Paris. Grant Allen's Historical Guides

**362. Raphael. Madonna and Child, with infant St. John, known as La Belle Jardinière. To the familiar group of the Madonna and Child, Florentine painters and sculptors early added the infant Baptist, as patron of their city, thus forming a graceful pyramidal composition. This exquisite picture, by far the most beautiful Raphael in the Louvre, belongs to the great painter’s Florentine period. It should be compared with the very similar Madonna del Cardellino in the Uffizi at Florence. For simplicity of treatment and beauty of colouring this seems to me the loveliest of Raphael’s Madonnas, with the exception of the Granduca. Look at it long, for colour, design, and tender feeling. Then go back to the St. Michael, and see how, as Raphael gains in dramatic vigour, he loses in charm.

407. Rembrandt. Christ and the Disciples at Emmaus. A fine study in light and shade, and full of art, but not a sacred picture. Compare with other pictures of the scene in this gallery. The feeling is merely domestic.

433. Rubens. Tomyris, Queen of the Scythians, with the head of Cyrus. A fine, vigorous painting, with the action frankly transferred to the court of Henri IV. Dash and colour and all the Rubens attributes.

365. Raphael. Small Holy Family.

364. Raphael. Holy Family, known as the “Sainte Famille de François Ier”: Joseph, Madonna, infant Christ, St. Elizabeth and the Baptist, and adoring angels. Belongs to Raphael’s Roman period, and already vaguely heralds the decadence. Admirable in composition and painting, but lacking the simplicity and delicacy of colour of his earlier work. Compare it with the Belle Jardinière. It marks the distance traversed in art during his lifetime. The knowledge is far greater, the feeling less.

**142. Van Dyck. Charles I. A famous and splendid portrait, with all the courtly grace of this stately painter.

**462. Leonardo. Portrait of Mona Lisa. Most undoubted work of the master in existence. Has lost much of its flesh tints by darkening, but is still subtly beautiful. Compare with any of the portraits in the Salle des Primitifs, in order to understand the increase in science which made Leonardo the prince and leader of the Renaissance. The sweet and sphinx-like smile is particularly characteristic. Observe the exquisite modelling of the hands, and the dainty landscape background. Do not hurry away from it.

363. Raphael. Madonna with the infant St. John, known as “La Vierge au Voile.” A work of his early Roman period, intermediate in style between the Belle Jardinière and the François Ier. Compare them carefully.

Above it (379) Andrea del Sarto. Charity. A fine example of Andrea’s soft and tender colouring.

*523. Portrait of a young man. Long attributed to Raphael. More probably Franciabigio. Pensive and dignified.

452. Titian. Alphonso of Ferrara and his Mistress. A fine portrait, with its colour largely faded.

Above it, 154. Good portrait by Van Dyck.

539. Murillo. The Immaculate Conception. Luminous and pretty, in an affected showy Spanish manner. Foreshadows the modern religious art of the people. An immense favourite with the inartistic public.

**121. Gerard Dou. The Dropsical Woman. A triumph of Dutch painting of light and shade and detail. Faces like miniatures. The lamp and curtain like nature. Illuminated on the darkest day. Examine it attentively.

293. Metsu. Officer and Lady. Another masterpiece of Dutch minuteness, but far less fine in execution.

526. Ter Borch. Similar subject treated with coarse directness.

**551. Velasquez. The Infanta Marguerite – a famous portrait.

A little above it (229), Sebastiano del Piombo. Visitation. Compare with the Ghirlandajo in the Salle des Primitifs. A very favourable example of this Venetian master, painted in rivalry with Raphael. It well exhibits the height often attained, even by minor masters, at the culminating point of the Renaissance.

Above, occupying a large part of the wall, *Paolo Veronese. Christ and the Magdalen, at the supper in the house of Levi. Another refectory picture, treated in Veronese’s large and brilliant manner, essentially as a scene of lordly Venetian life. The Pharisee facing Christ is a fine figure. Notice the intrusion of animals and casual spectators, habitual with this artist. The sense of air and space is fine. The whole picture is instinct with Venetian feeling of the period; scenic, not sacred. A lordly treatment. Earlier painters set their scene in smaller buildings: the Venetians of this gorgeous age chose rather the Piazza of some mighty Renaissance Italian city. Here, the architecture recalls the style of Sansovino.

This room also contains many good works of the 17th century, justly skied. Examine them by contrast with the paintings of the best ages of art beneath them. Return to them later, after you have examined the works of the French artists in later rooms of this Gallery.

Now proceed into the

Long Gallery

which contains in its First Compartment works of the High Renaissance masters, transitional from the conventionality of the 15th, to the freedom of the 16th, and the theatrical tendency of the 17th centuries. Begin on the L, and follow that wall as far as the first archway.

Francia. Crucifixion, with Madonna and St. John, and Job extended at the feet of the cross, probably indicating a votive plague offering. A tolerable example of the great Bolognese painter, from the church of San Giobbe, patriarch and plague-saint, at Bologna.

Ansuino(?) Adoration of the Magi. Note coincidences with others.

308. Francia. Madonna. A fair example.

168. Dosso. St. Jerome in the Desert. Interesting as showing a later treatment of this familiar subject.

230. Luini. Holy Family. A good specimen of Luini’s easel work. Compare with the frescoes in the Salle Duchâtel. The hair is characteristic, also the oval face and cast of features.

Near it, two works by Marco da Oggiono, a pupil of Leonardo. His work and Luini’s should be compared with that of the founder of the school. The differences and agreements should be observed. Notice also the survivals from earlier treatment.

354. Sacchi. The Four Doctors of the Church, attended by the Symbols of the Four Evangelists. This is a composition which frequently recurs in early art. L, St. Augustine, holding his book “De Civitate Dei,” with the Eagle of St. John. Next, St. Gregory, inspired by the Holy Spirit as a dove, and accompanied by the Bull of St. Luke. Then, St. Jerome, in his Cardinal’s hat, with the Angel of St. Matthew. Lastly, St. Ambrose with his scourge (alluding to his action in closing the doors of the church at Milan on the Emperor Theodosius after the massacre of Thessalonica), accompanied by the winged Lion of St. Mark. An interesting symbolical composition, deserving close study.

232. Luini. The daughter of Herodias with the head of St. John Baptist. A favourite subject with the artist, who often repeated it. Compare it with his other works in this gallery, till you feel you begin to understand Luini.

Above it, Borgognone. Presentation in the Temple. In the pallid colouring peculiar to this charming Lombard master. Observe the positions of the High Priest and other personages.

85. Borgognone. St. Peter Martyr introducing or commending a Lady Donor to the Madonna. One panel of a triptych; the rest of it is wanting. Look out for similar figures of saints introducing votaries. St. Peter Martyr has usually a wound or a knife in his head, to indicate the mode of his martyrdom.

Beneath, a quaint little Leonardesque Annunciation.

Solario. Calvary, characteristic of the School of Leonardo.

Beneath it, 394, *Solario. Madonna with the Green Cushion. His masterpiece, a graceful and tender work, exhibiting the growing taste of the Renaissance.

458. Attributed to Leonardo. The young St. John Baptist. Hair, smile and treatment characteristic; but possibly a copy. You will meet with many similar St. Johns in Florentine sculpture below hereafter.

465. School of Leonardo. Holy Family. St. Michael the Archangel oddly introduced in order to permit the Child Christ to play with the scales in which he weighs souls – a curious Renaissance conception, wholly out of keeping with earlier reverential feeling.

*460. Leonardo. “La Vierge aux Rochers.” A replica of the picture in the National Gallery in London. Much faded, but probably genuine. Examine closely the rocks, the Madonna, and the Angel.

395. Solario. Good portrait of Charles d’Amboise, a member of the great French family who will frequently crop up in connection with the Renaissance.

461. Attributed to Leonardo, more probably Bernardino de’ Conti. Portrait of a Lady. Compare with the Mona Lisa, as exhibiting well the real advance in portraiture made by Leonardo.

463. Attributed to Leonardo, but probably spurious; Bacchus, a fine youthful figure, begun as a St. John Baptist, and afterwards altered. Compare with the other St. John Baptist near it.

* Beltraffio. The Madonna of the Casio family. A characteristic Leonardesque virgin, attended by St. John Baptist and the bleeding St. Sebastian. (A votive picture.) By her side kneel two members of the Casio family, one the poet of that name, crowned with laurel. Intermediate Renaissance treatment of the Madonna and donors.

78 and 79. Good Franciscan saints, by Moretto.

Between them, 298. Charming Girolamo dai Libri.

We now come upon a magnificent series of works by Titian, in whom the Venetian School, ill-represented in its origin in the Salle des Primitifs, finds its culminating point.

**440. Titian. The Madonna with the Rabbit. This is one of a group of Titian’s Madonnas (several examples here) in which he endeavours to transform Bellini’s type (see the specimen in the Salle des Primitifs) into an ideal of the 16th century. The Madonna is here attended by St. Catherine of Alexandria, marked as a princess by her coronet and pearls. The child, bursting from her arms, plays with the rabbit. Once more a notion far-removed from primitive piety. Notice the background of Titian’s own country. Landscape is now beginning to struggle for recognition. Earlier art was all figures, first sacred, then also mythological.

445. Titian. The Crown of Thorns. A powerful but very painful painting. The artist is chiefly occupied with anatomy and the presentation of writhing emotion. The spiritual is lost in muscular action.

**443. Titian. The Disciples at Emmaus. Treated in the contemporary Venetian manner. This is again a subject whose variations can be well traced in this gallery.

451. Titian. Allegory of a husband who leaves for a campaign, commending his wife to Love and Chastity. Finely painted.

450. Titian. Portrait of François Ier. Famous as having been painted without a sitting – the artist had never even seen the king. He took the face from a medal.

448. Titian. Council of Trent. Very much to order.

Above it, *Titian. Jupiter and Antiope. Charming Giorgionesque treatment of the pastoral nude. Compare with the Giorgione in the Salon Carré, in order to understand how deeply that great painter influenced his contemporaries.

453. Titian. Fine portrait.

439. Titian. Madonna with St. Stephen, St. Ambrose, and St. Maurice the soldier. Observe the divergence from the older method of painting the accompanying saints. Originally grouped on either side the Madonna, they are here transformed into the natural group called in Italian, a “santa conversazione.” Look at the stages of this process in the Salle des Primitifs and this Long Gallery.

442. Titian. Another Holy Family. Interesting from the free mode of its treatment, in contrast with Bellini and earlier artists.

**455. Titian. Magnificent portrait.

Above these are several excellent Bassanos, worthy of study. Compare together all these Venetian works (Bonifazio etc.), lordly products of a great aristocratic mercantile community; and with them, the Veroneses of the Salon Carré, where the type attains a characteristic development.

Now return to the door by the Salon Carré and examine the R Wall.

Poor Pinturicchio, and two inferior Peruginos.

403. Lo Spagna. Nativity. Characteristic example of this scholar of Perugino and fellow-pupil of Raphael. Notice its Peruginesque treatment. Examine in detail and compare with the two other painters. As a Nativity, it is full of the conventional elements.

189. Raffaellino del Garbo. Coronation of the Virgin, beheld from below by four attendant saints of, or connected with, the Vallombrosan order – St. Benedict, Saint Salvi, San Giovanni Gualberto, and San Bernardo degli Uberti. These were the patrons of Vallombrosa; and the picture comes from the Church of St. Salvi, at Florence.

246. Manni. Baptism in Jordan. Observe, as usual, the attendant angels, though the simplicity of early treatment has wholly disappeared. The head-dresses are characteristic of the School of Perugino. Compare with Lo Spagna’s Nativity.

Above it (496) Florentine Madonna, with St. Augustine, St. John Baptist, St. Antony and St. Francis. Observe their symbols. I do not always now call attention to these; but the more you observe them, the better you will understand each picture as you come to it.

390. Luca Signorelli. Adoration of the Magi. A fine example of the mode of treatment of this excellent anatomical painter, the forerunner of Michael Angelo. It needs long looking into.

289. Piero di Cosimo. Coronation of the Virgin, with St. Jerome, St. Francis, St. Louis of Toulouse and St. Bonaventura. Compare with Raffaelino del Garbo, close by, for the double scene, on earth and in heaven. Notice the crown which Louis refused, in order to embrace the monastic profession. This is a Franciscan picture; you will find it casts much light on assemblages of saints if you know for what order each picture was painted. The grouping always means something.

16. Albertinelli. Madonna on a pedestal, with St. Jerome and St. Zenobius. Scenes from their legends in the background. A characteristic example of the Florentine Renaissance. The grouping is in the style then fast becoming fashionable. Compare with Lorenzo di Credi in the Salle des Primitifs.

144. Pontormo. Visitation. Showing the older Renaissance tendencies. Compare with the Ghirlandajo, and note persistence of the arch in the background.

*57. Fra Bartolommeo. Marriage of St. Catherine of Siena. This is a variant on the legend of the other St. Catherine – of Alexandria. The infant Christ is placing a ring on the holy nun’s finger. Around are attendant saints – Peter, Vincent, Stephen, etc. The composition is highly characteristic of the painter and his school.

380. Andrea del Sarto. Holy Family. Exquisitely soft in outline and colour.

372. Doubtful. Attributed to Raphael. Charming portrait of a young man.

Beyond it,* two most delicate little pictures of St. George (a man) and St. Michael (an angel, winged) of Raphael’s very early period. Note the princess in the St. George; you will come upon her again. Simple and charming. Trace Raphael’s progress in this gallery, by means of Kugler.

Beyond them, again, two portraits by Raphael, of which 373 is of doubtful authenticity.

*366. Raphael. The Young St. John: a noble figure.

**367. Raphael. St. Margaret: issuing triumphant from the dragon which has swallowed her. A figure full of feeling and movement, and instinct with his later science. It was painted for François Ier, out of compliment to his sister, Queen Margaret of Navarre.

All these Raphaels should be carefully studied. The great painter began with a certain Peruginesque stiffness, through which nevertheless his own native grace makes itself felt at once; he progressed rapidly in knowledge and skill at Florence and Rome, but showed a tendency in his last works towards the incipient faults of the later Renaissance. By following him here, in conjunction with Florence and Rome, you can gain an idea of the course of his development.

The Second Compartment of the Long Gallery, which we now enter, though containing several works by Titian and other masters of the best period, is mainly devoted to painters of the later 16th and 17th century, when the decline in taste was rapid and progressive. Notice throughout the substitution of rhetorical gesture and affected composition for the simplicity of the early masters, or the dignity and truth of the High Renaissance. Begin again on the L wall, containing finer pictures than that opposite.

441. Titian. Another Holy Family, with St. Catherine. Both women here are Venetian ladies of high rank and of his own period. Observe, however, the persistence of the Madonna’s white head-covering. Also, the playfulness introduced in the treatment of St. Catherine’s palm of martyrdom, and the childish St. John with his lamb. These attributes would have been treated by earlier painters with reverence and solemnity. Titian transfers them into mere pretty accessories. Characteristic landscape background. (The female saint in this work is usually described as St. Agnes, because of the lamb: I think erroneously. The lamb is St. John’s, and the St. Catherine merely plays with it.)

88. Calcar. Fine portrait of a young man.

38. Attributed (very doubtfully) to Giorgione. Holy Family, with St. Sebastian, St. Catherine, and the donor, kneeling. A good example of the intermediate treatment of saints in groups of this character.

Above it (92) Paolo Veronese. Esther and Ahasuerus. Treated in the lordly fashion of a Venetian pageant. Try now to understand this Venetian ideal in style and colour.

91. Paolo Veronese. Similar treatment of Susanna and the Elders, a traditional religious theme, here distorted into a mere excuse for the nude, in which the Renaissance delighted.

**274. Palma Vecchio. Adoration of the Shepherds. A noble example of this great Venetian painter. Observe how he transforms the traditional accessories in the background, and employs them in the thorough Venetian spirit.

Beyond it, several small Venetian pictures. Self-explanatory, but worthy of close attention; especially 94, a delicate Paolo Veronese, on a most unusual scale – a Venetian Dominican nun presented by her patroness, St. Catherine, and St. Joseph to the Madonna. Also, 93, by the same artist, St. George and St. Catherine presenting a Venetian gentleman to the Madonna and Child. These two saints were the male and female patrons of the Venetian territory; hence their frequency in Venetian pictures.

99. The Disciples at Emmaus. Another characteristic transformation by Veronese of a traditional scene. The pretence of sacredness is very thin.

98. Paolo Veronese. Calvary. Similarly treated.

*335. Tintoretto. Susanna at the Bath. Admirable example of this artist’s bold and effective method. In him the Venetian School attains its last possible point before the decadence.

Beneath it, two good Venetian portraits.

336. Tintoretto. A characteristic Paradise (sketch for the great picture in the Doge’s Palace at Venice), whose various circles of saints and angels should be carefully studied. Gloomy glory.

Above it, 17. A Venetian gentleman introduced to the Madonna by St. Francis and a sainted bishop, with St. Sebastian in the background. Doubtless, a votive picture in gratitude for the noble donor’s escape from the plague.

Beyond these, we come chiefly upon Venetian pictures of the Decadence, among which the most noticeable are the Venetian views by Canaletto and Guardi, showing familiar aspects of the Salute, the Doge’s Palace, San Zaccaria, and other buildings.

Further on, this compartment contains Spanish pictures, – an artificial arrangement not without some real justification, since in the 16th and 17th centuries, Spain, enriched by her American possessions, became, for a short period, the material and artistic inheritor of Italy, and accepted in full the mature fruits of the Italian Renaissance. At the same time, she imbued the developed arts she received from Italy with Spanish showiness and love of mere display, to the exclusion of deeper spiritual feeling. The most famous among the few Spanish pictures of the Louvre are: —

552. **Velasquez. Philip IV of Spain.

Beneath it, *Murillo. One of his favourite Boy Beggars, killing fleas. A curious subject, excellently rendered.

548. Ribera. Adoration of the Shepherds.

540. Murillo. Birth of the Virgin, where the transformation of the traditional element is even more marked than in the Italian Renaissance. The colouring splendid. St. Anne is always seen in bed; other points you could notice in the enamels at Cluny. With Murillo, they become mere excuses for display of art-faculty.

Further on, Murillo. The occupants of a poor monastery in Spain miraculously fed by angels, known as “La Cuisine des Anges.”

I do not recommend more than a cursory examination of these fine Spanish works, which can only be properly understood by those who have visited Madrid and Seville. It will suffice to note their general characteristics, and the way in which they render traditional subjects. The best point of view for the “Cuisine des Anges,” is obtained from the seat nearly opposite, beneath the archway, when the splendid luminous qualities of this theatrical picture can be better appreciated. From this point also, many of the other Spanish pictures are well seen with an opera-glass. They are not intended for close examination.

(The columns which separate these compartments have an interesting history. They first belonged to a classical temple in North Africa. They were brought thence by Louis XIV to support a baldacchino at St. Germain-des-Prés. Finally, the Revolution transferred them to the Louvre.)

Return again, now, to the last archway, and begin once more on the R side, which contains for the most part tawdry works of the Baroque period, which should, however, be studied to some extent in illustration of the decadence of art in the later 16th century, and also as examples of further transformation of the traditional motives.

53. Barocci. Madonna in Glory, with St. Antony and St. Lucy. A good example of the insipid style which took its name from this master.

Below it, 309. Bagnacavallo. Circumcision, with twisted pillars, showing the decline in architectural taste. The crowded composition may be instructively compared with earlier and simpler examples of this subject; also, with Fra Bartolommeo, whose fine but complex arrangements rapidly resulted in such confused grouping.

52. Barocci. Same scene. The tradition now entirely ignored, and an unpleasantly realistic, yet theatrical and mannered treatment, introduced.

304. After Primaticcio. Mythological concert, exhibiting the taste of the School of Fontainebleau (the Italian artists of Raphael’s group, scholars of Giulio Romano, introduced into France by François Ier).

349. Rosselli. Triumphant David, with the head of Goliath. Marking the advance of the histrionic tendency.

A very cursory examination of the rest of the works on this wall will probably be sufficient. Look them over in an hour. The most celebrated are two by Salvator Rosa: 318, Guido Reni’s Ecce Homo, full of tawdry false sentiment; and Domenichino’s St. Cecilia (often copied), with the angel reduced to the futile decorative winged boy of the period. 324, Guido’s St. Sebastian, may be well compared with Perugino’s, as marking the decline which art had suffered. It is on works like these that the Spanish School largely based itself.