colo, and Lorenzo, of whom the two former, but especially Niccolò, attempted to infuse the contemporary improvements of central Italy into their distinct traditionary style, while the latter, after a similar effort, abandoned it altogether. Paolo painted the outer case of the Pala d'Oro, in the treasury of S. Mark's, and specimens of the works of Niccolò and Lorenzo may be seen in the interesting museum of the Venetian Academy.* * A large altar-piece, in a great number of compartments, of which the central, representing the Coronation of the Virgin, is much superior to the rest, is the most important work of Semitecolo. The only compositions worth notice are that of S. Francis renouncing his father in the market-place at Assisi, the third of the upper row, adapted apparently from a composition by Giotto at Assisi, and the Last Judgment, in which one of the angels attendant on Our Saviour holds forth a scroll of the sun, moon, stars, &c., as if about to roll it up, while below, to the left, one vast tomb, surrounded by trees, appears to enshrine the spirits of the just, and fire descends as usual from the throne to consume the wicked, to the right of the picture. This is purely a revival, an Italianization of the Byzantine style, and as such the picture is very curious. In the robes of Our Saviour and the Virgin the lights are done in gold, in the trictrac manner, so common with the Byzantines. Blue rays, shaped like the blade of a sword, descend from the circlet symbolical of heaven, when the interference of Deity is expressed. Something very like this occurs in the paintings of Tintoretto at Venice and even in the Annunciation by Titian on the staircase of the Confreria di S. Rocco, one of the many reminiscences of Byzantium in his early works. Four other of Niccolò's pictures, one of them signed 'Nicholeto Simetecolo de Venetia,' another dated 1367-and representing S. Sebastian reproving the Emperors Maximian and Diocletian, his being shot at, his martyrdom, beaten to death with clubs, and his burial-are preserved in the Libreria del Duomo, at Padua. The Burial is the best, it is well grouped, the colouring neither very warm nor very pale, the expression tame. They are It would prolong this sketch unnecessarily to notice the traces of these Semi-Byzantine revivals discoverable long after the direct succession had in each several district failed, and the influence of Niccola Pisano become predominant in Italy-at Siena longer than at Florence, at Bologna longer than at Siena, at Venice longer than at Bologna; while in Western Lombardy, and at Asti, in particular, as late as the pontificate of Leo X., artists might be found, descendants apparently in the direct line from the original Roman school, who perpetuated many of the worst peculiarities of the Byzantine school in the style of the worst contemporaries of the Menologion.* highly finished.-Lorenzo is an artist of far higher merit. The earliest of his works would appear to be the immense picture in compartments, formerly in S. Antonio di Castello, now in the Academy at Venice. The Byzantine influence is still visible in it, but in his later works in the same gallery it wholly disappears. His colouring is soft and warm, betraying, if I mistake not, the influence of the early German school of Cologne.-We shall have repeated occasion, hereafter, to notice the influence of Byzantium, long lingering, and perpetually reappearing and asserting itself in the development of art at Venice. * See for example a picture by Ambrose of Asti, dated 1514, in the Academy of Pisa, and more especially the compositions on the gradino. The picture nevertheless displays points of originality and merit. In the central compartment Mary Magdalen pours the ointment over Our Saviour's head, which I never saw elsewhere, and his conversation with her, (as identified with Mary, the sister of Lazarus,) on the gradino, though rude, is full of feeling. S. Orsola, regina di Bretagna' is represented in the compartment to the right, with her Vision, the Voyage of the Eleven Thousand Virgins, and her Martyrdom, on the gradino,-and to the left we behold S. Ilaria di Barcalone,' VOL. II. I should have brought this letter more speedily to a close, had I not wished you to appreciate the Sculpture and Painting of Italy in all their varied relations, nor would the "bright chambers of the East" have revealed Niccola Pisano sooner for my shaking the hour-glass. There is a freshness too in the half-hour's walk immediately before sun-rise, which insensibly begets a brisker step and a more discursive lip than may be maintained in the heat of the day, when the mouth is parched and the foot drags heavily onward. "Absit omen!" but to a pedestrian like yourself this similitude may serve possibly as a Janus-faced apology. (Barcelona,) a really beautiful figure, with her exposure to the flames, and her decollation, below; a hand, as if from heaven, holds the sword that has despatched her, and her soul flies up to heaven in the shape of a little white bird. The rocks in the background are exactly like those of the Menologion, to which This the whole composition bears a singular resemblance. picture belongs to a class whose interest, like that of S. Umiltà, is of a documentary description-rude indeed, and of little worth in themselves, but valuable as witnesses in the history of art. H CHRISTIAN ART OF MODERN EUROPE. PERIOD I. ARCHITECTURE. Development of the Christian Element, Spirit-Lombard and Gothic, or Pointed Architecture-Rise of Sculpture and Painting-Expression. III. NICCOLA PISANO AND HIS SCHOOL-RISE AND RESTORATION OF SCULPTURE, IN CONNEXION WITH GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE PREPARATION FOR GHIBERTI AND DONATELLO. SECT. 1. Pisa-Niccola and Giovanni Pisano. SECT. 4. Naples. |