Carlo Dolci

by George Hay

The picture of an angel pointing out to Christian souls the road to Heaven attracted great comment and praise when it was painted; so too did two oval pictures, one of the Archbishop of Florence, and the other of St. Philip of Neri. A half-length figure of St. Catherine was another of the painter's notable works that may be referred to his middle life. He had acquired the art of giving to his canvas the high finish of a miniature, and his colours were very fresh and glowing. Indeed, it may be said of Carlo Dolci's work that it has preserved its freshness to a very remarkable extent; some of the pictures painted more than 250 years ago are still glowing with colour, while the work of many men who came after Dolci has lost all its original brightness and has become muddy. This suggests that Dolci had found time to study the composition of paint with great care, and that some of the secrets of glazing surfaces had been revealed to him. Belonging to the middle period is the picture of St. Andrew embracing the Cross and the picture in octagon shape called Charity, presenting a beautiful woman nursing a sleeping babe, and holding a flaming heart in her right hand. A small picture of Hagar and Ishmael belongs to these years.

In 1655 Carlo Dolci's teacher, Rosselli, passed away, and in the following year the artist completed the painting of a standard that his master had begun. The subject is St. Benedict on a cloud in a blue sky, and Dolci is said to have made studies of it from a picture that was already in possession of another brotherhood. Composition was never his strong point. He painted another standard for the Benedictines, to their great delight, and in the following year a St. Dominic on wood, and the famous Angel of the Lily.

Carlo Dolci was now a married man, for in 1654, apparently on the advice of his friends, he married the Signora Teresa di Giovanni. The suggestion that Carlo Dolci married to order is supported to some extent by the incidents of the marriage day. Baldinucci tells us that the painter's friends and family, together with the friends and family of his wife, were all gathered together, but Carlo did not keep his appointment, and messengers were despatched all over the city to find him. He was not at home, he was not with the Benedicts, he was not in the churches he favoured most, and dinner-time had come round when some happy searcher found the painter in a church that the others had overlooked. Having scolded him for forgetting his appointment, the bride forgave her absent-minded partner, and the marriage took place. It was a very happy one.

Some time after this alliance, and when he had passed his fortieth year, Carlo Dolci turned his attention to fresco, and painted a figure of God the Father, the Holy Ghost, and four archangels. We learn that one of his pupils painted in the other angels, and this little fact is worth noting, because it shows that Carlo Dolci had reached the period of his life in which the demands for his work could not be satisfied without assistance, and he had been forced to follow the example of great predecessors. We know that Titian and Tintoretto and other masters of the Renaissance period in Italy never scrupled to avail themselves of the services of clever pupils, and many a picture that left the studio with the master's name upon it did not receive more than the slightest touch of the master's brush. This scandal, for so we must describe it, has been common to nearly every period in the development of art, and was perhaps justified to some small extent in days when artists were not rewarded on a generous scale. While their commissions came from patrons who would not brook delay, and were quite well able to make their anger effective, it was unwise to be too scrupulous about the means to an end. For the preparation of a canvas and the painting in of draperies for portraits the use of pupils may escape adverse criticism, but when the pressure of commission became very serious, too many great artists have succumbed to the temptation of leaving the bulk of the work to be painted by a pupil, trusting to a few skilled touches to give the completed canvas the stamp of their own individuality. We have no means of saying how far Carlo Dolci indulged in a custom that was common to his time. We are quite sure that had he thought it an immoral one he would have abandoned it without hesitation.

After turning his attention to fresco work the painter sent a St. Agatha to Venice, together with a portrait of St. John the Evangelist, and a picture entitled Sincerity, a woman garlanded with lilies. For another picture sent to Venice, representing Christ crowned with flowers and sitting at the entrance of a garden, Dolci received 200 scudi, a rather considerable sum when it is compared with those that were generally paid for his pictures. This picture was so successful that he painted another version of it in 1675 for a daughter of the Archduke Ferdinand and Anna de Medici. For this he received no less than 300 scudi, and the Marquis Runecini paid the same price for a picture of St. John, in which the saint sees in a vision a lady trampling a dragon under foot. Among other works belonging to this period are a St. Girolamo, a St. Luke, and a St. Benedict, all commissioned by his doctor, Signor Lorenzo.

For one of the Corsini family Dolci painted St. Anthony with a skull in his hand, and for Signor Corbinelli the full-length life-size canvas of the figure of St. Peter. For the Scalzi Brotherhood he painted the picture of the Eternal Father that was placed over the high altar, and a picture of Herodiade with the head of St. John the Baptist. A David with the head of Goliath was painted for the Marquis Runecini, and a copy was made for the English ambassador in Florence. This picture created a sensation when it was sent to England, and brought the painter many commissions for the portraits of Englishmen. The head of the Corsini house had given Dolci certain commissions, and they were so well executed that requests followed for another St. John, and a picture of King Casimir of Poland. The St. Cecilia playing the organ, which was sent to Poland, was painted shortly afterwards.

PLATE VI.—THE MAGDALEN

This picture, painted for a Roman patron, is at present to be in the Corsini Palace, Rome. It has, however, not been so well preserved as some of the best work from the same hand.

About this time Sustermans, a painter some of whose work may be seen and admired in Florence to-day, was commissioned to paint a portrait of Claudia, daughter of the Grand-duke Ferdinand and Anna de Medici, on the occasion of her marriage with the Emperor Leopold. But Sustermans on account of his great age could not accept the commission, and it was then offered to Carlo Dolci, who, although he had lived so long, and had achieved so large a measure of renown, had never travelled beyond the walls of Florence. However, he did not hesitate, but started out for Innsbrück in the spring of the year. He arrived in Holy Week, when, according to his rule of life, he would not paint secular subjects, but as soon as Easter had come to an end he began the portrait commissioned, and was then asked by the Duke to paint a second one of the same subject in a different pose. At Innsbrück Dolci received another commission of the sort that throws a strong light upon the ethics of the art world of his time. He was asked to repaint or touch up several devotional pictures by great masters who had passed away, and he does not seem to have hesitated. It was sufficient for him that the pictures were of a kind that met his approval; he asked nothing more, but set to work on the canvases of other men without a qualm. He was the guest at Innsbrück of the Abbé Viviani, and by way of expressing his gratitude for his host's unvarying attention and kindness he painted a beautiful head of St. Philip of Neri and gave it to him. Dolci remained at Innsbrück from April until the end of August, and received in addition to a considerable sum of money a gift of valuable jewels from his grateful patrons.