DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61022#0211
THE MADONNA DELLA SEDIA
it is thrown by the immediate purpose of its action. These are
the similarities between the two pictures. The differences are
equally obvious, for the ‘Madonna della Sedia,’ being a rapid
representation of an observed fact, shows more of portraiture and
less of careful selection, both in the features and in the choice
of attitude. There is none of the refinement of either the
‘ Sistine Madonna ’ or of the Child in that altar-piece in the faces
of the Matron and bold Infant of the ‘ Sedia ’; their attitudes are
frankly a denegation of all dignity, and even the painting, though
masterly and even miraculous in its rapidity and ease, has not the
same transparency nor the colour the same harmony against its
artificially effective background of black. The modelling of the
Madonna’s face is wanting in delicacy, and the St. John, apparently
thrown in as an afterthought for the sake of the design, is either
painted in a totally different key or is completely repainted. These
contrasts arise through the difference in the conception of the
pictures. The ‘ Sedia Madonna ’ is a swift and frankly realistic
portrait of a mother with her child, palpitating and breathing
with the hot life of the Roman sun, and though as such it is the
culmination of the whole tendency of Italian art to find in
the Madonna the incarnation of human motherhood, the logical
conclusion of the tendency proves to some extent its ruin. It is
absurd to suppose that in painting the picture Raphael was either
more or less governed and impelled by what is called a ‘ religious ’
motive than were the earlier Florentines who portrayed the
Madonna in the likeness of a human mother. But the sheer
fulness and joy of life which dominates his whole mind and
penetrated into every detail of his expression, while it was for him
as natural an attribute of the divine mother as any of the qualities
with which the earlier men had endowed their ideal, is, in fact, too
completely human to satisfy as the fitting clothing of a divine
figure. Every man in the presentation of his ideal must take
his fortune in his hands and strive honestly for realisation whether
he is to hit or miss an ideal which other men can share. To some
189
it is thrown by the immediate purpose of its action. These are
the similarities between the two pictures. The differences are
equally obvious, for the ‘Madonna della Sedia,’ being a rapid
representation of an observed fact, shows more of portraiture and
less of careful selection, both in the features and in the choice
of attitude. There is none of the refinement of either the
‘ Sistine Madonna ’ or of the Child in that altar-piece in the faces
of the Matron and bold Infant of the ‘ Sedia ’; their attitudes are
frankly a denegation of all dignity, and even the painting, though
masterly and even miraculous in its rapidity and ease, has not the
same transparency nor the colour the same harmony against its
artificially effective background of black. The modelling of the
Madonna’s face is wanting in delicacy, and the St. John, apparently
thrown in as an afterthought for the sake of the design, is either
painted in a totally different key or is completely repainted. These
contrasts arise through the difference in the conception of the
pictures. The ‘ Sedia Madonna ’ is a swift and frankly realistic
portrait of a mother with her child, palpitating and breathing
with the hot life of the Roman sun, and though as such it is the
culmination of the whole tendency of Italian art to find in
the Madonna the incarnation of human motherhood, the logical
conclusion of the tendency proves to some extent its ruin. It is
absurd to suppose that in painting the picture Raphael was either
more or less governed and impelled by what is called a ‘ religious ’
motive than were the earlier Florentines who portrayed the
Madonna in the likeness of a human mother. But the sheer
fulness and joy of life which dominates his whole mind and
penetrated into every detail of his expression, while it was for him
as natural an attribute of the divine mother as any of the qualities
with which the earlier men had endowed their ideal, is, in fact, too
completely human to satisfy as the fitting clothing of a divine
figure. Every man in the presentation of his ideal must take
his fortune in his hands and strive honestly for realisation whether
he is to hit or miss an ideal which other men can share. To some
189