DOI Heft:
Nr. 339 (August 1925)
DOI Artikel:Valentiner, Wilhelm Reinhold: The Clarence H. Mackay collection
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19985#0344
mceRnAcionAL
CHRIST ON THE MOUNT OF OLIVES BY KAFFAEL
eccentric, less consciously modern in his mental cleverly varied expressions of joy on the faces of
attitude than the great Florentine. He clings, the saints and angels who are smiling, singing or
like all of the Sienese school, more closely to the lost in contemplation of the wonder of the Christ
medieval tradition, uses gold backgrounds and child.
garments richly brocaded in gold. His figures Andrea Mantegna, the greatest of the Early
wear an expression of happy and tender piety Renaissance masters of Lombardy—indeed one
and his frankly lyrical gift is at its best in his of the greatest that Italy has produced—was a
presentations of the Madonna. contemporary of Matteo di Giovanni, as he was
Although the fingers of his figures are exag- born in 1430. Mr. Mackay possesses one of his
geratedly thin and somewhat spider-Iikc there is smaller most elaborately carried out paintings,
nothing strained in the poise of the heads or in the "The Adoration of the Child by the Virgin and
expressions, rather something of bourgeois sim- Shepherds," from the Boughton-Knight collection,
plicity. His picture in the Mackay collection That delight in plastic form which we have
follows the usual arrangement of his numerous already observed in the Florentine masters, and
Madonnas, which mostly comprise six, occasion- which has to do with the sharpness and clarity
ally only four figures—isolated figures in the back- with which objects stand out under the Italian
ground being curiously cut off by the elaborate sky, is developed to the highest degree in Man-
gold halos. Our painting is distinguished from tegna's work, so that his pictures resemble trans-
numerous others by its wonderful state of preser- positions from bronze or stone reliefs. Undoubt-
vation and particularly happy combination of edly Donatello's influence was partly responsible
color in the red garment brocaded in gold worn for this. In Mantegna's early youth Donatello
by the Madonna and her deep blue cloak, with spent ten years in Padua and left numerous pupils
the orange-brown and greyish-white costumes of among the sculptors of the town,
the neighboring figures. This trait, however, must have lam deep-
The combination of shyness and pride in the rooted in Mantegna's own nature for he strove to
Madonna's face as she holds the child tenderly in present with a penetrating sharpness every indi-
her arms is particularly charming, as are the vidual object down to the very last detail and
three jorty-jour
august 1925
CHRIST ON THE MOUNT OF OLIVES BY KAFFAEL
eccentric, less consciously modern in his mental cleverly varied expressions of joy on the faces of
attitude than the great Florentine. He clings, the saints and angels who are smiling, singing or
like all of the Sienese school, more closely to the lost in contemplation of the wonder of the Christ
medieval tradition, uses gold backgrounds and child.
garments richly brocaded in gold. His figures Andrea Mantegna, the greatest of the Early
wear an expression of happy and tender piety Renaissance masters of Lombardy—indeed one
and his frankly lyrical gift is at its best in his of the greatest that Italy has produced—was a
presentations of the Madonna. contemporary of Matteo di Giovanni, as he was
Although the fingers of his figures are exag- born in 1430. Mr. Mackay possesses one of his
geratedly thin and somewhat spider-Iikc there is smaller most elaborately carried out paintings,
nothing strained in the poise of the heads or in the "The Adoration of the Child by the Virgin and
expressions, rather something of bourgeois sim- Shepherds," from the Boughton-Knight collection,
plicity. His picture in the Mackay collection That delight in plastic form which we have
follows the usual arrangement of his numerous already observed in the Florentine masters, and
Madonnas, which mostly comprise six, occasion- which has to do with the sharpness and clarity
ally only four figures—isolated figures in the back- with which objects stand out under the Italian
ground being curiously cut off by the elaborate sky, is developed to the highest degree in Man-
gold halos. Our painting is distinguished from tegna's work, so that his pictures resemble trans-
numerous others by its wonderful state of preser- positions from bronze or stone reliefs. Undoubt-
vation and particularly happy combination of edly Donatello's influence was partly responsible
color in the red garment brocaded in gold worn for this. In Mantegna's early youth Donatello
by the Madonna and her deep blue cloak, with spent ten years in Padua and left numerous pupils
the orange-brown and greyish-white costumes of among the sculptors of the town,
the neighboring figures. This trait, however, must have lam deep-
The combination of shyness and pride in the rooted in Mantegna's own nature for he strove to
Madonna's face as she holds the child tenderly in present with a penetrating sharpness every indi-
her arms is particularly charming, as are the vidual object down to the very last detail and
three jorty-jour
august 1925