May 13, 2012
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| - | [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Memling_056.jpg] | + | [[Advent and Triumph of Christ]][http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Memling_056.jpg] |
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| The entrance to the picture gallery is by a door on the right hand, affording us a sight of a beautiful spiral staircase, which goes circling upward from the very basement to the very summit of the palace, with a perfectly easy ascent, yet confining its sweep within a moderate compass. We looked up through the interior of the spiral, as through a tube, from. the bottom to the top. The pictures are contained in three contiguous rooms of the lower piano, and are few in number, comprising barely half a dozen which I should care to see again, though doubtless all have value in their way. One that attracted our attention was a picture of [[Christ Disputing with the Doctors]], by [[Albert Dürer]], in which was represented the ugliest, most evil-minded, stubborn, pragmatical, and contentious old Jew that ever lived under the law of Moses; and he and the child Jesus were arguing, not only with their tongues, but making hieroglyphics, as it were, by the motion of their hands and fingers. It is a very queer, as well as a very remarkable picture. But we passed hastily by this, and almost all others, being eager to see the two which chiefly make the collection famous,--Raphael's [[Fornarina]], and [[Guido]]'s [[portrait of Beatrice Cenci]]. These were found in the last of the three rooms, and, as regards Beatrice Cenci, I might as well not try to say anything; for its spell is indefinable, and the painter has wrought it in a way more like magic than anything else. . . . | The entrance to the picture gallery is by a door on the right hand, affording us a sight of a beautiful spiral staircase, which goes circling upward from the very basement to the very summit of the palace, with a perfectly easy ascent, yet confining its sweep within a moderate compass. We looked up through the interior of the spiral, as through a tube, from. the bottom to the top. The pictures are contained in three contiguous rooms of the lower piano, and are few in number, comprising barely half a dozen which I should care to see again, though doubtless all have value in their way. One that attracted our attention was a picture of [[Christ Disputing with the Doctors]], by [[Albert Dürer]], in which was represented the ugliest, most evil-minded, stubborn, pragmatical, and contentious old Jew that ever lived under the law of Moses; and he and the child Jesus were arguing, not only with their tongues, but making hieroglyphics, as it were, by the motion of their hands and fingers. It is a very queer, as well as a very remarkable picture. But we passed hastily by this, and almost all others, being eager to see the two which chiefly make the collection famous,--Raphael's [[Fornarina]], and [[Guido]]'s [[portrait of Beatrice Cenci]]. These were found in the last of the three rooms, and, as regards Beatrice Cenci, I might as well not try to say anything; for its spell is indefinable, and the painter has wrought it in a way more like magic than anything else. . . . | ||
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Advent and Triumph of Christ[1]
The entrance to the picture gallery is by a door on the right hand, affording us a sight of a beautiful spiral staircase, which goes circling upward from the very basement to the very summit of the palace, with a perfectly easy ascent, yet confining its sweep within a moderate compass. We looked up through the interior of the spiral, as through a tube, from. the bottom to the top. The pictures are contained in three contiguous rooms of the lower piano, and are few in number, comprising barely half a dozen which I should care to see again, though doubtless all have value in their way. One that attracted our attention was a picture of Christ Disputing with the Doctors, by Albert Dürer, in which was represented the ugliest, most evil-minded, stubborn, pragmatical, and contentious old Jew that ever lived under the law of Moses; and he and the child Jesus were arguing, not only with their tongues, but making hieroglyphics, as it were, by the motion of their hands and fingers. It is a very queer, as well as a very remarkable picture. But we passed hastily by this, and almost all others, being eager to see the two which chiefly make the collection famous,--Raphael's Fornarina, and Guido's portrait of Beatrice Cenci. These were found in the last of the three rooms, and, as regards Beatrice Cenci, I might as well not try to say anything; for its spell is indefinable, and the painter has wrought it in a way more like magic than anything else. . . .
It is the most profoundly wrought picture in the world; no artist did it, nor could do it again. Guido may have held the brush, but he painted better than he knew. I wish, however, it were possible for some spectator, of deep sensibility, to see the picture without knowing anything of its subject or history; for, no doubt, we bring all our knowledge of the Cenci tragedy to the interpretation of it.
Close beside the Beatrice Cenci hangs the Fornarina. . . .
--Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks by Nathaniel Hawthorne
![[1]](http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Memling_056.jpg){kind=link}