Child-life in Art

by Estelle M. Hurll

We can appreciate the Tempi Madonna at the first glance; the meaning of the Sistine Madonna we can never fully reach, though to contemplate it day by day is to feel our thoughts become purer and our aspirations nobler.

A feature of the child-life of Jesus upon which Raphael loved to dwell is his companionship with his cousin John, a boy of nearly the same age, whose destiny was indissolubly linked with the Christ. Following the Gospel description of the Baptist when he came forth from the desert “clothed with camel’s hair and with a girdle of skin about his loins,” the artist has represented the child John as a dark, faun-like boy, with a little skin garment girt about him,—a picturesque figure to contrast with the fair beauty of the Christ-child.

The two boys are most charming, when, as in the Madonna of the Pearl, the little John seeks with childish eagerness to please his cousin. Here he is running gleefully to Jesus, with his skin garment full of newly gathered fruit. The Christ-child, seated on his grandmother’s knee, beside his mother, stretches out his hands for the gift, his face shining with simple, child-like pleasure. At another time Saint John brings a goldfinch to the Virgin’s knee, and the two children lean lovingly against her, Jesus turning his earnest eyes towards the bird, which he thoughtfully strokes. A very pretty incident is embodied in the Aldobrandini Madonna, where the Christ-child reaches from his mother’s arms to smilingly bestow a flower upon Saint John.

Other pictures introduce, more or less definitely, an element of devotion on the part of the infant Baptist, as in the Madonna of the Meadow, where he kneels to receive the cross from the hands of the Christ-child. The devotional relation is still more marked in the Belle Jardinière of the Louvre. In the Holy Family of Casa Canigiani, Jesus is giving Saint John a banner with the words Ecce Agnus Dei.

The two boys, as the central figures of the Holy Family, have engaged the brush of nearly every great religious painter, some producing familiar and domestic scenes, others emphasizing the symbolic and religious significance of the theme. Andrea del Sarto treated the subject many times, and usually portrayed the children in a natural and playful intimacy. Pinturicchio painted them running across a flowery meadow to get water from a fountain. Guilio Romano has given us the decidedly domestic scene of Jesus in the bath, with Saint John merrily pouring water upon him. Sometimes, as in a lovely work by Angiolo Bronzino, Saint John is affectionately kissing the sleeping Babe.

It was a beautiful thought on the part of some few artists,—notably Palma Vecchio, Luini, and Murillo,—to introduce a lamb as a playmate for the children, the suggestion having its origin in the Baptist’s description of Jesus as the “Lamb of God.”

In Botticelli’s Holy Family, Saint John stands by with clasped hands, adoring the Infant. Perugino places him kneeling at a little distance in the rear,—a perfect embodiment of childish devotion. In a painting by Titian, also, he kneels apart, leaning on his cross, and in one by Guido, he humbly kisses the Christ-child’s foot.

In a lovely picture by Murillo, called the “Children of the Shell,” he kneels to drink from a cup which the little Jesus holds to his lips. Here the contrast between the two is exquisitely rendered, both from the artistic and the religious point of view, the Christ-child bearing the unmistakable stamp of superiority, in spite of his childish figure, while the infant John is a charming impersonation of reverent and loving humility.

The religious spirit of the old masters has not been successfully imitated by any modern artist who has attempted to delineate the Infant Jesus and Saint John, nor is this to be expected. There are many pleasing works of art, however, which, though differing widely from early Italian standards, have an attractiveness of their own.

Such, for instance, is Boucher’s painting, thoroughly characteristic of the artist, and, when considered in itself, a very pretty thing. The two plump babies are bewitching little figures, irresistibly lovable in their dimpled beauty. Sweet cherub faces peep from the surrounding clouds, regarding the holy children with wondering awe.