced appropriate decorations of the kind in England. But the great reformer of the stage in this particular was John Rich, who spared no expense in the decoration of Covent Garden, while it was under his management, in the early part of the last century. The application of scene painting known as a panorama was first introduced by Robert Barker, the builder and original pro- prietor towards the close of the last century of the rooms in Leices- ter Square, and who was succeeded by that excellent artist, the late Mr. Burford. In a panorama the spectator is, as it were, placed on a central eminence, commanding a view on all sides. The pictorial representation surrounds him as would the natural scenery ; the painting being executed on the inside of the hollow cylinder which forms the wall of the exhibition building. The picture is lighted from a skylight. But the effectiveness of the lighting is greatly increased by covering the space immediately above the platform on which the spectator stands, and thus con- cealing the soucre of the light which falls on the painted surface. A picture placed in light and viewed through a medium of shadow is known to acquire more than ordinary optical illusiveness. A difficulty in the execution of a panoramic painting is the applica- tion of the rules of perspective where the point of sight is indeter- minate and would in nature move with the spectator. This diffi- culty should be met, as far as possible, by making all the visual rays meet in the centre of the circle. A painting of this kind re- quires an appropriate building ; and two have been erected in Lon- don — that known so long as Burford’s Panorama, but now finally closed, and the Coloseum in the Regent’s Park. The Germans name a similar exhibition ‘Rundbild’ or Cyclorama, which more accurately indicates its nature. The two great pictures of London and Paris at the Coloseum, Regent’s Park, have been exhibited many years. Of these the view of London from the top of St. Paul’s was the first, and has always been most attractive. The sketches were made and the painting was commenced some forty years since, by the late Mr. Horner, and after his death the work was taken up and completed by Mr. E. T. Parris, the artist who repainted in monochrome the pictures of Sir James Thornhill in the dome of St. Paul’s. The word Panorama has been also made to apply to a series of 318 PAINTING POPULAKLY EXPLAINED. panoramic views painted on a flat surface, and made to pass be- fore the eyes of the spectator. In this case the conditions are reversed — the spectator becomes the fixed object, and the picture the moving one. The most beautiful example of a ‘moving panorama,’ as it is called, is that which was painted for Mr. Macready by his friend Mr. Stanfield, in illustration of the chorus of ‘ King Henry the Fifth,’ the last of the Shakesperian plays so magnificently put upon the stage by that distinguished manager and actor. The Diorama is a still more illusive and beautiful application of science and skill to the purposes of art than the Panorama. Those who remember visiting the building in the Eegent’s Park, where dioramic pictures were exhibited several years ago, will bear witness to their pre-eminence over the ‘ dissolving views ’ and other optical illusions which have since attracted the public. While the Panorama was the invention of an English artist, the Diorama was conceived and perfected by two Frenchmen, MM. Daguerre and Bouton. Although in some respects more limited in the power of representing nature, it produces a far greater degree of optical illusion. The means of lighting the picture are more complicated, the light and shade being chiefly managed by the admission and exclusion of actual daylight on the surface of the painting ; certain parts of the work being transparent, the light can also be admitted from behind and through the canvas, thereby producing great brilliancy — an artifice which causes an appearance of solidity and reality in the parts exposed to the action of the ordinary daylight on the surface. A combination is secured of transparent, semi-transparent, and opaque colour- ing, which is still further assisted by the power of varying both the effects and the degree of light and shade on the surface of the picture. Thus the accidental effects of nature, sunshine, and storm, and moonlight, and even motion, as the fall of an ava- lanche, or the tumbling waters of a cataract, can be represented with an appearance of truth that renders the diorama the most perfect scenic representation of nature in existence. In the power of representing architecture, and especially interiors, it is unrivalled ; a powerful relief may be obtained without exaggera- tion ; and colour need not be sacrificed for the sake of effect. As a panorama requires a building specially suited for its dis- play, so the diorama cannot be exhibited in its perfection except in a building expressly suited to its necessities, both as regards the display of the picture and the position of the spectator. There is no longer any such building in London; and, since the death of Bouton, there has been no exhibition which could be properly called a diorama. We are indebted for a portion of the preceding facts relating to panoramas and dioramas to an article in the excellent recently-established periodical. The Reader. APPENDIX. 319 Note D. — On Triptychs, Eetables, Antependia, etc. The art of the Middle Ages had a specific use. Artists did not paint, as now, on speculation. The uses to which the tabular or wooden pictures were applied, suggested certain forms and mpdifications. Altar-pieces were originally portable ; which ex- plains the practice of enclosing pictures in cases with doors, called diptychs, triptychs, or polyptychs, accordingly as they consisted of two, three, or many portions. A reference to the origin of these terms may be not uninteresting. The diptychs are of very early date. They were among the Romans formed of two little tablets, of wood or ivory, folding one over the other like a book, and the interior presented a surface of wax prepared for writing. These tablets, ov jpugillares, as they were called, sometimes served, when sealed, for convey- ing secret messages ; but they were soon employed for a more interesting purpose. From the time of the emperors, it was the custom for the consuls and superior magistrates, on their elevation, to make presents of ivory diptychs carved externally, with sculptures in bas-relief. On one leaf was carved the portrait and titles of the new consul, and on the other a mythological subject, or the games of the circus with which he had amused the people at the period of his elevation. These interesting diptychs are known by the name of consulares. At a later period, when the Roman empire had adopted the Christian religion, the consuls sent diptychs to the principal bishops also ; and these, receiving them as a testimony of good- will and respect to the Church, placed the diptychs upon the altars, that the magistrates who gave them might be recom- mended to the prayers of the congregation at the celebration of mass. Such is the origin of ecclesiastical diptychs. The subjects of the carvings which enriched the exterior of these diptychs being taken from the New Testament, they appeared, after the fall of the Empire, very suitable for decorating the covers of books of prayers — to which use we owe the preservation of a great number. The following difference existed between the Christian diptychs of this period and the Consular diptychs — -viz., that the principal representation of the former was inside instead of outside the covers. This difference, no doubt, arose from the desirability of folding up and concealing the contents of these portable diptychs in time of persecution. Afterwards they were again exhibited on the altar open. ‘ When the persecution had ceased, the use of these pictures [or sculptures] was universal, and continued in succeeding centuries. The crusader, the traveller, the poorest pilgrim, enclosed in diptychs and triptychs of wood and ivory the holy images he carried with him [as do the Russians to this day] ; and before which he daily prostrated himself, to offer his 320 PAIN TING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. prayer to Grod. Some were also made of large dimensions, and placed over a or devotional chair in private rooms/ — Laharte. In the oldest triptychs the portions were united by hinges, and it was only at a comparatively late period that the chief portions of the altar-piece were separated by pilasters, and bore heavy cornices. An example of the simple folding-doors or wings on each side of a gabled picture may be seen in the painting by Duccio da Siena, in the National Gallery. The outside of the doors had, almost universally, subjects painted on them in black or brown and white {chiaroscuro^, probably from a traditional imitation of the sculptured back of the original diptych. The form of the triptych when opened suggested what is called the ‘ retable,^ ‘ retablement,’ which is flat and does not admit of being closed. As altar pieces became more decorative, certain supplementary or cemplementary pictures were painted on the 'predella. The ‘ predella ’ or gradus was the wooden base (on the top and back of the altar) on which the altar-piece rested, and to which it was attached. On this panelling were depicted in minia- ture dilferent events in the life, or other circumstances connected with the saint or divine personage represented above on the altar- piece proper. When — as it frequently was — the altar-piece was presented to the church, the heraldic arms of the ‘ donor ’ were often added at the extremities of the predella, in addition to his portrait, generally introduced into one of the compartments above. As the decorative capabilities of these works became recognised, they were variously ornamented, and their frames assumed archi- tectural importance — the architectonic enrichments following the taste of the place and period. The original Eoman diptychs were generally rectangular, but sometimes the upper edges are raised and ornamented somewhat like the tympanum of a building. The Byzantine diptychs have often circular tops. Later Italian and German works of this class commonly finish in more or less pure forms of Gothic : the early deoorated style occurring most frequently. The architectural importance of an altar-piece may be seen (and would be still more advantageously if all the por- tions were united) in the very extensive retable by Andrea Or- cagna in the National Gallery. A picture by Jacopo di Casentino, in the same collection, is a still more elaborately constructed though less extensive altar-piece. It has gables and medallions or roundels, a predella and side projections, or buttresses, which are adorned with panels in dilferent tiers, containing small full- length figures, which arrangement serves to account for the im- mense number of similar small paintings of secondary merit dispersed in various places and assignable to this period. The great altar-piece of the Van E^cks at Ghent is a polyptych (that is, of more than three leaves). It originally consisted of two APPENDIX. 321 tiers of leaves, seven above and five below. Of the seven, three were fixed, and the portions closing upon them were divided on each side into two subjects. Of the five, one large centre subject was fixed, and two leaves (one on each side) closed upon it. The older method of artistic arrangement in pictures of this description was to place the principal subject in the centre, and single figures of saints on the doors. The figures of saints and evangelists were, however, soon brought into the centre picture, which generally represented the enthroned Madonna * or Christ holding a globe termed a ‘Majesty’). The saints were also greatly increased in number, and groups belonging to different periods were introduced to share in this presumed heavenly adoration. Hence the origin of the Sacra Conversazione. We have glanced at the practice of presenting pictures as offerings to a particular church. These were frequently simple panels. Such panels were inserted in the sides of shrines and reliquaries, as they were also in coffers, furniture, and domestic utensils. The numerous side chapels of churches were of course dedicated to various saints, hence those votive pictures frequently contained a confused jumble of incredibly ludicrous, and not un- frequently, even indecent representations of various events in the life of the patron saint, painted often with Chinese disregard of relative proportion. At other times the commemorative tablet recorded some local legend or fact. There was yet another, and in some respects a more important class of panel picture — viz. the altar ‘ frontals’ or ‘antependia,’ These altar-facings were movable, and, according to the usage of the Church of Home, four or five of them were provided for each altar, in order that they should harmonise in subject with the nature of the sacred office to be performed. These frontals being, from their position, very conspicuous, the highest order of ability was engaged for them; and from extant continental examples, no decoration appears to have been too costly, and no material too rich, to lavish on their embellishment. To prove this, we need only refer to the precious ‘ palliotto’at Venice, the golden casing of St. Ambrogio at Milan, and the silver, gold, and enamelled antependia of the altars of San Griovanni Batista at Florence, and San Griacomo at Pistoia. One beautiful specimen of a ‘ precious frontal ’ is placed under glass in the south ambulatory or pro- cessional path next the choir in Westminister Abbey; chough situated as it is among the tombs, it may be mistaken for part of a monument. It is an extensive work, measuring about eleven * See the picture attributed to Cimabue in the National Gallery, which is very similar to the Cimabue in Santa Maria Novella at . Florence (see p. 67). p3 322 PAINTING POPrLARLY EXPLAINED. feet in length and three in height. The paintings, on a gold mosaic ground, are extremely well and carefully designed, and are attributed to the close of the thirteenth or commencement of the fourteenth century. Messrs. Digby Wyatt and Waring remark* that the striking difference between this beautiful production as a work of art, when compared with the commoner decorative painting practised at this period in England and Germany, leads to the inference that in the Middle Ages for the finest decorative work we were under great obligations to Italian artists. In this frontal the processes are exactly similar to those of the early Florentines : and curiously enough, ‘ in the Close Eolls of the 44th of Henry III. (1260), is to be found a mandate from the king commanding the sheriff of Surrey to cause that < ‘immediately the pictures and frontal of the altar of the great chapel at Guildford be made as we have instructed William of Florence our 'painter f ’ From this mandate these gentlemen infer that William the Monk, mentioned in the records of the decorations at Westminster, is the same artist, and that this frontal was probably executed by him. It is, however, satisfactorily proved in Gage Eokewode’s Account of the Fainted Chamber (p. 25), that William the Monk of Westminster was a distinct person from William of Florence ; and more than this, that while the latter was only paid sixpence a day, William of Westminster was receiving two shillings. Although beyond the scope and intention of this book to have carried out, we would take the opportunity of a new edition to record our coincidence with an opinion expressed in a very kindly estimate of our labours in the Saturdci'y Beview of April 2, 1859. The writer of the critique alluded to, observes that the history of early English art would reward a diligent inquirer for all the pains he might bestow on the investigation. ‘ The more documents are searched, and the more our ancient buildings are examined, the more clearly it will appear that a native school of art fiourished in this country, whose works, moreover, were probably in no way inferior to any other specimens of painting on this side the Alps. Why does not some one collect the scat- tered notices of English pictorial «.rt — the story of Benedict Biscop, the legend of St. Dunstan, the fragments of English embroidery and illumination, the mural paintings still preserved in many churches, the Painted Chamber, St. Stephen’s Chapel, and the Liber Eliensis ? Here is a mine which needs working. Nor need the search be confined to painting.’ In sculpture, we may add, the great cycle of religious subjects in the West Front of W ells Cathedral, which Fiaxman, the late Professor Cockerell, and The Mediceval Court in the Crystal Falace, p. 34, APPENDIX. 323 the best authorities consider the work of English artists, though executed at a period dating somewhat before the revival of the art in Italy under Donatello, would form a great 'point (Tappui. But the whole history of British art has yet to be written. Note E. — The Glory, Nimbus, Aureola, etc. The golden ‘ glory ’ is the representation of a kind of halo, supposed to emanate from the head or body of divine persons. When it surrounds the head it is a nimbus, when it envelopes the body it is an aureola. The ‘ glory ’ also applies to the union of both. The symbols, emblems, and legends, employed in early Christian art, form a curious and extensive study (Hagiology and Christian Iconography), upon which the late Mr. Pugin, M. Didron, Mrs. Jameson, and others, have written very learnedly. The various forms and attributes of the Glory is a most impor- tant branch of this interesting subject. In classical times it was a great honour to have a portrait painted on a circular golden shield, and suspended in temples and other public places. The distinction was conferred upon heroes and those who had served their country ; Greek inscriptions decreeing these honours are still in existence. In course of time, from the head being painted on a circular gold shield, the shield was attached to the head alone in full-length representations. This is the origin of the nimbus which frequently appears in Pagan pictures, especi- ally those discovered at Herculaneum and Pompeii. Little discs, attached like flat hats to the heads of their statues, weri also employed by the sculptors as a mark of distinction and sanctity, although in earlier times sculptors had employed the same kind of plates over their statues simply to protect them from rain or the ordure of birds in the open air. Some painters, from seeing the effect of these plates on the statues, imitated them in actual perspective in their pictures, while others (the earlier ones probably) kept them flat and perfectly round, as in the works of Giotto and Cimabue. The nimbus being of Pagan origin, there was, however, at first some opposition to its intro- duction into Christian art. But after the eleventh century, it was invariably employed to distinguish sacred personages, as the Saviour, the Virgin Mary, angels, apostles, saints and martyrs. Nimbi are sometimes of various colours in stained glass windows. ‘ They are of various forms ; the most frequent is that of a cir- cular halo, within which are various enrichments, distinctive of the persons represented. In that of Christ it contains a cross more or less enriched ; in subjects representing events before.the Resurrection, the cross is of a simpler form than in his glorified state. The nimbus most appropriate to the Virgin Mary con- sists of a circlet of small stars ; angels wore a circle of small r.ays, surrounded by another circle of quatrefoils, or roses, 324 FAINTING POPULAELT EXPLAINED. interspersed with pearls, &c. Those for saints and martyrs were similarly adorned; but in the fifteenth century it was customary to inscribe the name of the particular saint, and espe- cially those of the apostles, round the circumference. A nimbus of rays diverging in a triangular direction, which occurs but seldom before the fourteenth centuiy, is attached to representa- tions of the Eternal Father ; and his symbol, the hand in the act of benediction, was generally encompassed by a nimbus. When the nimbus is depicted of a square form, it indicates that the person was living when delineated, and is affixed as a mark of honour and respect. From the twelfth to the fifteenth cen- tury the nimbus appears as a broad golden band behind the head, composed of concentric circles, frequently enriched with precious stones.’ — Fairholt. After this it was defined merely with a line or thread of gold, sometimes quite round, sometimes as a small disc in flattened perspective. As an attribute of 'power, it was often attached to the heads of evil spirits and Satan himself. The use of the aureola, or enlarged nimbus, which surrounds the whole body, is much more limited than that of the nimbus, being confined to the persons of the Almighty, Jesus, and the Virgin Mary. Sometimes, however, it is seen envelop- ing the souls of saints and of Lazarus. The aureola varies in form. That in which our Saviour is represented, and which was a very early symbol of our Lord, is called ‘ vesica piscis,’ from the elliptical form resembling a fish. Then there is the ‘ divine oval ’ and the ‘ mystical almond.’ When the person is seated, the aureola is circular : sometimes it takes the form of a quatre- foil, each lobe encompassing the head, the feet, or the arms ; and it is frequently intersected by a rainbow, upon which is seated Jesus or the Virgin Mary. Note F. — Painting in Embroidery. In embroidery, the ladies of antiquity and medi'seval times found (if we may be permitted to say so) a more artistic, if a less useful, employment than that furnished their fair descendants in the ‘knitting, netting, and crochet,’ or even the potichomanie of the present day. Embroidery must indeed have been one of the very earliest forms in which art developed itself. Em- broidery was commonly practised in Egypt, and Sir J. Gr. Wil- kinson says, ‘ that the Hebrews, on leaving the country, took advantage of the knowledge they had there acquired to make “ a rich hanging for the door of the tent, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, wrought with needlework.”’ ‘ Needlework ’ and ‘ embroidery’ is mentioned in various parts of Holy Writ. From Homer w^e learn that it was the employment of Andromache, Penelope, and Helen. In the first centuries of the Christian era, and especially in APPENDIX. 325 the Grreek Church (as it is to this day), the Christ, the Virgin and saints were embroidered upon the pontifical ornaments, upon the tissues that decorated the altars, and the ‘ veils ’ or curtains of the churches. In the fifth century the art of weaving silk stuffs of the most brilliant colours, and enriching them with sub- jects executed in gold and silver thread, was carried to great perfection. The embroidery upon the priestly vestments was particularly sumptuous and elaborate : the whole history of Christ was embroidered on the toga of a Christian senator. The Anglo- Saxon ladies were especially skilful in this art ; they showed their great devotion to the Church by supplying the richest orna- ments to its ministers, and their productions were renowned over the Continent under the title of Oi^us Anglicaniim. The Norman ladies showed equal talent ; and we owe the tapestry preserved in the library at Bayeux — one of the most interesting historic monuments — to the skill and patience of Queen Matilda, the wife of William the Conqueror, who, like another Helen, embroidered the incidents of his victory in England for the use of the cathedral at Bayeux. Arras in France, all through the middle ages and down to the sixteenth century, was famous for its tapestry. The name of the town was given in England and Italy (Italice as Araszi) to the pictorial hangings that adorned the palaces of kings and nobles. Kaphael’s Cartoons, now in Hampton Court Palace, were, as already observed, designed for the tapestry-workers of Arras. The tapestries themselves are now preserved in the Vatican, and are called Arazzi della scuola vecchia (of the old school) to distinguish them from a second series of Arazzi della scuola nuova (of the new school), which are supposed, from the great inferiority of their drawing and style, to have been executed from cartoons made by Flemish masters from small sketches by Raphael. Note Gr. — S tudy at the Royal Academy, etc. In the Royal Academy the study from the ‘Life,’ that is to say, drawing and painting from the ‘ figure ’ or ‘ living model,’ is conducted by gaslight during the winter. The model isy) 05 m\ or ‘ set,’ as it is otherwise expressed, in some particular attitude, and either nude, for the study of anatomy, or clothed, for the study of drapery. Etty’s studies from the life, now so much prized, were for the most part rapidly executed by gaslight. Before the pupil is admitted to this Life School, he has to go through a course of chalk drawing, commencing with three pro- bationary drawings — the first an outline from the skeleton ; the second, the ‘anatomical figure’ in outline — generally Houdin’s ecorche (a figure by the French sculptor displaying the muscles without their integumentary investment) ; and the third, a 326 PAINTING POPtlLAPLY EXPLAINED. shaded drawing from a classical statue. The course of drawing from the ‘ antique ’ is then entered upon, in which six finished chalk drawings are made from several of the best remains of an- cient sculpture. Drawings and paintings in these schools are always somewhat less than half the size of life, and are called ‘ Academy figures,’ though the term is generally limited to studies from the nude. For the study of anatomy the pupils have also the privilege of drawing from dissections at King’s College. In addition to these facilities there are — a Painting School, con- ducted exclusively by daylight, in which pictures of established reputation are copied — a Library of valuable books on art and prints ; and on Thursdays and Fridays the students are allowed to copy from pictures in the National Gallery (Old Masters), Tra- falgar Square, and on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Saturdays from pictures in the National Gallery (British School) at South Ken- sington. Students of architecture and sculpture have similar advantages. Visitors are appointed from the ranks of the Eoyal Academicians to the different schools ; so that the diplomatic honour of membership is not without its duties, and these, espe- cially in the case of the portrait-painting R.A.’s, are, it may be conceived, sometimes onerous. The course of instruction in academies generally, though it may teach to avoid defects, cannot supply native genius ; yet this necessary limitation has alone, it would seem, sometimes led to a bad sense being attached to the epithet ‘ Academic.’ The model is of course posed in a conventual attitude to display muscular action, form, light and shade, or colour, to the best advantage, and as many even of the easiest attitudes are painful to preserve quite immovable, the artist sometimes unconsciously imitates the constrained appearance weariness soon induces; and so it happens that when a painter introduces a figure wanting in repose or in its parts inharmonious, or else, apparently merely to parade his knowledge or his taste, and either a figure inappro- priate altogether, or bearing an evident disregard of higher quali- ties, such, for instance, as expression — in all these cases, it is at once called ‘ Academic,’ or an ‘ Academy Figure.’ Note H. — Crayon, or Pastel Painting. Painting in coloured crayons is of German origin ; but has been carried to the highest perfection in France, where Greuze, Nattier, Girodet, and other eminent painters practised the art. The facility and rapidity with which a picture may be executed with the dry crayons are very great, and render them very useful for studies of effect, particularly in landscape ; but crayon paint- ings have a certain meretriciousness which has prevented their extensive adoption for finished works among English artists. Coloured crayons, or pastels, are made by the mixture of colour APPENDIX. 327 with a colourless base. A mucilage is used to bring the colour and its base to the consistence of a soft paste (whence the name pastel), when it is formed into small round lengths, or ‘ sticks,’ which, when dry, are ready for use. ‘ The material upon which the painting is executed is commonly a paper manufactured for this purpose, in such a manner that the texture becomes loosened, and forms a woolly surface, which at once assists the blending of the tints, and receives and retains the crayon powder.’* Tor finer work vellum is used, to the surface of which a ‘ nap ’ has been communicated by friction. The tints are rubbed in, and blended for the most part with the finger, although ' stumps ’ (Fr. estompes), and the point of the crayon or pieces of its length are also used. There is no satisfactory method of ‘ fixing ’ pastel paintings, and the chief objection to them is want of permanency — friction, damp, and sunlight being particularly injurious. Note I. — What is Phe-Eaphaelitism ? Pre-Eaphaelitism, according to the explanation of it given by its champion, Mr. Kuskin, is intended to combat the tendency of modern art to the pursuit of beauty at the expense of manliness and truth ; and the servile imitation of the Post-Eaphaelite painters, to the neglect of the exact imitation of Nature, thus resting in an imperfect reproduction of eclectic merit, which must result in conventual mannerism, and hinder, if not prevent, the artistic discovery and reproduction of new truth from the inex- haustible fountain of Nature herself. To escape from this ten- dency, ‘the Pre-Eaphaelite Brethren,’ as they style themselves, propose to follow the track of art from its infancy ; in the words of Lord Lindsay, the student must ‘ ascend to the fountain-head ; he must study Duccio and GKotto, that he may paint like Taddeo di Bertolo and Masaccio ; — Taddeo di Bertolo and Masaccio, that he may paint like Perugino and Lucca Signorelli ; — and Perugino and Lucca Signorelli, that he may paint like Eaphael and Michael Anglo.’ Mr. Kuskin repudiates the idea of the Pre-Eaphaelite artists imitating any pictures ; he avers that ‘ they merely oppose themselves to the modern system of teach- ing ; and paint Nature as it is around them, with the help of modern science, and with the earnestness of the men of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.’ He has, however, more recently gone to a much greater extreme ; for instance, he insists that mediaeval art was religious, and all modern art is profane ; that mediaeval art confessed. Christ, while modern art denies Christ. Against this schism in art it is objected that its very title' is likely to mislead ; for judging from their works, we may well say, with Mr. Euskin himself, that ‘ these Pre-Eaphaelite pictures * The Art of Painting in Coloured Crayons. By H. Murray. PAINTING POPULARLY EXPLAINED. 32 S are just as superior to the early Italian in skill of manipula- tion, power of drawing, and knowledge of effect, as inferior to them in grace of design ; and that, in a word, there is not a shadow of resemblance between the two styles.’ And even if there are errors in the modern system of teaching, they do not prove it to be wrong by availing then.seh^es of it only so far as it gives mere skill in exact technical imitation, and rejecting its higher principles, while professing to substitute a style in which these technical merits do not exist, but whose qualities of grace, purity, beauty, and expression they confessedly miss. Let us have, if possible, closer study of Nature, and more conscientious imitation of her ; but why should the artist, more than the poet, resign his noble prerogative of educating his mind and eye to the appreciation for purposes of selection of all that she offers of tender or lovely, expressive or beautiful ? Why should he not do what even Nature herself refuses to do, unite, for harmony or con- trast, many diverse beauties together, provided he cull the flowers from Nature herself, and they be not artificial? .Again, these painters profess to imitate Nature, and eschew the plagiarism of modern art; yet some of them imitate the productions of a period when almost the only excellence was expression, which they do not reproduce, while they borrow much that is merely grotesque. Not that the ancient painters intended it to be so ; but it was the nearest approach to the imitation of Nature which their imperfect scientific and technical resources permitted them to make. The truth appears to be, that there is some analogy between the progress of art and science, — every step has been the vantage-ground for further progress, — iDoth are infinite, and no one mind can master every branch of either ; still, by following the natural inclination, a proper use of the knowledge of what has already been done, and the conscientious study of Nature, there will ever be room for originality. The religious spirit of early art being the product of totally different tendencies from those of modern society, we can no more recall it than we can return to the manners and customs and entire mode of thinking of that agfe. As Mr. Leslie happily says : ‘ The spirit of Chaucer is not to be caught by adopting his phraseology, or by printing in black-letter ; so neither shall we catch the spirit of any school or master by adopting that from it which is merely temporary.’ We have, however, in various parts of this volume, acknow- ledged the service rendered to art by Pre-Kaphaelitism in the way of protest against the conventionality into which the English school had fallen — against a system of mere picture manufacture, and against the substitution of flippant execution for honest labour, and the intelligent reverential rendering of Nature. INDEX ABO A BOZZO, 254 Academic style, 175, app. 326 Academy-board, 211 Academy, Royal, 279, app. 325 Accessories, note 124 Accidental effects in water-colour painting, 284 Acropolis, paintings of, 40 Esthetics, note 40 Aetius, 233 Agnus Dei, 87 Albani, 176, note 176 Alfred jewel, the, 116 Altar-f rentals, app. 321 Altar-pieces, 320 Amber-varnish, 207-244 Anatomy among the G-reeks, 49 Ancient painting, finest specimen, 56 Ancient painting, remains of, 55 Angelico, 72 Anne of Cleves, miniature of, note 271 Antependia, app. 321 Airtique, study of the, 152, app. 326 Apelles, 43 Apelles and Protogenes, contest of lines between, 45. Apollodorus, 41 Arabesque, 53 Aristides, 43 Arras, app. 325 Asphalt um, a cause of cracks, 222 Assisi, Church of S. Francesco at, 67 Assyrians, painting of, 36 Atelier, the, 185 Athos, Mount, school of,-96 Atmosphere, influence of, on execu- tion, 229 Atramentum, the varnish of Apelles, 20 Aureola, app. 323 Auripetrum, 12 CAM B ackgrounds, gold, 7, 10, 15, 84 Backgrounds, open, 12 Baptistery, ancient form of, 86 Bartolommeo, 162 Basilica, the, and its decoration, 87 Baths of Titus, paintings found in, 57 Battens, or ledges, 212 Bayeux tapestry, app. 325 Bearing out, 197 Bellini Giovanni, 150 Bianchi and Neri, in art, 190 Bitumen, a frequent cause of cracks, 222 Bleaching of paper destructive, 298 Blooming or chilling of vai’uish, 199 Blue, 220 Body-colour, 103, 289, 292 Bolognese school, 173 Borders of painted glass, 133 Bordone, Paris, 172 Botticelli, Sandro, 148 Bristol-board, 282 British Institution, 279 British School, the, 271 Brown, 222 Brushes, 192, 291 Buon fresco, 135, 142, 146 Byzantine art, 63, 88 Byzantine influence traced to Eng- land, 65 Byzantine MS. discovered by M. Di- dron, 95 Byzantine style, 89 et seq. Byzantine style, traditionai-y cha- racter of, 91 C ABINET pictures, note 18 Cake colours, note 290 Calking, 140 Calligraphy, study of, 101 C£-mpo Santo at Pisa, 71, 74 330 INDEX. CAN Cano, Alonzo, 263 Canvas, 7, 210 Canvas used by Romans, 6 Caravaggio, 177 Carracci, the, 173 Cartoon, note 7 Cartoons for fresco, 139 Cartoons, by Raphael, 139, 166 Cast of draperies, 196 Cast-shadows, noteldl Catacombs of Rome, early Christian paintings in, 59 Catagrapha, 39 Cavallini Pietro, 72, note 72 Cauterium, 27 Ceiling of Sistine Chapel, 156 Cennini Cennino, his treatise, 7, note 7 CestiTim, 26, note 26 Charlemagne, 92,106, 116 Charles I., his patronage of art, 272 Chiaroscuro, 14 et passim Chinese art, 91 Christ, earliest portrait of, 60 Christ, earliest type of, 58 Christian art in tempera and en- caustic, 58 Christian art, the purposes it served, 70 Christian art, revived taste for study of, 73 Cimabue, 67 Claude, 259, 267 Climate, influence of, on j>ainting, 240 Cloisters, art in, 13, 64,65, 100, 184, 233 Cloth, 7, 9, 210 Clothlet colours, 103 Colouring, theories of, 215 Colours, complementary, 216 Colours, contrasts of, 216 Colours, modern as good as ancient, 217 Colours of mediaeval painters, 24 Colours originally prepared by painters themselves, 217 Colours, primary, secondary, and tertiary, 216, et seq. Colours, pure in early frescoes, 137 Colours, the permanent, 218 Colours used by the ancients, 23 Colours used by the Egyptians, 33 Colours used in enamel painting, 108 Colours used in fresco, 136 Colours used in missal painting, 103 Colours used in oil, 215 Colours used in water painting, 288 Compo and cements as grounds, note 136 Constantine the Great, 89 Constantinople, 63, 90, 93 ENA Consulares, app. 319 Conventional lines in drawing, 227 Copal varnish, 206 Correggio, 169 Cracks in ^intings, cause of, 200 Crayon painting, app. 326 Crystal Palace, copy of ceiling by Raphael in, note 163 Crystal Palace, Egyptian Court, 35 Crustae Yermiculae, 82 Cubes employed in mosaic, 80, 82 Cycles of Biblical subjects in mediae- val art, 106, 158 D ante, portrait of, 69 David, 270 Dead-colouring, 225 Diapers and patterns on grounds, 11 Dilettanti, 199 Diluents, 203 Diorama, app. 318 Diptychs, app. 319 Distemper, 6 Distribution of paintings, app. 313 • Domenichino, 175 Donor, the, app. 320 Draperies, characteristics of, note 196 Drawing not a proper term for water-colour painting, note 299 Dry point, 192 Dryers, 203 Drying, difficulty among early painters of rendering their oil, 236 Drying panels in sun, 236 Dry-touching or dragging, 225 Duccio di Buoninsegna, 68 Diirer, Albert, 248 Dutch schools, 255 Dutch style, 258 E asel, the, 194 Easel pictures, 194 Eclectic school of the Carracci, 176 Eclectic style, 175 Egg- vehicle of tempera, 5 Egyptian art, filled character of, 31 Egyptian bas-relief, 32 Egyptian origin of Greek orna- ments, 31 Egyptian painted statues, &c., 34 Egyptian painters, 34 Egyptian painting, 30 Egyptian painting, inartistic, 36 Egyptian wall painting, 32 Ely, early records of decoration at, 236 Embroidery, Greek, 38, app. 325 Embroidery, painting in, app. 324 ■ Enamel incrustations of ancients, 83 INDEX, 331 EXA Enamelling on glass, 132 Enamel, miniature painting on, 107 Enamels, and enamel painting, 115 Enamels, champleve, 117 Enamels champleve, of Glaulish origin, 118 Enamels, cloisonne, 115 Enamels, incrusted, 115 Enamels, painted, of Limoges, 120 Enamels, translucid, upon relief, 119 Encaustai, 25 Encaustic, advantages of, 29 Encaustic, ancient method of, lost, 27 Encaustic in modern times, 75 Encaustic on ships, 28 Encaustic, or wax painting, 25 Engraving, origin of, 150 Eraclius, treatise of, 64 Etruscan painting, 38, 52 Evangelists, symbols of, 87 Execution, 226 Execution, masters remarkable for, 230 Execution, varieties possible in fresco, 148 Execution, varieties of in water-co- lour painting, 283 Eyxk, Van, amber varnish used by, 243 Eyck, Van, dryer of, 243 Eyck, Van, the greatest discovery of, 242 Eycks, the Van, our real obligations to, 232 Eycks, the Van, their principle of colouring, 252 Eycks, Van, which of the, effected the improvement in oil painting, 238 F AENZA ware, 127 Fayence, 127 Fig-tree juice, 5 Figure, the, app, 325 Finish, proper de^e of, 228 Fixing crayon paintings, app^ 327 Flatting oil paint, 238 Flemish and German, early schools, 245 Flemish painters, no secret among the early, 244 Flemish painters, technical methods of early, 251 Flemish pictures, characteristics of early, 231 Flemish schools, the later, 255 Florentine fresco, 142 Florentine or Tuscan school, 67, 147, 157, et passim Flower painters, Dutch, 260 Flux, of enamel, 110 GOL Flying draperies, note 196 Focal distance for viewing pictures, app. 314 Foreshortening, 39, note 39 Fomarina, the, 167, note 167 Framing and frames, app. 315 Francia, Francesco, 151 French school, 266 Fresco, characteristics of, 135 Fresco, conduct of a work in, 139 Fresco, did the ancients paint in true ? 144 Fresco in England, 180 Fresco in France, 179 Fresco in Germany, 177 Fresco in 15th century, 146 Fresco in Italy' in 17th and 18 th centuries, 173 Fresco in 19th century, 177 Fresco, joinings in, 143 Fresco, modes of painting allied to, 142 Fresco painting, 135 Fresco secco, 142 Frescoes, transferring from walls to cloth, 142 Fusion of tints, 15 G ainsborough, 278 Gaslight, painting by, 189, app. 325 Genre, 48, note 48 Genre, Dutch painters of, 258 German schools, early, 246 German schools, the later, 255 Gesso, 6, note 135, 213 Ghent, great altar-piece by Van Eycks at, 247, app. 320 Ghirlandajo Domenico, 148 Gilding, &c., 10 Giordano, Luca, 177, 265 Giorgione, 170 Giotto, 68 Giotto, pale colouring of, 22 Giotto, scholars and follow'ers of, 70 Glass painting, 129 Glass painting, defects of modern. 134 Glass, substitutes for, 130 Glazing, 222 Glories, 11, app. 323 Glo^ on pictures, 244 Gold, first imitated with colours, 11 Gold grounds of Byzantine mosaics, 84 Gold grounds of Campo Santo, 12 Gold grounds of oil painting, 15 Gold pounds of tempera, 7, 10 Gold in pictures, bad effect of, 11 Gold-leaf, 12 Gold on lights, 11 Gold, use of in antiquity, 10 332 INDEX. GOL Gold, use of, in Christian art, 10 Goldsmiths, several eminent artists, note 11 Gozzoli Benozzo, 147 Graphis, 47 Greek church, art in, 92, 95 Greek painting, 37 Greek painting, essential style of, 38 Greek painting in age of Alexander, 43 Greek painting, sculpturesque cha- racter of, 40 Greuze, 269 GrisaiUe, 123, note 123 Grisailles in glass, 133 Ground of early Flemish painters, non- absorbent, 251 Grounds, absorbent and non-absor- bent, 215 Grounds of, oil-paintings, 213 Grounds of tempera, 6, etseq. Guido, 175 Guilds of painters, 184 Gumtion, 200 H and, in benediction, %&,app. 324 Hand, drawing of, 14 Handling, 226 Hanging, 285, app. 313 Hangings, paintings on linen for, 9 Hatching, 15 Hieroglyphs, Egyptian, 35 High art, 2, 111, et passim Hogarth, 274 Hogarth, Mrs., note 274 Holbein, Hans, 250, 271 Honey, use of in tempera, 19 Horizontal line, 314 app. Hues, 8 ICONOCLASTS, the, 62, 90 X Ideal, the, 2 et passim Idolatry, Christian, 59, 62 Illuminating, art of, 100 Illusion in painting, 41 Imitation in painting, 1 et seq. Impasting and impasto, 223 Implements used in painting, 192 Indian painting, 91, 114 Indigo, 297 Ino, the Italian diminutive, note 71 Inquisition in Spain, influence on art, 261 Intonaco, 142 Ivory, effect of its grain, 287 Ivory, encaustic on, 26 Ivory, large sheets of, 108 Ivory, miniature painting on, 107 MAX JULIUS II., Pope, 156, 162, 165 K AUSIS, 25 Kit-cat canvases, 211 Kneller, Sir Godfrey, 273, 276 L ac vaenish, 207 Landscape painting. Northern, 259 Lanzi, 74 Large-letter writing, 102 Lasinio, 74 Last Judgment, 159 Last Supper, by L. da Vinci, 153, note 153 Lawrence, Sir Thomas, 279 Lay- figure or mannikin, 195 Leathery surface in oil paintings, cause of, 223 Le Brun, 268 Legends respecting the person of Christ, 60 Legitimacy of practice in water-co- lour painting, 292 Leisborn, Meister Von, 247 Lely, Sir Peter, 273 Lesche at Delphi, paintings in, 40 Leseur Eustache, 268 Lettres historiees, 102 Life, study from the, app. 325 Light for pictures, 287 Light of studio, effect of, on paint- ings, 192 Lime, used in ground, and as a pig- ment in fresco, 137 Limning, 101 Limoges, 118 Limousin enamellers, 123 Line, the, app. 314 Linen, studies on, 9 Linen, used to cover walls for paint- ing, 7 Lippi, Filippino, 147, 148 Lixivium, 28 Loading in oil painting, 223 Local colour, 8 Lombardic style, 93 Lombardy, schools of, 168 Longobards, the, 90 Luini, 154 M abuse, 251 Madder, 220, 288 Madonna, the, 88 Maesta, 86 Majolica, 126 Majolica-fina, 128 Majolica, did Eaphael paint on ? 128 Manipulations, 222 INDEX, 333 MAN Manner, 1, 226, etseq. Mantegna, Andrea, 149 MSS. Byzantine, 104 MSS. Carlovingian, 106 MSS. English, 106 MSS. in British Museum, 106 MS. Illuminations, historical sketch of, 104 MSS. Italian, 104 Mariolatry, 62, 86, 87, 88 Masaccio, 146 Mastic varnish, 205, 254 Maul-stick, the, 1 93 Mealiness in oil paintings, cause of, 225 Medallions in painted windows, 131 Medici, the, 146 Medium, 4, note 4 Meguilps, 200 Memling, 248 Memmi, Simone, 71 Mengs, Raphael, 177, 266 Messina Antonello da, 239, 253 Metsys, Quintin, 250 Mezza majolica, 127 Mezzo fresco, 142 Michael Angelo, 141, 155 Michael Angelo, scholars and imi- tators of, 160 ^lilanese school, 153 Millboard, 211, 283 Miniatori, 101, 102 Miniature, derivation of word, 101 Miniature painters, English, 112 Miniature painting, 100, 107 Miniature portraits, interest of. 111 Mirror, the, 295 Missal and other MS. illuminations, 100 Model, living, o/jp. 325 Models in clay and wax, use of, 140 Moist colours, note 290 Monochromatic Greek painting, 37 Monographic Greek painting, 37 Morales, Luis de, 261 Mordant, 12, note 12 Moresque, 53 Mosaic, definition of, 79 Mosaic glass windows, 83, 130, et seq. Mosaic, later histoiy of, 97 Mosaic, modern Italian manner of executing, 80 Mosaics, ancient, for pavements, 81 Mosaics, artistic character of, 84 Mosaics, Christian, 84, 89, 97 Mosaics, Florentine, note 81 Mosaics for walls, &c., 83 Mosaics, various kinds of, 82 Mosaicisti, celebrated, 95 Mosque of St. Sophia, 90 Motives in painting, 67, note 67 Mount, the, app. 315 Murillo, 265 PAL ATURALISTI, the, 177 Naturalistic style, 177 Navicella of Giotto, 98 Neapolitan schoj5l, 151, 176 Neutral tint, 299 Nicias, 47 Niello, 150 Nimbus, 12, app. 323 Northern art, characteristics of, 248 Notte, by Correggio, 169, 188 Nouches, 13 O BJECTIVE, 40 Oil, a drying, first mention of in connexion with painting, 233 Oil and distemper, mixed method of, 76 Oil painting, 184 Oil painting, introduction of, into Italy, 253 Oil painting, the modern discovery of, denied, 232 Oil painting practised before the Van Eycks, 230 Oil painting unknown to the an- cients, 33, 232 Oil thickened by early painters, 238 Oil varnish, injurious effect of, 209 Oil vehicles, yellow tendency of, 198, 202 Oiling out, 197 Oils, drying of, 202 Oils, fixed, 201 Oils, preparation of, 201 Oils, the various kinds, 201 Oils, volatile or essential, 203 Olio di Abesso, 207 Opaque painting, 223 Opus Anglicanum, app. 325 Orcagna, 71 Ornament, Arabian, derived from Byzantine art, 98 Ornamento, 13 Ornaments, Egyptian, conventional, 31 ^ Outline drawing among ancients, 46 Outhnes in ink. 7 Oxides, metallic, 109, 130, 203 P ADUAN school, 150 Painted Chamber,Westminster, 235 Painting compared with sculpture, 1 Painting, definition of, 1 Painting, origin of, 30 Painting-room, the, 185 Pala d’Oro, Venice, 98 Palaeography, 101 Palette, the, 193 Palette-knife, the, or spatula, 194 Palimpsest MSS., 101 334 INDEX. PAM Pamphilus, school of, 43 Panels, 210 Panels, Greeks painted on, 6 Panorama, app. 317 Paper, hot pressed, 282 Paper, oiled for sketch in^r, 211 Paper, tinted, 282, note 283 Paper, used in water-colour paint- ing, 281 Paper-windows in studios, 191 Parchment, &c., used to cover wood for painting, 7 Parma frescoes, 170 Parmegiano, 168 Parrhasius, 42 Pastel painting, app, 326 Pausias, 47 , Pencillias, 47 Pencilling, 226 Pencillum encaustic, 27 Persian painting, 91, 114 Perspective, aerial, 14, 267, 282 Perspective, first reduced to system, 147 Perugino Pietro, 151 Petits maltres, 124, 249 Photography on ivory, app. 312 Photography, auxiliary to art, app. 309 Photographs, tinted, app. 213 Photographic portraits, colouring of, app. 213 Photographic portraits, defects of, app. 311 Phylacteries, legends painted on, 133 Pictura translucida, 237 Picture cleaning, app. 315 Pictures, care of, app. 315 Pietre commesse, note 81 Pietre dure, note 81 Pigments distinguished from co- lours, 23 Pisa,Campo Santo at, 71, 74 Pisan cartoon, by M. Angelo, 154 Plaster, for fresco, 135 Plaster of Paris, note 136 Pliny, his Nat. Hist,, note 25 Polychromy, Greek, 51 Polygnotus, 40 Polyptych, 247, app. 320 Pompeii, paintings of, 55 Porcelain, painting on, 125 Porporino, 12 Pose of sitters, 194, 310, app. 325 Pottery, painting on, 125 Poussin, G., 267 Poussin, N., 266 Predella, app. 320 Preparations, 297 Pre-Raphaelitism, 2, 183, 191, 226, app. 327 Priming, 213, 215, 225, 2.35, 251 Processes and manipulations, 222 ST. p. Prophets of Sistine Chapel, 157 Proportions, human, Egyptian can- no of, 32 Proportions, human, Greek canon of, 49 Pugillares, app. 319 Putrido, painting a, 5 Q uattrocento, note i46, 153 Quills for brushes, 292 R aphael, i6i et passim Raphael, scholars and imi- tators of, 168 Raphael ware, 126 Ravenna, mosaics at, 88, 92 Red, 219 Reflected light in painting, 189 Relining pictures, app. 316 Reliquaries, 248, app. 321 Rembrandt, 186, 188, 252, 258 Renaissance, 124, 146 Replica, 188 Resins, various kinds of, used in varnishes, 204 Restoring pictures, app. 316 Retable, retablement, app. 320 Retouchings of fresco in tempera,! 44 Revival of painting in Italy in 13th century, 66 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 77, 275 Rhabdion, 26 Rhyparography, 48 Ribalta, 262 Ribera (Spagnoletto), 262 Richardson, Jonathan, 274 Roman arabesques, 53 Roman landscape painting, 53 Roman painting, 52 Roman picture collectors, 52 Roman portrait painting, 54 Roman school, 163, 170 Roman style, the later, 84 Romanesque style, 64, 97 Romano Giulio, 168 Romans, decline of art under, 53 Romantic element in northern art, 246 Rome, mosaics in, 92 Romney, 278 Rubens, 252, 255 Russian art, 95 S ACRA Conversazione, app. 321 St. Francis, incidents of life, favourite subject in early art, 70 St. Francis, artist order of, 68 St. Luke, patron of artists, 184 St. Peter Martyr, by Titian, 171, note 171 INDEX. 335 ST. M, St. Mark’s, Venice, 94 St. Stephen’s, Westminster, 235 Sta. Veronica, note 61 Sala di Constantino, 163 Sandarac, 21 , 205 Sandpaper, use of, in water-colour painting, 283 Sarto, Andiea del, 161 Scene painting, app. 316 Scenography, 39 Scholar and master in the Middle Ages, 184 School. See Bolognese, Early Fle- mish and German, later Flemish, German and Dutch, Venetian, Neapolitan, Lombardic, Eclectic of Caracci, Umbrian, Florentine, Sienese, Milanese, Paduan, Span- ish, French, British Scraping, use of, in water-colour painting, 283, 294 Scumbling, 224 Sebastiano del Piombo, 160 Sectilia, 80, 82 Selection and adaptation, 2 Self- colour, 8 Sfregazzi, 255 Sgraffiti, 26 Shadows, complementary to lights, 190, 252 Shadows, dark, in painting, 188 Shrines, 116, app, 321 Shrivelling of oil paint, 235 Sibyl, Delphic (Frontispiece), 157 Sibyls of Sistine Chapel. 157, note 158 Sicily, art under Normans in, 94 Sienese pictures, green tone of, 22 Sienese school, 68, 151 Signorelli, Luca, 149 Silver, use of, in staining glass, 132 Sinking in, note 197 Sistine Chapel, 151, 159 Sketch, coloured for fresco, 139 Sketches, advantage of paper for, 283 Skiagraphy, 37 Smalti, of coloured glass, 132 Smalti, of mosaics, 80 Smoky appearance in paintings, cause of, 225 Solvents, 204 Spagnoletto (Ribera), 177 Spanish schools, 260 Speciality in art, 69 Sponge, use of, in water-colour painting, 283 Squarcione, 149 Squares, use of, in copying, 140, 226 Stained glass, distinguished from painted glass, 130 Stanze of Raphael in Vatican, 162 Statue painting, 51 TYP Stephan, Meister, 246 Stereochrome, 301 Stereoscope, the, 310 app. Still-life, 48, note 46, 260 Stipple-engraving, 16 Stippling, 15 Stucco ornaments in pictures, 13 Studio, the, 1 85 Stumps, app. 327 Style, definition of, 1, 226, et seq. Style. See Academic, Naturalistic, Eclectic, Dutch, Romanesque, tlie later Roman, Byzantine, Lom- bardic Stylus, 47 Subjective, 40 Sudarium, note 61 Surface, inequalities of, in tempera, note 13 Surface in oil painting, 223 Symbols in Christian Art, 58, 87 T arsia work, 98 Tavola, 212 Tempera, 4 Tempera and oil, mixed method, 76 Tempera in modern times, 75 Temple painting, 51 Teniers, David, 259 Tesselation, 82, 85, 98 Tessera, 80, 82 Texture in oil painting, 223 Texture of paper in water-colour painting, 282 Theophilus, treatise of, 64 Thin painting, 224 Thornhill, Sir James, 274 Throne, the, 194 Timanthes, 42 Tintoretto, 172 Tints, 8 Titian, 170, 254 Tone, brown, of old masters, 199 Tone, 15, note 15, 204 Touch, 226 Touches, expression of, 229 Tracing, 8, 140 Transferring, 140 Transferring pictures from panel to canvas, app. 316 Transfiguration, by Raphael, 187, 212 Transparencies, 9 et seq. Transparent painting, 223 Triptychs, 297, app. 319 Tubes, colours in, note 291 Turner, 78, 218, 280, 297 Turpentine, concrete, 204 Turpentine, spirits of, 203 Types, in art, 31, 58, 60, 91 Typical style, in Christian art, 58 336 INDEX, ZUB ULT U LTRAMARINE (blue), 220 Umbrian school, 72 V ANDYKE, 256 Varlets, artistsformeiiy classed as, 237 Varnish of Greek painter, 20 Varnish of tempera pictures, 19 Varnish, use of, with colours, 207 Varnishes of Egyptians, 35 Varnishes, comparative durability of, 208 Varnishes, various kinds of, 204 Varnishing, 204, 208 Varnishing, injudicious, 210 Varnishing, proper time for, 209 Varro, Marco, portraits inserted in the writings of, 83 Vasari, 75 Vasari, his account of Van Eyck’s improvement, 240 Vase painting, Etruscan, 38, 52 Vase painting, Greek, 38, 39, 47, 48 Vatican, frescoes in, by Raphael, 162 Vehicle of oil painting not likely to have been suddenly discovered, 231 Vehicles of missal painting, 103 Vehicles of oil painting, 197 Vehicles of tempera, 4 Vehicles, note 4, 197 Velasquez, 264 Velatura, 255 Venetian school, 150, 170 Venetians, technical methods of, 254, 255 Vernice liquida, 21, 243 Vernix, derivation and early use of word, 21, 234 Veronese, Paul, 173, 255 Vesica piscis, app. 324 Vinci, Leonardo da, 153, note 154 Virgin tints, advantage of, 225 Viriculum, 26 Volterra, Daniele da, 160 Vouet, Simon, 266 W ALLS, proper for frescoes, 138 Walpole, 234, 272, 275 Washing pictures, app. 315 Water-colour painting, 281 Water-colour painting, rise of, 298 Water-glass, 301 Watteau, 269 Wax in mummy-cloths, 28 Wax painting, revival of, in France and Germany, 76 Wax painting, or encaustic, 25 Wax, used for varnishing walls and statues, 29 Westminster, early records of deco- rations at, 234 Westminster, the Palace, frescoes in, 181 White, 219,289, wo