DOI issue:
No. 217 (April, 1911)
DOI article:Macfarlane, Cecil: An italian sculptor: Leonardo Bistolfi
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20972#0203
Leonardo Bistolfi
meditative mind strongly attracted towards the
mysteries of existence.
A funeral monument, The Sphinx, repro-
duced in an early number of this magazine
(xxi, 271), may be held to be the first
embodiment of Bistolfi's ideals of symbolic
art and the daring and independent manifesta-
tion of a new mode of thought in sculpture, in
defiance of every academic conventionality.
It is the first and perhaps the most powerful
of his figurations of death; in the almost
geometrical harmony of the whole composition,
its sense of scale and the co-ordination of its
particulars, he reaches at a bound the height
of artistic expression.
In this and the subsequent works, The
Beauty of Death, The Nuptials of Death.
The Dream, The Holocaust, and The Resur-
rection, he has broken away from the tradi-
tional myths and legends associated with the
thought of death in art. He has clothed the
idea in fresh and beautiful imagery. In his
poetical philosophy, death is neither a monstrous
or maleficent power, but a tender and com-
passionate influence which sheds its divine and
purifying light across life, illuminating the
noblest deeds of man.
The Beauty of Death is figurative of this
conception of the ennobling power of death : a
form, half woman, half spirit, her head bending
over an armful of flowers—symbolical of the
life of the man whose effigy lies in the low
niche beside her—is inhaling all the perfume
they contain to diffuse their sweetness among
the living. Bistolfi has created a whole host of
these dream-maidens to embody his conceptions
of the mysteries of death. They are slender,
virginal forms of strange purity and spiritual
charm, whose dreamily languorous movements
seem to breathe forth a sense of music, and,
in their half-closed eyes, the bend of a delicate
head, or two sensitive hands folded in supplica-
tion,, there is such an intensity of exaltation and
expression, that one stands in wonder at the
extraordinarily acute sensibility of the artist
who can thus infuse spirit into stone.
Such works as these are out of place in large
exhibitions and are not understood. They need
the calm of the Campo Santo for their full
appreciation, where their harmony appears to
participate in that of the surrounding scheme
of nature. The blue sky and the dark cypresses
seem to be their natural complement.
In 1889 Bistolfi completed his large bas-
relief, Grief comforted by Memories (The
Studio, vol. xiv, p. 211), which took first
prize at the Turin exhibition and established
his right to take place among the foremost
181
meditative mind strongly attracted towards the
mysteries of existence.
A funeral monument, The Sphinx, repro-
duced in an early number of this magazine
(xxi, 271), may be held to be the first
embodiment of Bistolfi's ideals of symbolic
art and the daring and independent manifesta-
tion of a new mode of thought in sculpture, in
defiance of every academic conventionality.
It is the first and perhaps the most powerful
of his figurations of death; in the almost
geometrical harmony of the whole composition,
its sense of scale and the co-ordination of its
particulars, he reaches at a bound the height
of artistic expression.
In this and the subsequent works, The
Beauty of Death, The Nuptials of Death.
The Dream, The Holocaust, and The Resur-
rection, he has broken away from the tradi-
tional myths and legends associated with the
thought of death in art. He has clothed the
idea in fresh and beautiful imagery. In his
poetical philosophy, death is neither a monstrous
or maleficent power, but a tender and com-
passionate influence which sheds its divine and
purifying light across life, illuminating the
noblest deeds of man.
The Beauty of Death is figurative of this
conception of the ennobling power of death : a
form, half woman, half spirit, her head bending
over an armful of flowers—symbolical of the
life of the man whose effigy lies in the low
niche beside her—is inhaling all the perfume
they contain to diffuse their sweetness among
the living. Bistolfi has created a whole host of
these dream-maidens to embody his conceptions
of the mysteries of death. They are slender,
virginal forms of strange purity and spiritual
charm, whose dreamily languorous movements
seem to breathe forth a sense of music, and,
in their half-closed eyes, the bend of a delicate
head, or two sensitive hands folded in supplica-
tion,, there is such an intensity of exaltation and
expression, that one stands in wonder at the
extraordinarily acute sensibility of the artist
who can thus infuse spirit into stone.
Such works as these are out of place in large
exhibitions and are not understood. They need
the calm of the Campo Santo for their full
appreciation, where their harmony appears to
participate in that of the surrounding scheme
of nature. The blue sky and the dark cypresses
seem to be their natural complement.
In 1889 Bistolfi completed his large bas-
relief, Grief comforted by Memories (The
Studio, vol. xiv, p. 211), which took first
prize at the Turin exhibition and established
his right to take place among the foremost
181