Chapter XLIX: J. M. WHISTLER--Lillie in Our Alley 328 (3)

Two large altar pictures still claim our attention; they also belong to Raphael's later period. One is the _Christ Bearing the Cross_, in Madrid, known by the name of _Lo Spasimo di Sicilia_, from the convent of Santa Maria dello Spasimo at Palermo, for which it was painted. Here, as in the tapestries, we again find a finely conceived development of the event, and an excellent composition. The other is the _Transfiguration_, now in the Vatican, formerly in S. Pietro at Montorio.

PORTRAIT OF BALDASSARE CASTIGLIONE

_Louvre, Paris_]

This was the last work of the master (left unfinished at his death); the one which was suspended over his coffin, a trophy of his fame, for public homage.

"I cannot believe myself in Rome," wrote Count Castiglione, on the death of the master, "now that my poor Raphael is no longer here." Men regarded his works with religious veneration as if God had revealed himself through Raphael as in former days through the prophets. His remains were publicly laid out on a splendid catafalque, while his last work, the _Transfiguration_, was suspended over his head. He was buried in the Pantheon, under an altar adorned by a statue of the Holy Virgin, a consecration offering from Raphael himself. Doubts having been raised as to the precise spot, a search was made in the Pantheon in 1833, and Raphael's bones were found; the situation agreeing exactly with Vasari's description of the place of interment. On the 18th of October, in the same year, the relics were reinterred in the same spot with great solemnities.

* * * * *

The schools of Lombardy and the Emilia, which derive their characteristics from Florentine rather than from Venetian influences, may here be briefly mentioned before turning to the consideration of the Venetian School. In 1482, it will be remembered, Leonardo went to Milan, where he remained till the end of the century; and the extent of his influence may be judged from many of the productions of BERNADINO LUINI (1475-1532) and GIOVANNI ANTONIO BAZZI, known as SODOMA (1477-1549). Of AMBROGIO DI PREDIS we have already heard in connection with the painting of our version of Leonardo's _Virgin of the Rocks_. GIOVANNI ANTONIO BOLTRAFFIO (1467-1516) was a pupil of VINCENZO FOPPA, but he soon abandoned the manner of the old Lombard School, and came under the influence of the great Florentine, of whom he became a most enthusiastic disciple.

More independent--indeed, he is officially characterised as "an isolated phenomenon in Italian Art"--was ANTONIO ALLEGRI, commonly called CORREGGIO, from the place of his birth. In 1518 he settled at Parma, where he remained till 1530, so that he is usually catalogued as of the School of Parma, which for an isolated phenomenon serves as well as any other. Of late years his popularity has been somewhat diminished by the increasing demands of private collectors for works which are purchasable, and most of Correggio's are in public galleries. At Dresden are some of the most famous, notably the _Nativity_, called "La Notte," from its wonderful scheme of illumination, and two or three large altar-pieces. The _Venus Mercury and Cupid_ in our National Gallery, though sadly injured, is still one of his masterpieces. It was purchased by Charles I. with the famous collection of the Duke of Mantua. Our _Ecce Homo_ is entitled to rank with it, as is also the little _Madonna of the Basket_.

MERCURY, CUPID, AND VENUS

_National Gallery, London_]

_VENETIAN SCHOOLS_

I

THE VIVARINI AND BELLINI

In Venice the Byzantine style appears to have offered a more stubborn resistance to the innovators than in Tuscany, or, in fact, in any other part of Italy. Few, if any, of the allegorical subjects with which Giotto and his scholars decorated whole buildings are to be found here, and the altar pictures retain longer than anywhere else the gilt canopied compartments and divisions, and the tranquil positions of single figures. It was not until a century after the death of Cimabue and Duccio that the real development of the Venetian School was manifested, so that when things did begin to move the conditions were not the same, and the results accordingly were something substantially different.

The influence of the Byzantine style still hangs heavily over the work of NICOLO SEMITECOLO, who was working in Venice in the middle of the fourteenth century, as may be seen in the great altar-piece ascribed to him in the Academy--the Coronation of the Virgin with fourteen scenes from the life of Christ. In this work there is little of the general advancement visible in other parts of Italy. It corresponds most nearly with the work of Duccio of Siena, though without attaining his excellence; while the gold hatchings and olive brown tones are still Byzantine.

An altar-piece, by MICHELE GIAMBONO, also in the Academy, painted during the first half of the fifteenth century, shows a more decided advance, and even anticipates some of the later excellences of the Venetian School. The drapery is in the long and easy lines which we see in the Tuscan pictures of the period, and what is especially significant, in view of the subsequent development of Venetian painting, the colouring is rich, deep, and transparent, and the flesh tints unusually soft and warm. This is signed by Giambono, and is one of his most important works, as well as the most complete, as it exists in its original state as an _ancona_ or altar-piece divided into compartments by canopies of joiners' work. It is unusual in form, inasmuch as the central panel, though slightly larger than the pair on either side, contains but a single figure. This figure was generally supposed to be the Saviour, but it has recently been pointed out that it is S. James the Great, the others being SS. John the Evangelist, Philip Benizi, Michael, and Louis of Toulouse. Some of Giambono's finest work was in mosaic, and the walls and roof of the Cappella de'Mascoli in S. Mark's may be regarded as the highest achievement in mosaic of the early Venetian School. While this species of decoration had given place to fresco painting elsewhere, it was here, in 1430, brought to a pitch of perfection by Giambono which entitles this work to a prominent place in the history of painting.

But the two chief pioneers of the early fifteenth century were Giovanni, or JOHANNES ALAMANUS, and ANTONIO DA MURANO. The former appears from his surname to have been of German origin, the latter belonged to the family of VIVARINI, and they used to work together on the same pictures. Two excellent examples of this combination are in the Academy at Venice. The one, dated 1440, is a Coronation of the Virgin, with many figures, including several boys, and numerous saints seated. In the heads of the saints we may trace the hand of Alamanus, in the Germanic type of countenance which recalls the style of Stephen of Cologne. A repetition of this, if it is not actually the original, is in S. Pantalone at Venice. The other picture, dated 1446, of enormous dimensions, represents the Virgin enthroned, beneath a canopy sustained by angels, with the four Fathers of the Church at her side. The colouring is fully as flowing and splendid as that of Giambono.

We do not recognise here, as Kugler rightly observes, the influence of the school of Giotto, but rather the types of the Germanic style gradually assuming a new character, possibly owing to the social condition of Venice itself. There was something perhaps in the nature of a rich commercial aristocracy of the middle ages calculated to encourage that species of art which offered the greatest splendour and elegance to the eye; and this also, if possible, in a portable form; thus preferring the domestic altar or the dedication picture to wall decorations in churches. The contemporary Flemish paintings, under similar conditions, exhibit analogous results. With regard to colour, the depth and transparency observable in the works of the old Venetian School had long been a distinguishing feature in the Byzantine paintings on wood, and may therefore be traceable to this source without assuming an influence on the part of Padua, or from the north through Giovanni Alamanus.

The two side panels of an altar-piece, representing severally SS. Peter and Jerome, and SS. Francis and Mark, now in the National Gallery (Nos. 768 and 1284), are ascribed to Antonio Vivarini alone, though the centre panel, the Virgin and Child, now in the Poldi Pezzoli collection at Milan is said to be the joint work of Alamanus and Antonio. However that may be, there is no longer any dispute about the fascinating Adoration of the Kings in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum at Berlin, formerly supposed to be the work of Gentile da Fabriano, but now catalogued as that of Antonio.

In 1450 the name of Alamanus disappears altogether, and that of BARTOLOMMEO VIVARINI, Antonio's younger brother, replaces it in an inscription upon the great altar-piece commissioned by Pope Nicholas V. in commemoration of Cardinal Albergati, now in the Pinacoteca of Bologna. The change is noticeable as introducing the Paduan influence of Squarcione, under whom Bartolommeo had studied, instead of the northern influence of Alamanus, into Antonio's workshop, and while this work of 1450, as might be supposed, bears a general resemblance to that of 1446, the change of partnership is at least perceptible, and had a determining influence on the development of the Venetian style.

A slightly earlier work of Bartolommeo alone is a Madonna and Child belonging to Sir Hugh Lane, signed and dated 1448. An altar-piece in the Venice Academy is dated 1464, a Madonna and Four Saints, in the Frari, 1482, and S. Barbara, in the Academy, 1490. Bartolommeo is supposed to have died in 1499.

ALVISE, or LUIGI, VIVARINI was the son of Antonio, and though he worked under him and his uncle Bartolommeo, as well as under Giovanni Bellini, the Paduan influence is apparent in his work. He was born in 1447, and his first dated work is an altar-piece at Montefiorentino, in 1475. In the Academy at Venice is a Madonna dated 1480, and at Naples a Madonna with SS. Francis and Bernard, 1485. Another Madonna at Vienna is dated 1489, and the large altar-piece in the Basilica at the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin is assigned to about the same time. This is the first of his works in which the influence of Bellini rather than that of his family is traceable, while of the "Redentore" Madonna at Venice, of about five years later, Mr Bernhard Bernson says that, "As a composition no work of the kind by Giovanni Bellini even rivals it." In 1498 he had advanced so far as to be spoken of as anticipating Giorgione and Titian, in the effect of light and in the roundness and softness of the figures of the _Resurrection_, at Bragora. His last work, the altar-piece at the Frari, was completed after his death in 1504 by his pupil Basaiti. Bartolommeo Montagna, Jacopo da Valenza and Lorenzo Lotto were the chief of his other pupils.

In connection with the Vivarini must be mentioned CARLO CRIVELLI, who studied with Bartolommeo under Antonio and Squarcione. But there was something fierce and uncongenial about Crivelli which takes him out of the main body of Venetian painters, and seems to have given him more pride in being made a knight than in his pictorial achievements, remarkable as they were. In his ornamentation of every detail with gold and jewels he recalls the style of Antonio Vivarini, but while the master used it as accessory merely, Crivelli positively revelled in it. An inventory of the precious stones, ornaments, fruits and flowers, and other detached items in the great "Demidoff Altar-Piece" in the National Gallery would fill several pages. Of the eight examples in this gallery the earliest is probably the _Dead Christ_, presumably painted in 1472. The Demidoff altar-piece is dated 1476. The _Annunciation_ (No. 739), which may be considered his masterpiece, was ten years later. In 1490 Crivelli was knighted by Prince Ferdinand of Capua, and from that date onward he was careful to add to his signature the title _Miles_--as appears in our _Madonna and Child Enthroned_, with SS. Jerome and Sebastian--called the Madonna della Rondine:----

CAROLUS CRIVELLUS VENETUS MILES PINXIT. This was painted for the Odoni Chapel in S. Francesco at Matelica, the coat of arms of the family being painted on the step.

Our _Annunciation_ was executed for the convent of the Santissima Annunziata at Ascoli, and is dated 1486. Three coats of arms on the front of the step at the bottom of the picture are those of the Bishop of Ascoli, Pope Innocent VII., the reigning Pontiff, and the City of Ascoli. Between these are the words _Libertas Ecclesiastica_, in allusion to the charter of self-government given in 1482 by the Pope to the citizens of Ascoli. The patron saint of the city, S. Emidius, is represented as a youth kneeling beside the Archangel, holding in his hands a model of it. The Virgin is seen through the open door of a house, and in an open loggia above are peacocks and other birds. Amid all the rich detail, the significance of the group of figures at the top of a flight of steps must not be missed, amongst which a child and a poet are the only two who are represented as noticing the mystic event.

Another painter of the earlier half of the fourteenth century may be mentioned here, though as he was more famous as a medallist his influence on the main course of painting is not observable. VITTORE PISANO, called PISANELLO, was born in Verona before 1400, and died in 1455. Of the few pictures attributed to him we are fortunate in having two such beautiful examples as the _SS. Anthony and George_ and _The Vision of S. Eustace_ in the National Gallery. Both exhibit his two most noticeable characteristics, namely, the minute care and exquisite feeling that made him the most famous of medallists, and his wonderful drawing of animals. The latter, it is worth remarking, was attributed by a former owner to Albert Duerer. The other is signed "Pisanus"; in the frame are inserted casts of two of his medals, representing Leonello d'Este, his patron, and a profile of himself.

Another very considerable factor in the development of Venetian painting was the influence of GENTILE DA FABRIANO (_c._ 1360-1430), who settled in Venice in the latter part of his life, and there formed the closest intimacy with Antonio Vivarini. The remarkable _Adoration of the Kings_ in the Berlin Museum was until lately given to Gentile, though it is now catalogued as the work of Antonio. Of Gentile's education little is known, and of the numerous works which he executed at Fabriano, in Rome and in Venice very few have survived. From those that exist, however, we can form an estimate of his talents and of the difference between his earlier and later styles. To the first belong a fresco of the Madonna in the Cathedral at Orvieto, and the beautiful picture of the Madonna and saints which is now in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum at Berlin. Also the fine _Adoration of the Kings_, inscribed with his name and the date 1423, formerly in the sacristy of S. Trinita at Florence, and now in the Accademia. This, his masterpiece, is one of the finest conceptions of the subject as well as one of the most excellent productions of the schools descended from Giotto. Of his later period the _Coronation of the Virgin_ (called the _Quadro della Romita_) in the Brera gallery at Milan is one of the finest. In many respects his work is like that of Fra Angelico, and was aptly characterised by Michelangelo when he said that "Gentile's pictures were like his name." Apart from the influence of the Paduan School, which will next be noticed, the Venetian owed most to Gentile da Fabriano, if only as the master of Jacopo Bellini, whose son, Giovanni Bellini, may be regarded as the real head of the Venetian School as developed by his pupils Giorgione and Titian at the opening of the sixteenth century.

Whether or not Giotto left any actual pupils in Padua after completing the frescoes in the chapel of the arena there, it must be admitted that the older school of painting in Padua, which centred round the church containing the body of S. Anthony, was an offshoot of the Florentine, and that as Giotto was the great leader in Florence he must be considered the same here; though his followers differ so much from each other in style that beyond their indebtedness to their founder they have no distinctive feature in common. But with the opening of the fifteenth century one particular tendency was developed under the fostering influence of FRANCESCO SQUARCIONE, born in 1394, which affected in a very sensible degree the style of the great painters of the next generation in Venice. This, in a word, was the cult of the antique.

Among the Florentines, as we have seen, the study of form was chiefly pursued on the principle of direct reference to nature, the especial object in view being an imitation in two dimensions of the actual appearances and circumstances of life existing in three. In the Paduan School it now came to be very differently developed, namely, by the study of the masterpieces of antique sculpture, in which the common forms of nature were already raised to a high ideal of beauty. This school has consequently the merit, as Kugler points out, of applying the rich results of an earlier, long-forgotten excellence in art to modern practice. Of a real comprehension of the idealising principle of classic art there does not appear any trace; what the Paduans borrowed from the antique was limited primarily to mere outward beauty. Accordingly in the earliest examples we find the drapery treated according to the antique costume, and the general arrangement more resembling bas-relief than rounded groups. The accessories display in like manner a special attention to antique models, particularly in the architecture, and the frequent introduction of festoons of fruit; while the exaggerated sharpness in the marking of the forms due to the combined influence of the study of the antique and the naturalising tendency of the time, sometimes borders on excess.

The immediate cause of this almost sudden outbreak of the cult of the antique--whatever natural forces were behind it--was the visit of Squarcione to Greece, and Southern Italy, to collect specimens of the remains of ancient art. On his return to Padua his collection soon attracted a great number of pupils anxious to avail themselves of the advantages it offered; and by these pupils, who poured in from all parts of Italy, the manner of the school was afterwards spread throughout a great portion of the country. Squarcione himself is better known as a teacher than as an artist, the few of his remaining works being of no great importance. There is no example in the National Gallery, but of the work of his great pupil, Mantegna, we have as much, at any rate, as will serve to commemorate the master.

ANDREA MANTEGNA was born at Vicenza in 1431, and when no more than ten years old was inscribed in the guild of Padua as pupil and adopted son of Squarcione. As early as 1448 he had painted an altar-piece for Santa Sophia, now lost, and in 1452 the fresco in San Antonio. In 1455 he was engaged with Nicolo Pizzolo (Donatello's assistant), and others, on the six frescoes in the Eremitani Church at Padua. The whole of the left side of the chapel of SS. James and Christopher--the life of S. James--and the martyrdom of S. Christopher are his, and in these, his earliest remaining works, we already see the result of pedantic antiquarianism combined with his extraordinary individuality.

In 1460 he went to Mantua, where he remained for the greater part of his life, visiting Florence in 1466 and Rome in 1488.

Among his earlier works are the small _Adoration of the Kings_ in the Uffizi at Florence, the _Death of the Virgin_ and the _S. George_ in the Venice Academy. From 1484 to 1494 he was intermittently engaged on the nine great cartoons of _The Triumph of Caesar_, which are now at Hampton Court, having been acquired by Charles I. with many other gems from the Duke of Mantua's collection. On the completion of these he painted the celebrated _Madonna della Vittoria_, now in the Louvre--a large altar-piece representing a Madonna surrounded by saints, with Francesco Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, and his wife, kneeling at her feet. It is a dedication picture for a victory obtained over Charles VIII. of France in 1495. It is no less remarkable for its superb execution than for a softer treatment of the flesh than is usual in Mantegna's work. Two other pictures in the Louvre are, however, distinguished by similar qualities--the _Parnassus_, painted in 1497, and the _Triumph of Virtue_.

THE MADONNA DELLA VITTORIA

_Louvre, Paris_]

In our own collection we have _The Agony in the Garden_, painted in 1459--to which I shall refer presently--two monochrome paintings (Nos. 1125 and 1145), the beautiful _Virgin and Child Enthroned_, with SS. Mary Magdalen and John the Baptist, which is comparable with the more famous Louvre _Madonna_, and, lastly, the _Triumph of Scipio_, in monochrome, painted for Francesco Cornaro, a Venetian nobleman, completed in 1506, only a few months before the painter's death. In this we see that Mantegna's antiquarianism was not simply a youthful phase, but lasted till the very end of his career. The subject is the reception of the Phrygian mother of the gods among the recognised divinities of the Roman State, as is indicated on the plinth by the inscription. In the centre is Claudia Quinta about to kneel before the bust of the goddess. Behind is Scipio, and in the background are monuments to his family. The composition includes twenty-two figures. It is significant that the subject and its treatment are so entirely classic as only to be appreciated by references to Latin literature.

Another significance attaches to the _Agony in the Garden_ above mentioned, which is one of the very earliest, as the _Scipio_ is the very latest, of Mantegna's pictures, being painted before he left Padua to go to Mantua. In this we find that the original suggestion for the design appears to have been taken from a drawing in the sketch-book of his father-in-law, Jacopo Bellini, which is now in the British Museum; and the same design appears to have served Giovanni Bellini in the composition of the picture in our gallery (No. 726). This takes us back to Venice, and accounts for the Paduan influence traceable in the works of the Bellini family and their pupils.

JACOPO BELLINI, whose considerable talents have been somewhat obscured by the fame of his two sons, Gentile and Giovanni, was originally a pupil of Gentile da Fabriano, after whom he named his eldest son. He was working in Padua in the middle of the fifteenth century, in rivalry with Squarcione, and in 1453 his daughter Nicolosia married Andrea Mantegna. Thus it happened that both of his sons came under the influence of Mantegna, and evidently, too, of the sculptor Donatello, when working at Padua between 1450 and 1460.

Very few authentic pictures by Jacopo are known to us. _A Crucifixion_ (much repainted) was in the sacristy of the Episcopal Palace at Verona; and another, which recalls the treatment of his master, Gentile da Fabriano, at Lovere, near Bergamo. In the sketch-book above mentioned, the contents of which consist of sacred subjects, and studies from the antique, both in architecture and in costume, we see the peculiar tendency of the Paduan School expressed in the most complete and comprehensive manner. These drawings constitute the most remarkable link of connection between Mantegna and the sons of Jacopo Bellini, all three of whom must have studied from them. The book was inherited by Gentile on his mother's death, and bequeathed by him to his brother on condition that he should finish the picture of _S. Mark_, on which Gentile was engaged at the time of his death.

GIOVANNI BELLINI was born in 1428 or 1430 and lived to 1516. Albert Duerer, writing from Venice in 1506, says that "he is very old, but is still the best in painting."

The greater number of Bellini's pictures are to be found in the galleries and churches in Venice, all of those which are dated being the work of his old age. Of his earlier pictures we are fortunate in having two fine examples in the National Gallery, _Christ's Agony in the Garden_ (No. 726) and _The Blood of the Redeemer_ (No. 1233). In both of these the influence of his famous brother-in-law Andrea Mantegna, is traceable,--the former being till lately attributed to him. Both Giovanni and Gentile worked in Padua, where Mantegna was established, in 1460 or thereabouts, and where another influence, that of the sculptor Donatello, must have had its effect on the young brothers. Similar in character, and even more beautiful in some respects, is the _Redeemer_, a single half figure in a landscape, recently acquired for the Louvre--the first authentic example of the master in that collection.

In 1464, Giovanni had returned to Venice, and it was some years before the severe Paduan influence melted before "the sensuous feeling of the true Venetian temperament." In 1475, however, the arrival of Antonello da Messina in Venice, bringing with him the practice of painting in oil, effected a revolution, in which Giovanni, if not one of the foremost, was certainly one of the most successful in adopting the new method. His later works, so far from showing any diminution of power, may be said to anticipate the Venetian style of the sixteenth century in the clearest manner. One of the chief, dated 1488, is the large altar-piece in the sacristy of S. Maria di Frari, a _Madonna Enthroned_ with two angels and four saints. The two little angels are of the utmost beauty; the one is playing on a lute, and listens with head inclined to hear whether the instrument is in tune; the other is blowing a pipe. The whole is perfectly finished and of a splendid effect of colour. To the year 1486 belongs a _Madonna Enthroned with Six Saints_, now in the Academy at Venice. The famous head of the Doge Loredano in the National Gallery must have been painted in or after 1501. In 1507, he completed the large picture of _S. Mark Preaching at Alexandria_, now in the Brera Gallery at Milan, begun by his brother Gentile. Within three years of his death, namely in 1513, he could produce such a masterwork as the altar-piece in S. Giovanni Crisostomo. His last work, the landscape in which was finished by Titian, is dated 1514. This is the famous _Bacchanal_ now in the collection of the Duke of Northumberland.

The influence of Bellini on the Venetian School was paramount, and his noble example helped more than anything else to develop the excellences observable in the works of Cimada Conegliano, Vincenzo Catena, Lorenzo Lotto, Palma Vecchio and Basaiti, to say nothing of his great pupils Titian and Giorgione. It is impossible to conjecture what course the genius of this younger generation would have taken without his guidance, but when we consider that in 1500 Bellini was seventy years old, and had stored within his mind the experience of his early association with his brother-in-law Andrea Mantegna in Padua, the introduction of the use of oil paints by Antonello da Messina in 1475, since which date he had sedulously developed the new practice; when we also take into account the dignity and gravity of his own works, and the indication they afford of the man himself, it is not difficult to judge how much his pupils and successors owed to him.

The works of GENTILE BELLINI, the elder brother of Giovanni, are of less importance, but of considerable interest, especially in view of his journey to Constantinople in 1479 at the request of the Sultan, whose portrait he painted there in the following year. A replica

THE DOGE LOREDANO

_National Gallery, London_]

of this portrait has been bequeathed to the National Gallery by Sir Henry Layard, and it is to be hoped that the difficulties raised by the Italian government as to its removal from Venice will shortly be overcome. The picture of _S. Mark Preaching at Alexandria_ already mentioned as having been finished by Giovanni, is remarkable for the Oriental costumes of all the figures in it. Gentile's pictures are often ascribed to his brother; in two examples at the National Gallery (Nos. 808 and 1440) there is actually a false signature on a cartellino. In the latter instance Messrs Ludwig and Molmenti are still of opinion that the picture is the work of Giovanni.

VINCENZO CATENA (_c._ 1470-1530) is not known to have been a pupil of Bellini, but he began by so modelling his style upon him that one of his works in the National Gallery was until quite lately officially ascribed to him, namely the _S. Jerome in his Study_. Another, a later work, _A Warrior Adoring the Infant Christ_ was similarly ascribed to Giorgione. This is a proof that Catena was very susceptible to various influences, and was "an artist of extraordinary suppleness of mind, never too old to learn or to appreciate new ideals and new sentiments." In a manner more his own is the _Madonna with Four Saints_ in the Berlin Gallery (No. 19). The _S. Jerome_ and the _Warrior_ are among the most popular pictures in the National Gallery--partly perhaps on account of their supposed illustrious parentage, but by no means entirely. A painter who could so absorb the characteristics of two such masters must needs be a master himself.

CIMA DA CONEGLIANO, so called from his birthplace in Friuli--the rocky height of which serves as a background in some of his pictures--settled in Venice in 1490, when he was about thirty years old. The influence of Bellini may be seen in the temperamental as well as the technical qualities of his work, which is distinguished by sound drawing and proportion, fine and brilliant colour, as well as by sympathetic types of countenance. One of his best and earliest pictures is the _S. John the Baptist_ with four other saints, in Santa Maria del Orto in Venice. Another is the _Madonna with S. Jerome and S. Louis_, now in the Vienna Gallery. A smaller but peculiarly attractive piece is the _S. Anianus of Alexandria_ healing a shoemaker's wounded hand, at Berlin, distinguished for its beautiful clear colours and the life-like character of the heads.

ANDREA PREVITALI, born in Bergamo in 1480, came to Venice to study under Bellini, whom he succeeded in imitating with remarkable success. _The Mystic Marriage of S. Catherine_ (No. 1409) in the National Gallery was formerly attributed to Bellini. If he had not the originality to carry the art any farther, his pictures are nevertheless a decided and very agreeable proof of the advance that was being made in it at the beginning of the sixteenth century, before the full splendour of Giorgione and Titian had unfolded.

MARCO BASAITI, though probably not a pupil of Bellini, nevertheless acquired many of his characteristics. The picture in the National Gallery known as _The Madonna of the Meadow_ was until lately assigned to Bellini, and another of his, in the Giovanelli Palace at Venice, which is identical in technique, tone, and general effect with this one, is still so ascribed. Whether or not he learnt from Bellini, he was certainly an assistant to Alvise Vivarini, on whose death he completed the large altar-piece in the Church of S. Maria de Friari at Venice, representing _S. Ambrose surrounded by Saints_. His _Christ on the Mount of Olives_ and _The Calling of Zebedee_, both dated 1510, are now in the Academy at Venice, and together with the _Portrait of a Man_, dated 1521, in the Bergamo Gallery, and _The Assumption_ in S. Pietro Martire at Murano, may be considered his best performances.

More remote from Bellini, yet not so far as to be entirely free from his influence in some of their more important compositions, was the school formed by LAZZARO DI BASTIANI or SEBASTIANI, of which the chief ornament was Vittore Carpaccio, and among the lesser ones Giovanni Mansueti and Benedetto Diana. The history of this independent group of painters has only of late years been elucidated; Kugler, after a page devoted to Carpaccio, dismissed them with the remark that Mansueti and Bastiani were both pupils of Carpaccio, and that Benedetto Diana was "less distinguished." Our national collection was without any example until 1896, when Mansueti's _Symbolic representation of the Crucifixion_ was purchased. In 1905 the National Art-Collections Fund secured Bastiani's _Virgin and Child_, and in 1910 Sir Claude Phillips presented Diana's _Christ Blessing_. Alas! that we are still without anything from the hand of Vittore Carpaccio. Seven portraits by Moroni do not fill a gap like this.

The name of Lazzaro de Bastiani first occurs in Venice as a witness to his brother's will in 1449, and as early as 1460 he was painting an altar-piece for the Church of San Samuele. Ten years later, the brothers of the Scuolo di San Marco ordered a picture of the _Story of David_ from him, promising him the same payment as they gave to Jacobo Bellini, who had been working for them with his two sons Gentile and Giovanni. In 1474, another proof of his rank and repute as a painter is afforded by a letter from a gentleman in Constantinople, asking for a picture by him, but that Giovanni Bellini should paint it in the event of Bastiani being already dead. He was thus, it would seem, preferred to Bellini, though it will be remembered that five years later, when the Sultan expressed the wish that a distinguished portrait-painter should be sent him from Venice, it was Gentile Bellini who was nominated. All the same, Gentile was a portrait-painter, and Bastiani was not; and it is fairly evident that the latter was at least in the front rank. One of his best-known pictures the _Vergine dai begli occhi_ in the Ducal Palace at Venice used to be attributed to Giovanni Bellini; but though he appears to have drawn inspiration for his larger and more important compositions from Jacobo Bellini, his style was chiefly developed through that of Giambono. His most important work is now in the Academy at Vienna--an altar-piece painted for the Church of Corpus Domini, Venice, _S. Veneranda Enthroned_. In the Imperial Gallery at Vienna are a _Last Communion_ and _Funeral of S. Girolamo_. In the Academy at Venice are _S. Anthony of Padua_, seated between the branches of a walnut-tree, with Cardinal Bonaventura and Brother Leo on either side, a large picture of a _Miracle of the Holy Cross_, and a remarkable rendering of _The Madonna Kneeling_, the child being laid under an elaborate canopy. An _Entombment_ in the Church of S. Antonino at Venice is reminiscent of Giovanni Bellini at his best.

In 1508, the name of VITTORE CARPACCIO occurs with that of Bastiani in connection with the frescoes of Giorgione upon the facade of the Fondaco de Tedeschi, about which there was a dispute. To Carpaccio we are indebted for the most vivid realization of the contemporary life of Venice; for although his subjects were nominally taken from sacred history or legend, they are treated in a thoroughly secular fashion, giving the clearest idea of the buildings, people, and costume of the Venice of his time, with the greatest variety and richest development. His object is not only to represent single events, but a complete scene, and while we observe this characteristic in one or two pictures by the Bellini, Carpaccio not only shows it much oftener, but carries it to a much fuller development--possibly influenced by the Netherlandish masters.

Many of his works are in the Academy at Venice; eight large pictures, painted between 1490 and 1495, represent the history of S. Ursula and the eleven thousand virgins. Such a wealth of charming material might have embarrassed a less capable painter, but "the monotonous incident which forms the groundwork of many of them," as Kugler coldly puts it, "is throughout varied and elevated by a free style of grouping and by happy moral allusions." Another series is that of the _Miracles of the Holy Cross_, among which may be especially noticed the cure of a man possessed by a devil; the scene is laid in the loggia of a Venetian palace, and is watched from below by a varied group of figures on the Canal and its banks. Larger and broader treatment may be seen in the _Presentation in the Temple_, painted in 1510, which is also in the Academy, and in the altar-piece of _S. Vitale_, dated 1514. This last brings Carpaccio into closer comparison with the later Venetian painters, being in the nature of a _Santa Conversazione_, where the holy personages are grouped in some definite relation to each other, and not independent figures.

PALMA VECCHIO (1480-1528), so called to distinguish him from Giacomo Palma the younger--Palma Giovane,--was so much influenced by Giorgione and Titian that his indebtedness to Bellini appears to have been comparatively slight. The beautiful _Portrait of a Poet_ in the National Gallery has been attributed both to Giorgione and to Titian.

The number of pictures which are now permitted by the experts to be called Giorgione's is so small, that we may learn more about him as an influence on the work of other painters--especially Titian--than from the meagre materials available for his own biography. The only unquestioned examples of his work are three pictures at the Uffizi, _The Trial of Moses_, _The Judgment of Solomon_, and _The Knight of Malta_; the _Venus_ at Dresden; _The Three Philosophers_ at Vienna; and the famous _Concert Champetre_ in the Louvre. But until the critics deprive him even of these, we are able to agree that "his capital achievement was the invention of the modern spirit of lyrical passion and romance in pictorial art, and his magical charm has never been equalled."

II

TIZIANO VECELLIO

TITIAN occupies almost, if not quite, as important a place in the history of painting as does Shakespeare in that of literature. His fame, his popularity, the wide range as well as the immense quantity of his works, entitle him to be ranked with our poet, if only for the

VENETIAN PASTORAL

_Louvre, Paris_]

enormous influence they have both exercised on posterity: and without carrying the parallel farther than the limits imposed by the difference of their circumstances and their method of expression, it may fairly be said that Titian, in painting, stands for us to-day much as Shakespeare stands for in letters. "Titian," says M. Caro Delvaille,[2] "is the father of modern painting. As the blood of the patriarchs of old infused the veins of a whole race, so the genius of the most productive of painters was destined to infuse those of artists through all the ages even to the present day. He bequeathed, in his enormous _oeuvre_, a heritage in which generations of painters have participated."

Not only was he the father of modern painting, but he was himself the first modern painter, just as Shakespeare was, to all present intents and purposes, the first modern writer. Among a thousand readers of Shakespeare, there is possibly not more than one who has ever read a line of Chaucer, or who has ever heard of any of his other predecessors. So it is with Titian. To the connoisseur, Titian is one of the latest painters; to the public he is the earliest. "In certain of his portraits," we read in the National Gallery Catalogue, "he ranks with the supreme masters; in certain other aspects he is seen as the greatest academician, as perhaps he was the first."

As it happens, too, Titian stands in much the same relation to Giorgione as Shakespeare did to Marlowe. Giorgione was really the great innovator, and Giorgione died young, leaving Titian to carry on the work. It has always been supposed that Titian and Giorgione, like Marlowe and Shakespeare, were born within the same year; but in this respect the parallel is no longer admissible, as Mr Herbert Cook has shown to the verge of actual proof that the story of Titian being born in 1577, and having lived to be ninety-nine years old, is unworthy of acceptance. If this were merely a question of biography, it would not be worth dwelling upon; but as it seriously affects the whole study of early Venetian painting, it is necessary to point out that the probability, according to a critical study of all the evidence available, is that Titian was not born till 1488 or 1489, and was thus really the pupil rather than the contemporary of Giorgione, and therefore more slightly influenced by Giovanni Bellini than has been generally supposed.

Without going into all the evidence adduced by Mr Cook (_Reviews and Appreciations,_ Heinemann, 1913) it is nevertheless pretty evident that in the account given by his friend and contemporary, Lodovico Dolce, published in 1557, we have the most authentic story of Titian's early years, and from this it is quite clear that Titian was considerably younger than Giorgione. "Being born at Cadore," he writes, "of honourable parents, he was sent, when a child of nine years old, by his father to Venice, to the house of his father's brother, in order that he might be put under some proper master to study painting; his father having perceived in him even at that tender age strong marks of genius towards the art.... His uncle directly carried the child to the house of Sebastanio, father of the _gentilissimo_ Valerio and of Francesco Zuccati (distinguished masters of the art of mosaic, ...) to learn the principles of the art. From them he was removed to Gentile Bellini, brother of Giovanni, but much inferior to him, who at that time was at work with his brother in the Grand Council Chamber. But Titian, impelled by nature to greater excellence and perfection in his art, could not endure following the dry and laboured manner of Gentile, but designed with boldness and expedition. Whereupon Gentile told him he would make no progress in painting because he diverged so much from the old style. Thereupon Titian left the stupid Gentile and found means to attach himself to Giovanni Bellini; but not perfectly pleased with his manner, he chose Giorgio da Castel Franco. Titian, then, drawing and painting with Giorgione, as he was called, became in a short time so accomplished in art that when Giorgione was painting (in 1507-8) the facade of the Fondaco de'Tedeschi, or Exchange of the German merchants, which looks towards the Grand Canal, Titian was allotted the other side which faces the market place, being at the time scarcely twenty years old. Here he represented a Judith of wonderful design and colour, so remarkable indeed, that when the work came to be uncovered it was commonly thought to be the work of Giorgione, and all the latter's friends congratulated him (Giorgione) as being by far the best thing he had produced. Whereupon Giorgione, in great displeasure, replied that the work was from the hand of his pupil, who showed already how he could surpass his master and (what is more) Giorgione shut himself up for some days at home, as if in despair, seeing that a young (_i.e._ younger) man knew more than he did."

Again, in speaking of the famous altar-piece--the _Assumption_, now in the Academy at Venice--painted by Titian in 1516, Dolce mentions him twice as "giovinetto." "Not long afterwards he was commissioned to paint a large picture for the high altar of the Church of the Frate Minori, where Titian, quite a young man, painted in oil the Virgin ascending to Heaven.... This was the first public work which he painted in oil, and he did it in a very short time, and while still a young man."

Vasari's account of Titian's early years is substantially the same, but unfortunately opens with the statement that he was "born in the year 1480." This might easily have been a slip of the pen or a printer's mistake for 1488 or 1489, and subsequent passages in the life bear out this supposition. But partly because Titian was a Venetian and not a Florentine, and partly, no doubt, because he was still alive, and had been producing picture after picture for over sixty years at the time Vasari published his second edition in 1568, the whole account is so confused and inaccurate that its credit has been severely shaken by modern critics, with the result that it is hardly nowadays considered authentic in any respect. The following extracts, however, there seems no reason to question:----

"About the year 1507, Giorgione not being satisfied [with the old-fashioned methods of Bellini and others] began to give his works an unwonted softness and relief, painting them in a very beautiful manner." And a little later "Having seen the manner of Giorgione, Titian early resolved to abandon that of Gian Bellino, although well grounded therein. He now, therefore, devoted himself to this purpose, and in a short time so closely imitated Giorgione that his pictures were sometimes taken for those of this master, as will be related below. Increasing in age, judgment and facility of hand, our young artist executed numerous works in fresco.... At the time when he began to adopt the manner of Giorgione, being then not more than eighteen, he took the portrait of a gentleman of the Barberigo family, who was his friend, and this was considered very beautiful, the colouring being true and natural, the hair so distinctly painted that each one could be counted, as might also the stitches in a satin doublet painted in the same work; in a word, it was so well and carefully done that it would have been taken for a work of Giorgione if Titian had not written his name on the dark ground."

With this we may leave the question of Titian's birth date, and consider the exceptional interest attaching to the question of this Barberigo portrait. According to Mr. Cook, and also, under reserve, to several other eminent authorities, it is no other than the so-called _Ariosto_, which was purchased for the National Gallery in 1904. The chief difficulties in deciding the question are, first, whether it is possible that a youth of eighteen could have painted such a masterpiece, second, that the signature _Titianus_ is supposed not to have been used by the artist before about 1520, and lastly, that the head, at any rate, is decidedly more in the manner of Giorgione than that of Titian. This last, of course, did not trouble Vasari, and his testimony is therefore all the more valuable; but all difficulties vanish if we accept Mr. Cook's theory that the portrait was begun by Giorgione in 1508, was left incomplete at his sudden death in 1510, and finished by Titian in 1520. That is to say, the head and general design is that of Giorgione, the marvellous finish of the sleeve and other parts that of Titian.

Of works left unfinished at a master's death and completed by a pupil there are numerous instances; the famous _Bacchanal_ at Alnwick is one which takes us a step further in Titian's career. This was begun by Giovanni Bellini, and Titian was invited by the Duke of Ferrara, in 1516, to finish it. The landscape is entirely his. To complete the decoration of the apartment in which the picture was hung, he was called upon to paint two others of the same size, one the _Triumph of Bacchus_, or as it is usually called _Bacchus and Ariadne_ (now in the National Gallery) and the other a similar subject, the _Bacchanal_, now in the Prado (No. 418, formerly 450).

Ridolfi, in his life of Titian characterises our picture as one to whose unparalleled merits he is inadequate to do justice; "There is," he says, "such a graceful expression in the figure of Ariadne, such beauty in the children--so strongly marked both in the looks and attitudes is the joyous character of the licentious votaries of Bacchus--the roundness and correct drawing of the man entwined with snakes, the magnificence of the sky and landscape, the sporting play of the leaves and branches of the most vivid tints, and the detailed herbage on the ground tending to enliven the scene, and the rich tone of colour throughout, form altogether such a whole that hardly any other work of Titian can stand in competition with it."

In the composition of the second picture, _The Bacchanal_ at Madrid, a number of the votaries of Bacchus are assembled on the bank of a rivulet, flowing with red wine from a hill in the distance; some of them are distributing the liquor to their associates, while a nymph and two men are dancing. The nymph is supposed to be a portrait of Violante, Titan's mistress, as he has painted, in allusion to her name, a violet on her breast and his own name round her arm. Her light drapery is raised by the breeze, and discovers the beautiful form and _morbidezza_ of her limbs. In the foreground Ariadne lies asleep, her head resting on a rich vase in place of a pillow.[3]

PORTRAIT SAID TO BE OF ARIOSTO

_National Gallery, London_]

Cumberland says that Raphael Mengs, who lived long at Madrid at the time when this picture was in the reception room of the New Palace, was of opinion that Titian's superior taste was nowhere more strikingly displayed, and remarks that he himself could never pass by it without surprise and admiration, more particularly excited by the beauty of the sleeping Ariadne in the foreground.

Respecting the merits of both pictures the testimony of Agostino Carracci should not be omitted; when he viewed them in the possession of the Duke of Ferrara he declared that he considered them the first in the world, and that no one could say he was acquainted with the most marvellous works of art without having seen them.

Commenting upon another picture of Titian's early period, Sir Joshua Reynolds delivers himself of the following criticisms on Titian as compared with Raphael, "It is to Titian that we must turn," he says, "to find excellence in regard to colour, and light and shade in the highest degree. He was both the first and the greatest master of this art; by a few strokes he knew how to mark the general image and character of whatever object he attempted, and produced by this alone a truer representation of nature than his master, Giovanni Bellini, or any of his predecessors, who finished every hair. His greatest object was to express the general colour, to preserve the masses of light and shade, and to give by opposition the idea of that solidity which is inseparable from natural objects....

"Raphael and Titian seemed to have looked at nature for different purposes; they both had the power of extending their view to the whole, but one looked only at the general effect as produced by form, the other as produced by colour. We cannot refuse Titian the merit of attending to the general form of the object, as well as colour; but his deficiency lay--a deficiency at least when he is compared with Raphael--in not possessing the power, like him, of correcting the form of his model by any general idea of beauty in his own mind. Of this his _St. Sebastian with other Saints_ (in the Vatican) is a particular instance. This figure appears to be a most exact representation both of the form and colour of the model which he then happened to have before him, and has all the force of nature, and the colouring of flesh itself; but unluckily the model was of a bad form, especially the legs. Titian has with much care preserved these defects, as he has imitated the beauty and brilliancy of the colouring...."

Of the Sebastian, Vasari says very much the same as Reynolds. "He is nude," he writes, "and has been exactly copied from the life without the slightest admixture of art, no efforts for the sake of beauty have been sought in any part--trunk or limbs; all is as nature left it, so that it might seem to be a sort of cast from the life. It is nevertheless considered very fine, and the figure of our Lady with the infant in her arms, whom all the other figures are looking at, is also accounted most beautiful."

Two more of the pictures of Titian's earliest period are in the National Gallery--the _Christ appearing to Mary Magdalen_ (No. 270), and the _Holy Family_ (No. 4). The former is ascribed to about the year 1514, partly on the ground that the group of buildings in the landscape is identical, line for line, with that in the Dresden _Venus_ painted by Giorgione but completed by Titian after his death. The same landscape also occurs in the beautiful little _Cupid_ in the Vienna

THE HOLY FAMILY

_National Gallery, London_]

Academy, and, as Mr Herbert Cook suggests, possibly represents some cherished spot in Titian's memory connected with his mountain home at Pieve di Cadore.