preparation of the cartoons. Five months in the year would probably be the longest period in which it would be possible to paint in fresco in London. Fresco painting, as a durable and immoveable decoration, can only be fitly applied to buildings of a permanent character. Not only capricious alterations, but even repairs, cannot be attempted without destroying the paintings. There can be no doubt that the general introduction of such decorations would lead to a more solid style of architecture; at the same time the impossibility of change would be considered by many as an objection. This objection would not, however, apply to public buildings. On the whole, the smoke of London might be found less prejudicial than that of the candles in Italian churches. The Last Judg ment of Michael Angelo could hardly have suffered more in three centuries from coal fires than from the church ceremonies, which have hastened its ruin. The superior brilliancy (as regards this quality alone) of frescoes which adorn the galleries of private houses, where they have not been exposed to such injurious influences, is very remarkable; as, for example, in the Farnese ceiling. The occasional unsound state of some walls, even in buildings of the most solid construction in Rome, is to be attributed to slight but frequent shocks of earthquake. A ceiling painted by one of the scholars of the Carracci in the Costaguti Palace in Rome fell from this cause. Such disadvantages might fairly be set against any that are to be apprehended in London, With regard to the modes of cleaning fresco, the description of the method. adopted by Carlo Maratti in cleaning Raphael's frescoes, when blackened with smoke, happens to be preserved but, no doubt, modern chemistry could suggest the best possible means. The general qualities in art which fresco demands, as well as those which are less compatible with it, have been elsewhere considered. It has been often assumed that it is fittest for public and extensive works. Public works, whether connected with religion or patriotism, are the most calculated to advance the character of the art, for as they are addressed to the mass of mankind, or at least to the mass of a nation, they must be dignified. Existing works of the kind may be more or less interesting, but there are scarcely any that are trivial. This moral dignity is soon associated in the mind of the artist with a corresponding grandeur of appearance, and his attention is thus involuntarily directed to the higher principles of his art. The painters employed on an extensive series of frescoes would have to devote a considerable portion of their lives to the object. In such an undertaking, they ought not to encounter any impatience or want of confidence on the part of their employers the trial should be a fair one. It would hardly be possible for the artists to paint any oil pictures while so occupied; their designs and cartoons would, at least for some time, require all their attention. After a few years, when assistants would be formed, more leisure might be gained; and it was under these circumstances that Raphael painted in oil when employed by Julius the Second in Rome. But for the first three years after he began the frescoes in the Vatican, he confined himself entirely to those labours; and Michael Angelo, as is well known, completed the ceiling of the Cappella Sistina without assistance. The more general practice was, however, to employ scholars; and this is one of the serious considerations connected with the present question. Owing to the self-educating system of painters in this country, the younger artists are more independent than they are elsewhere, and they might have some reluctance to co-operate in works in which their best efforts would only contribute to the fame of the professor under whom they might be employed. In Italy, and in recent times in Germany, this subordination was not felt to be irksome, and the best scholars were soon entrusted with independent commissions. It is to be hoped that artists thus created in England would be commissioned to decorate private houses; the result, at all events, would be that the school would gain in design, and probably without any sacrifice of the more refined technical pro cesses in colouring, in which the English painters now excel their Continental rivals. Some Italian painters, for example, Andrea del Sarto, the Carracci and their scholars, were equally skilful in oil and in fresco. STATE AND PROSPECTS OF THE ENGLISH SCHOOL. 31 No. IV. THE STATE AND PROSPECTS OF THE ENGLISH SCHOOL, CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO THE PROMOTION OF ART IN REBUILDING IN the Report of the Committee on the Fine Arts, appointed by the House of Commons in 1841, it was observed, that "the chief object aimed at by the appointment of the Committee," was "the encouragement of the Fine Arts of this country," and that, by means of the decoration of the Houses of Parliament, "encouragement beyond the means of private patronage, would be afforded, not only to the higher walks, but to all branches of art." It is here proposed to consider this question with reference to the state and prospects of the English school of painting. And first it is to be observed that, although "all branches of art" may be entitled to the consideration of the Commission, historical painting is not only generally fittest for decoration on a large scale, but is precisely the class of painting which, more than any other, re * [Printed in the Appendix to the First Report of the Commissioners on the Fine Arts. 1842.-ED.] |
