Fig. 25.—MANTEGNA.
The Virgin and the Infant Jesus.
Of all the Italian engravers who, towards the end of the fifteenth century, completed the popularisation in their country of the art whose first secrets and examples were revealed and supplied by Florence, the one most powerfully inspired and most skilful was certainly Andrea Mantegna. We need not here recall the true position of this great artist in the history of painting. Such of his pictures and decorative paintings as still exist possess a world-wide fame; and, though his engravings are less generally known, they deserve equal celebrity, and would justify equal admiration.
Fig. 26.—MANTEGNA.
From the Print Representing a Battle of Sea-Gods.
The engraved work of Mantegna consists of only twenty plates, about half of which are religious, and the remainder mythological or historical. Though none of these engravings bears the signature or initials of the Paduan master, their authenticity cannot be doubted. It is abundantly manifest in certain marked characteristics of style and workmanship; in the delicate yet strong precision of the drawing; and in that somewhat rude elegance which was at the command of none of his contemporaries in the same degree. Every part of them, even where they savour of imperfection or of extravagance, bears witness to the indomitable will and independent genius of a master. His touch imparts a passionate and thrilling aspect even to the details of architectural decoration and the smallest inanimate objects. One would suppose that, after having studied each part of his subject with the eye of a man of culture and a thinker, Mantegna, when he came to represent it on the metal, forgot all but the burning impatience of his hand and the fever of the struggle with his material.
Fig. 27.—MANTEGNA.
The Entombment.