The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1901-06-11
THE CHRIST IN ART.
SCARCITY OF EARLY PAINTINGS OF
THE RESURRECTION.

Theme and Modern Painters Were
More Successful In Treatment of
the Scene at the Tomb.
1t was many years before painters took
brush in hand to paint the resurrection
The horrors of that time, told by eyewit-
nesses and descending mouth to mouth
through the generations, were enough to
falter the brush.
The early painters were intensely re-
ligious and firm believers not only in the
reality of the scenes they painted, but
also in the holiness Of them. The sorrows
of the Christ saddened them; his joys
were the only themes they could paint.
They were depressed by the legends-for
much came down in purely legendary
form until the Bible was printed on
printing presses and became general-and
with true artistic instinct they avoided
that which was disagreeable and sought
that which was lovely. And that is the
reason why so few early paintings of
the resurrection have come down to US,
while the paintings Of the beautiful Ma
donna and of the Christ child are the
most numerous in art.
Surreto and Rossini are the first paint
GfS WHO VGuluIGQ u lOuNA lAC Shilling
scene. Even they robbed it Of its tragedy
and took it along to the spot where the
risen Lord is seen ascending in wonderful
robes to heaven. Neither sent forth a
great painting.
Surreto was unfortunate in his face Of
the Christ and his work persisted in fire
in Rome, when only the most valuable
paintings could be removed and that of
poor Surreto was left to burn.
Rossini did still poorer. One of the ia
nous family that afterward left its mark
upon art of another nature, he painted
"The Resurrection" in too matter of fact
a way. Nothing was left to the imagina-
ton, and the angel at the sepulcher
looked sadly out Of place In the midst Of
the devastation of the disorderly tomb
which Rossini had painted there.
Their work brought forth lots Of criti-
cism and stirred on other painters to try.
A series of pictures of the resurrection
followed, and for few years 1t looked as
though there would be nothing else in
sacred art; even the Madonna was neg
lected for the great theme Of Christ risen
from the dead.
As interpreted by the artists Of that
day the scene was one that gave the wild
est latitude for dreamy thought. The
tomb, a picturesque thing in architecture
Of that day, gave the background; then
came the graceful women to it; then the
marvellous sky work, in which the figure
Of the Lord was visible.
In the hundreds of pictures that were
turned out previous to the fifteenth cen
fury only few remain, but after that the
painters were more fortunate and gave
US works of art that are enduring. Crack
ed, SCARED, often defaced and having
! gone through vandalism and vicissitudes,
they are still marvelously beautiful, in a
beauty not so much the beauty of form
as beauty of conception.
The old masters understood that. which
we call composition. They were not so
anxious to get strong effects; they wanted
whole, a picture, something that
would tell story. Take any Of the old
paintings and study it and you will OBJ
serve this popularity. An entire story is
told in the picture and not one person or
| part is made more prominent than the
rest; it is as a whole that the old masters
must be viewed.
With the modern masters it is all differ
ent They sought beauty. Reading the
Scriptures they formed conception, and
from that they painted. Only beauty ap-
| pealed to them, and they placed upon the
canvas only beauty.
| We have today nothing lovelier in art
than the pictures of the resurrection, as
turned out by the hands of the modern
painters, and, looking at them, one be-
gins to worship, even one who has never
worshiped before The old masters sought
this result; the modern found it.
The greatest difficulty in painting the
resurrection lay in the work of painting
the face of Christ. Each had his concep-
ton of the ideal head, but few agreed in
this ideal You see heads of Christ in the
earlier days with long, curling beard and
| features too strong for beauty. Then you
see him in another type, blond, softly
lovely, almost like a woman. To paint
the face of the Saviour was the most diff
fcult task the masters, ancient and mod
ern, ever set for themselves. The most
successful compromised matters by indi-
eating face strong in a manly beauty
and not too pronounced in type. That in
depreciation succeeded, and faces of
Christ, those that have survived, now
generally show that style.
The faces of the women were easier to
paint, being mortal. The face of wom-
an was enough, provided she were beau
tiful, and SO nearly all were successful in
their women's faces.
The strangest thing to be noticed in the
| pictures of the resurrection is the light
that curious light which battles the scene.
All have agreed that the resurrection took
place at an hour when the light was un-
certain and changing and that from the
depths Of the tomb came wonderful ray
that is not equaled by the discoveries of
science.
The pictures Of the resurrection as
counted today are not so numerous, but
in interest they equal those provoked by
any other theme, secular or divine.-Chi-
cago Chronicle.