Portraits, 4

 

In this essay, I would like us to consider portraiture from a slightly different point of view and that is, portraiture as sculpture. Sculptors have been making portraits at least as long as painters have and, in certain periods, it is arguable that sculpture was in fact the preferred medium. Needless to say, when sculptors are considering their sitter as the subject of a work, they like painters, need to consider the normal imperatives (assuming a likeness is required): the salient physical characteristics of their model, the eventual collocation of the work (in a private house, a public space, indoors or outdoors, and so on), its size, what medium to use if it hasn't been specified already, etc.

The three works we will look at are made of bronze and are all of 'human' scale, although the first is, as I recall it, slightly larger than life-size. This 4th-century BC Greek work was discovered in Rome during modern excavations (1885), buried several metres underground. It is in nearly perfect condition, especially considering its age and where it had remained buried for possibly 1500 years or so 1. It is a portrait of a boxer caught between bouts, or only moments after the fight; this is obvious from the blood shown on his face and dripped on his legs, the cuts and contusions in various places, also on the face; he is still wearing the metal-reinforced gloves, now weighing on his hands resting wearily between his thighs; the broken nose and cauliflower ears testify to years of similar trauma. This particular statue therefore carries more information than the painted works we have studied so far, in that here we have, as well as the face, an entire body to express not only the courageous self-possession of this subject, the boxer himself, but to show as well the effort and the exhaustion of his physical self. 

The immediate impression on first seeing this work is the odd one of having interrupted a private moment, especially if one enters from the direction in which the boxer is himself looking. He has been placed in a carefully-lit smallish space, away from the other exhibits in the museum; we can walk all around him and marvel at the extraordinary craftsmanship speaking to us from every angle of this obvious masterpiece. Here, he seems a lonely figure, utterly exhausted after his fight, and perhaps preferring to be left in peace. His once inset eyes (see the next work) are no longer, but his expression might have all the more pathos for that; he looks at us but seems not to see: he has retreated into a space only another professional could understand.

Although we have no idea who the model was, there was a model: the physiognomic details tell that. Some may object that artists used models all the time, to represent all manner of characters from history, religion and so on, and that that use of a person, as a generalised model or type, does not constitute portraiture per se; technically I agree, but there are certain cases, this being one, where, even though the subject may be a generalised one - that of boxers - this work speaks as that of a particular person, that is, it appears a unique individual has been portrayed here. When I saw this work, I had the clear impression that I was looking at a portrait and not at a generic statement 2.

 Greek sculptor, possibly Lysippos. The Boxer (Il Pugile), 4th-century BC, bronze and copper.

Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, Rome (Photo: the author)

Detail of The Boxer, above (Photo: the author)

Note his lips made with the addition of copper and the deadly, metal reinforced gloves!

Our second sculpture, in its present state a portrait bust, is a wonderful example of Roman sculptural portraiture, dating from the Republican period (that is, when Rome was theoretically a republic, prior to the advent of Julius Caesar and the subsequent Imperial period). The first image, below, is taken from directly in front of and slightly below the head; we can see clearly that this is a representation of a particular individual and therefore a portrait in the normal sense. It is made of bronze with inset eyes made of some hard stone (or glass paste or ivory); personally, I find the eyes done in this way, that is, intact, to be somewhat distracting, although the fixity of the sitter's gaze is plausible. In contrast with the first work we examined, here the hair, moustache and beard are all unique notations, even allowing for some possible 'artistic licence'. 

The strong, middle-aged and still virile face is forcefully modelled, presenting the viewer with a portrait which is simultaneously a 'type'; by that I mean that, at least for the modern viewer, this face fits with what we have been schooled to think upstanding, possibly 'noble' republican Romans should look like. There appears to be no air of arrogance about this man, no pretence, just the frank and pragmatic gaze of a free citizen.

Anonymous Roman (?) sculptor. Capitoline Brutus (Bruto Capitolino, detail), IV - III century BC (Republican period), bronze.

Musei Capitolini, Rome. (Photo: the author)

Capitoline Brutus, detail

Musei Capitolini, Rome (Photo: the author)

Our final example (below) is from much closer to our own time, from the twentieth century: it is by the well-known Italian sculptor, Marino Marini (1901-1980) 3 and is particularly interesting because it is a portrait of his friend, the also very famous British sculptor, Henry Moore (1898-1986). Although, like our earlier sculptures, a bronze, it is the smallest, and, in the sense that it has almost nothing but the face of the sitter, it is the most 'essential'. However, only superficially because the Roman portrait we just saw was, as can be seen in the second photo, also fairly straightforward, with not too much interfering with the treatment of the main planes.

It's still fair to say nevertheless, that Marini has dealt primarily with the major facial features; even the hair is no more than the smoothed globs of the clay or wax (or plaster) from which the portrait was originally made, pre-casting. Apparently, the head was modelled by Marini in Carrara, in Tuscany, where Moore had gone to spend the summer. The modelling reflects in a way that mountainous place, the same place Michelangelo would go to find the marble he needed, some 400-odd years earlier; and Moore was from Yorkshire, a place of tough people who often led a tough life. The face is formed below a massive forehead from which protrudes a large nose; the eyes are set deep under that forehead; the large fleshy mouth is almost shrouded by the broad cheeks which form a kind of arch over it and the strong chin. Neck and ears are suggestions only; no shoulders or body are necessary as we are forced to regard only those facial features which distinguish Moore from anyone else. In contrast with the Roman head, in this piece the 'art' is as much the work as the likeness is; ironically, at a time when photography was well and truly established (mid-twentieth century), Marino Marini's sculpture is less like a photo of its sitter than is the Roman portrait (IV - III century BC)!

Marino Marini, Henry Moore, 1962, bronze.

National Portrait Gallery, London (Photo; the author)

In functional terms, sculpted portraits are little different from painted ones, in so far as both forms generally need to capture a likeness of the sitter, and if possible, also some aspect of his or her character. The principal difference between the two - apart from the obvious technical ones - is that sculptures are in some way or other three-dimensional; this allows, and requires, the artist to consider the real light conditions under which the work will be seen. The Roman portrait considered here relies on the 'natural' play of light in as much as it accepts it (the light) in the same way that a living human face does; it has the same forms, the same concavities and protrusions, the same proportions as a real face, so that, allowing for the effects of the medium (in this case, bronze), the sculpture will, in a general sense, behave similarly. The Marini portrait however, perhaps because of the existence of photography, relies somewhat less on direct similitude of physical reality, and more on the three-dimensional ability of the medium to 'direct' the play of light. As mentioned, he has accentuated certain forms - the broad forehead, the elongation of the 'head' which is really only the face - to force particular effects of the light; the likeness is certainly there but, as said earlier, the work's character as 'art' is, to my mind, more pronounced than it is in the Roman example.

And while figurative painters obviously are very concerned with light, it is to a much greater degree the light inherent within the image, rather than from any external source - be it natural or artificial - a light which the artist 'bestows', so to speak, on the work, an essentially immutable light, that determines how the image will be seen. Sculpture in general plays with and is dependent upon external 'physical' light in a way fundamentally quite different from that of painting.

1 It appeared at the time of its discovery that it had been deliberately hidden and carefully buried, indicating that its artistic value was well understood. The time spent underground (or indeed, under water) by antique works of art varies considerably and depends on a number of factors. Towards the end of the western Roman empire, Rome itself was besieged and burned a number of times; buildings left in ruins after such events were often simply abandoned, resulting in their slow 'reclamation' by nature: earth covered them, grass and trees took root, and so on. Our statue was rediscovered in the late 19th century, I believe during excavation work for new construction (a common event in Rome even today). The intervening oblivion however had ensured that the Boxer avoided the fate of so many ancient bronze works, that of being melted down for re-use as arms, coins, etc.

2 I am happy to admit that, without doubt, the hair and beard for instance, have been stylised; but even the guide book of the museum in Rome describes this figure, or especially the face, as a type of portrait: "La statua, ... poteva essere il ritratto di ricostruzione di un celebre pugile, ... ." (The statue ... could have been a reconstructed portrait of a famous boxer ... .) Guida, Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, published 2017 by Electa, p28. That said, other commentators doubt this and maintain that it is not a portrait per se; nevertheless, its power of direct emotional communication (as distinct from 'illustrated' emotion, such as in the Laocoön) is enough for me to describe it as such!

3 Marino Marini came from Pistoia, also in Tuscany, not far from Florence. In both cities there is a museum devoted to Marini's work; he is perhaps best known for a series of horses with their riders (or knights), and for another of theatrical and circus people. His portraits form a separate vein in his oeuvre; he also made many paintings and drawings and his work is widely dispersed in museums around the world.

Portraits, 3

 

Continuing what has become a series of articles dealing with the portrait, this time let's begin with a 'modernist' picture painted by the Italian artist Giuseppe Capogrossi (1900-1972). It is Portrait of a Woman (in Italian, Ritratto muliebre) painted in 1932 and kept at the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna in Rome. Capogrossi is interesting as, in his maturity, he changed tack completely, becoming a major abstract painter and it is for his abstracts that he may be better-known. In fact, the same gallery which houses our portrait also has a substantial collection of those later abstract pictures.

Giuseppe Capogrossi, Portrait of a Woman, 1932, oil on panel

Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna, Rome (Photo: the author)

I wanted us to look at this painting because, although it portrays a young woman, seated and dressed in a kind of patterned dress or smock (it's not clear exactly what the garment is), which the artist has made an important part of his composition, it could hardly be more different from the Moroni Portrait of a Lady seen in the previous essay (Portraits, 2). Structurally, the woman's body, and her two-toned clothing form a kind of cool central column which occupies, as a unit, the better part of the image. The cool blues of her clothes, and her eyes for that matter, contrast markedly with the reds distributed around the image and, particularly, those of her face; however, while the facial reds, oranges and pinks are 'warm', the apricot pink or orange of the seat (?) she appears to sit on, is cool; this has the optical effect of not competing with the warmer reds, as can be seen by contrasting that seat with the red of the fruit in her hand, another warm accent. That fruit and her very red lips, while seeming to exist in two different spaces or planes - that is, the fruit seems closer to us than do her lips - are virtually of the same intensity; and this observation brings us to another important formal or technical characteristic of this portrait, viz. that it is a tonal painting.

The description 'tonal painting', as a style or technique, signifies that the artist is primarily concerned with constructing forms by varying the intensity, the tones, of each colour, as opposed to the manipulation of black and white as monochrome elements onto which colours are then applied. The tonal painter, very much concerned with light, depends for his or her effects on a skilful control and manipulation of colour as such; that is to say, colour is not an adjunct to black and white but rather, so to speak, the 'substance' of light. Put simply, starting from a middle tone, forms are modelled in colours which are made lighter or darker, with the addition of white in the former case, and the addition of more of the pure colour (or a darker one) in the latter. Pure black and pure white, as modelling 'tools' as it were, are (usually) absent; this however, depends on the desired general tone 1. 

In the present example, we can see that the woman's face is composed entirely of areas of colour, with minimal suggestion of line; the background, an almost neutral tone applied as horizontal bands, contrasts thus doubly with the generally strongly-coloured and 'vertical' orientation of the figure. We may note incidentally, that in this portrait, most details of the face, the hands, the hair, etc., have been suppressed in a way unknown and probably unacceptable in earlier periods; a Perugino (or even a Sutherland later) would not have painted such a pared-down, simplified portrait 2. Interestingly, the hands holding the red object (fruit?) raise a question: are they merely an anatomical fact (that is, that we must be able to see her hands, given the length of the figure), or does the focus on both them and the face through the use of warm colour signify some symbolic content? 

Our next portrait is little more than a drawing although it is technically a painting; it is a fresco painted on a terracotta roofing tile!

Anonymous Florentine Painter (Filippino Lippi or Domenico Ghirlandaio ?), Portrait of an Old Man, last quarter of the 15th century, fresco on terracotta tile. Uffizi, Florence (Photo: the author)

Although the author of this marvellous 'drawing' is unknown, its supreme skill, both in the drawing itself and in its psychological observation, is clear to see. Even in its present state, which seems to be that of an unfinished work, it is absolutely arresting. An undoubted initial drawing has been gone over with veils of very thin monochrome paint, giving the image the effect of a tonal drawing. This portrait is another example of works which are dependent on line: the linear quality is obvious and the image's dependence on line, both for structure and form, is patent (especially compared to the previous picture just discussed). The painting is restricted to tones of fundamentally the same colour, a sort of light yellow ochre and/or red earth, the tones modulated to create light and shadow. As well as the depth implied by the sitter's left shoulder across to his right, the head is a kind of block, modelled as if sculpturally, with a definite left side, in shadow, and a definite 'front' side, as it were 'revealing' (in Michelangelo's sense 3) the facial features upon which the light falls. There is no white or black - except for perhaps the pupils - in this portrait.

An alert and, we might say, sanguine expression characterises this mature face drawn entirely of curves, in spite of the initial impression of blockiness (of the head). In fact, curves play the most important role in the structuring of the facial features (nose, eyes, chin, jowl) but also in the suggestion of the roundness of the forehead - the curve of his cap - the ear, and the neck - the curve of his 'collar' around to the back. Although there are no real straight lines in the human face, it is not often that we see a drawing or painting of one where the curvilinear quality is so well expressed; in this image, even apparently straight lines, for instance, those of the height of the cap, are actually very gradual curves.

Mention could be made here of the way the top of the ear is pushed down and forward by the rim of that cap, a curiosity which is often seen in paintings of this period! Our sitter looks as if he is wrapped-up in his heavy garment (he could be a monk or friar), with his thick hat on, as though to keep warm; even if the bright blue background and the overall lightness of the colours suggest spring or summer. The big slow curves indicating his body and folded arms also convey his form, his bulk: so much with so little! Of course, the articulation of the expression on the rocky landscape of the old man's face is no simple matter: this artist has 'seen' the sitter's face, not merely looked at it!

The final portrait is another fresco but this time, one still in its original position, on the wall of a chapel in the Florentine church of Santa Trinita.

Domenico Ghirlandaio (1449-1494), Portrait of Nera Corsi,  1483-86, fresco.

 Cappella Sassetti, Santa Trinita, Florence (Photo: the author)

Note: the date under the fresco reads 1480 in Roman numerals but others are missing: faintly visible, a Roman '5' (V). There is a shadow of the altarpiece, between the frescos of the wife and husband, covering the right side of this photo.

The elderly woman represented here is the left part of a double portrait, the right part being that of her husband Francesco Sassetti. It is an example of the 'profile portrait' discussed in the first essay in relation to the medal of Leon Battista Alberti; here however, our subject is represented as as an entire figure, kneeling as was common, before the holy work of which she and her husband were the donors or patrons. She is shown very modestly dressed although wealthy, her head covered with a type of veil that descends to cover her shoulders; her long dark dress covers her completely. Nera has her hands held before her, joined in prayer, and appears to be looking directly towards her husband on the other side of the altar.

The profile is exact, we see only the right side of her face; she has the large eyelids and sunken eyes indicative of a certain age, her mouth is pulled back towards her gums, her chin distinct from her lower cheek, now become jowly. She is impassive, lost in her own thoughts, perhaps religious ones, perhaps not; but the power of this portrait lies in this fact, that we don't know what she is thinking but the image is so attractive, that we do begin to question who this woman was, what she may have done, how much longer she may have lived after the portrait was made; in other words, the portrait interests us (like any good portrait), not only for its formal qualities as art, but also for what it represents, the life (or, a part thereof) of one of us.

Double portraits were not altogether unusual in the art of this period and earlier, famous examples being that by Piero della Francesca of the Duke of Montefeltro and his wife (in the Uffizi), and that by Masaccio in his Trinità fresco in Santa Maria Novella. In this last, the identity of the donors is in dispute (said by some to be Lorenzo Lenzi and his wife) and although the two people represented as patrons are normally husband and wife, in this case it has been suggested that the couple may be brother and sister. Also, of anecdotal interest, in relation to the pushed-down ears in the Portrait of an Old Man, in the Masaccio painting, the male donor, this time on the left, also has his ears pushed down by his headdress. 

Masaccio (1401-1428?) La Trinità (detail showing male donor), 1425-27, fresco.

Church of Santa Maria Novella, Florence (Photo: the author)

Again, an exact and excellent profile portrait, like the Ghirlandaio, a kneeling figure, hands in prayer. This fresco has been repositioned a couple of times and the lower portion of the donor's red cloak has apparently been repainted.

1 At some point in the making of a painting, the painter will decide on the tonal range of the particular picture; it may be quite light, as in this example, that is, its tones tend towards white; or it may, on the contrary, be quite dark and the tones will therefore tend towards the black end of the scale. Most tonal paintings work with a set of related tones operating somewhere or other along the scale between white and black, perhaps more frequently, somewhere closer to the white end; in Capogrossi's portrait, his darkest tones are in the darker blues; if we were to place a sheet of dead-black paper beside those 'dark' blues however, we would see immediately how far they are in fact from the black end of the scale. Tonal pictures, like all pictures really, create their own inherent reality, a reality which exists within the picture frame; within those borders, the painter must control all the elements so that the inherent reality is coherent - not with the 'real' world outside, but within the particular world of the painting itself. In this sense, pictures differ from free-standing sculpture: they are their own world, whereas, sculpture which projects into the real objective world must, in a way, fight for its place in that three-dimensional physical reality. Good pictures (and low-relief sculpture, as it were, 'pictorial' sculpture) invite us into another world, a different reality.

2 During the late 19th century and certainly into the early 20th, artists had been simplifying, for various reasons, the forms of the human body; and of course, simplification as a sort of short-hand notation had been common in sketches and preparatory work for centuries. In the present picture, the simplification has the effect somewhat of rendering the subject, the model, as a more generalised statement, perhaps that is, as less of a portrait per se.

3 Michelangelo's famous concept of 'liberating' the figure enclosed in the block of stone; he is also supposed to have said that sculpture was good to the degree that it distanced itself from painting (flatness), and painting to be good to the degree that it approached sculpture (suggestion of three dimensions). He also specified that, in relation to 'liberating' the figure from its stone, his work involved 'taking away', removing material, whereas, painting and modelled sculpture, such as with clay, involved the addition of material, something he apparently disapproved of. The whole discussion to be seen with reference to the contemporary (Renaissance) dispute as to the relative 'nobility' of painting and sculpture.

 

Portraits, 2

The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (1983) defines 'Portrait' as "A figure drawn, painted, or carved upon a surface to represent some object: spec. (now almost always) a likeness of a person, esp. of the face, made from life by drawing, painting, photography, engraving, etc.". I believe that, even today, most people would agree with this definition while perhaps allowing for various other forms of more contemporary representation (such as, video). In our first look at portraits, entitled Three Painted Portraits, what we examined were examples which definitely fall under the dictionary definition but I wanted to point out that the word 'portrait' does, in fact, cover almost any representational image, of any thing. 

Adrian Stokes' 1955 essay on Michelangelo1 pointed out that he, Michelangelo, was not particularly interested in portraits per se, even though it is believed that several self-portraits are included in his works 2, as well as perhaps stylised or idealised portraits of some contemporaries, most notably Pope Julius II in the guise of Moses 3. But here, stylised is the key word; in my opinion, some of Michelangelo's stylised faces - as opposed to portraits - have become familiar to us in the same way that some portraits of historically real people have: the faces of his Eve in The Temptation of Adam and Eve, his Adam in The Creation of Man, and of the The Libyan Sibyl, for example, all in the Sistine Chapel. The faces of Mary in the Pietà of Saint Peter's in Rome, of Moses mentioned already, of David in the Accademia in Florence, are perhaps even better known and, in a sense, may be regarded as quasi portraits, so powerful is their impression on our collective memory; they exist there, in that memory, as do the real self-portraits of Leonardo da Vinci (a famous drawing), Rembrant or Van Gogh.

Michelangelo's work, directed as it was towards the expression of the universal and the sublime, as well as, inevitably, the personal, was not concerned, in a general sense, with the ephemeral, the particular, the contingent; so, portraiture per se, landscape, painted architectural environments and so on, were of no concern to him. But, to most of his contemporaries, portraiture was of great interest and, given this, it developed substantially. Let's start with a portrait by the Florentine master Andrea del Sarto (1486-1530).

Andrea del Sarto, Portrait of a Young Man, c.1518, oil on canvas

National Gallery, London (Photo: the author)

Perhaps the most obvious aspect of this portrait, compared with those we examined previously, is its pose: the sitter, whose identity is unknown, is positioned with his back to us and is caught as though being interrupted while engaged with the book (?) he holds in his hands; his head is turned quite sharply to look at us (or the artist) over his left shoulder. In our previous survey, Three Painted Portraits, two of the three sitters were facing us quite normally although with their heads turned slightly to meet our gaze; in the present case, the artist has composed his painting so that it appears as if the sitter has been momentarily interrupted while engaged in something quite different. In fact, we can even see the back of the chair on which the model is seated; both chair and sitter are facing away from the painter, and therefore, away from us, the anticipated viewers.

This point incidentally is pertinent as far as art in general is concerned; artists deal in time and ironically, although fixing in one particular moment in time a given event, are simultaneously anticipating the future - the potential viewers of the artwork - while recording, as in the portrait above, the present, or, imagining the past in such a way that it seems the present! A complex of temporal considerations, perhaps the most intriguing, that of anticipating our existence at some time potentially remote - in time and space - from the actual creation of the artwork.

Be that as it may, another salient element of this portrait is the beautiful violet-blue sleeve of the elegant shirt worn by the young man; the artist has drawn attention to it in several ways, the most obvious being its prominent position and size in the lower centre of the picture; but also by the placement of the almost black doublet and the dark neutral blueish-grey of the background. The large sleeve has been given special attention as well in the way Andrea has observed very closely the individual creases and folds of this garment. The overall tone of the image is a cool grey-blue which happens to contrast strikingly with the  warm and ruddy complexion of the sitter, a type of contrast we have noted previously. But one feature of this face, apart from its being turned to look over the shoulder, is the way the paint has been applied. Unlike the very fine, detailed application of the Perugino portrait we saw last time, here the painter has applied his paint almost roughly, almost as though he were in a hurry to fix this face before the sitter resumed his reading!

Andrea del Sarto has stressed the bone structure of his model, has accentuated the light and shade used to form the nose, the cheeks, the chin, the forehead; the eyes, in deep shadow, are as though sketched-in, there is very little specific detail here, in fact, there is much more explicit observation in the mouth. Our sitter's mouth possesses, more so than do the eyes, a wonderful ambiguity of expression; the full, large lips, perhaps on the verge of a patient smile, hint in their ambiguousness at calm intimacy and intelligent comprehension.

Our second portrait is also kept in the National Gallery in London and is very different in several ways from those already discussed. To begin with, it's a portrait of a woman, a beautiful young and apparently wealthy woman.

Giovanni Battista Moroni (1520/4-1579), Portrait of a Lady, c.1556-60, oil on canvas

National Gallery, London (Photo: the author)

Moroni was a northern Italian artist, born near the city of Brescia where he apparently spent most of his working life. He is known especially for his elegant portraits, not only of the wealthy, but also of artisans (see his famous portrait The Tailor, also in London) soldiers, clergy and so on. Our painting is this time a full-length seated portrait of, as said, a young woman wearing a splendid - and splendidly painted - very fashionable dress. In this picture we see some features which were and remained characteristic of Venetian painting, such as the detailed and specific rendering of the fabric - in this case of the dress - the jewellery, the hair and, where appropriate, the fine aristocratic features of the sitter. The young woman is sitting in a solid wooden chair, apparently placed in some kind of alcove or passage-way, with what looks like a doorway on our right.

Where this portrait differs the most however from all those looked at so far, is in its principal focus: it is a portrait, there is the representation of a real individual but actually, the main subject would seem to be the dress! The dress is painted so finely as to be mistaken for a photograph, its tactile quality, especially in the gold underskirt and sleeves, is pronounced; the gold stitching, the lacework at the cuffs and the collar, the small bits pulled through the holes at the shoulders, all are represented as though so to say, 'touchable'. If we consider for a moment the cursory nature of the clothing in our Fayum portrait, and then compare it with the treatment here, the difference is immeasurable. However, as just now implied, while the Fayum was clearly and wholly - and only - an image if a particular individual, the Moroni is, we might say sarcastically, an image of a particular dress - with an individual inside it! In noting this, and the undoubted fact that the artist has made a lovely image of the sitter herself, we may observe that portraiture has shifted gear somewhat and is now, at least in this and similar works, more obviously at the service of reputation and status: in the sense that, while the sitter herself may fade from our memory, her dress will not!

Francisco de Goya (1746-1828), Portrait of Don Andrés del Peral, before 1798, oil on poplar

National Gallery, London (Photo: the author)

The final work is by the most wonderful Spanish painter, Goya, a profound observer of the weaknesses and strengths of his fellow men and women. In the beautiful portrait we are considering at present, we see a return, in general terms, to a concentration on the sitter himself, albeit with his elegant and fashionable waistcoat and jacket skilfully noted. Without doubt however, the focus is on the sitter's intelligent and engaged face; Goya, like Andrea del Sarto above, has treated the features of the face in an apparently summary manner but, on close inspection, there is endless and most subtle notation of its 'topography'. What we see is a proud and alert man, staring confidently at his artist friend - and therefore, at us - sitting upright on a wooden chair in a controlled environment: designed by Goya so that the light (and shadow) played across Don Andrés' face to reveal its outside forms and, astutely observed, something of his inherent character.

Earlier, the word 'photograph' was used and we might consider photography at this point, given that it was invented roughly around the time that Goya died. The invention of photography did have an effect on portraiture, and painting in general, since it satisfied - or, appeared to satisfy - one of the main functions of art, that is, to record. Photography was able to record, not only what people looked like, but almost anything - except the past - more quickly and in some technical ways more simply, than painting was able to do. One of the eventual results of this was that artists towards the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, abandoned certain types of representational image-making in favour of an art which dealt more with, amongst other things, the social conditions of the day - and that in more or less abstract forms. Eventually however, people and artists in particular, began to realise that in fact, painting could do and reveal things which photography could not; so the painted portrait returned as a vital and important expression (Bacon, Freud, Giacometti, etc.); actually, in the field of so-called 'society portraits', it had never gone away but the reference here is to serious painting.

1 In The Critical Writings of Adrian Stokes, Vol III, Thames and Hudson, 1978, and relevant footnotes.

2 For example, in the flayed skin of Saint Bartholomew in the Last Judgement, in the Sistine Chapel, and as the figure of Nicodemus in the Pietà, now in the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo in Florence; to quote Pope-Hennessy, "... and in 1564 the head of Nicodemus was already looked upon as an idealized self-portrait." John Pope-Hennessy, Italian High Renaissance & Baroque Sculpture, Phaidon, 1996 (Fourth Edition).

3 The marble figure of Moses (c.1516?) carved for the Tomb of Julius II (now in San Pietro in Vincoli, in Rome), a project which caused endless problems for Michelangelo, resulting in a much-distorted final result.

Art 'speaking'.

 

For some of us, artists in particular I imagine, art works take-on or have, as it were, an animated personality: that is to say, they become almost like a kind of living being. It is a commonplace that certain artists - not all - regard their artistic products as though they were their children. This idea of the particular personality of art works was reinforced for me on becoming aware of a common Latin phrase used by medieval and later artists when signing their work: so-and-so "me fecit": 'so-and-so made me'. In this manner, it is the artwork itself which is speaking to us - and continues to speak over the centuries! It is also the joining of the verbal onto the visual; the image exists, conveying the content it is supposed to represent - a visual content, whether painted or sculpted - and then, as if to give it the 'breath of life', the artist claims it by having the work itself state the artist's authorship. Very often, these few words, and others similar, are hidden, inconspicuous; they are certainly not meant to  distract from the principal significance carried by the image.

Pietro Lorenzetti (c.1280-1348), Polittico della Pieve, 

tempera and gold leaf on wood, 1320 -1324 circa

The church of Santa Maria della Pieve, Arezzo (Photo: the author)

Pietro has signed this great work in two places, both in Latin: one in a more formal and obvious manner, under the main central panel; the other, this one invisible from any distance, on the sword blade held by Saint Reparata in a minor panel (top register, extreme left): Petrus me fecit.

In relation to medieval or Renaissance art particularly, as well as more generally, it has been my experience that, wherever they might be, certain images seem to 'communicate', as it were personally, as one walks by or, more likely, as one stands to admire them. It is as though a figure or personage, possibly one out of many, had expressly decided to address a particular viewer! Obviously, the figure does not actually speak; the sensation one has is of a feeling that that figure possibly has some kind of personal significance; a riddle of course, especially so as this normally happens only with an individual figure - and which is more likely to occur when one is alone in front of the particular work. Needless to say, this effect was, at least in part, a desired one: that the holy figures (if the work be a religious one) should 'touch' us, as though personally; but the same thing can happen with secular images too1. At other times however, it would seem to be the artist him- or herself who 'communicates' in this mute fashion, again a kind of riddle. In this case, perhaps it is the utterly convincing nature of the image - the formal and textual coherence - which 'carries' so much of the 'anima' of its creator that it manages to 'speak' - so to speak! 

Giottino, The Lamentation over the Dead Christ, (detail) 1360-65, tempera on wood

The Uffizi, Florence (Photo: the author)

Here is an example of a painting, or rather, a figure which communicated with me in the special way I am describing. I like very much the whole image but was especially taken by this extraordinarily melancholy Mary Magdalene: seated somewhat apart, her right knee, shoulder and arm blocking her view of the horrific tragedy beside her. This profoundly lonely figure appealed to me.

The artist is however really speaking to us in the sense that art is a language and, as such, it is probably no surprise that we sometimes have the sensation that we are being personally addressed. In making art objects, artists are 'speaking' to the future viewers of that object through the vocabulary, grammar and syntax of the particular 'art language' they happen to be using. In certain respects, this effect may be taken as a sign of the artwork's - that is, the artist's - success; a given function of art is to communicate and so it follows that in communicating, it fulfils this basic function (what exactly is being communicated is, naturally, another topic). This is a generally recognized function of art but what I am referring to is, as said, a personal or individual contact established by the artwork with particular viewers and not perhaps with whomsoever happens to pass by. The question arises as to whether it is in fact the artwork that is doing the communicating, or whether it is the viewer reading something into the experience of studying the artwork; that is, is the viewer 'projecting' some special quality onto or into the specific art object, is it the viewer who is 'animating' the object beyond any objective criteria? Or, is this especial 'communication' perhaps really the result of understanding the 'language', of being schooled or instructed in not only the language itself, but in its interpretation?

A detail of the so-called Gates of Paradise made by Lorenzo Ghiberti,  1425-52, gilded bronze. Originals (replaced by copies at the Baptistry itself) now in the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Florence (Photo: the author)

Here is an example of another way in which artists signed their work, in this case, a self-portrait, of Ghiberti, on the left, and his son, Vittorio, on the right. Ghiberti also signed this masterpiece with his name, on the bar just to the left in this image (not visible). It is an example of the artist regarding us while we regard his work, a mutual exchange of studied interaction.

In this relation, I have recently been fortunate enough to have been reading two particularly interesting texts 2 and unfortunate enough to have been subjected to another (thankfully short) which, in terms of 'art literacy', could be termed the polar opposite of the other two! Given the very low level of appreciation - not to say knowledge - and the general confusion of the latter piece (whose details I don't wish to publicise), it could be taken as an example of why it is that so often, the untutored mind misses the point, that is, people like this often miss altogether or don't understand what is being communicated by a given artwork. On numerous occasions, the sight of crowds of people filing past some of the most important, not to say sublime, works of art, in major art galleries, has saddened me, knowing that with even a small amount of interpretive knowledge or learning, some more at least of these people would get so much more out of their experience.

A related obstacle, ironically, is, as the proverb goes, 'a little knowledge is a dangerous thing'; by this I mean that often it seems that the reaction to certain works of art is conditioned by the fame of the artwork. People will bill and coo in front of, for instance, a Raphael or a Michelangelo or a Picasso because they know it was made by that artist, but will be absolutely cold before the (possibly very good) work of someone they've never heard of. This suggests that what they are doing before the Raphael etcetera is exactly what they've been conditioned to do (and what they think they should do); when however, they are confronted with a work for which they have no yardstick (no fame, no verbal commonplaces), they are unable to form an independent judgement or opinion and remain silent - or worse, criticise the hapless work from the shallowness of their unschooled appreciation. 3

For me at any rate, whether this communication is a 'real' phenomenon or simply my mind fancifully projecting into the object is not of the greatest importance; what is important is that this effect continue to occur, to take me into a condition one might say of privilege, of individual dialogue with another person's thought and 'anima'.

1 My own experience is that, normally, the effect I am writing about occurs in relation to figurative works and, more exactly, works in which there is the representation of human figures, of people; the effect is not so strong nor so common with landscapes or still-life for instance, or with over-sized work, and perhaps even less so with regard to abstract pieces (no criticism implied). The phenomenon is completely absent when viewing 'installations', performance 'art', conceptual art and so forth (criticism implied)! 

2 The two particularly interesting texts referred to are: Michael Baxandall, Giotto and the Orators, Oxford, originally 1971, and Lorenzo Ghiberti,  I Commentarii, Giunti, 1998 (Introduzione e cura di Lorenzo Bartoli).

3 This condition, that is, of some people's appreciation of art being in some way conditioned by their expectations as opposed to being a reaction to the art per se, has been remarked on for some time. While preparing this article, I came across a reference to Francisco de Hollanda's (1517-85) Roman Dialogues (c. 1550 manuscript only) in which he imagines or recounts a conversation between Vittoria Colonna and Michelangelo in which she asks him his opinion of Flemish painting; Michelangelo replies, "Flemish painting pleases the pious better than any Italian style ... This is not due to vigour or merit in the painting but is entirely the fruit of pious sensibility". Although he goes on to a more detailed formal criticism of Flemish painting, Michelangelo here makes an observation concerning the fact that some people's preferences are based not on an appreciation of any given painting on its own terms, but rather on the power of the (in this case) religious sentiment it carries; the formal success or otherwise of the artwork in question, for viewers like these, is almost irrelevant and probably not understood. Reference and quotation found in The Critical Writings of Adrian Stokes,  Lawrence Gowing (Ed.), 1978, Vol III: 'Michelangelo', footnote #35 (p348).

Three Painted Portraits

 

This article is about portraits. I would like us to look at three painted portraits and see how they might be similar to each other and how they are different. The first is an image from Fayum, in Egypt, and dates to the early 1st century AD, a period in which Egypt was under the control of the Romans. This type of portrait was made and used a bit like we today might have a photo taken of a family member and which on his or her death, at least in some cultures, is attached to their tombstone. It is believed that most Fayum portraits were painted while the sitter was still alive - something I would say was pretty obvious - and then, on their death, were placed in the position of the face in an Egyptian-style mummy and held in place by the mummy wrappings; in this way, Greco-Roman realism was superimposed onto traditional Egyptian burial practices.

 

A typical Fayum portrait, artist and sitter unknown. 1st century AD. Encaustic on wooden panel. Walters Art Museum, Baltimore. (Image: Public Domain through Wikipedia)

Note that the top corners and the lower edge are left as exposed wood because it was anticipated that they would be covered by the mummy wrappings. *

What I would like us to examine however is the style of the portrait. The sitter is a youngish man, perhaps close to 30 years old, apparently of high rank judging from what we see of his clothing (especially his angusticlavius condition: wearing a narrow stripe of purple on the tunic, signifying a plebeian tribune). Being dressed in the Roman manner, this alone would set him apart from a typical Egyptian image; but there are other notable cultural differences. Egyptian burial masks are, first, just that, they are stylized masks of the deceased, not portraits as we - or the Romans - understand the term; secondly, they are, without fail, frontal: the Fayum portrait on the other hand, is nearly always a three-quarter view; that is, the sitter, as in the image above, often (not always) is seen by the painter slightly more from either the right or the left, usually not full-face, usually not frontally. The shoulders and chest of the man above indicate this positioning as does his face: although he is looking directly at us, we can in fact see more of his left cheek, ear, nose and neck, suggesting that, while his body is directed more towards his right - creating thereby an abstract diagonal (and therefore depth) into the very shallow illusionistic space of the image - his head is turned towards his left to look at the painter. The importance of this is that it has nothing to do with the indigenous art of the place where at least a good number of such portraits has been found, that is, in Fayum, in Egypt. Having said that however, one of the most important aspects of this portrait type is that it became the, we might say, standard portrait pose in western painting, particularly for a head-and-shoulders image.

Formally, the portrait above is strikingly life-like; it is obviously a representation of a real person (and not a stylised one). The light falls from the right side creating shadows on the left, especially along the longish nose and on the forehead. The shadows and light work together to mould the cheeks, the area around the mouth and the chin; they cause the face to appear in front of the neck. The top lip is in shadow and the slightly protruding lower lip is catching the light. The eyes are large and that general area indicates a somewhat pensive personality, although this often occurs when people sit for portraits: they sooner or later enter into a private world, especially if they are asked by the painter not to talk. All of these effects of the light together with the pose itself became absolutely standard elements in western representational art for the next two thousand years, in fact, for figurative artists, to this very day. Finally, we may notice as well that the colouring is naturalistic, something which varies, as is to be expected, from sitter to sitter and from painter to painter.

Perugino (c.1448-1523), Portrait of Francesco delle Opere, c.1494

Oil on wood. Uffizi, Florence. (Photo: the author)

I have chosen the next example (above), painted some 1400-odd years later than the Fayum portrait we have just discussed because, while it is a descendent of that Fayum style, it displays some marked differences as well. To begin with, we know who both the sitter was and who the painter was; this is not the work of an anonymous (at least to us) artisan, but rather the proud work of a recognized and influential Renaissance painter (it is signed and dated on the back). The perhaps most obvious formal difference between the Fayum and this portrait is that the sitter is placed before a kind of limitless but realistic space; in the Roman portrait, there is only the merest hint of any space except that concerned with the features of the face. Here, the landscape background is a typical Perugino one, disappearing as it does into a limitless, expansive blue twilight; there is the suggestion of closer landscape features but more or less only as silhouettes against the cool ethereal blues. This cool blue of course serves to contrast with the warm flesh-tones in the face - not dissimilar in fact from those in the Fayum picture - and with the strong red shirt which forms an obvious vertical counterpoint to the calm horizontality of the distant background. Partly as a result of this, the head and face appear very near the front edge of this image, accentuated itself by the sitter's hands resting, supposedly, on that same edge. Fayum portraits sometimes show the sitter's hands as well and there are examples occasionally in fresco portraits of the same period at Pompeii. Like the Fayum portrait, Perugino's sitter is turned at a slight angle to the picture plane although his shoulders and chest fill-up most of the lower half of the image.

In essence, the face of Perugino's sitter is also shown in a quasi-three-quarter view, in fact, like the Fayum example, from the right; on this occasion, he is lit from the left and much more subtly: apart from the strong shadow along the sitter's left forehead and cheek, the light is diffuse, undramatic but very very 'descriptive'. We can see clearly the undulations, the 'topography' of Francesco's middle-aged face, we can see the stubble of his beard and almost count the hairs on his head as they stream out from under his cap. There is a suggestion as well of a possible illness which may have caused the unusual lifting of his top lip, on his right side. Earlier, reference was made to photographic images and to continue with that analogy, we could say that the Fayum picture is like an early Polaroid print compared to Perugino's digital one! In addition, although we know almost nothing of our Fayum sitter's life (except that he was sufficiently well-to-do and, at one time at least, in Egypt) we do know something about Francesco delle Opere - from the painting (that is, apart from external documents): in his right hand he holds a piece of paper with the words Timete Deum on it; those words are associated with the radical Dominican preacher Savonarola (1452-98), active and successful in Florence until his ultimate execution. Displaying so obviously a possible adherence to the doctrines of the firebrand preacher identifies our sitter with his religious and political ideas - both dangerous.

A brief remark at this point concerning the mediums used in the two portraits discussed so far. The first was painted in encaustic, which means the pigments were mixed with wax which was applied while hot or cold (in an emulsion) to the wooden panel; as can be seen, under the right conditions, an extremely durable technique. The second painting was done in oils - again on wood - a technique far more familiar today, even to non-specialists. It has also been an extremely successful technique although it is susceptible to many dangers. Its advantages are that it is relatively flexible when it dries, and is capable of a huge variety of effects, more so than encaustic or fresco painting. Perugino was a master of the suffused light of twilight, making full use of the translucence possible with oil paint. It is somewhat fashionable these days to denigrate Perugino but I think portraits like this one of Francesco delle Opere demonstrate, amongst other things, his perspicacious psychological subtlety.

The third portrait we might look at is one made by the British artist Graham Sutherland between 1962 and 1964 of his friend, the great English art historian, Kenneth Clark, (Baron Clark). This work, painted in oil on canvas and typical of the style of Graham Sutherland, is interesting in several ways, not least because it revives the fifteenth-century Italian profile portrait which itself was a revival of those found on classical Roman coins.

Leon Battista Alberti, Self Portrait, c.1435, bronze

National Gallery of Art, Washington DC (Photo: the author)

Alberti's self portrait is one of the earliest of a style, which became popular in Italy at the time, of so-called 'profile portraits', based more or less closely on classical Roman coins which featured a profile of an emperor. Alberti's is not strictly a medal as it doesn't have a reverse side, nevertheless, subsequent exemplars did have, one of the most famous being that of Sigismondo Malatesta by Matteo de' Pasti (dated 1450 but struck in 1453).

Graham Sutherland (1903-80), Portrait of Kenneth Clark, Baron Clark (1903-83),

1962-64, oil on canvas. The National Portrait Gallery, London (Photo: the author)

The portrait of Clark takes up this ancient type of exact profile rendering as seen in the Alberti bronze. Here of course, it is a painting and as such, may be compared, so to say, as apples with apples, with both the Fayum and the Perugino pictures. The obvious difference with the Clark is that the sitter is shown in profile, and not in the three-quarter view we see in the other two instances; it is similar though in one respect at least to the Fayum portrait in that the 'background' is really hardly more than a flat colour: there is no attempt to suggest realistic depth behind the sitter and, as we have seen, this is true of the Fayum as well. But there is depth and this is where Sutherland has shown his mastery as a painter: apart from the naturalistic reddish tones in the face, both the colours and the shadows work to 'explain' the topography of Kenneth Clark's head as an almost sculpted mass in space. The light falls from above and from the front, so there is no definite 'dark side' or 'light side'; we can see shadows under Clark's eye-brow, his nose, his lower lip, his chin, and under his very explicit ear. There are clear shadows in his collar but also a light at the top edge of the button side; the light falls on his forehead, the top of his hair, the top of his ear, the bridge of his nose, the area above the top lip, the top of his chin. Within these more obvious observations, Sutherland has modulated his numerous colours and tones to 'sculpt' the topography of his sitter, from his right shoulder, across the hills and dales of the face to the distal collar; if we look at the ear and then the shadow in the space below the eye-brow beside the top of the nose, we realise what a distance has been travelled and therefore, what depth there really is in this apparently, at first, quite simple view. The overall greenish colour of both the cardigan and the background contrast strongly with the overall warm tones in the face, although, there too, there is a most subtle and elegant exchange between the warms and the cools.

Graham Sutherland was a lover of line and of the painted line in particular, as we can appreciate in the many 'linear' creases and wrinkles in Kenneth Clark's face: the clear age-related lines around the eyes and forehead, the line of the front of the cheek and that of the thin mouth. But perhaps the most marked is the one, again age-related, traversing the neck, almost as if cut with a knife! Sutherland's picture is a twentieth-century painting which brings into play a fifteenth-century mode (the strict profile) and, in that interplay of pinks and cool greens, also the faces in late-Gothic Italian frescos.

Much more could be said about portraiture of course, and where to stop would be the question, not to say the problem. Naturally, artists used models for their non-portrait faces and figures as well but that is yet another area of exploration.

* Although many 'Fayum" portraits were done in encaustic paint, there were quite a number done as well in tempera; both techniques are still used today, although oil and acrylic paints are by far much more popular now. The name 'Fayum' is that of a place in middle-Egypt where there was a large population of Greeks, or people who regarded themselves, or were regarded by the authorities, as in some way mainly Greek; however, such portraits have now been found in many other places in Egypt, and elsewhere in north Africa. It would seem that those who had such portraits made (in Egypt) belonged to the upper strata of Egyptian society and thought of themselves as in some way Roman while nevertheless still maintaining their 'Greek-ness' and sometimes also, their 'Egyptian-ness'! These portraits are especially significant in art history terms because they give us almost the only substantial idea of what ancient Greek panel painting (that is, portable pictures on wood) actually looked like, and of the extraordinarily high standard it had reached. The Greek connection, as far as these portraits are concerned, is highlighted by the occasional Greek inscription on either the painted surface itself, or on the mummy wrappings. Naturally, Roman officials stationed in Egypt on behalf of the Empire may also have had themselves portrayed in this same manner and therefore, not all of the images so far discovered need necessarily be of native-born Egyptians, whether 'Greek' or otherwise.

Pietro Lorenzetti - a rebirth

 Today I am writing about a subject with which I have been fortunate enough to have an intimate connection: the restoration of the polyptych1 painted between 1320 and 1324 by Pietro Lorenzetti for the church of Santa Maria della Pieve (also known as the Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta) in Arezzo. The Lorenzetti brothers, Pietro (c.1280-85 to c.1348?) and the younger Ambrogio, were from Siena and because of his rightly famous frescos there, the Allegories of Good and Bad Government, Ambrogio is perhaps the better-known of the two. However, Pietro painted (1310-20) some of the frescos in the lower Basilica of San Francesco in Assisi, a most important group in that complex art-historical environment. As far as our polyptych is concerned, the contract for the commission of the altarpiece in Santa Maria in Arezzo was signed in April 1320.

Madonna and Child with Saints, 1320-24, by Pietro Lorenzetti, tempera and gold leaf on wooden panels, 315.5 x 293.6 cm. The church of Santa Maria della Pieve (Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta), Arezzo. Note that almost the entire original frame, with its lateral pillars and predella base, is missing. Image courtesy of R.I.C.E.R.C.A., Arezzo.

I had come to know this exquisitely refined and subtle painting by making sure I visited it every time I found myself in Arezzo. My principal reason for making the short journey from Florence to this wonderful Tuscan city was in fact to see the fresco masterpiece in the ancient basilica of San Francesco, the Legend of the True Cross (1452-55?) painted by Piero della Francesca. And speaking of Piero, in the hill-top cathedral is another of his frescos, the powerful (like all his women) Magdalen (1462-64?) which just happens to be on the wall beside the large and impressive funerary monument of the Bishop of Arezzo, Guido Tarlati (of 1330; also restored by R.I.C.E.R.C.A. in 2017 with funds again raised by them) - the very man who commissioned the Pieve altarpiece from Pietro Lorenzetti. I would usually then visit the small church of San Domenico to see Cimabue's large painted crucifix, another elegantly powerful work. After that, on to the Pieve di Santa Maria, which, like San Domenico, I would normally have to myself: there to 'commune' with the respectfully taciturn elegance of Pietro Lorenzetti's great altarpiece. On a visit three years ago however, in 2017, Pietro's master-work was gone! I subsequently discovered that it had been removed into the hands of the restorers at R.I.C.E.R.C.A. - Paola Baldetti, Marzia Benini and Isabella Droandi - three experts in their field, and dedicated, even without sufficient funds, to the restoration of this most special late-medieval masterpiece. R.I.C.E.R.C.A., right from the outset and together with two non-profit groups, Art Angels Arezzo and Friends of Florence (especially concerning donations from the USA), has managed to gather the funds necessary for this unique endeavour. The restoration of this beautiful polyptych, carried out by R.I.C.E.R.C.A. in Arezzo, has therefore been paid for thanks in great part to the generosity of both Italian and international donors.

                                   

A close-up of the small roundel in the second tier on the extreme right-hand side showing the difference between the 'before' condition, on the left, and the 'after' condition, on the right. Note that special attention has been paid to the restoration of the gold background thereby restoring its 'transcendental' function. Image courtesy of R.I.C.E.R.C.A., Arezzo.

This extremely demanding work has taken about four years to (almost) complete and involved the disassembling of the 700 year-old wooden structure, the scientific analysis of its integrity, as well as the exhaustive cleaning and repair of the paint film. Some work remains to be done, notably on an indicative frame - parts of the original (which would have brought the overall dimensions to 350 x 350 cm) having been lost over the intervening centuries - and its stabilisation, with a steel sub-structure, for the return to its 'home', the Pieve. Given the large number of medieval works on wood which are now to be found in museums all over the world, it is a not-insignificant fact that Pietro's altarpiece, painted expressly for Santa Maria della Pieve, has been there, except for one or two brief periods, ever since its original installation. Hopefully, and with a little further financial support, it will soon be back!

One of the restorers using a microscope and very fine tools during the restoration of the right-hand panel, with St John the Evangelist holding a red book, of the Lorenzetti Polyptych. Image courtesy of R.I.C.E.R.C.A., Arezzo.

The altarpiece, also commented on by Vasari2, is typical insofar as its layout and iconography are more or less those which may be found in similar works of the period. It shows the Madonna gazing at her new son, the Christ Child, who in turn gazes back at her while holding with his left hand a part of her veil. On either side of these central figures are representations of four important saints, amongst whom St John the Baptist and St John the Evangelist. Above these are portrayed eight other saints with, in the centre, an Annunciation; above them four more saints and, at the very top, the Virgin in Glory. Various earlier restorations, not to say wilful damage (attempted arson, graffiti, etc.) have contributed to sometimes traumatic changes in the paint surface, especially the once common use of soda (a harsh abrasive) and the application of deliberately darkening varnishes. It was discovered during the extremely demanding restoration that all the incised work in the golden haloes, etcetera, was done by hand, that is, not with the use of labour-saving wheeled tools. For me at least, one of the important and interesting things about this work is that it was signed, twice, by its author Pietro, and that nearly all the saints still have their names written under them. The first 'signature', situated under the Madonna, reads: PETRUS LAURENTII HANC PINXIT DEXTRA SENENSIS (Pietro Lorenzetti of Siena painted this with his right hand3); the second, on the sword of Santa Reparata (in the first cuspid on the left) reads: PETRUS ME FECIT (Pietro made me)4.

Initially, the unveiling of the restored polyptych was to occur this year on the 700th anniversary of the date of the commission contract, April 17, 1320; unfortunately, COVID-19 caused this to be postponed but, all things being equal, it should now take place on November 8 (a recent resurgence of COVID in Italy however may cause this too to be postponed!). 

Here is the link to the GoFundMe page set-up by the non-profit organisation Art Angels Arezzo which is raising funds for the completion of the restoration: https://gf.me/u/y4t4sc  In this regard, it is interesting that the altarpiece was originally paid for, some 700 years ago, with donations from the public, and here, once again, it needs our support for its 'rebirth'. Even small amounts help and I think this is one very good way to say 'thank you' to Italy for the innumerable works of art it has given to all of us.

1 A 'polyptych' (πολλοι + πτυχη = many folds) is a multi-panelled painting, very typical of religious art in the late-medieval period, but also later; polyptychs were very often quite large and therefore costly and so were most frequently to be found in churches, normally standing on an altar (hence the alternative generic but not exclusive name 'altarpiece'). Sometimes, as in the present case, there were multiple images on one side only, but, in other cases, such as Duccio's  Maestà (in Siena) for instance, they could have images on both the front and the back. Unfortunately, over their centuries' long life, many have been cut down in size, and often somewhat mutilated by 'restorers' (the Arezzo example earlier suffering both fates), and many have been dismembered, with different elements ending up in different parts of the world (Piero della Francesca's Sant'Agostino Altarpiece is an example, with panels in Milan, London, Lisbon, New York and Washington DC). As the Greek words - from which derives the modern word - imply, many polyptychs were constructed so that they could be closed and then opened on special occasions (with pictures on the outside of the doors as well; see the Ghent Altarpiece by Hubert and Jan van Eyck). The Lorenzetti example here has images on one side only and no 'doors'.

2 Giorgio Vasari, Le vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettori, published by Edizioni dell'Orso, 2017, Volume 1, edited by Enrico Mattioda and based on the 1568 so-called Giuntina edition of the Lives. Page 283, in the Vita di Pietro Laurati (the Life of Pietro Laurati), Pietro Lorenzetti is mistakenly called by Vasari 'Laurati' and not linked to his brother Ambrogio, about whom he separately writes, correctly identifying him as 'Ambruogio Lorenzetti, pittor Sanese' (page312).

3 The last phrase of Pietro's 'signature', "with his right hand", has caused some perplexity as it is a very unusual statement, whereas his second 'signature', the one on the sword, is much more typical (interesting in itself however, as it is the artwork which is 'speaking': "Pietro made me"! The artist's reference to his right hand could possibly have something to do with the general disapproval of anything to do with the left hand, regarded superstitiously as not acceptable to God.

4 This information and other details were supplied to me by one of the team at R.I.C.E.R.C.A. and are taken from the Technical Summary entitled: Pietro Lorenzetti (1280 circa - 1348) Arezzo, Pieve di Santa Maria. There is some doubt concerning the dates of birth and death of Pietro but it is thought he may have perished with his brother during the plague.