1843.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL 



343 



the figures of the next compartment to a colossal size : they thus oc- 

 cupied the whole space, leaving no room for hack ground. Having 

 once satisfied himself as to the necessary size, lie adhered to it 

 throughout. 



The tapestries executed from Raphael's cartoons were originally 

 destined for, and ultimately hung up in the Sistine Chapel, round the 

 Presbyterium. In the cartoon which, from the intended situation of 

 the tapestry and from other circumstances, appears to have been exe- 

 cuted first, viz., the Miraculous Draught of Fishes, or Calling of 

 Peter, the figures are comparatively small; in all the rest, the size of 

 the figures is greatly increased. "" 



These examples may suffice to show that the distance from which 

 the spectator is supposed to contemplate a work (sometimes as a part 

 of an extensive decoration), not only defines the size of the figures, 

 but also regulates in a great degree the quantity of detail, and conse- 

 quently the selection, or at least the treatment of the subject. 



In the instances of the Stanze of the Vatican and the ceiling of 

 the Sistine Chapel, the great artists made their own arrangements 

 respecting the spaces or compartments. In the Palace at Westmin- 

 ster the distribution of the spaces has already been fixed by the ar- 

 chitect. The distance at which paintings in the Victoria Gallery 

 will be seen will be considerably greater than in the Vatican, not so 

 much from the difference in the dimensions of the rooms (the Victoria 

 Gallery being 45 feet wide, and the Hall of Constantine, the largest 

 of the suite in the Vatican here referred to, being not much short of 

 that measure), as from the smaller space which the architect proposes 

 to allot to each painting. As it is, the moderate size of 12 feet is 

 fixed. 



The apartments of the Vatican to which the Hall of Constantine 

 forms the approach, vary in dimensions and are not all rectangular. 

 The room called the Camera della Segnatnra measures about 35 ft. in 

 the longest dimension. Single frescos, with the addition of a painted 

 frame-work, occupy each wall. The paintings called Theology and 

 Philosophy (or the Dispute of the Sacrament and the School of 

 Athens) measure, without reckoning the painted frame-work, about 

 20 feet 8 inches wide; 11 so that the utmost distance to which the 

 spectator can retire from either is not sufficient for the eye to em- 

 brace the whole composition. The base of the paintings is, however, 

 above the height of the eye (in the other rooms higher than in this), 

 which somewhat increases the distance ; but in the Hall of Constan- 

 tine, measuring about GO feet by 12, the large fresco of the Battle 

 with Maxentius, about 3G feet in extent, 12 on one of the side walls, 

 cannot be viewed at the minimum of distance which is necessary to 

 see the whole of a picture. 13 



The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel is about GO feet from the ground ; 

 the size of the single compartments has no relation to this distance 

 which would admit of pictures measuring from 30 to 40 feet wide; 

 but the size of the figures (with the exception of those in the three 

 compartments before mentioned) is perfectly well calculated for their 

 situation. Those in the coved part of the ceiling, as is well known, 

 are still larger, partly perhaps with a view to counteract the effect of 

 the curve. The head of the Delphic Sybil measures about 2 feet, 

 giving a height for the entire figure, if it were erect, of nearly 

 1G feet. 



Thus, even where single paintings and compartments can be duly 

 embraced by the eye, the Italian painters seem to have considered 

 that the effect of each should be subservient to that of the whole wall 

 or ceiling, though that whole, strictly speaking, could not be compre- 

 hended at one glance. Instances, it also appears, are not wanting in 

 which the size of the apartments does not admit even of single paint- 

 ings in it being embraced by the eye at once. This may be a suffi- 

 cient excuse for the absence in such works of any general effect of 

 chiaro-scuro. The principle of making the effect of the various 

 compartments subservient to the whole scheme of decoration appears 

 therefore to be one of the points in which the equality of architec- 

 tural embellishment may, in some degree, require to be extended to 

 painting, and in which the unpicturesque principle of repetition is in 

 danger of superseding concentration. The resource of the painter, as 

 exhibited in all the examples quoted, is effective composition, through 



10 The cartoon of Paul preaching at Athens may offer an exception : the 

 subject demanded a display of architectural magnificence ; but even here the 

 principal figures are much larger than in the cartoon of the Calling of Peler. 



1 ' Passavant, in his life of Raphael, gives the dimensions 25 ft. by 15 ft., 

 French measure. 



12 Passavant (ib.) and Bunscn (Beschreihurg der Stadt Rom), give the di- 

 mensions 50 palms by 22, 



13 Once and half; the width of a picture is considered the minimum of 

 distance to which the spectator can retire to see its whole surface. A circle 

 cannul. he embraced by the eye til! the spectator retries to a distance equal 

 to thrice its semidiameter. 



wdiich, elevation, isolation, fee., may render the principal objects 

 striking, and a gradation of importance may be attained by skilful 

 arrangement. There are, however, instances in which the effect of 

 mural paintings of vast size, and which are seen alone, approach the 

 concentration of effect common in easel pictures. A cupula seems to 

 suggest this treatment; a single painting occupying the end wall of a 

 chapel, or of a hall, and which may be seen at a sufficient distanee, 

 admits of the principle of concentration (subject to the conditions 

 arising from its adaptation to architecture), inasmuch as it is a whole 

 in itself. Thus, judging from its present remains, there appears to 

 have been a treatment of light and dark in Michael Angelo's Last 

 Judgment different from that of the ceiling subjects. The enlarge- 

 ment of the figures in the upper part of the fresco is rather to be 

 accounted for by the principle before followed by the great artist in 

 the ceiling, namely, that of adapting the size of the figures to their 

 real distance from the spectator; for it may here be observed, that 

 the perspective diminution of figures is confined to narrow limits in 

 the works above mentioned, and in those of most of the Italian 

 masters, Correggio and his imitators excepted. This restriction is a 

 necessary consequence of the general aim of the severer schools — an 

 aim which was only recognized by Correggio in subservience to his 

 favourite qualities of chiaro-scuro and gradation. The other great 

 painters seem to have considered that figures reduced to minute di- 

 mensions by perspective may express distance, but, in general, no- 

 thing more. The real subject of Correggio's cupolas may be said 

 to be space ; the subjects of the mural paintings of Michael Angelo 

 and Raphael are rather human action and thought. 



With respect to the attempt to do away with the real surface of 

 ceilings by perspective appearances, a practice so much abused in 

 the decline of art, it would be a mistake to suppose that the repre- 

 sentation of an immeasurable space overhead, with violent fore- 

 shortening, as seen in the cupolas of Correggio, was altogether new in 

 Italy in his time; and it would be equally erroneous to conclude that 

 the great artist who painted for Julius II. were unacquainted with 

 efforts of the kind. There was a remarkable and early example in 

 the Church of the SS. Apostoli in Rome, by Melozzo da Forli, in 

 which a foreshortened figure of Christ, represented in the subject of 

 the Ascension, "seemed," to use the words of Vasari, "to pierce the 

 roof." 14 Michael Angelo, of all artists, would have been the last to 

 shrink from the difficulty of foreshortening, but he preferred the more 

 judicious, because more intelligible and expressive representation of 

 figures, seen as if opposite to the eye, and not as they would appear 

 above it. In his as well as in Raphael's ceiling pictures, the horizon 

 is often introduced as it would be in a painting on a wall. 



But to what extent, is the characteristic aim of painting, viz., the 

 representation of roundness and depth on a fiat surface, to be sacri- 

 ficed or limited in the adaptation of painting to architecture, and how 

 far are the observations, on this point, of the writers above quoted to 

 be looked upon as valid ? The answer may be furnished by the ex- 

 amples before mentioned. From those examples it is apparent that 

 the larger the dimensions of the figures, (the necessary consequence 

 of the distance at which the work may require to be viewed,) the 

 more abstract must be the representation, and the more it requires to 

 be reduced to expressive essentials; that, on the other hand, where 

 the spectator can only retire a few feet to contemplate a painting, the 

 eye demands a greater fulness of parts, and more gradation ; but that 

 in no case can the. imitation descend to the style of cabinet pictures, 

 in as much as the compartments, however small, are always to be con- 

 sidered as portions of an extensive whole. 



The apparent contradiction of the omission of detail, in proportion 

 to increase of size, was adverted to in a paper in the appendix to the 

 former report, and, bearing as it does on the question under discus- 

 sion, may be more fully stated on the authority of various examples, 

 as follows : — 



The representation, without reference to its frame or boundary, is 

 required to expand as it recedes from the eye ; this increase of size 

 with distance (or of distance with size) being indispensable, in order 

 that the work, as a whole, maybe duly seen. But this progressive 

 enlargement is confined to significant forms and objects; things less 

 important are gradually omitted, notwithstanding the general increase 

 of size. The extreme effects of proximity and distance correspond 

 in some respects, for works of art may be so small that their leading- 

 features only can be perceptible : this effect is equivalent to that of 

 distance. Thus, engraved gems often exhibit a grandeur of style fit 

 for colossal figures. On the other hand, the degrees of distance to 

 which the style of highly-finished cabinet pictures may be said to 

 belong, are defined by the average range of most distinct vision. 

 Beyond and within that limit, whether the pictured plane diminishes 



>•> Part of this work is now preserved in the Vatican. 



