TWO ALLEGED ‘GIORGIONES’
THE Leuchtenberg Gallery at St. Petersburg has lately yielded up some of those treasures which it has long and jealously guarded. In 1852 Passavant published a catalogue raisonné of the pictures, with illustrations in outline, and to many this large volume has been the sole medium of introduction to the collection. Several of the originals have now found their way to London, among them two which bear the great name of Giorgione—an Adoration of the Shepherds, and a Madonna and Child. Both appear in outline in Passavant’s book, under the name of Barbarelli, the supposed cognomen of Giorgione, to which, however, as modern research has shown, he is not entitled.[43] ¶ The Madonna and Child picture has now passed into the rich collection of Mr. George Salting, of which assuredly it will not be one of the least ornaments; here moreover it will hang in company with another picture from the same hand, each admirably illustrating two different phases of Cariani’s art. For to Cariani, the Bergamesque painter, must be ascribed the authorship of this Madonna and Child, which reveals him in a mood no less characteristic than does the fine Portrait of one of the Albani Family, which Mr. Salting has generously placed on loan at the National Gallery. It would be a fitting complement to see the new Cariani hung near the other, if only to prove how charming an artist he can be at times, and how far superior these examples are to the two which the nation actually possesses at Trafalgar Square. ¶ Like all artists not absolutely in the first rank, Cariani varies considerably in quality of workmanship; indeed, owing to the peculiar local characteristics of Bergamesque art Cariani is exceptionally protean in form, appearing now in Venetian guise, now in Brescian, now in his own native awkwardness. For by nature he was not gifted with great refinement, or with a strong individuality, and when the temporary influence of Lotto, or of Palma Vecchio, or even of Previtali, was withdrawn, he easily lapsed into a slovenliness which repels, or into a tastelessness which betrays his provincial origin. Fortunately this is not the mood we feel in Mr. Salting’s Madonna. There is a homely strain indeed, which makes the subject simply Mother and Child; a conception which we find exactly paralleled in another charming work of his known as La Vergine Cucitrice, or The Sempstress Madonna, in the Corsini Gallery in Rome (see [illustration]). But the homeliness of conception is in each case relieved by the exquisite setting; the landscape background and especially the decorative foliage being treated with a rare feeling for beautiful effects. Girolamo dai Libri’s lemon trees and the leafy arbours of Lotto and Previtali do not make more charming bowers than do Cariani’s rose hedge and his hanging limes. Add, moreover, a certain fullness of form, a softness of expression, and a harmony of colour, which can be traced to the direct influence of Palma Vecchio in Venice, and you have in Mr. Salting’s picture probably the most attractive Madonna and Child which Cariani ever painted. Can there be better evidence of appreciation on the part of some bygone owner than that he considered it worthy of the great Giorgione himself, and that up to now it has borne this courtesy title?
Walker & Cockerell, Ph.Sc.
Madonna and Child by Giovanni Busi (Cariani) in the collection of Mr. George Salting.
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LARGER IMAGE
Photography by Anderson
THE SEMPSTRESS MADONNA (LA VERGINE CUCITRICE) BY CARIANI; IN THE CORSINI GALLERY, ROME
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LARGER IMAGE
The second ‘Giorgione’ which comes from the Leuchtenberg Gallery is an Adoration of the Shepherds, now in the possession of Mr. Asher Wertheimer, by whose kind permission it is reproduced here. No excuse need be offered for its publication in The Burlington Magazine, inasmuch as it bears directly on one of the lesser problems in our National Gallery, where, in the Venetian Room, has hung for some years a similar painting ascribed to Savoldo. That this ascription is erroneous is admitted in the large illustrated edition of the catalogue, published a year or two ago by Sir Edward Poynter, the director, and it seems a pity to keep the old label with Savoldo’s name still attached to the frame. The National Gallery is a place of public resort, and the public believes in the labels it reads; for what does the public know of Savoldo? Those, however, who have studied his work at Venice, Milan, Verona, and elsewhere know that our National Gallery picture is only in a remote degree akin to him in style, and anyone who will take the trouble to make a comparison with the Magdalen in the same room (which is a genuine example), and also with the two pictures by him at Hampton Court, will be able to convince himself that Sir Edward Poynter is right in removing the Brescian master’s name from the catalogue, and more wisely substituting ‘Venetian School.’ Now comes the Leuchtenberg picture, a comparison with which proves that such likenesses exist as to exclude all theory of chance resemblance, yet such differences also exist as to dispel any suspicion that the one may be a copy of the other. In such cases a common original can usually be inferred, a deduction which modern archaeologists habitually make in similar circumstances; and rightly, for a common idea, or conception, underlies the outward divergencies of detail, so that when the highest common factor can be found we can reconstruct in idea what such an original must have been like. Now it is curious that Giorgione’s name is attached to the Leuchtenberg picture, for anyone at all familiar with Venetian painting must see at a glance that the style proclaims a period at least a decade after his death in 1510. It is more than probable that both this picture and that in the National Gallery date from about 1530 or so. Giorgione cannot possibly have produced either the one or the other: but is it altogether beyond possibility that some idea of his may have served as basis for later artists to work up? Strictly speaking, neither picture is Giorgionesque, except by reflection, for the dazzling personality of the young Castelfrancan shed lustre even on the succeeding generation in Venice. In neither does the painting show much trace of that mysterious glamour which the master, above all Venetian painters, knew how to impart. Yet in the romantic rendering of the subject, and in the picturesque treatment of landscape, we may trace an ultimate connexion with the art of Giorgione. In neither is the handling so unmistakably individual as to warrant a positive opinion as to authorship. It is true that several competent judges profess to recognize the hand of Calisto da Lodi in the National Gallery picture,[44] but further research is needed before certainty of judgement is reached; and as to the Leuchtenberg example—well, it matters little whether Beccaruzzi or some other imitator of better things be the author. Two separate painters have taken a common theme, they have treated the group of St. Joseph and the two Shepherds practically alike, and have laid down the outlines of landscape and architecture in the same way. Each has shown his independence in the treatment of the Madonna and Child and in the minor accessories. One of these details in the Leuchtenberg picture shows the sort of man the painter was, for he has calmly appropriated the idea of the boy angel playing at the trough, a motive which Titian first introduced in the world-famous Sacred and Profane Love. He seems also prone to introduce non-significant detail, such as the dog (very wooden, by the way) and the elaborate accessories of the ruined stable, the architecture of which baffles analysis. The Magi also appear in procession, thus distracting attention from the simple theme of the Adoration of the Shepherds. Yet as a colourist this painter is worthy of praise, though not such a master of chiaroscuro as his fellow-artist of the National Gallery. We may say then that the Leuchtenberg picture adds to the interest attaching to the other, and raises the question whether some Giorgionesque motive is not at the bottom of the composition.
HERBERT COOK.