Page:An Elementary History of Art.djvu/338

 308 Painting. to fresco-secco painting. Colours mixed with water-glass are called stereo-chromatic (?'. e. strong coloured) : many important works were executed in them, e. g. Maclise's Waterloo, and Trafalgar, in the Houses of Parliament, and Kaulbach's mural paintings of the new Berlin Museum, but the two former already show signs of decay. The true fresco is distinguished by a singularly luminous quality of colour ; and the best Italian frescoes exhibit a breadth of effect and simplicity of execution which impart to them a dignity unapproached (perhaps unapproachable) in oil. Hardly any specimens exist in this country ; but the same qualities of dignity, simplicity, and breadth, though not the same brilliancy, may be seen in Raphael's cartoons in the South Kensington Museum, which so closely resemble fresco painting that they will serve better than any other accessible examples to give the English art -student a fair idea of this mode of painting as practised by the great Italian masters. Examples, by Pinturicchio and Signorelli, of fresco-painting transferred to canvas, and by Domenico Veneziano of fresco in its original state, may be seen in the National Gallery, where is also a specimen of secco fresco, by Giotto — Two Apostles, part of a work originally in S. MariaTclel Carmine, Florence : other por- tions are in the Liverpool Institution. Another process employed by the ancients for mural painting was that called encaustic, in which wax melted by heat appears to have been the chief ingredient for fixing and melting the colours. Paul Delaroche's large work of the Hemicycle in the Palais des Beaux Arts, Paris, is an important example of modern times. And lastly there is spirit- fresco, invented by Mr. Gambier Parry, who used it in paintings in Highnam Church, and in St. Andrew's