Читать книгу The Palace and Park - Edward Winslow Forbes - Страница 17

Which, as will be at once remarked, closely resembles the style of antique Roman art, on which, indeed, the modern is professedly founded. Although Brunelleschi, as we have before observed, revived the practice of antique architecture as early as the year 1420, yet various causes combined to delay a thorough investigation of the antique remains until the close of the century; and it even is not until the commencement of the 16th century that we find the Italian style, or modernised Roman, regularly systematised and generally received throughout Italy; from whence it gradually extended, first to Spain and to France, and at a somewhat later period into England and Germany. The power and excellence of the style are nobly exhibited in a large number of buildings, amongst which may be noted the ancient Library at Venice; St. Peter’s, at Rome; the Pitti Palace, Florence; the Basilica of Vicenza, the great Colonnade of the Louvre, Paris; St. Paul’s Cathedral, London; and the Escurial Palace, near Madrid.

[17] See “Handbook to the Italian Court,” by M. Digby Wyatt and J. B. Waring.

In this style, architecture rests chiefly on its own intrinsic excellence, or on proportion, symmetry, and good taste. The arts of sculpture and painting, in a great measure, become independent of architecture; and their absence in buildings of a later period (the 17th and 18th centuries, for instance) led to a coldness of character, which happily promises at the present day to find its remedy.

The Court before which we stand is founded on a portion of the finest palatial edifice in Rome—the Farnese Palace, commenced by the architect Antonio Sangallo, for Cardinal Farnese, and finished under the direction of Michael Angelo. A curious fact in connexion with the original building is, that the stones which compose it were taken from the ancient Coliseum, within whose mighty walls the early Christians suffered martyrdom; so that, in truth, the same stones which bore witness to the faith and courage of the early devotees, served afterwards to build for the faith triumphant a palace in which luxury, worldliness, and pride found a genial home.

Ground Plan of Italian Court.

Prior to entering the Court, we may remark, in the niches, the bronze statues by Sansovino, from the Campanile Loggia at Venice, amongst which Apollo is conceived quite in the old Roman spirit. Passing beneath, the columns in the centre of the court, we see the fountain of the Tartarughe, or “of the Tortoises,” at Rome, designed by Giacomo della Porta: the copies of the bronze statues by Taddeo Landini belonging to it are, for the present, placed in front of the Vestibule of the Italian Court. Turning to the right, the first object that attracts our attention is a statue of the Virgin and Child, by Michael Angelo, the original of which is in the Church of Lorenzo, Florence. Advancing to the south side, we enter a loggia or arcade, the interior of which is richly ornamented with copies of Raffaelle’s celebrated frescoes in the Loggie of the Vatican palace at Rome. They consist of a most fanciful, yet tasteful, combination of landscape figures, architecture and foliage, founded on antique models, and bearing a close resemblance to the ornamental work discovered in various Roman ruins, having been imitated by Raffaelle from the baths of Titus, discovered about this time. The towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum, which have so much enlarged our knowledge of ancient arabesque ornament, were at that time unknown. In the centre of the arcade, towards the Court, is the monument of Giuliano de’ Medici, from San Lorenzo, Florence. On each side of his statue are the reclining figures Night and Day (part of the same monument). The face of the right-hand figure is left rough-hewn by the poet-sculptor to indicate the indistinct aspect of Night. The face of Twilight, on the opposite monument, though still in the rough, is more clearly expressed, as it should be. This is one of Michael Angelo’s masterpieces, and is remarkably characteristic of the sculptor’s style. At the back of it, in the Loggia, is a fine specimen of bronze casting, from the gates of the enclosure at the foot of the Campanile, Venice. On each side of the entrance to the gallery are two groups of a Virgin with the dead Christ, that to the right being by Bernini, the other to the left by Michael Angelo, both especially interesting as serving to indicate the state of art in the 16th and 17th centuries respectively. The remaining statues, viz.—the Slave, now in the Louvre, the Christ in the Church of S. Maria Minerva, Rome, and the Pietà in St. Peter’s, Rome, are by Michael Angelo. The visitor may now enter the loggia, which, like its companion on the other side of the Court, is ornamented with copies of Raffaelle’s frescoes from the Vatican; in the centre of this side of the Court is placed Michael Angelo’s celebrated monument of Lorenzo de’ Medici, from the church of San Lorenzo at Florence; the reclining figures on each side of the statue of Lorenzo represent Dawn and Twilight. At the back of this monument within the arcade is the fine bronze door by Sansovino from St. Mark’s, Venice, on which he is said to have laboured from twenty to thirty years. The projecting heads are supposed to be portraits; amongst them are those of Titian, Aretino, and of the sculptor himself. Proceeding onwards, the beautiful composition of Jonah and the Whale, by Raffaelle, is from the Chigi Chapel at Rome. Passing into the gallery on the Garden side, we remark in the four angles portions of the pedestals of the Venetian standards, from the Piazza of St. Mark, Venice. The painted ceilings of this gallery deserve special attention. The first on entering the gallery is from an existing example at the “Old Library,” Venice; the last is from the “Camera della Segnatura,” by Raffaelle, at the Vatican; beneath which is the wonderful statue of Moses, by Michael Angelo—a production the grandeur of which amounts to sublimity, expressing in every line, with, the noblest conception, the inspired lawgiver and appointed leader of a nation.