The Rice belt journal., 1916-04-21

NJECI EStfCs
laws which attach us to this earth.
This now becomes the characteristic
feature of all resurrection pictures.
Taddeo Gaddi adheres to this in his
magnificent frescO and so does Peru
gino.
Among the many disciples of GiottO
there was but one great artist, the
painter-monk, Fra Angelica of Fiesole.
There is an indescribable sweetness in
his virgins and angels, enhanced by
his exquisite drawing and delicate, lu-
minous color, but his very sweetness
often pals upon our modern taste. AS
Reinach says: I'VE long for a few
wolves in this impeccable sheepfold.
Fra Angelica treated the resurrection
subject several times. In one Of his
pictures he still has the pre-renaissanCe
reserve. He shows US the wondering
women and the angels at the sepul-
cher. In another he combines the old
version with the new. In the third
picture he shows the actual resurrec-
tion scene.
Fra Bartolomeo, the teacher of An
drea del Sarto, though not master of
the first rank, treated this subject with
great success in his picture, which is
now in the Pitt palace, Florence. Ra-
fael also painted it. In his picture the
keepers are not sleeping, but they are
witnesses of the resurrection. Ami
bale Carraci goes a step further He
was not satisfied to prove by a wit
ness that Christ really arose from the
dead. He sets out to show that he
arose In a miraculous manner. He not
only paints a closed tomb, which is
sCripturally correct, for the Gospels
describe the great earthquake and the
rolling away Of the stone as taking
place after the act Of resurrection, but
Carraci places a sleeping guard, lying
full length across the top OF the altar
like tomb. There can thus be no doubt
that the Savior who scars above must
have miraculously passed this double
barrier.
It is a relief to turn from the con.
temptation of such ridiculous puerili-
ties to the strength of Martin SchOen-
gauer's engraving. AlbreCht Duerers s
resurrection in his Smaller Passion
series of wood cuts is rather empty;
his Larger Passion shows lis much
more worthy and noble composition.
Rembrandt also treated this subject.
AS usual with him the great problem
was the treatment of light He does
not show the Savior, but he selects the
moment of the great earthquake and
the appearance of the angel as the sub.
ieCt for a most wonderful etching,
wherein he again, as Couture says,
with black and white makes color"
Whenever the risen Lord is shown
in these resurrection pictures, he ap-
pears as the victorious conqueror OF
death and the grave. This conception
has also passed into hymnology, for
the Lutheran hymn writer, Paul Ger,
hard, sings:
TheE in a grave did sink him,
The foe held jubilee;
Before he can bethink him,
Lo, Christ again is free.
And Victory he cries,
And waveth toward the skies
His banner, for the field
Is by the hero held
Perhaps the most natural and, there
fore, the most common representation
of the resurrection is the picture OF the
women at the empty sepulcher Like
the kings who came to adore the infant
Savior, their number is always three
We find them in the very earliest res
direction pictures and carvings, as
we'll as in the richly illuminated Cos
pels Of the tenth and eleventh cen
turies: Duccios treatment of this sub
ject is fine, especially the expression
of awe In the women, and the action ol
the angel, who points to the empty
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