216 REVIEWS AND PAMPHLETS ON ART

attributing to the same early period, the face of the musician is drawn with great refinement, and considerable power of rounding surfaces-(though in the drapery may be remarked a very singular piece of archaic treatment: it is warm white, with yellow stripes; the dress itself falls in deep folds, but the striped pattern does not follow the foldings-it is drawn across, as if with a straight ruler).

47. But passing from these frescoes, which are nearly the size of life, to those of the Arena chapel at Padua, erected in 1303, decorated in 1306, which are much smaller, we find the execution proportionably less dexterous.¹ Of this famous chapel Lord Lindsay says-

“nowhere (save in the Duomo of Orvieto) is the legendary history of the Virgin told with such minuteness.

“The heart must indeed be cold to the charms of youthful art that can enter this little sanctuary without a glow of delight. From the roof, with its sky of ultra-marine, powdered with stars and interspersed with medallions containing the heads of our Saviour, the Virgin and the Apostles, to the mock panelling of the nave, below the windows, the whole is completely covered with frescoes, in excellent preservation, and all more or less painted by Giotto’s own hand, except six in the tribune, which however have apparently been executed from his cartoons....

“These frescoes form a most important document in the history of Giotto’s mind, exhibiting all his peculiar merits, although in a state as yet of immature development. They are full of fancy and invention; the composition is almost always admirable, although sometimes too studiously symmetrical; the figures are few and characteristic, each speaking for itself, the impersonation of a distinct idea, and most dramatically grouped and contrasted; the attitudes are appropriate, easy, and natural; the action and gesticulation singularly vivid; the expression is excellent, except when impassioned grief induces caricature:-devoted to the study of Nature as he is, Giotto had not yet learnt that it is suppressed feeling which affects one most. The head of our Saviour is beautiful throughout-that of the Virgin not so good-she is modest, but not very graceful or celestial;-it was long before he succeeded in his Virgins-they are much too matronly: among the accessory figures, graceful female forms occasionally appear, foreshadowing those of his later works at Florence and Naples, yet they

I went to look at this work, I could hardly leave it-the faces of the musician and of Herod are worthy of any period of art. The draperies are, however, somewhat clumsier, rounder, and less felt than those of the Campo Santo, and it is curious to see the yellow stripe of the musician’s carried straight across it without in the least following the folds. Yet this very piece of simplicity gives a severity and character to the figure, which no correct design of drapery could have given.”]

¹ [For the Arena chapel, see Giotto and his Works in Padua (1854-1855).]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]