Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 10.djvu/695

Rh GLASS m1N'1'1Ne.] windows in straight horizontal lines, they were frequently bent to suit the design. Generally speaking, horizontal bars are not objectionable unless they cross faces, or hands and ifcet,—an arrangement which ought carefully to be avoided. Mosaic windows should be made waterproof, and the saddle bars should be painted at intervals of time, as otherwise the rust injures the glass. Enamelled glass, that is to say, white glass enamclled with colours, ﬁnally took the place of mosaic glass. In England in the last century glass—paintcrs of merit who practised enamel painting have left considerable works, amongst whom Francis Eginton, Forrest, Henry Giles, tobcrt S. Godfrey, J arves, and especially J ervais, who in 1717 executed from designs by Sir Joshua Reynolds the great east window of New College, Oxford. Vhatever may be thought of their method, these glass-painters were meri- torious artists. lefercnce has been made to some of the works of the admirable glass-painters of other countries besides Italy, but the object of the present paper has been to illustrate the history and practice of the art by Italian specimens hitherto little observed, and very inadequately and generally inaccurately described. At the present time the art of glass painting is practised in different countries with very divergent views of its character and limits. Seine think that the more nearly it can be assimilated to pictures in oil or fresco the better, whilst others maintain that all such resemblance is beyond its distinctive conditions as a branch of decorative art. It is a common but erroneous belief that the art of glass painting was lost, and that it has been revived in the pre-- sent century. It survived in its latest form of the enamel method, classed by Mr Winston as the intermediate style, which is still carried out with unsurpassed skill in Germany. Undoubtedly the mosaic system had disappeared, and it has been judiciously and ably restored wherever glass painting is now common, although with different modiﬁcations and ideas of its nature. In England glass-painters possessed of much technical skill and cultivated knowledge of old forms of the art, have produced meritorious works within the limits of almost servile imitation, insisted upon by pre- valent but mistaken sentiment, and in too many instances this imitation has reduced the art to the state of mere trade, so that at no period of its history have worse specimens been executed, too often found in the windows of the grandest monuments of medizeval architecture, which ought to have been preserved from such profanation. Of the great value and interest of early painted windows, as well as of those of more matured art, every one who studies them with intelligence must be sensible; and this value and interest are increased by the fact that they illustrate, with perfect truth, the tastes and ideas, the faith and customs, of the periods during which they were created, but modern counterfeits do nothing of the kind, and can convey no such impressions to future times. It is only by the restoration of the old union which existed between the great artist and the glass-painter, dwelt upon in these columns, that the beautiful art of glass painting can be really restored, nor are we without a completely successful instance of the happy results of this union. A window in the parish church at Alnwick, designed by the late William Dyce, R.A., and painted on glass at Munich, is a magniﬁcent specimen of the art, equal in design and execution to the works of its golden age. In Germany the arts ornamental still flourish as branches of ﬁne art. There, as generally throughout the Continent, the acquirement of a knowledge of ornament forms part of the curriculum of study of most artists; to the entire neglect of thisiin England, in academies of ﬁne art, may be attributed the low estate into which these branches have fallen. The most eminent German artists of the present GLASS 673 century have made designs for painted windows, which have been executed by highly-trained glass-painters, with that care which is so characteristic a national attribute. Such being the case, it remains a source of wonder that artists surrounded by precious remains of ancient genius remark- able for exquisite colour should notwithstanding show so little ability as colourists. They assimilate the coloured glasses of the best qualities, with every attention to the laws of harmony, but they do not bring them into union as the old masters did by forcible painting of the shadows and half tints. The shadows generally are too transparent, and the general effect is weak. The ﬁnest work of the Munich school of glass painting, and one of the best windows produced in the present century, is in the Parliament House Edinburgh. It is richer in colour than is usual; and, having been designed by the illus- trious Wilhclm von Kaulbach, the general composition is of a noble character. In France an imitative school, resembling that which has been dominant in England, has executed skilful mimicries of ancient glass painting, and has restored successfully ancient windows broken or otherwise injured in revolution- ary times or by neglect. Glass-painters of this class may be found in France, who dispute the supremacy in bad art of their island rivals. In efforts to escape from this abject imitation, trained artists have produced original works of considerable power of form and colour, but too many aim at a picturesque eccentricity, and an affected design, incon- sistent with the grave beauty of the art; and Jean Cousin and other great masters of the grand period of French glass painting have no successful followers, nor has any painted window been produced in France in the present century which equals that by the Scottish artist, William Dyce, or that by the German, Von Kaulbach. In Italy there are glass-painters whose merits as draughts- men, designers, and executants place them in the first rank, but their windows are almost invariably laborious imitations of pictures in oil; they have undoubtedly lost the methods as well as the ideas and style of their great predecessors, whose windows they not unfrequently injure deplorably by their restorations. It is to be regretted that artists so ad- mirably trained in many respects should so little compre- hend the magniﬁcent works of former times which would be their best models, and which they have skill enough to rival but for their vicious method of execution. In Belgium the art is practised with considerable skill, and works of merit have been executed, but here, as else- where, the modern glass-painter is inferior to his prede- cessors, although he is surrounded by so many admirable specimens of ancient art. The following works on glass painting may be advantageously studied :—Ferdinand dc Lasteyrie, Ilistoirc dc la pcinturc sur rcrrc d’aprés scs monuments cu France, Paris, 2 vols. folio, 1852; Id., Quclqucs mots sur la Tlzcm-ie de la point-are .9217 term, Paris, 121110, 1853 ; Id., Not'z'cc sur lcs vitraua: do l’abb(Lyc dc Ratlzlzauscn, canton dc Luccrnc, Paris, 1856; A. Lenoir, Histo2'rc de la pcinturc sur vcrre ct description dcs 1-itraua: anctcnncs ct nzodcr-ncs, 820., Paris, 1803 ; Id., Notice Iustoriquc sur l’ancz'cn-nc pdntnrc sur rcrrc, sw- lcs moycns pratiqucs (lans cet art dcpuis l'époquc de son intent2'on, j usqu’a nos jours, ct par suite sur Joan Cousin, qui a. carccllé dans la nzémc art, Paris; E. H. Langlois, Essai lz2'stori'quc ct (lcscrz'pt{fszu- la pcintu-re sin‘ 't'cr-rc ancicmw ct modcmw, Rom-n, 1832; Pierre lc Vieil, L’art dc la pcinturc sur Tcrrc ct do la 'r2'[rer2‘e, Paris, 1774; Glass: the man nor lzowc to anncilc or paint in glass: the true rcccptcs of the cullors, 1616 ; Gesscrt, Jtudimcntary Treatise on Painting on. Glass, London, 1851; Mrs Merriﬁeld, Ancient Practice of Painting in Oil, 111 iniaturc, Jfosaic, and on Glass, &c., London, 1849 ; Charles Winston, An Inquiry into the difference of style observable in ancient Glass Painting, especially in England, Oxford, 1847; Padre L, V._ Marchese, 1I[C77107"i€ dci pin in.-n'g-ni P-z'[lo7*i, .S'culto'rzT, e Arflutrttz: I)om.cm'can1', Florence, 1846; G. Gaye, Cartcggto inedito da-rtzstb dci sccoli xiv., xv., xvi., 3 vols., Florence, 1839 ; Gaetano Milanesi, La Opera a'i 0’cor_r/io l'a.sarz' con nuorc annotaztoui e comma-ntc, Flor- ence, 1879. (C- H- W-l X. — 85