Works of grant allen, p.946
Works of Grant Allen, page 946
II. SCULPTURE
[The Sculpture at the Louvre falls into three main divisions, each of which is housed in a separate part of the building. The Classical Sculpture is approached by the same door as the Paintings, and occupies the basement floor of Jean Goujon’s part of the Old Louvre, with the wing beneath the Galerie d’Apollon. The Renaissance Sculpture is approached by a separate door in the eastern half of the same side, and occupies the corresponding suite opposite the Classical series. The Modern Sculpture is also approached by a special door in the north wing of the W side in the old Cour du Louvre, and occupies the suite beyond the Pavillon de l’Horloge.
The importance of these three divisions is very different. Without doubt, the most valuable collection, intrinsically and artistically speaking, is that of the Classical or Antique Sculpture: and this should be visited in close detail by all those who do not contemplate a trip to Rome, Naples, and Florence. Nobody can afford to miss the “Venus of Milo,” the “Diana of Gabii,” or the Samothracian Nikè. On the other hand, these exquisite Greek and Roman works, models of plastic art for all time, including two or three of the greatest masterpieces which have come down to us from antiquity, have yet no organic connection with French history, or even, save quite indirectly, with the development of French art. At the same time, thoroughly to understand them is a work for the specialist: those who have little or no classical knowledge, and who desire to comprehend them, must be content to buy the new official catalogue (not yet issued), to follow closely the excellent labels, and also to study the subject in detail in the various excellent handbooks of antique sculpture, such as Lübke’s or Gardner’s.
The discrimination of the different schools, and the evidence (usually very inferential) as to the affiliation of the various works on the great masters or their followers, are so much matters of expert opinion that I do not propose to enter into them here. I shall merely give, for the general reader, a brief account of the succession and evolution of antique plastic art, as exemplified in the various halls of this gallery, referring him for further and fuller details to specialist works on the subject.
The Renaissance Sculpture, on the other hand, is largely French; and, whether French or Italian, it bears directly on the evolution of Parisian art, and has the closest relations with the life of the people. Every visitor to Paris should therefore pay great attention to this important collection, which forms the best transitional link in Western Europe between Gothic Mediævalism and the modern spirit.
The collection of Modern Sculpture, again, is both artistically and historically far less important. It may be visited in an hour or two, and it is chiefly interesting as bridging the lamentable gap between the fine Renaissance work of the age of the later Valois, and the productions of contemporary French sculptors.]
I. ANTIQUE SCULPTURE
[Few or none of the most famous masterpieces of the great classical artists have come down to us with absolute certainty. The plastic works which we actually possess are for the most part those which have been casually preserved by accidental circumstances. Almost all the greatest productions of the greatest sculptors have either been destroyed or else defaced beyond recognition. We therefore depend for our knowledge of ancient sculpture either upon those works which were situated on comparatively inaccessible portions of huge buildings like the Parthenon and other temples, and which have consequently survived more or less completely the ravages of time, the mischief of the barbarian, and the blind fury of early Christian and Mahommedan fanatics; or else upon those which have been preserved for us in the earth, under the débris of burnt and ruined villas and gardens, or in the ashes of buried cities like Pompeii. Under these circumstances, the wonder is that so much of beautiful and noble should still remain to us. This is mainly owing to the fact that in antiquity a fine model, once produced, was repeated and varied ad infinitum, — much as we have seen at Cluny and in the paintings upstairs each principal scene from the Gospels or the legends of the saints, once crystallized by custom, was reproduced over and over again with slight alterations by many subsequent artists. The consequence is that most of the statues in this department fall into well-marked groups with other examples here or elsewhere. We have not the originals, in most cases, but we have many copies; and few of these copies are servile reproductions: more often, they show some touch of the individual sculptor. The best antiques are therefore generally those which happen most nearly to approach in spirit and execution a great and famous original. (See later, for example, the Apollo Sauroctonus.) You must compare these works one with another, in this collection and elsewhere, in this spirit, recollecting that often even an inferior variant represents in certain parts the feeling of the original far better than another and generally finer example may happen to do. Nay, such splendid works as the so-called Venus of Milo itself must thus be regarded rather as fortunate copies or modifications of an accepted type by some gifted originator than as necessarily originals by the best masters. With the exception of the few fragments from the Parthenon by Pheidias and his pupils, hardly anything in this gallery can be set down with certainty to any first-class name of the very best periods. But many statues can be assigned to groups which took their origin from certain particular famous sculptors: we know the school, though not the artist. And several are judged by the descriptions of ancient writers to be copies or variants of works assigned to sculptors of the first eminence.
Many of the statues found in the Renaissance period, and up to the close of the eighteenth century, have been freely and often injudiciously restored: others have really antique heads, which do not however in every case belong to them. Not a few have been considerably altered and hacked about in the course of restoration, or of arbitrarily supplying them with independent faces. This reprehensible practice has not been followed in more recent additions such as the “Venus of Milo” and the Samothracian Nikè.]
Enter by the same door as for the paintings. Proceed along the corridor (Galerie Denon) and dive, right or left, under the great staircase. (Good new room to the R, containing excellent Roman mosaics from French North Africa.) Pass some good sarcophagi and other objects, and enter the Rotonde, which contains for the most part works of a relatively late period. In the centre, the *Borghese Mars (or, in Greek, Ares), a celebrated statue, less virile than is usual in figures of this god. Round the room are grouped many fairly good statues, not a few of them almost duplicates. Among them should be noticed (beginning from the door) on the R a fine Melpomène; then, the Lycian Apollo, with harmless serpent gliding from a tree-trunk; and especially the famous *Silenus nursing the Infant Bacchus, of the School of the great sculptor Praxiteles — perhaps the most pleasing of the many representations of Faun and Satyr life which antiquity has bequeathed to us. This work should be studied as showing that later stage of easy Greek culture when sculpture was not wholly religious and monumental, but when the desire to please by direct arts and graces was distinctly present. Close by are two or three good draped female figures; and another Lycian Apollo, which should be closely compared with the one opposite it, as indicating the nature of the numerous copies or replicas commonly made of famous works of antiquity. Beside this, a couple of Hermæ, or heads on rough bases, in later imitation of the archaic Greek style, with its curious stiff simper: the type was doubtless too sacred to be varied from: a portrait-statue of a lady with the attributes of Ceres; a charming Nymph, carrying an amphora; excellent figures of athletes, etc. Many of the statues in this and succeeding rooms are much restored, and in some cases with heads that do not belong to them. They are interesting as showing the general high level of plastic art among nameless artists of the classical period.
The next room, * *the Salle Grecque, or Salle de Phidias, is interesting as containing a few works of the great artist after whom it is called, as well as many specimens of archaic Greek art, before it had yet attained to the freedom and grace of the age of Pheidias. In the centre are fragments of the early half-prehistoric figures (6th century B.C.) commonly known as Apollos, but more probably serving in many cases merely as funereal monuments — a man in the abstract, to represent the deceased, like a headstone. They exhibit well the constrained attitudes and want of freedom in the position of the arms and legs, which are characteristic of the earliest epoch. These very old features are still more markedly seen in the mutilated draped Herè in the centre; it well illustrates the starting-point of Hellenic art. The admirable *bas-reliefs from Thasos on the entrance wall, on the other hand — removed from a votive monument to Apollo, the Nymphs and the Graces, and still retaining the dedicatory inscription graven over their portal, — exemplify the gradual increase in freedom and power of modelling during the early part of the 5th century B.C. This improvement is very noticeable in the Hermes with one of the Graces on the first of these reliefs. Still somewhat angular in movement, they herald the approach of the Pheidian period. From this time forward the advance becomes incredibly rapid.
Next, examine the work of the perfect period. Above is a mutilated fragment of Athenian girls ascending the Acropolis to present the holy robe to Athenè, from the frieze of the Parthenon, of the great age of Pheidias (not a century later than these archaic attempts): with portions of a Metope of the same temple. The first may be possibly by Pheidias himself: the second by his pupil Alcamenes. Close by, Metope of the temple of Zeus at Olympia (about 450 B.C.), whose subjects are sufficiently indicated on the labels: almost equal in power to the Athenian examples. The fine bas-relief of Orpheus and Eurydice, of the best period (falsely named above, later) should also be observed. (But the works of the archaic and transitional periods are far better exemplified at Munich and in London; while the fragments of Pheidias cannot of course compare with the magnificent series in the British Museum. See the copies of both in the École des Beaux Arts.) By the next window, lion and bull, somewhat recalling remote Assyrian influence; with numerous small reliefs of the best age, which should be carefully studied. These, for the most part of the finest early workmanship, admirably illustrate the extraordinary outburst of artistic spirit during the age which succeeded the wars with Persia. The reliefs on the end wall, chiefly from Athens and the Piræus, as well as those by the last window, belong in most instances to this splendid age of awakening and culminating art-faculty. I do not enumerate, as the labels suffice; but every one of the works in this room should be closely followed. Do not miss the charming, half-archaic, funereal relief of Philis, daughter of Cleomedes, from Thasos.
Continue on through the Long Gallery, flanked by inferior works — but what splendid inferiority! — to the room of the Medea sarcophagus, a fine stone tomb, containing scenes from the legend of Medea and the children of Jason. Round the room are grouped several small statues, much restored, indeed, and not of the best period, but extremely charming. The most noticeable is the dainty little group of the Three Graces, characteristic and pleasing, though with modern heads. The next compartment — that of the Hermaphrodite — includes one of the best and purest of the many versions of this favourite subject, from Velletri, couched, by the window. (Another in the Salle des Caryatides, for comparison.) The Farnese Eros is a pretty work of a late period. The room also possesses several works of the Satyr class, two of which, close by, are useful as instances of repetition. The four statues of Venus (Aphroditè), at the four corners (in two closely similar pairs) are also very interesting in the same manner, being variants based upon one original model, closely resembling one another in their general features, but much altered in the accessories and details. The same may be said of the good figures of Athenè by the far wall.
The Hall of the Sarcophagus of Adonis contains several excellent sarcophagi, the reliefs on which well illustrate the character of the class; among them, one to the L has interesting reclining figures of its occupant and his wife, an early motive, late repeated. The relief from which the room takes its name, on the wall to the right, represents, in three scenes, the departure of Adonis for the chase; his wounding by a wild boar; and Aphroditè mourning over the body of her lover. Such reliefs afforded important hints in mediæval times to the sculptors who first started the Renaissance movement. As we pass into the next compartment, notice another variant of the Aphroditè.
The Salle de Psyché contains, opposite the window, the famous figure from which it takes its name (too much restored to be freely judged): together with two characteristic dancing Satyrs, after models of the school of Praxiteles. The fine sculptured chairs of office by the window should also be noticed.
We now come to the Hall of the so-called Venus of Milo — an absurd mistranslation of the French name: the idiomatic English would be either “the Melos Venus,” “the Melian Venus,” or, better still, “the Melian Aphroditè.” This is undoubtedly the finest plastic work in the whole of the Louvre. Its beauty is self-evident. It was found in 1820 in the island of Melos in the Greek Archipelago. The statue is usually held to represent the Greek goddess of love, and is a very noble work, yet not one by a recognised master, nor even mentioned by ancient writers among the well-known statues of antiquity. Nothing could better show the incredible wealth of Greek plastic art, indeed, than the fact that this exquisite Aphroditè was produced by a nameless sculptor, and seems to have been far surpassed by many other works of its own period. In type, it belongs to a school which forms a transition between the perfect early grace and purity of Pheidias, with his pupils, and the later, more self-conscious and deliberate style of Praxiteles and his contemporaries. Not quite so pure as the former, it is free from the obvious striving after effect in the latter, and from the slightly affected prettinesses well illustrated here in the group of Silenus with the infant Bacchus. The famous series of Niobe and her Children, in the Uffizi at Florence (duplicates of some elsewhere), exhibits much the same set of characteristics. Those works have been attributed on reasonable grounds to Scopas, a contemporary of Demosthenes: and this statue has therefore been ascribed with little hesitation to one of his pupils. It is, however, purer in form than the Niobe series, and exhibits the perfect ideal, artistic and anatomical, of the beautiful, healthy nude female form for the white race. Its proportions are famous. As regards the missing portions, which have happily not been conjecturally restored, it was originally believed that the left hand held an apple (the symbol of Melos), while the right supported the drapery. It is more probable, however, that the figure was really a Nikè (or Victory) and that she grasped a shield and possibly also a winged figure on an orb. Comparison with the other similar half-draped nude statues described as Venuses in the adjoining rooms is very instructive: their resemblances and differences show the nature of the modifications from previous types, while the immense superiority of this to all the rest is immediately apparent. Notice in particular the exquisite texture of the skin; the perfect moderation of the form, which is well developed and amply covered, without the faintest tinge of voluptuous excess, such as one gets in late work; and the intellectual and moral nobility of the features. No object in the Louvre deserves longer study. It is one of the finest classical works that survive in Europe.
Pass to the R into the next suite of rooms, the first of which contains the colossal figure of Melpomène, the tragic muse — a splendid example of this imposing type of antique sculpture, so well represented in the Vatican. Round the room are ranged several minor works, including a charming Flute-Player, doubtfully restored, and some excellent busts.
The long series of rooms which follows this one contains in many cases Græco-Roman works, imitated from the great Greek models, and often showing more or less decadent spirit. Among them, however, are some of the finest specimens of ancient sculpture, Greek included: and indeed it must be admitted that the grounds upon which such Greek works are distinguished by experts from later copies are often sufficiently delicate and inferential. Centre, a beautiful Genius of Sleep. Behind it, good figures of Eros (Love) drawing his bow, again indicating the nature of the replicas and variations of established models which were so familiar to antique sculptors. The little mutilated fragment by their side, well placed here for comparison, excellently illustrates the nature of the evidence on which such works are frequently restored. Further on — a Venus, which is a variant (probably Roman) of the type of the Venus of Arles, just beyond it. Behind this, a little in front in the room, the noble *Pallas from Velletri — the finest and most typical representation of the goddess: a good Roman copy of a Greek work of the best period. Then the famous *Venus of Arles itself, a Greek original, which may be instructively compared with the replica or variant close to it. (The labels well indicate to the student who cares to proceed further in this study the extent of the restorations in every case.) This figure, after the Melian Aphroditè, is probably the most beautiful female form in the entire collection. Behind it, the graceful and exquisitely-draped Polyhymnia (replica of a well-known type), a model of perfect repose and culture, but largely modern. Then, good bust of Homer. Next, the *Apollo Sauroctonus or Lizard-Slayer, a copy in marble of a famous work in bronze by Praxiteles. This is once more one of the many reproductions (not necessarily always actual copies) of types which are mentioned by classical authors. By the archway, Euterpe, and a Votary. Among the sarcophagi, one of Actæon torn by his dogs: another representing the Nine Muses. Most of the figures in this room are marked by a calm and classical repose; while those in the next compartment,
