DOI article:
The editor's room
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17190#0242
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tion to his thesis. But even in the cases through-
out the rest of his work, where he does attempt to
prove his assumptions, his conclusions are rendered
useless by failure to understand the nature of the
evidence required in dealing with works of art—■
that is to say, required by connoisseurship. As
this is a new science still begging for admission
among recognised sciences, a brief parenthesis
dealing with the scope of connoisseurship and its
methods is scarcely out of place at this point.
Connoisseurship is the identification of resem-
blances between works of art so close as to indi-
cate identical authorship, the finding of likenesses
between artist and artist, so great that they point
to the existence of a personal connection, which
connection the relative ages of the artists and
other considerations must determine. Comparison
is therefore the apparently essential function of the
connoisseur, and essential it would be, provided
the connoisseur always knew just what factors to
consider while making comparisons. Few con-
noisseurs, however, get beyond the elementary
considerations of type, composition, and superficial
detail. But as all of these are easily copied, such
resemblances by themselves are not only insufficient
to prove identity of authorship, but even of school.
Neri de Bicci, for instance, precisely copied Fra
Filippo more than once, and his copies, far from
being mistaken for possible works of the Frate, do
not so much as suggest his school, but write them-
selves down immediately as mere copies, because
their technique and touch are so different. The
evidence the connoisseur is therefore required to
consider deals chiefly with questions of technique
and touch, and he can deal with them only when
he is a real connoisseur, a person who to peculiar
endowments adds a special training. He must, to
start with, have a fine eye, a great power of visuali-
sation, a good memory, and he must take natural
pleasure in the merely specific qualities of a work
of art. So endowed, many years of study of one
school enables him to distinguish with almost un-
failing accuracy the precise relations existing—to
speak only of painting—between picture and pic-
ture and painter and painter. No mere erudition,
no luck in discovering documents, no skill in de-
ciphering them, no subtlety in stringing far-fetched
hypotheses, can fit the person who lacks endow-
ment and training for dealing with the only evidence
of primary consequence in an unauthenticated work
of art—-the evidence of technique and touch. It
is because the mere scholar, paleographist, or logi-
cian never gives due consideration to this evidence
that he is always running away from the point in
XXXII
search of data that are either unnecessary, or inca-
pable of yielding the required information.
Now, to return to Dr. Ulmann's book. Had he
given even a superficial consideration to the tech-
nique and touch of Fra Filippo and Botticelli, he
would have found plenty of likeness between them,
without once leaving the perfectly authenticated
works. Botticelli was too great a genius to repeat
his creations of his master. Creating types and
compositions of his own, he had no occasion to
imitate Fra Filippo's, although, as it happens, affi-
nities are by no means lacking even in the types,
appearing for example with the greatest clearness
in the Madonna of the rectangular Adoration of the
Magi in the National Gallery (there unaccountably
ascribed to Filippino), and in the Madonna of the
Adoration of the Magi in the Uffizi. But even the
most gifted artist has to learn from some one how
to draw and colour, and if there is anything like
equality of talent between pupil and master there
is apt to be a likeness between them not only in
technique, but in quality of technique—that is to
say, in touch. As a matter of fact, there can be
no greater likeness between two painters than
there are, in artistic quality, between Botticelli
and Filippo, in spite of the different messages
they had for the world. They are both great
linealists, sacrificing Nature as much to indulgence
in line—line, not for its structural functions, but
for its own sake—as the naturalists, their con-
temporaries, sacrificed line to merely correct,
anatomies. The quality of line not only connects
Botticelli with Filippo, but, being the one essen-
tial element of his artistic personality, furnishes
the only test for the authenticity of works attri-
buted to him. Botticelli seems to have made a
hard effort to take up with the naturalists, and
Baldovinetti, the Pollajuoli, and Verocchio, each
in turn, for a while absorbed him. Yet even in
works done wholly under these influences, he
cannot conceal his quality of line, which appears
on the surface almost in spite of himself, as in
the Fortezza, which is otherwise thoroughly Pol-
lajuolesque. But he gave up the struggle before
many years, and in the frescoes of the Sixtine
Chapel he is himself again—more than ever, more
even than Filippo, a linealist. These paintings begin
to show how Leonardo came as a fatality into his
existence. Leonardo was far greater even as a
linealist than Botticelli, and to this supreme
quality of line he added a power of articulating the
figure, and therefore of rendering movement, which,
until our day and in the work of M. Degas, has
found no equal. His line is therefore always
tion to his thesis. But even in the cases through-
out the rest of his work, where he does attempt to
prove his assumptions, his conclusions are rendered
useless by failure to understand the nature of the
evidence required in dealing with works of art—■
that is to say, required by connoisseurship. As
this is a new science still begging for admission
among recognised sciences, a brief parenthesis
dealing with the scope of connoisseurship and its
methods is scarcely out of place at this point.
Connoisseurship is the identification of resem-
blances between works of art so close as to indi-
cate identical authorship, the finding of likenesses
between artist and artist, so great that they point
to the existence of a personal connection, which
connection the relative ages of the artists and
other considerations must determine. Comparison
is therefore the apparently essential function of the
connoisseur, and essential it would be, provided
the connoisseur always knew just what factors to
consider while making comparisons. Few con-
noisseurs, however, get beyond the elementary
considerations of type, composition, and superficial
detail. But as all of these are easily copied, such
resemblances by themselves are not only insufficient
to prove identity of authorship, but even of school.
Neri de Bicci, for instance, precisely copied Fra
Filippo more than once, and his copies, far from
being mistaken for possible works of the Frate, do
not so much as suggest his school, but write them-
selves down immediately as mere copies, because
their technique and touch are so different. The
evidence the connoisseur is therefore required to
consider deals chiefly with questions of technique
and touch, and he can deal with them only when
he is a real connoisseur, a person who to peculiar
endowments adds a special training. He must, to
start with, have a fine eye, a great power of visuali-
sation, a good memory, and he must take natural
pleasure in the merely specific qualities of a work
of art. So endowed, many years of study of one
school enables him to distinguish with almost un-
failing accuracy the precise relations existing—to
speak only of painting—between picture and pic-
ture and painter and painter. No mere erudition,
no luck in discovering documents, no skill in de-
ciphering them, no subtlety in stringing far-fetched
hypotheses, can fit the person who lacks endow-
ment and training for dealing with the only evidence
of primary consequence in an unauthenticated work
of art—-the evidence of technique and touch. It
is because the mere scholar, paleographist, or logi-
cian never gives due consideration to this evidence
that he is always running away from the point in
XXXII
search of data that are either unnecessary, or inca-
pable of yielding the required information.
Now, to return to Dr. Ulmann's book. Had he
given even a superficial consideration to the tech-
nique and touch of Fra Filippo and Botticelli, he
would have found plenty of likeness between them,
without once leaving the perfectly authenticated
works. Botticelli was too great a genius to repeat
his creations of his master. Creating types and
compositions of his own, he had no occasion to
imitate Fra Filippo's, although, as it happens, affi-
nities are by no means lacking even in the types,
appearing for example with the greatest clearness
in the Madonna of the rectangular Adoration of the
Magi in the National Gallery (there unaccountably
ascribed to Filippino), and in the Madonna of the
Adoration of the Magi in the Uffizi. But even the
most gifted artist has to learn from some one how
to draw and colour, and if there is anything like
equality of talent between pupil and master there
is apt to be a likeness between them not only in
technique, but in quality of technique—that is to
say, in touch. As a matter of fact, there can be
no greater likeness between two painters than
there are, in artistic quality, between Botticelli
and Filippo, in spite of the different messages
they had for the world. They are both great
linealists, sacrificing Nature as much to indulgence
in line—line, not for its structural functions, but
for its own sake—as the naturalists, their con-
temporaries, sacrificed line to merely correct,
anatomies. The quality of line not only connects
Botticelli with Filippo, but, being the one essen-
tial element of his artistic personality, furnishes
the only test for the authenticity of works attri-
buted to him. Botticelli seems to have made a
hard effort to take up with the naturalists, and
Baldovinetti, the Pollajuoli, and Verocchio, each
in turn, for a while absorbed him. Yet even in
works done wholly under these influences, he
cannot conceal his quality of line, which appears
on the surface almost in spite of himself, as in
the Fortezza, which is otherwise thoroughly Pol-
lajuolesque. But he gave up the struggle before
many years, and in the frescoes of the Sixtine
Chapel he is himself again—more than ever, more
even than Filippo, a linealist. These paintings begin
to show how Leonardo came as a fatality into his
existence. Leonardo was far greater even as a
linealist than Botticelli, and to this supreme
quality of line he added a power of articulating the
figure, and therefore of rendering movement, which,
until our day and in the work of M. Degas, has
found no equal. His line is therefore always