United States or Mauritius ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Giordano, on his return to Naples from Florence, established himself in Ribera's fine house, opposite the Jesuit's church of S. Francesco Xavier. In 1685 he was commissioned by the Fathers to paint a large picture for one of the principal altars, and agreed that it should be completed by the approaching festival of the patron saint.
The apostrophe to "blessed health," in c. xxxiii. of vol. v. is taken direct from the Anatomy of Melancholy; so is the phrase, "He has a gourd for his head and a pippin for his heart," in c. ix.; so is the jest about Franciscus Ribera's computation of the amount of cubic space required by the souls of the lost; so is Hilarion the hermit's comparison of his body with its unruly passions to a kicking ass.
He summoned before Margaret the whole array of Ribera's ghoulish dwarfs, with their cunning smile, the insane light of their eyes, and their malice: he dwelt with a horrible fascination upon their malformations, the humped backs, the club feet, the hydrocephalic heads.
Ribera's adventure with the Cardinal, and his abilities, soon distinguished him among the crowd of young artists in Rome. Finding Rome overstocked with artists, he went to Naples, where he made the acquaintance of a rich picture-dealer. The latter was so much pleased with Ribera's genius, that be offered him his beautiful and well-dowered daughter in marriage.
Before leaving the Spaniards we must look at the most pleasing of all Ribera's works, the Ladder-Dream of Jacob. The patriarch lies stretched on the open plain in the deep sleep of the weary. To the right in a broad shaft of cloudy gold the angels are ascending and descending. The picture is remarkable for its mingling the merits of Ribera's first and second manner.
In Rembrandt's and Terburg's Adoration of the Shepherds, the light emanates from the infant Christ; in Ribera's magnificent Deposition from the Cross, the dead Saviour and His companions are represented, not, as in the Entombments of Perugino and Raphael, in the open air, but in the ghastly light of the mouth of the sepulchre.
Word Of The Day