A winter pilgrimage : being an account of travels through Palestine, Italy, and the island of Cyprus, accomplished in the year 1900 . withtheir nudity accentuated by means of bathing drawers;vulgar-looking busts of vulgar-looking men ; coy creaturessmirking at butterflies seated on their naked arms orbosoms, and other sculptured delights. But never awork that has a spark of the old Promethean fire, whichelevates its student, or moves him—at any rate as artshould move. Of painting and buildings is it not the same ?Where has the genius flown and will it ever return ?I know the fashion is to decr
A winter pilgrimage : being an account of travels through Palestine, Italy, and the island of Cyprus, accomplished in the year 1900 . withtheir nudity accentuated by means of bathing drawers;vulgar-looking busts of vulgar-looking men ; coy creaturessmirking at butterflies seated on their naked arms orbosoms, and other sculptured delights. But never awork that has a spark of the old Promethean fire, whichelevates its student, or moves him—at any rate as artshould move. Of painting and buildings is it not the same ?Where has the genius flown and will it ever return ?I know the fashion is to decry our modern Englishart, and doubtless much of it is poor. Yet so far asmy small experience goes, that art has, at any rate insome instances, more truth and spirit than any otherof the day which I have found abroad. I have said that I will not discourse upon the arttreasures of Florence. Still I may be permitted tomention two, by no means of the best known, whichperhaps impressed me most among them. Of these oneis a certain life-sized Annunciation by Donatello, fashionedof a dark-coloured freestone, cut in high relief and set. A TUSCAN WINE-FARM 17 into a very gloomy wall of the church of Santa was, I believe, one of the masters earlier works, butlooking at it I wondered whether he ever fashioned any-thing more beautiful. The Virgin is of a somewhat moderntype of face, with rippling hair parted in the middle;indeed I can remember a lady who might have sat for amodel of that statue. As for the exquisite grace ofher pose and shape, or that of the angel who bends theknee to her, to be understood they must be here is hopeless; I can say only that in mycase at any rate they affect the mind as does the sight ofsame perfect landscape, or of a lovely flower breakinginto bloom. What imagination also is comprised in the Virginspose. She has risen from her seat and her left handclasps the book she reads. Her robe has caught upona corner of the chair so that her
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookpublisherlondo, bookyear1901
