The sun., 1919-08-03

people have a solidity of form and an
intensity Of expression that the figures
in ours cannot approach. Our version
is more youthful in workmanship and
its only advantage over the other,
which has a gold background, lies In
the interest of the landscape.
Our panel shows its authors re-
lance on Fra Angelica, whose work It
recalls In spirit, In color, and above all
in the landscape. The attrtbution to
Peselllno is vouched for by several au-
thorities. chief among whom is Lang
ton Douglas. the editor of the most
recent edition of Grove and Caval-
caselle's History of italian Painting.
Pesellino, according to Wiesbach, came
in direct contact with Fra Angelica,
working as an assistant on the pre-
dele Of the San Marco and the Pc
rugia altarpieces about the year 144O.
The fact is not established. however,
nor is 1t necessary in the explanation
Of the traits of the young painter that
are due to Angelico's influence.
The most impressionable period of
Pesellino's life fell at the time when
the old medieval concepts were giving
place to the naturalism of the if
teenth century and all the greater
Florentine artists were then inno-
vators. Fra Angelica himself, con-
trary to the old idea, is now recog-
nized as one Of the innovators. The
innovation of his that was most promi-
nent at the time of Pesellino's youth
was In landscape. Berenson says that
Fra Angelica Is the first Italian to
paint a landscape that can be identi-
fed: and more than that he appears to
have been the first who remarked the
part played by the atmosphere in the
modification of the color of objects,
the most important fact In the his
tory Of European landscape painting.
The panels which Fra Angelica
painted for the Annunciata in Flor
ence (now in the Accademia) are ex-
amples Of this effort after atmospheric
effect, and these were the starting
point for our picture.
The medieval conception Of land
scape still persists in our panel; II is
not all founded on observation. The
foreground is the gray, rocky ledge
with crisp edges like split jelly that
was inherited from Byzantine art.
But back Of the formal foreground
Is real country with air between the
beholder and It. such as one sees at
twilight in Tuscany. There lis a hill
with pines and expresses showing dark
against further shadowy hills and dis
tant green-blue mountains lit up with
the level evening light. The sky is
luminous and opalescent at the hori-
zon. but higher up, back OF the figure
OF Christ, are rain clouds of heavy
blue. All except the foreground has
been seen and set down much in the
modern way, and this gives its pc
culiar interest to our little picture.
Students OF italian painting will find
an attraction also In that 1t shows one
of the earliest glimpses into that mys-
ferrous, blue peaked land that sue
ceeding artists explored more deeply
the consummate aspect Of which is
seen back OF the Virgin OF the Rocks"
and of Mona Lisa"
Frederic Blaschke has designed and
executed for the Museum OF Natural
History a group representing a camp
OF African pigmies in the Belgian Con-
go. The scene is a return from the
chase and the central figure, a young
huntsman, carries an antelope on his
back. His hunting dog squats in front
of him. q mother holding a hahv