ANIMAL LIFE IN ITALIAN PAINTING 



Michael 

 Angelo, 

 1475-1564 



Andrea del 



Sarto, 



1486-1531 



who sits nursing a rabbit. An unusually well-painted 

 and lustrous-eyed rabbit with dark-tipped ears noses the 

 hand of the child in the Mars and Venus (Berlin), and 

 amongst other birds, two doves bill and coo between the 

 pair. A hawk-moth has settled on the leg of Venus. 

 The Child in the arms of the Madonna (Louvre) 

 stretches out to touch a pigeon which has the same 

 characteristics and happiness of pose as the birds in 

 the Berlin picture. 



It was through the grandeur of the human figure 

 that Michelangelo Buonarroti expressed his noble and 

 lofty ideals. He had no desire to satisfy the eye by 

 painting landscapes as Gozzoli did, where trees, flowers, 

 birds, and beasts produce a whole which, however little 

 real thought there may be in it, cannot fail to please. 

 It is, however, interesting to notice his conception of 

 the whale which swallowed Jonah (Rome, Sistine 

 Chapel). He also paints the ram in NoaJis Offering, 

 and the swan in the story of Leda, but there is no 

 evidence of interest in animals for their own sake. 



A large fresco by Andrea d'Agnolo, called del Sarto 

 from his father's trade as a tailor, must be mentioned, 

 but not as representing his usual style. It is in the 

 Medici Villa at Poggio a Cajano, and in it are represented 

 parrots, a turkey, a giraffe with the horn-like excres- 

 cences well marked on the head, monkeys, and Eastern 



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