Page:Architectural Review and American Builders' Journal, Volume 1, 1869.djvu/174

 146 Sloan's Architectural Review and jBuilders' Journal. [August, have a very important effect upon the laying out of frescos. It is not in the delicacy, the perfec- tion, or the intuitively graceful feeling, of outline presenting detached objects, that the moderns can expect to surpass the ancients. But the latter times far exceed the former in contrasting and in harmonizing the lines and tints of orna- mental painting in grouping the sub- jects under treatment, not only where human figures are concerned, but also in still life ; in linear and in aerial per- spective, and, finally, in general effect. In like manner, the ancients were ac- quainted with music, as far as respects melody, the distinctive term for the air, or that part of a musical composition which everybody hums, and in which all the voices and the instruments are either in unison or else pitched with in- tervals of an octave, always most agree- able to the uneducated musical sense ; but very insignificant was their knowl- edge of harmony, or the agreement, de- rived from thorough-bass, or counter- point, of a number of melodies, in inti- mate relationship to and with each other, all of which, separately, are agree- d-able to the ear ; all of which are heard and enjoyed separately, and yet all are so arranged, as to musical intervals, that their combined effects, while not drown- ing the air, are far richer than the finest solo, whether bass, barytone, tenor, alto, or treble, ever sung or played. Throughout the Christian era, fresco- painting has flourished beyond all pre- cedents ; the master hands of Michael Angelo, Raphael, the Fra Bartolomeo, Domenichino, and others, having raised it to the highest level as an art. There are three different modes of frescoing : — The first and earliest : Consists in the application of the colors to the fresh or wet plastering, the artist almost imme- diately following the plasterer. In this method, the pigments strike directly through, and become most absolutely incorporated with the entire body of the plaster. This would seem to be the very perfection of such an art, as the picture, so far from existing merely as a surface film, will be constantly the same, on regularly abrading and resmoothing the face of the plaster, till no more of the latter shall be left. Accordingly, we find, in the European palaces and cathe- drals, that while, in frescos executed two centuries ago, pieces of the ceiling flake off, and drop to the pavement, or the floor, these layers are not paint on one side and lime on the other, but always of a homogeneous color ; and, what is much more important, that the pictures themselves remain fresh and perfect as ever, except that, in certain points of view, the edges of resulting shallow con- cavities of surface display certain lights, or shades, or shadows, certainly not in- tended by the artist, and decidedly out of place, yet, after all, at the distance whence they must be viewed, not inhar- monious ; whereas, were the colors not an integral portion of the plaster, the intelligent reader well understands, that these flakings would leave white spots, and the pictures would soon become the most melancholy wrecks. There is, how- ever, one most serious abatement from the absolute perfection of this method. No care, skill, or art can hide the slight variations in tone, produced by the con- tact of the portions of the surface corre- sponding with the several or many days' labors of the plasterer and the artist. There they always are, irking the pro- ducers during their own lives, and ever annoying the considerate artists and connoisseurs who come after, sometimes even being quite perceptible to the un- educated or inartistic eye. This insepa- rable drawback from the perfect beauty of the greater works in wet fresco, would seem to prove, that the acme of this style can only be expected in such sized panels as the artist is certain of beginning and finishing within a single day It must be allowed, that a mere chance leak — if immediately attended to, so that the whole body of the plaster