DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61252#0165
THE BRIDGEWATER GALLERY.
121
Gilles Rousselet, in 1656, with the inscription, Flores
apparverunt in terra nostra. (2.) By Jean Raymond,
(reversed,) for the Crozat Gallery, 1729. (3.) By Massard,
in the Orleans Gallery. (4.) By Huber, and others.
I know of one copy only, ascribed to Fra Bartolomeo,
and now in the possession of Count Czernichew.
93 The Virgin and Child.—Distinguished as “La plus
belle des Vierges;” and by Passavant, as “ The Madonna of
the Bridgewater Gallery.
The Virgin, half length, seated, in blue drapery, is
contemplating, with the softest expression of affection, the
infant Saviour extended in her lap, while he looks up
fondly in her face. She sustains him with the right hand ;
the left is pressed to her bosom.
This picture, also, has been transferred from panel to
canvas, and has suffered even more in the process •, still we
have all the sentiment of the design, which can neither be
obliterated nor mistaken. Nothing can exceed in loveliness
the position and form of the infant. The undulating line
from the shoulder to the foot is a perfect exemplification of
Hogarth’s “Line of Beauty.” The colouring, too, is very
delicate ; and though the surface has been rubbed down by
cleaning, and it has been here and there visibly retouched,
it has not suffered from repainting. As in the St. Catherine
of the National Gallery, the impasto is so thin, that in
some places the first outline in chalk is perceptible through
the paint, and it is interesting to trace the deviations from
the original design.*
This picture was painted about 1512, when Raphael was
in his twenty-sixth or twenty-seventh year. For whom it
was originally painted does not appear. It was purchased
out of Italy, by Colbert, Marquis de Seignelay, (son of the
great minister,) and from his collection passed into the
Orleans Gallery, whence it was purchased by the Duke of
Bridgewater, at the valuation of 3000Z.
This Madonna has always been celebrated, and ancient
repetitions of it, by painters of Raphael’s school, exist in
many galleries—in the Museum at Berlin ; at Frankfort ;
* Such a deviation is termed in art a “ Pentimento.”
121
Gilles Rousselet, in 1656, with the inscription, Flores
apparverunt in terra nostra. (2.) By Jean Raymond,
(reversed,) for the Crozat Gallery, 1729. (3.) By Massard,
in the Orleans Gallery. (4.) By Huber, and others.
I know of one copy only, ascribed to Fra Bartolomeo,
and now in the possession of Count Czernichew.
93 The Virgin and Child.—Distinguished as “La plus
belle des Vierges;” and by Passavant, as “ The Madonna of
the Bridgewater Gallery.
The Virgin, half length, seated, in blue drapery, is
contemplating, with the softest expression of affection, the
infant Saviour extended in her lap, while he looks up
fondly in her face. She sustains him with the right hand ;
the left is pressed to her bosom.
This picture, also, has been transferred from panel to
canvas, and has suffered even more in the process •, still we
have all the sentiment of the design, which can neither be
obliterated nor mistaken. Nothing can exceed in loveliness
the position and form of the infant. The undulating line
from the shoulder to the foot is a perfect exemplification of
Hogarth’s “Line of Beauty.” The colouring, too, is very
delicate ; and though the surface has been rubbed down by
cleaning, and it has been here and there visibly retouched,
it has not suffered from repainting. As in the St. Catherine
of the National Gallery, the impasto is so thin, that in
some places the first outline in chalk is perceptible through
the paint, and it is interesting to trace the deviations from
the original design.*
This picture was painted about 1512, when Raphael was
in his twenty-sixth or twenty-seventh year. For whom it
was originally painted does not appear. It was purchased
out of Italy, by Colbert, Marquis de Seignelay, (son of the
great minister,) and from his collection passed into the
Orleans Gallery, whence it was purchased by the Duke of
Bridgewater, at the valuation of 3000Z.
This Madonna has always been celebrated, and ancient
repetitions of it, by painters of Raphael’s school, exist in
many galleries—in the Museum at Berlin ; at Frankfort ;
* Such a deviation is termed in art a “ Pentimento.”