Carlo Cesare Malvasia
Felsina pittrice
Lives of the Bolognese Painters
Volume 9
Life of Guido Reni
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| Guido Reni, Altarpiece of the Beggars, 1613-1616, Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale Source: https://www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/it/content_page/item/316-gesu-cristo-in-pieta-pianto-dalla-madonna-e-adorato-dai-santi-petronio-francesco-domenico-procolo-e-carlo-borromeo-br-pala-dei-mendicanti |
Critical Edition, Translation, and Essay by Lorenzo Pericolo, Historical Notes by Lorenzo Pericolo with Elizabeth Cropper, Stefan Albl, Mattia Biffis, and Elise Ferone
Corpus of Illustrations Established by Lorenzo Pericolo, with Mattia Biffis and Elise Ferone
Published for the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington,
2 tomes, Turnhout, Harvey Miller. An imprint of Brepols Publishers, 2019
Review by Giovanni Mazzaferro. Part Two
Go Back to Part One
'First' and 'Second' Manner
The discrimination between the 'first' and the 'second'
manner in Reni's artistic production is a historical reality. It materialised
almost immediately after the artist's death (1642) and basically developed in
the art market. The works falling into the first group were, basically, those
that achieved higher prices. In fact, it was not rare the case of
intermediaries who, while offering to potential buyers paintings of the artist
made in late age, claimed that, contrary to what the dates could suggest, they
had been performed in his 'first' manner. Unfortunately Malvasia (who also accommodated
himself to the distinction) did not produce a clear statement about the
differences between the one and the other typology; as it has been said, he did
not produce an art criticism monograph like the ones, which we are used to read
today. Furthermore, we have seen that, speaking of Guido's 'second' manner, the
Bolognese scholar expressed apparently irreconcilable judgments, which were oscillating
between unconditional praise and harsh criticism. Perhaps Malvasia made the
clearest distinction when he elaborated his views from a contrary position and
pointed out, speaking of the older works, that “all of these, even though so very beautiful in some details, and so very well done, nevertheless taken all together do not display that great invention, fertile composition, judicious modes of appropriately casting shadows and modulating light, that propriety in the figures and in the expression of the affections that Guido, as I have already said, put into pratice much more in those other outstanding paintings he made earlier” (V. I, p. 115). Some works can be considered particularly
representative of one or the other period. Let us check what Malvasia wrote about
them.
With reference to the 'first' manner, it is
undoubtedly appropriate to mention the Altarpiece
of the Beggars and the Massacre of
the Innocents. The Altarpiece of the
Beggars, or the four patrons of the city of Bologna with Saint Charles
Borromeo in the presence of the Weeping Virgin over the dead Christ, was made
for the Chiesa dei Mendicanti (or Santa Maria della Pietà) in Bologna between
1613 and 1616 and is located today in the local Art Gallery, the Pinacoteca
Nazionale. This was the work - according to what Malvasia wrote - that closed
the mouth of the artist's rivals “since these four figures (...) made it clear to the Carracci partisans that he too, as much as any master, could elevate his style and achieve fierceness whenever delicacy was not his main objective. Beyond their ordinary and commensurate proportions, these figures are endowed with such relief and evoke such formidability that they arouse fear, while their expressions and affections could not be more appropriate and meaningful” (V. I, p. 65). Previously, Malvasia had used
words of unconditional praise for the Massacre
of the Innocents, made between 1611 and 1612 for the chapel of the Berò
counts in the St Domenic church, also today in the Art Gallery in Bologna: “And in truth, the figures in Guido's Massacre are endowed with movement; they jostle and make such a clamor that it seems they are about to leap out of the painting. As a counterpoint to this turmoil, Guido placed in the foreground a woman in a quiet attitude, sitting on the ground, her hands intertwined, and her eyes turned heavenward; she mourns over two slaughtered children, while graceful little angels descend from above, holding palm branches to bestow upon these innocent protomartyrs. Guido executed everything with a strength suffused with such tenderness, with a nonchalance thus reined in by precision, with movements regulated in such a manner by decorum, that no one has ever reached such a mark of distinction” (pp.
55 and 57).
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| Guido Reni, Massacre of the Innocents, 1611-1612, Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale Source: https://www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/it/content_page/item/403-strage-degli-innocenti |
The limits of the 'second manner' are evident,
however, in the so-called Pallione della Peste (Pallione of the Plague) or Pallione del Voto, created in 1630 and today also in the
Bolognese Pinacoteca Nazionale: “Regarding the Pallione del Voto, for example, I could contend, so to speak, that, whereas the propriety and liveliness of the affectionate expression of Saint Francis is a divine thing, this does not correspond to Saint Dominic's, whose physiognomy and complexion, so full and colorful, are inappropriate and do not fit the austerity of that religious man, not to mention his calm countenance and towering stature, when in fact he was rather short. Furthermore, his right and perfectly matches the left hand of Saint Petronius on the opposite side, and therefore too closely mirrors it because in the same pose. Likewise Saint Petronius's right hand is also seen from the same viewpoint as that of Saint Ignatius, a little above him. I shall omit Saint Proculus in his rather ungraceful attitude, so analogous to that of Saint Florian opposite him. I shall also pass over the fact that the figures, painted with little gradation of colors, all advance equally, nor, as I have said, did he introduce in it flashes of light or contrasts of shades and reflections. These would have helped the figures detach themselves one from the other, assisted by judicious movements, expedients, and counterpoints, all of which is so typical of the always incomparable Venetian school" (V. I, pp. 115 and 117).
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| Guido Reni, Pallione del Voto, 1630, Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale Source: https://www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/it/content_page/item/312-madonna-col-bambino-in-gloria-e-i-santi-protettori-di-bologna-petronio-francesco-ignazio-francesco-saverio-procolo-e-floriano-br-pala-della-peste |
The criticisms are of various types. First, the
first set of comments was linked to the lack of respect for verisimilitude and,
therefore, harmful to the counter-reformed dictate (think of Cardinal Paleotti and his Discourse
on sacred and profane images): so Saint Dominic is too ruddy to be an austere religious. The second type
of comments relate to the deficiencies in the invention, with the repetition of
gestures that invalidate the variety of the scene: the right hand of Saint Dominic mirroring that of Saint Petronius, the left of Saint Petronius himself
substantially similar to that of Saint Ignatius. On a stylistic level, the
greatest objection was probably the last: Malvasia observed that the lights,
the colours and the shadows were insufficiently graded, thus providing
insufficient importance to the figures and substantially flattening them on the
same plan. And again, with reference to the Triumph
of St. Job (1636), which recently miraculously escaped the fire of
Notre-Dame in Paris, he argued that the rules of clarity of the
counter-reformation were again violated by the image of the same saint, which
one could easily confuse with one of Christ.
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| Guido Reni, Triumph of Saint Job, 1636, Paris, Notre Dame Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Trionfo_di_san_Giobbe_-_Reni.jpg |
Finally, he commented on Bacchus and Ariadne (1640) destined for the Queen of England and
cut into pieces already in 1650 (the only fragment certainly identified is the
Ariadne always in the Bologna Pinacoteca Nazionale): when I saw it “I could not much blame Bernini, or perhaps Cortona, whoever it was, for calling it the painting of a procession, on seeeing that many of the figures are shown pair by pair and in the same, or only slightly dissimilate, attitude" (V. I, p. 119). Overall, it seems that Malvasia
questioned, with reference to the 'second' way, Guido’s abilities as a
historical painter (of sacred or profane setting) (V. II, p. 68).
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| Guido Reni, Ariadne, fragment from Bacchus and Ariadne, 1640, Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale Source: https://www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/it/content_page/item/345-arianna |
Between Bologna and Rome, looking for
references
One of the most disconcerting aspects of the
biography is that, with exceptions, Malvasia began to speak of the 'first' manner
with reference to paintings painted from 1610 onwards (V. II, p. 64). The works
of youth were absent. The question of Guido's training constitutes a critical
problem in itself, which permits to place Guido in the line of the tradition of
Bolognese painting and which, in turn, helps to better clarify the role of
other painters, such as the Carraccis, in the context of the same
tradition. In this sense, the distinction between 'first' and 'second' manner
seems to me, personally, a superstructure that somehow meets the needs of the
public of the time (who expected a distinction of this type), rather than a
real dichotomy felt by the Bolognese scholar. Reni's beginnings were with the
mannerist Denijs Calvaert (1540-1619) and, subsequently, in the Carraccis’ school.
In short, Guido drew abundantly from the Carraccis' "learned
compendium", and, in particular, from Ludovico. According to what Malvasia
wrote, in 1604, that is very soon, and especially on the eve of his first stay
in Rome, Reni had fully achieved the mastery of the artistic means of the
Carraccis (a circumstance on which Annibale would have alerted Ludovico, urging
him not to overdo teaching requirements towards such an already gifted pupil).
He proved it in his St. Benedict Receiving Gifts from the Peasants, which is part of the pictorial cycle of
the cloister of San Michele in Bosco (unfortunately very soon ruined).
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| Giacomo Maria Giovannini after Guido Reni, Saint Benedict Receiving Gifts from the Pesants, from Carlo Cesare Malvasia, Il Claustro di San Michele in Bosco, Bologna, 1694 Source: https://aperto.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/opere/pn-4642 |
According to Malvasia, the result is of such an
impact as to make one say that for 'softness, goodness and greatness' the pupil
had overcome the teachers: “In this painting Guido represented Saint Benedict at the top of a mountain, stepping out of a grotto with a certain affability that does non diminish his gravitas, receiving the various gifts brought to him by the rustic inhabitants of different genders, ages, and complexions, and diverse in proportion, attitudes, and costumes. A graceful young girl, girdled with the finest veils and carrying a basket of eggs, is in the style of Raphael; in the style of Correggio, an older girl, her companion, with a smiling face rests a hand upon her shoulder. Both look out toward the viewers with so much liveliness and spirit they seem to breathe. In the style of Titian there is a little sheperd playing a flute with hands of a living and tender flesh; another sheperd, of not inferior beauty, listens intently to his music. In the style of Annibale is a woman with a nursing baby at her breast, and another older child whom she prods with her right hand into offering a basket of apples on which he fixes greedy eyes. Passing over many other figures, I shall mention a full-length nude in the foreground who pulls forcefully at a donkey's reins, and who is so vigorously and furiously drawn that it would seem that Michelangelo himself had traced his contours, leaving to the school of Lombardy the task of covering his body with living flesh in a more tender manner” (V. I,
p. 37). When Reni arrived in Rome (perhaps on the wave of his copy of Raphael's Santa Cecilia), he already was a full-fledged
artist. This induced Malvasia to diminish the importance of the Roman period in
two respects: on the one hand, the influence of Raphael and the study of the
ancient (to which reference is made in passing and almost at the bottom of the
biography) and, on the other hand, the 'caravaggesque' period of Reni’s
painting, which had its peak in the Crucifixion
of Saint Peter (1604-1605) for the church of San Paolo alle Tre Fontane,
now in the Vatican Museums.
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| Guido Reni, Crucifixion of Saint Peter, 1604-1605, Vatican Museums Source: http://www.museivaticani.va/content/museivaticani/en/collezioni/musei/la-pinacoteca/sala-xii---secolo-xvii/guido-reni--crocifissione-di-s--pietro.html |
Malvasia explained this occurrence as a simple
episode, mainly due to pressure from Cavalier d'Arpino, Guido's Roman mentor
and eager to isolate Michelangelo Merisi. Things were obviously different and Pericolo,
very sharply, stressed how, in doing so, the Bolognese historian failed to
identify at least two compositional aspects related to Caravaggesque painting
that had a lasting influence on Guido's painting: first, the tendency to
painting figures strongly in the foreground with respect to the frame and
second, alternatively, the evident preference for the realization of half
figures.
But for Malvasia, in reality, Guido Reni,
through the Carraccis, had become the anti-Caravaggio. The circumstances that would
have crowned him in this position are historically unreliable. A Roman painting
by Merisi would have arrived in Bologna at the Carraccis's studio (with Annibale still
present, therefore by 1595). Having seen it, "Ludovico remained astonished, as he was unable to discern in it anything but a great contrast of light and shadow, an excessive attachment to nature, without decorum, with little grace and even less intelligence”
(see I, p. 29). At this point, Annibale would have said: “I would certainly know another way of making a big splash, and even of defeating and mortifying this one. I would oppose an extreme tenderness to his fierceness of color. Does he use a compact and falling light? I would want it diffused and face-on. Does he conceal the difficulties of art amidst the shadows of night? I would like to uncover in the bright light of noonday the most learned and erudite researches. If he throws down on the canvas whatever he sees in nature, without seizing the good and the best, I would choose the most perfect parts, the most correctly arranged, giving to the figures that nobility and harmony lacking in the originals" (V. I, p. 29). The words
pronounced by Annibale Carracci, in fact, were a veritable artistic manifesto
and perhaps at the same time the densest explanation of Guido's poetics. The
real point of the question – as Pericolo pointed out - is why Malvasia put
these words in Annibale's own mouth, when the prototype of perfection in his
work was Ludovico. In doing so, the author achieved two objectives. First, he
provided an interpretation of Annibale different from the one which had linked
him to the Roman school and seen in him the new interpreter of that tradition
in the Galleria Farnese. Secondly and even more importantly, he created a
link between the third and fourth ages of painting: Annibale would have theorised
what Guido eventually brought to completion. Importantly, the basis of this
theory is the creation of a new manner, which goes beyond perfection, and which
is a reaction to Caravaggio's 'naturalism': the new modern manner.
Between naturalism, ideal beauty and chimeric
painting
One point must be clear: for Malvasia, the type
of painting which Annibale Carracci contrasted to Caravaggio in words, and
Guido Reni in his works was a painting imitating
nature, through a process that ennobled it by drawing from the world of ideas.
For Malvasia, Reni's inventions were not chimerical, not even in the 'second' manner,
as Scannelli wrote instead in his Microcosmo della Pittura, reporting a judgment by Fabio Della Cornia with reference to
an unidentified painting by the Bolognese painter. Lorenzo Pericolo, however,
underlined how Carlo Cesare, anchoring his Guido to naturalism, was unable to establish
perhaps the most important element of his critical interpretation of the
painter: the existence of a poetics of the supernatural, which tends to untie
the pure imitation of the natural data, and even goes beyond the simple
'selection' of the best parts of nature itself. As evidenced by a note found in
the Scritti originali (Original Writings) and not transcribed in the Felsina, Malvasia had the opportunity to reflect on these elements,
again with regard to the alleged weakness of the second manner: “[Guido's] last manner did not meet with success, as it was deemed weak and feeble, although this was rather a delicacy never practiced before, and thus new; new, I say, but not truly far from the possible, such as the one to be found in a not ordinary nature, but not always, but only in the noblest and most perfect, especially in depicting divine and celestial ideas, such as God, the Virgin, saints, angels, and suchlike, in the representation of which, because he ought to distance himself from the earthly natural, it was opportune to play with the idea and give himself over to the supernatural; this is why we see that his heads are commonly said to be made in paradise, inasmuch as they partake more of divinity than umanity” (V. II, p. 90). All this was not the result
of simple inspiration, but of study and continuous application. Malvasia’s
Guido was a man who lost his temper when he was attributed only innate and natural qualities which
would allow him to create divine works; his art had its roots in the study of
nature, optical phenomena and uninterrupted practice.
In defining Reni’s art, Malvasia frequently used
terms such as 'divine', 'delicate' and 'sublime'. Pericolo impeccably recalled
the literary humus on which these concepts were based, in the context of the
time, referring to the writings of Francesco Patrizi (Della poetica, About
poetics - 1586), Matteo Peregrini (Delle acutezze, About sharpness - 1639) and
Emanuele Tesauro (Il Cannocchiale aristotelico, The Aristotelian telescope - 1654). And
throughout the biography, Carlo Cesare referred, always implicitly, to
distorting concepts of the mimetic representation of nature, coming to define a
way of rendering the body in a supernatural way that was the result of a fusion
(and not of an opposition) of elements: the so-called divine manner. The beauty of
human torsos, the delicacy and variety of the heads, the perfection in the feet
and hands was accompanied by an evident clearing of the palette over the years.
It was technically substantiated in the use of white lead (the 'white manner'), to
which Malvasia combined not only the artist's desire to achieve greater
softness of the image, but also the need to make it lasting over time: “No doubt, we observe more and more every day the verification of Guido's prediction, that, while, the paintings of others would lose a great deal over the years, his pictures would gain as the white lead would yellow, and they would take on a certain patina reducing all the pigments to a true and good natural color, whereas those other works would blacken to excess and level out into smoky darkness, preventing the viewer from seeing and discerning the gradations of chiaroscuro, the half-tints, and the principal lights” (V.
I, p. 185).
Malvasia - it has been said - did not go so far
as to claim for Reni that he deliberately made a 'chimeric' painting (moreover
he had used the same adjective to stigmatize mannerism’s failure to adhere to
the nature). However he listed a number of examples where “Guido's treatment of the body, whether young or old, entails a subtle denaturation of nature; through its agency, art dissolves nature into artifice. Lines, contours, relief, chiaroscuro, color. brushwork: all the technical elements of the representation belie nature by beautifying it. Through art's alchemy, strength does not truly morph into delicacy, nor does deformity morph into grace. Rather, strength and delicacy, the misshaped and the graceful, merge together without losing their specificity. In doing so, art expands its domain by its softening of opposites and its beautification of decaying flesh. When Malvasia insists on Guido's grace, sweetness, delicacy, and nobility as the specific components of his perfection, he also celebrates the process by which the artifice of beautifying nature not only manifests itself, but also exhibits its operation as an ongoing paradox, whether it be the coalescence of opposites or the embellishment of the monstruos. In this light, Guido's "sweetness" is not just sweetness of expression: it is above all the smoothing out of nature, even raw nature, through pure visual artistry” (V. II,
pp. 70-71).
We are clearly faced with a stalemate, and it
is merit of Pericolo to highlight its contents. Of course, Guido Reni was
Malvasia’s youth idol. However, his judgment changed over time. He was first the
pinnacle of art development together with Ludovico Carracci, then became primus
inter pares of the first generation after the Carraccis and lastly manifested a
final phase of his artistic production characterized by progressive decline and
weakness. Nevertheless, the writer continued to highlight aspects of his
poetics which betrayed his sympathy towards the artist: “Over time, Guido came to free the constraints of nature by forging a supernatural body: one exceeding nature in slenderness and magnified through a synthesis of opposites. Even though Malvasia balked at the idea that Guido might have relinquished nature altogether, it is relevant that, all the same, he defended other aspects of Guido's supernatural style as intimately related to an artistic notion of divinity” (V. II, p. 78). In this regard, Malvasia vehemently
defended the way of draping of the artist. Thus, for example, he rejected the
criticisms regarding the fresco of the Glory of Saint Dominic in the homonymous
church in Bologna (1613-1615), according to which the folds of the drapery of
the saint, of Christ and of the Virgin were decidedly excessive and unnatural.
The Bolognese scholar countered those censures by stating: “Insofar as this supposed grandness concerns supernatural objects, they can and should clearly separate themselves from earthly meanness, and the breadth of the draperies in those celestial figures aims at exactly the same effect as that created by the great trail of a mantel wrapped round a noble matron, or the great train of the cappa magna worn by cardinals, which adds so much external decorum and majesty to them” (V. I, p. 62). And,
in this regard, Carlo Cesare recalled the study of the works of Dürer: Reni
resumed his richness of clothes, however abandoning the dryness of Northern
European painting.
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| Guido Reni, Glory of Saint Dominic, 1613-1615, Bologna, Church of San Domenico Source: https://www.wikiwand.com/it/Basilica_di_San_Domenico_(Bologna) |
Needless to say, reading the biography of Reni
gives the reader plenty of other food for thought, which it is not possible to
review for reasons of space. There is an argument, however, that it is not
possible to ignore and that will be the subject of the third (and last) part of
this review: it is about the importance of money and the role of art trade
within the pages dedicated to Guido in the Felsina
Pittrice.
End of Part Two
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