Light And Shadow Are Beautiful Things, Capable Of A
Thousand Blendings, Softenings, And Harmonizings, Which One Loves To
Have Represented:
The great Artist of all loves light and shadow; why
else does he play such a magical succession of changes upon them
through all creation?
But for an artist to make the most solemn
mystery of religion a mere tributary to the exhibition of a trick of
art, is a piece of profanity. What was in this man's head when he
painted this representation of the hour when his Maker was made flesh
that he might redeem a world? Nothing but _chiaro-scuro_ and
foreshortening. This overwhelming scene would give him a fine chance
to do two things: first, to represent a phosphorescent light from the
body of the child; and second, to show off some foreshortened angels.
Now, as to these angels, I have simply to remark that I should prefer
a seraph's head to his heels; and that a group of archangels, kicking
from the canvas with such alarming vigor, however much it may
illustrate foreshortening, does not illustrate either glory to God in
the highest, or peace on earth and good will to men. Therefore I have
quarrelled with Correggio, as I always expected to do if he profaned
the divine mysteries. How could any one, who had a soul to understand
that most noble creation of Raphael, turn, the next moment, to admire
this?
Here also are six others of Correggio's most celebrated paintings.
They are all mere representations of the physical, with little of the
moral.
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