--Raphael. "The Sibyls."
Santa Maria della Pace, Rome.]
[Illustration: Plate 20.--Raphael. "Portrait of Tommaso Inghirami."
In the collection of Mrs. Gardner.]
Raphael's portraits alone, had he done nothing else, would justify a
great reputation, but they form so relatively small a part of his work
that they may almost be neglected in examining his claims to the rank
that used to be assigned him among the world's greatest artists. It is,
after all, his unique mastery of composition that is his chief title to
fame, and his glory must always be in proportion to the estimation in
which that quality is held. It was because composition was to him a
comparatively unimportant part of painting that Velazquez thought little
of Raphael. It is because, for them, composition, as a distinct element
of art, has almost ceased to exist that so many modern painters and
critics decry Raphael altogether. The decorators have always known that
design is the essence of their art, and therefore they have always
appreciated the greatest of designers. That is why Paul Baudry, in the
third quarter of the nineteenth century, idolized Raphael and based his
own art upon that of the great Umbrian. To-day, in our own country,
mural decoration is again becoming a living art, and the desire for the
appropriate decoration of important buildings with monumental works of
painting is more wide-spread, perhaps, than it has been anywhere at any
time since the Italian Renaissance.
Pages:
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100