“The revival of the Greek Language and Greek Literature raised the long ebb into a wave that swept over civilized Europe. On its glittering crest the Venetian painters especially were lifted into the society of gods, goddesses, nymphs, and satyrs. They might see sky, sea and earth peopled with radiant beings; perhaps with a sort of semi-belief such as we accord to the Lorelei and fairies, creations that somehow easily worked in with creeds and experience. Anyhow, they might see Pan come dallying down the sparkling brook-side, now shouting to the laughing brown nymphs rustling through the reeds, and pretending to be afraid, now scattering a shower of notes from his pipes that would fall upon the ears as the brightness of the iris over a fountain falls upon the eye.”...
“It may seem strange if I place the Venetian school and Titian, with his liberal line—which, however, is by no means wanting in reticence—in closer relationship with Greek art of the great period than the more classical schools of Tuscany and Rome. Supposing one were to endeavor to paint a restoration of the pediments of the Parthenon, it would be possible to interpolate with figures by Titian, never with any by Poussin, or, I think, even by Raphael or Michael Angelo.”...
“In spite of extravagant and even absurd defects (for the great artist’s eyes no longer served him faithfully), when Titian, towards the end of his life painted the ‘Europa’ ... the muse who inspired Pheidias laid her hand on the old man’s shoulder, and she inspired the wealth of volume, ease of line, and glowing sense of nature’s exuberance.”
George Frederick Watts, his Life and Writings, London and New York, Vol. III., pp. 251, 253, 254.
Fig. 309. Caravaggio. Death of the Virgin.—Louvre.
Chapter IX
THE REALISTS AND ECLECTICS
The Confusion following Raphael and Michelangelo—Giulio Romano—Caravaggio and realistic Revolt—Salvator Rosa, romantic Individualism and the Picturesque—The Carracci and the Eclectic Ideal—Later Eclectics; Guido Reni—Domenichino—The Waning of Italian Greatness—Influence of Italy on the Schools of France, Flanders, and Spain.
Italian painting suddenly declined for lack of taste. The followers of Raphael and Michelangelo possessed astonishing power and knowledge, but, save their own cleverness, no longer had anything to express. Thus painting became merely an art of self-exploitation and display, a matter of difficult foreshortenings, complicated groupings, and novel constructions in light and shade. Such at least was the case at Rome, and partly at Florence. At Venice, Milan, Cremona, Ferrara, and generally in the North the decline was gradual and benign. Sincere art of a minor character was still produced. But in the artistic centre the collapse was complete, and all the more disastrous that nobody realized that a collapse had come.
It is staggering to find that Vasari, in the face of merited ridicule, had no doubt that he was a great painter. How he boasts of his own powers! “But what matters most for this art, is that they have made it so perfect today, and so easy for him who possesses design, that where formerly a picture was made by one of our masters in six years, today our masters make six in one. And I am the credible witness of this both by my observation and by my work. And many more perfect and finished pictures are now seen, than formerly were made by the important masters.” (Vol. IV, p. 13.) Nothing is more appalling than to find Vasari at Florence and Lomazzo at Milan regularly naming Giulio Romano, Polidoro and Maturino along with Raphael and Michelangelo. Evidently the old sure taste of the Renaissance has yielded to confusion.