Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1664 page)

Here is a fresco which aspires to represent the most impressive of all Christian subjects; it is painted on the wall of a Christian church, by a man belonging to a Christian community — what evidences of religious feeling has it to show me? I look at the lower part of the composition first, and see — a combination of the orthodox nursery notion of the devil, with the heathen idea of the conveyance to the infernal regions, in the shape of a horned and tailed ferryman giving condemned souls a cast across a river! Pretty well, I think, to begin with.

Let me try and discover next what evidences of extraordinary intellectual ability the picture presents. I look up toward the top now, by way of a change, and I find Michael Angelo’s conception of the entrance of a martyr into the kingdom of Heaven, displayed before me in the shape of a flayed man, presenting his own skin, as a sort of credential, to the hideous figure with the threatening hand — which I will not, even in writing, identify with the name of Our Saviour. Elsewhere I see nothing but unnatural distortion and hopeless confusion; fighting figures, tearing figures, tumbling figures, kicking figures; and, to crown all, a caricatured portrait, with a pair of ass’s ears, of a certain Messer Biagio, of Sienna, who had the sense and courage, when the “Last Judgment” was first shown on completion, to protest against every figure in it being painted stark naked!

I see such things as these, and many more equally preposterous, which it is not worth while to mention. All other people with eyes in their heads see them too. They are actual matters of fact, not debatable matters of taste. But I am not — on that account — justified, nor is any other uncritical person justified, in saying a word against the picture. It may palpably outrage all the religious proprieties of the subject; but, then, it is full of “fine foreshortening,” and therefore we uncritical people must hold our tongues. It may violate just as plainly all the intellectual proprieties, counting from the flayed man with his skin in his hand, at the top, to Messer Biagio, of Sienna, with his ass’s ears, at the bottom; but, then, it exhibits “masterly anatomical detail,” and therefore we uncritical spectators must hold our tongues. It may strike us forcibly that, if people are to be painted at all, as in this picture, rising out of their graves in their own bodies as they lived, it is surely important (to say nothing of giving them the benefit of the shrouds in which they were buried) to represent them as having the usual general proportions of human beings. But Sir Joshua Reynolds interposes critically, and tells us the figures on the wall and ceiling of the Sistine Chapel are sublime, because they don’t remind us of our own species. Why should they not remind us of our own species? Because they are prophets, sibyls, and such like, cries the chorus of critics indignantly. And what then? If I had been on intimate terms with Jeremiah, or if I had been the ancient king to whom the sibyl brought the mysterious books, would not my friend in the one case, and the messenger in the other, have appeared before me bearing the ordinary proportions and exhibiting the usual appearance of my own species? Does not sacred history inform me that the prophet was a man, and does not profane history describe the sibyl as an old woman? Is old age never venerable and striking in real life? But I am uttering heresies. I am mutinously summoning reason and common sense to help me in estimating an old master. This will, never do; I had better follow the example of all the travelers I see about me, by turning away in despair, and leaving the “Last Judgment” to the critics and connoisseurs.

Having thus discovered that one masterpiece of high art does not address itself to me, and to the large majority whom I represent, let me go next to the picture gallery, and see how the second masterpiece (the “Transfiguration,” by Raphael) can vindicate its magnificent reputation among critics and connoisseurs. This picture I approach under the advantage of knowing, beforehand, that I must make allowances for minor defects in it, which are recognised by the learned authorities themselves. I am, indeed, prepared to be disappointed at the outset, because I have been prepared to make allowances:

First, for defects of colour, which spoil the general effect of the picture on the spectator; all the lights being lividly tinged with green, and all the shadows being grimly hardened with black.. This mischief is said to have been worked by the tricks of French cleaners and restorers, who have so fatally tampered with the whole surface that Raphael’s original colouring must be given up as lost. Rather a considerable loss, this, to begin with; but not Raphael’s fault. Therefore, let it by no means depreciate the picture in my estimation.

Secondly, I have to make allowances for the introduction of two Roman Catholic, saints (St. Julian and St. Lawrence), represented by the painter as being actually present at the Transfiguration, in order to please Cardinal De Medici, for whom the picture was painted. This
is
Raphael’s fault. This sets him forth in the rather anomalous character of a great painter with no respect for his art. I have some doubts about him, after that — doubts which my critical friends might possibly share if Raphael were only a modern painter.

Thirdly, I have to make allowances for the scene of the Transfiguration on the high mountain, and the scene of the inability of the disciples to cure the boy possessed with a devil, being represented, without the slightest division, one at the top and the other at the bottom of the same canvas — both events thus appearing to be connected by happening in the same place, within view of each other, when we know very well that they were only connected by happening at the same time. Also, when I see some of the disciples painted in the act of pointing up to the Transfiguration, the mountain itself being the background against which they stand, I am to remember (though the whole of the rest of the picture is most absolutely and unflinchingly literal in treatment) that here Raphael has suddenly broken out into allegory, and desires to indicate by the pointing hands of the disciples that it is the duty of the afflicted to look to Heaven for relief in their calamities. Having made all these rather important allowances, I may now look impartially at the upper half of this famous composition.

I find myself soon looking away again. It may be that three figures clothed in gracefully fluttering drapery, and dancing at symmetrically exact distances from each other in the air, represent such an unearthly spectacle as the Transfiguration to the satisfaction of great judges of art. I can also imagine that some few select persons may be able to look at the top of the high mountain, as represented in the picture, without feeling their gravity in the smallest degree endangered by seeing that the ugly knob of ground on which the disciples are lying prostrate is barely big enough to hold them, and most certainly would not hold them if they all moved briskly on it together. These things are matters of taste on which I have the misfortune to differ with the connoisseurs. Not feeling bold enough to venture on defending myself against the masters who are teaching me to appreciate high art, I can only look away from the upper part of the picture, and try if I can derive any useful or pleasant impressions from the lower half of the composition, in which no supernatural event is depicted, and which it is, therefore, perfectly justifiable to judge by referring it to the standard of dramatic truth, or, in one word, of Nature.

As for this portion of the picture, I can hardly believe my eyes when I first look at it. Excepting the convulsed face of the boy, and a certain hard eagerness in the look of the man who is holding him, all the other faces display a stony inexpressiveness, which, when I think of the great name of Raphael in connection with what I see, fairly amazes me. I look down incredulously at my guide-book. Yes! there is indeed the critical authority of Lanzi quoted for my benefit. Lanzi tells me in plain terms that I behold represented in the picture before me “the most pathetic story Raphael ever conceived,” and refers, in proof of it, to the “compassion evinced by the apostles.” I look attentively at them all, and behold an assembly of hard-featured, bearded men, standing, sitting, and gesticulating, in conventional academic attitudes; their faces not expressing naturally, not even affecting to express artificially, compassion for the suffering boy, humility at their own incapability to relieve him, or any other human emotion likely to be suggested by the situation in which they are placed. I find it still more dismaying to look next at the figure of a brawny woman, with her back to the spectator, entreating the help of the apostles theatrically on one knee, with her insensible classical profile turned in one direction, and both her muscular arms stretched out in the other; it is still more dismaying to look at such a figure as this, and then to be gravely told by Lanzi that I am contemplating “the affliction of a beautiful and interesting female.” I observe, on entering the room in which the “Transfiguration” is placed, as I have previously observed on entering the Sistine Chapel, groups of spectators before the picture consulting their guide-books — looking attentively at the work of high art which they are ordered to admire — trying hard to admire it — then, with dismay in their faces, looking round at each other, shutting up their books, and retreating from high art in despair. I observe these groups for a little while, and I end in following their example. We members of the general public may admire “Hamlet” and “Don Giovanni” honestly, along with the critics, but the two sublimest pictures (according to the learned authorities) which the world has yet beheld, appeal to none of us; and we leave them, altogether discouraged on the subject of Art for the future. From that time forth we look at pictures with a fatal self-distrust. Some of us recklessly take our opinions from others; some of us cautiously keep our opinions to ourselves; and some of us indolently abstain from having anything to do with an opinion at all.

Is this exaggerated? Have I misrepresented facts in the example I have quoted of obstructive criticism on art, and of its discouraging effects on the public mind? Let the doubting reader, by all means, judge for himself. Let him refer to any recognised authority he pleases, and he will find that the two pictures of which I have been writing are critically and officially considered, to this day, as the two master-works of the highest school of painting. Having ascertained that, let him next, if possible, procure a sight of some print or small copy from any part of either picture (there is a copy of the whole of the “Transfiguration” in the Gallery at the Crystal Palace), and practically test the truth of what I have said. Or, in the event of his not choosing to take that trouble, let him ask any unprofessional and uncritical friend who has seen the pictures themselves — and the more intelligent and unprejudiced that friend, the better for my purpose — what the effect on him was of the “Last Judgment,” or the “Transfiguration.” If I can only be assured of the sincerity of the witness, I shall not be afraid of the result of the examination.

Other readers who have visited the Sistine Chapel and the Vatican Gallery can testify for themselves (but few of them will — I know them!) whether I have misrepresented their impressions or not. To that part of my audience I have nothing to say, except that I beg them not to believe that I am a heretic in relation to all works by all old masters, because I have spoken out about the “Last Judgment” and the “Transfiguration.” I am not blind, I hope, to the merits of any picture, provided it will bear honest investigation on uncritical principles. I have seen such exceptional works by ones and twos, amid many hundreds of utterly worthless canvases with undeservedly famous names attached to them, in Italy and elsewhere. My  
valet de place
has not pointed them out to me; my guide-book, which criticises according to authority, has not recommended me to look at them, except in very rare cases indeed. I discovered them for myself, and others may discover them as readily as I did, if they will only take their minds out of leading-strings when they enter a gallery, and challenge a picture boldly to do its duty by explaining its own merits to them without the assistance of an interpreter. Having given that simple receipt for the finding out and enjoying of good pictures, I need give no more. It is no part of my object to attempt to impose my own tastes and preferences on others. I want — if I may be allowed to repeat my motives once more in the plainest terms — to do all I can to shake the influence of authority in matters of Art, because I see that authority standing drearily and persistently aloof from all popular sympathy; because I see it keeping pictures and the people apart; because I find it setting up as masterpieces two of the worst of many palpably bad and barbarous works of past times; and, lastly, because I find it purchasing pictures for the National Gallery of England, for which, in nine cases out of ten, the nation has no concern or care, which have no merits but technical merits, and which have not the last and lowest recommendation of winning general approval, even among the critics and connoisseurs themselves.

And what remedy against this? I say at the end, as I said at the beginning, the remedy is to judge for ourselves, and to express our opinions, privately and publicly, on every possible occasion, without hesitation, without compromise, without reference to any precedents whatever. Public opinion has had its victories in other matters, and may yet have its victory in matters of art. “We, the people, have a gallery that is called ours; let us do our best to have it filled for the future with pictures (no matter when or by whom painted) that we can get some honest enjoyment and benefit from. Let us, in Parliament and out of it, before dinner and after dinner, in the presence of authorities just as coolly as out of the presence of authorities, say plainly, once for all, that the sort of high art which is professedly bought
for us,
and which does actually address itself to nobody but painters, critics and connoisseurs, is not high art at all, but the lowest of the low: because it is the narrowest as to its sphere of action, and the most scantily furnished as to its means of doing good. We shall shock the connoisseurs (especially the elderly ones) by taking this course; we shall get indignantly reprimanded by the critics, and flatly contradicted by the lecturers: but we shall also, sooner or later, get a collection of pictures bought for us that we, mere mankind, can appreciate and understand. It may be a revolutionary sentiment, but I think that the carrying out of this reform (as well as of a few others) is a part of the national business which the people of England have got to do for themselves, and in which no existing authorities will assist them. There is a great deal of social litter accumulating about us. Suppose, when we start the business of setting things to rights, that we try the new broom gently at first by sweeping away a little high art, and having the temerity to form our own opinions.