Part 19

This old painter was born at Florence in 1349, and was a disciple of Antonio Veneziano. His name was Mazzocchi, but being very celebrated as a painter of animals, and especially so of birds, of which last he formed a large collection of the most curious, he was called Uccello (bird). He was one of the first painters who cultivated perspective. Before his time buildings had not a true point of perspective, and figures appeared sometimes as if falling or slipping off the canvass. He made this branch so much his hobby, that he neglected other essential parts of the art. To improve himself he studied geometry with Giovanni Manetti, a celebrated mathematician. He acquired great distinction in his time and some of his works still remain in the churches and convents of Florence. In the church of S. Maria Novella are several fresco histories from the Old Testament, which he selected for the purpose of introducing a multitude of his favorite objects, beasts and birds; among them, are Adam and Eve in Paradise, Noah entering the Ark, the Deluge, &c. He painted battles of lions, tigers, serpents, &c, with peasants flying in terror from the scene of combat. He also painted landscapes with figures, cattle and ruins, possessing so much truth and nature, that Lanzi says "he may be justly called the Bassano of his age." He was living in 1436. Vasari places his birth in 1396-7, and his death in 1479, but later writers have proved his dates to be altogether erroneous.

UCCELLO'S ENTHUSIASM.

"Paolo Uccello employed himself perpetually and without any intermission," says Vasari, "in the consideration of the most difficult questions connected with art, insomuch that he brought the method of preparing the plans and elevations of buildings, by the study of linear perspective, to perfection. From the ground plan to the cornice, and summit of the roof, he reduced all to strict rules, by the convergence of intersecting lines, which he diminished towards the centre, after having fixed the point of view higher or lower, as seemed good to him; he labored, in short, so earnestly in these difficult matters that he found means, and fixed rules, for making his figures really to seem standing on the plane whereon they were placed; not only showing how in order manifestly to draw back or retire, they must gradually be diminished, but also giving the precise manner and degree required for this, which had previously been done by chance, or effected at the discretion of the artist, as he best could. He also discovered the method of turning the arches and cross-vaulting of ceilings, taught how floors are to be foreshortened by the convergence of the beams; showed how the artist must proceed to represent the columns bending round the sharp corners of a building, so that when drawn in perspective, they efface the angle and cause it to seem level. To pore over all these matters, Paolo would remain alone, almost like a hermit, shut up in his house for weeks and months without suffering himself to be approached."

UCCELLO AND THE MONKS OF SAN MINIATO.

Uccello was employed to decorate one of the cloisters of the monastery of San Miniato, situated without the city of Florence, with subjects from the lives of the Holy Fathers. While he was engaged on these works, the monks gave him scarcely anything to eat but cheese, of which the painter soon became tired, and being shy and timid, he resolved to go no more to work in the cloister. The prior sent to enquire the cause of his absence, but when Paolo heard the monks asking for him, he would never be at home, and if he chanced to meet any of the brothers of that order in the street, he gave them a wide berth. This extraordinary conduct excited the curiosity of the monks to such a degree that one day, two of the brothers, more swift of foot than the rest, gave chase to Paolo, and having, cornered him, demanded why he did not come to finish the work according to his agreement, and wherefore he fled at the sight of one of their body. "Faith," replied the painter, "you have so murdered me, that I not only run away from you, but dare not stop near the house of any joiner, or even pass by one; and all this owing to the bad management of your abbot; for, what with his cheese-pies, and cheese-soup, he has made me swallow such a mountain of cheese, that I am all turned into cheese myself, and tremble lest the carpenters should seize me, to make their glue of me; of a certainty had I stayed any longer with you, I should be no more Paolo, but a huge lump of cheese." The monks, bursting with laughter, went their way, and told the story to their abbot, who at length prevailed on Uccello to return to his work on condition that he would order him no more dishes made of cheese.

UCCELLO'S FIVE PORTRAITS.

Uccello was a man of very eccentric character and peculiar habits; but he was a great lover of art, and applauded those who excelled in any of its branches. He painted the portraits of five distinguished men, in one oblong picture, that he might preserve their memory and features to posterity. He kept it in his own house, as a memorial of them, as long as he lived. In the time of Vasari, it was in the possession of Giuliano da Sangallo. At the present day, (Editor's Florentine edition of Vasari, 1846) all trace of this remarkable picture is lost. The first of these portraits was that of the painter Giotto, as one who had given new light and life to art; the second, Fillippo Brunelleschi, distinguished for architecture; the third, Donatello, eminent for sculpture; the fourth, Uccello himself, for perspective and animals; and the fifth was his friend Giovanni Manetti, for the mathematics.

UCCELLO'S INCREDULITY OF ST. THOMAS.

It is related, says Vasari, of this master, that being commissioned to paint a picture of St. Thomas seeking the wound in the side of Christ, above the door of the church dedicated to that saint, in the Mercato Vecchio, he declared that he would make known in that work, the extent of what he had acquired and was capable of producing. He accordingly bestowed upon it the utmost care and consideration, and erected an enclosure around the place that he might not be disturbed until it should be completed. One day, his friend Donatello met him, and asked him, "What kind of work is this of thine, that thou art shutting up so closely?" Paolo replied, "Thou shalt see it some day; let that suffice thee." Donatello would not press him, thinking that when the time came, he should, as usual, behold a miracle of art. It happened one morning, as he was in the Mercato Vecchio, buying fruit, he saw Paolo uncovering his picture, and saluting him courteously, the latter anxiously demanded what he thought of his work. Donatello having examined the painting very closely, turned to the painter with a disappointed look, and said, "Why, Paolo, thou art uncovering thy picture at the very moment when thou shouldst be shutting it up from the sight of all!" These words so grievously afflicted the painter, who at once perceived that he would be more likely to incur derision from his boasted master-piece, than the honor he had hoped for, that he hastened home and shut himself up, devoting himself to the study of perspective, which, says Vasari, kept him in poverty and depression till the day of his death. If this story be true, Uccello must have painted the picture referred to in his old age.

THE ITALIAN SCHOOLS OF PAINTING.

The fame and success of Cimabue and Giotto, brought forth painters in abundance, and created schools all over Italy. The church increasing in power and riches, called on the arts of painting and sculpture, to add to the beauty and magnificence of her sanctuaries; riches and honors were showered on men whose genius added a new ray of grace to the Madonna, or conferred a diviner air on St. Peter or St. Paul; and as much of the wealth of Christendom found its way to Rome, the successors of the apostles were enabled to distribute their patronage over all the schools of Italy. Lanzi reckons fourteen schools of painting in Italy, each of which is distinguished by some peculiar characteristics, as follows: 1, the Florentine school; 2, the Sienese school; 3, the Roman school; 4, the Neapolitan school; 5, the Venetian school; 6, the Mantuan school; 7, the Modenese school; 8, the school of Parma; 9, the school of Cremona; 10, the school of Milan; 11, the school of Bologna; 12, the school of Ferrara; 13, the school of Genoa; 14, the school of Piedmont. Of these, the Florentine, the Roman, and the Bolognese are celebrated for their epic grandeur of composition; that of Siena for its poetic taste; that of Naples for its fire; and that of Venice for the splendor of its coloring.

Other writers make different divisions, according to style or country; thus, Correggio, being by birth a Lombard, and the originator of a new style, the name of the Lombard school has been conferred by many upon the followers of his maxims, the characteristics of which are contours drawn round and full, the countenances warm and smiling, the union of the colors clear and strong, and the foreshortenings frequent, with a particular attention to the chiaro-scuro. Others again, rank the artists of Milan, Mantua Parma, Modena, and Cremona, under the one head of the Lombard school; but Lanzi justly makes the distinctions before mentioned, because their manners are very different. Writers of other nations rank all these subdivisions under one head--the Italian school. Lanzi again divides these schools into epochs, as they rose from their infancy, to their greatest perfection, and again declined into mannerism, or servile imitation, or as eminent artists rose who formed an era in art. Thus writers speak of the schools of Lionardo da Vinci, of Michael Angelo, of Raffaelle, of Correggio, of Titian, of the Caracci, and of every artist who acquired a distinguished reputation, and had many followers. Several great artists formed such a marked era in their schools, that their names and those of their schools are often used synonymously by many writers; thus, when they speak of the Roman school, they mean that of Raffaelle; of the Florentine, that of Michael Angelo; of Parma or Lombardy, that of Correggio; of Bologna, that of the Caracci; but not so of the Venetian and Neapolitan schools, because the Venetian school produced several splendid colorists, and that of Naples as many, distinguished by other peculiarities. These distinctions should be borne in mind in order rightly to understand writers, especially foreigners, on Italian art.

CLAUDE JOSEPH VERNET.

Claude Joseph Vernet, the father of Carl Vernet, and the grandfather of Horace, was born at Avignon in 1714. He was the son of Antoine Vernet, an obscure painter, who foretold that he would one day render his family illustrious in art, and gave him every advantage that his limited means would permit. Such were the extraordinary talents he exhibited almost in his infancy, that his father regarded him as a prodigy, and dreaming of nothing but seeing him become the greatest historical painter of the age, he resolved to send him to Rome; and having, by great economy, saved a few louis d'or, he put them into Joseph's pocket, when he was about eighteen years of age, and sent him off with a wagoner, who undertook to conduct him to Marseilles.

VERNET'S PRECOCITY.

The wonderful stories told about the early exhibitions of genius in many celebrated painters are really true with respect to Joseph Vernet. In his infancy, he exhibited the most extraordinary passion for painting. He himself has related, that on his return from Italy, his mother gave him some drawings which he had executed at the age of five years, when he was rewarded by being allowed to use the pencils he had tried to purloin. Before he was fifteen, he painted frieze-panels, fire-screens, coach-panels, sedan chair-panels, and the like, whenever he could get a commission; he also gave proof of that facility of conceiving and executing, which was one of the characteristics of his genius.

VERNET'S ENTHUSIASM.

It has been before stated that Vernet's father intended him for an historical painter, but nature formed his genius to imitate her sweetest, as well as most terrible aspect. When he was on his way to Marseilles, he met with so many charming prospects, that he induced his companion to halt so often while he sketched them, that it took them a much longer time to reach that port than it would otherwise have done.

When he first saw the sea from the high hill, called La Viste, near Marseilles, he stood wrapt in admiration. Before him stretched the blue waters of the Mediterranean as far as the eye could reach, while three islands, a few leagues from the shore, seemed to have been placed there on purpose to break the uniformity of the immense expanse of waters, and to gratify the eye; on his right rose a sloping town of country houses, intersected with trees, rising above one another on successive terraces; on his left was the little harbor of Mastigues; in front, innumerable vessels rocked to and fro in the harbor of Marseilles, while the horizon was terminated by the picturesque tower of Bouc, nearly lost, however, in the distance. This scene made a lasting impression on Vernet. Nature seemed not only to invite, but to woo him to paint marine subjects, and from that moment his vocation was decided on. Thus nature frequently instructs men of genius, and leads them on in the true path to excellence and renown. Like the Æolian harp, which waits for a breath of air to produce a sound, so they frequently wait or strive in vain, till nature strikes a sympathetic chord, that vibrates to the soul. Thus Joseph Vernet never thought of his forte till he first stood on La Viste; and after that, he was nothing but a painter of ships and harbors, and tranquil seas, till the day when lashed to the mast, he first beheld the wild sea in such rude commotion, as threatened to engulf the noble ship and all on board at every moment. Then his mind was elevated to the grandeur of the scene; and he recollected forever the minutest incident of the occasion.

"It was on going from Marseilles to Rome," says one of his biographers, M. Pitra, "that Joseph Vernet, on seeing a tempest gathering, when they were off the Island of Sardinia, was seized, not with terror, but with admiration; in the midst of the general alarm, the painter seemed really to relish the peril; his only desire was to face the tempest, and to be, so to say, mixed up with it, in order that, some day or other, he might astonish and frighten others by the terrible effects he would learn to produce; his only fear was that he might lose the sight of a spectacle so new to him. He had himself lashed to the main mast, and while he was tossed about in every direction, saturated with seawater, and excited by this hand-to-hand struggle with his model, he painted the tempest, not on his canvass, but in his memory, which never forgot anything. He saw and remembered all--clouds, waves, and rock, hues and colors, with the motion of the boats and the rocking of the ship, and the accidental light which intersected a slate-colored sky that served as a ground to the whiteness of the sea-foam." But, according to D'Argenville and others, this event occurred in 1752, when he was on his way to Paris, at the invitation of Louis XV. Embarking at Leghorn in a small felucca, he sailed to Marseilles. A violent storm happened on the voyage, which greatly terrified some of the passengers, but Vernet, undaunted, and struck with the grandeur of the scene, requested the sailors to lash him to the mast head, and there he remained, absorbed in admiration, and endeavoring to transfer to his sketch-book, a correct picture of the sublime scene with which he was surrounded. His grandson, Horace Vernet, painted an excellent picture of this scene, which was exhibited in the Louvre in 1816, and attracted a great deal of attention.

VERNET AT ROME.

Vernet arrived at Rome in 1732, and became the scholar of Bernardino Fergioni, then a celebrated marine painter, but Lanzi says, "he was soon eclipsed by Joseph Vernet, who had taken up his abode at Rome." Entirely unknown in that metropolis of art, always swarming with artists, Vernet lived for several years in the greatest poverty, subsisting by the occasional sale of a drawing or picture at any price he could get. He even painted panels for coach builders, which were subsequently sawed out and sold as works of great value. Fiorillo relates that he painted a superb marine for a suit of coarse clothes, which brought 5000 francs at the sale of M. de Julienne. Finding large pictures less saleable, he painted small ones, which he sold for two sequins a-piece, till a Cardinal, one day gave him four louis d'or for a marine. Yet his ardor and enthusiasm were unabated; on the contrary, he studied with the greatest assiduity, striving to perfect himself in his art, and feeling confident that his talents would ultimately command a just reward.

VERNET'S "ALPHABET OF TONES."

It was the custom of Vernet to rise with the lark, and he often walked forth before dawn and spent the whole day in wandering about the surrounding country, to study the ever changing face of nature. He watched the various hues presented by the horizon at different hours of the day. He soon found that with all his powers of observation and pencil, great and impassioned as they were, he could not keep pace with the rapidly changing and evanescent hues of the morning and evening sky. He began to despair of ever being able to represent on canvass the moving harmony of those pictures which nature required so little time to execute in such perfection, and which so quickly passed away. At length, after long contemplating how he could best succeed in catching and transferring these furtive tints to his canvass, bethought himself of a contrivance which he called his Alphabet of tones, and which is described by Renou in his "Art de Peindre."

The various characters of this alphabet are joined together, and correspond to an equal number of different tints; if Vernet saw the sun rise silvery and fresh, or set in the colors of crimson; or if he saw a storm approaching or disappearing, he opened his table and set down the gradations of the tones he admired, as quickly as he could write ten or twelve letters on a piece of paper. After having thus noted down in short hand, the beauties of the sky and the accidental effects of nature, he returned to his studio, and endeavored to make stationary on canvass the moving picture he had just been contemplating. Effects which had long disappeared were thus recomposed in all their charming harmony to delight the eye of every lover of painting.

VERNET AND THE CONNOISSEUR.

Vernet relates, that he was once employed to paint a landscape, with a cave, and St. Jerome in it; he accordingly painted the landscape, with St. Jerome at the entrance of the cave. When he delivered the picture, the purchaser, who understood nothing of perspective, said, "the landscape and the cave are well made, but St. Jerome is not _in_ the cave." "I understand you, Sir," replied Vernet, "I will alter it." He therefore took the painting, and made the shade darker, so that the saint seemed to sit farther in. The gentleman took the painting; but it again appeared to him that the saint was not in the cave. Vernet then wiped out the figure, and gave it to the gentleman, who seemed perfectly satisfied. Whenever he saw strangers to whom he shewed the picture, he said, "Here you see a picture by Vernet, with St. Jerome in the cave." "But we cannot see the saint," replied the visitors. "Excuse me, gentlemen," answered the possessor, "he is there; for _I_ have seen him standing at the entrance, and afterwards farther back; and am therefore quite sure that he is in it."

VERNET'S WORKS.

Far from confining himself within the narrow limits of one branch of his profession, Vernet determined to take as wide a range as possible. At Rome, he made the acquaintance of Lucatelli, Pannini, and Solimene. Like them, he studied the splendid ruins of the architecture of ancient Rome, and the noble landscapes of its environs, together with every interesting scene and object, especially the celebrated cascades of Tivoli. He paid particular attention to the proportions and attitudes of his figures, which were mostly those of fishermen and lazzaroni, as well as to the picturesque appearance of their costume. Such love of nature and of art, such assiduous study of nature at different hours of the day, of the phenomena of light, and such profound study of the numerous accessories essential to beauty and effect, made an excellent landscape painter of Vernet, though his fame rests chiefly on the unrivalled excellence of his marine subjects. Diderot remarks, that "though he was undoubtedly inferior to Claude Lorraine in producing bold and luminous effects, he was quite equal to that great painter in rendering the effects of vapor, and superior to him in the invention of scenes, in designing figures, and in the variety of his incidents."

At a later period, Diderot compared his favorite painter to the Jupiter of Lucian, who, tired of listening to the lamentable cries of mankind, rose from table and exclaimed: 'Let it hail in Thrace!' and the trees were immediately stripped of their leaves, the heaviest cut to pieces, and the thatch of the houses scattered before the wind: then he said, "Let the plague fall on Asia!" and the doors of the houses were immediately closed, the streets were deserted, and men shunned one another; and again he exclaimed: 'Let a volcano appear here!' and the earth immediately shook, the buildings were thrown down, the animals were terrified, and the inhabitants fled into the surrounding country; and on his crying out: 'Let this place be visited with a death!' the old husbandman died of want at his door. Jupiter calls that governing the world, but he was wrong. Vernet calls it painting pictures, and he is right.