Christ and the Woman of Samaria is treated in a more open manner than either of the two preceding engravings. The beautiful landscape, as also the hill to the left, is entirely in line, while the flick work upon the figures and garments and, even more noticeably, in the foreground to the right, is of a more open character than that which appears in the Young Shepherd. It may belong to the latter part of Campagnola’s career as an engraver. There is an amplitude in the design of the seated woman which suggests Giorgione and Palma, though one cannot definitely name any painting by either of these masters from which Campagnola has borrowed his figure.
GIULIO CAMPAGNOLA. ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST
Size of the original engraving, 13⅝ × 9½ inches
In the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
GIULIO AND DOMENICO CAMPAGNOLA. SHEPHERDS IN A LANDSCAPE
Size of the original engraving, 5¼ × 10⅛ inches
In the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
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The last of Campagnola’s plates, left unfinished at his death and completed by Domenico Campagnola, is Shepherds in a Landscape or, as it is sometimes called, the Musical Shepherds. The original drawing, in reverse, for the right-hand half of this print is in the Louvre. It is unquestionably by Giulio Campagnola; but, equally without question, the left-hand portion of the engraving itself is by Domenico. Whether Domenico was a close relative or merely a pupil of Giulio’s has not been determined; but the Shepherds in a Landscape conclusively proves that he was at least the artistic heir of the older master. Domenico’s style is in marked contrast to that of Giulio. Flick work is almost absent from his engravings, which are executed in rather open lines, more in the mode of an etcher than of an engraver working according to established tradition. The skies, in particular, have a romantic quality which is all their own, and which can be seen to advantage in the Shepherd and the Old Warrior, dated 1517.
Marcantonio Raimondi, born in Bologna about 1480, for over three centuries enjoyed a reputation eclipsing that of any other Italian master. Of recent years, however, upon insufficient grounds, he has been somewhat pushed aside and belittled as a “reproductive engraver,” his critics wilfully forgetting the fact that, with the exception of Pollaiuolo and Mantegna, the Italian School is, in the main, derivative, and cannot boast of any original engravers of world-wide fame, such as Schongauer or Dürer. But Marcantonio was far from being a mere translator of alien works. “He is like some great composer who borrows another’s theme only to make it his own by the originality of his setting.”[11]
[11] Marcantonio Raimondi. By Arthur M. Hind. The Print-Collector’s Quarterly, Vol. 3, No. 3. p. 276.