The Boys' and Girls' Pliny · the Elder Pliny
CHAPTER XV. ARTISTS WHO PAINTED WITH THE PENCIL.
His inventions, too, in the art of painting, have been highly serviceable to others; but one thing there was in which no one could imitate him. When his works were finished, he used to cover them with a black varnish, of such remarkable thinness, that while it gave more vivacity to the colors, and preserved them from the contact of dust and dirt, its existence could only be detected when one was close enough to touch it.[240] The brightness of the colors was softened and harmonized to the sight, as though they had been viewed from a distance, and through a medium of specular-stone, the contrivance, by some indescribable means, giving a sombreness to colors which would otherwise have been too florid. One of the contemporaries of Apelles was Aristides of Thebes; the first of all the painters to give full expression to the mind and passions of man, known to the Greeks as {êthê}. He painted a Battle with the Persians, a picture which contained one hundred figures, for each of which he was paid at the rate of ten minæ by Mnason, the tyrant of Elatea. He also painted Chariots with four horses in full career; a Suppliant, which almost speaks; Huntsmen with game; and a damsel pining to death from love for her brother. There was also to be seen, in the Temple of Faith, in the Capitol, a picture of his, representing an Aged Man giving instructions to a Child on the lyre. He executed also a painting of an Invalid, upon which endless encomiums have been lavished. Indeed, so great was the excellence of this artist, that King Attalus is said to have purchased one picture of his at the price of one hundred thousand dollars.
At the same period flourished Protogenes, native of Caunus, a place held in subjection by the Rhodians. Great poverty in his early days, and extreme application to his art, were the causes of his comparative unproductiveness. It is not known with certainty from whom he received his instruction in the art: indeed some say that he was only a ship-decorator down to his fiftieth year; a proof of which, it is asserted, is the fact, that in decorating the Propylæum of the Temple of Minerva, situated in one of the most celebrated spots in Athens, where he has painted the fine picture of Paralus and Hammonias, known by some as the Nausicaa, he has added in the side pieces of the picture, by painters called "parerga," several small ships of war; wishing thereby to show in what department that skill had first manifested itself which had thus reached the citadel of Athens, the scene of his glory. Of all his compositions, however, the palm has been awarded to his Ialysus, grandson of Apollo, now at Rome, consecrated in the Temple of Peace.
So long as he was at work upon it, he lived upon nothing but soaked lupines; by which means he at once appeased both hunger and thirst, and avoided all risk of blunting his perception by too delicate a diet. In order to protect this picture against the effects of ill-usage and old age, he painted it over four times, so that when an upper coat might fail, there would be an under one to succeed it. There is in this picture the figure of a dog, which was completed in a very remarkable manner, inasmuch as accident had an equal share with design in the execution of it. The painter was of opinion that he had not given the proper expression to the foam at the mouth of the animal, panting for breath, as it was represented; while, with all other parts of the picture he was perfectly satisfied, a thing extremely unusual with him. The thing that displeased him was, the evident traces of art in the execution of it, touches which did not admit of any diminution, and yet had all the appearance of being too labored, the effect produced being far removed from his conception of the reality--the foam bore the marks of being painted, and not natural. Vexed and tormented by this dilemma, it being his wish to depict truth itself, and not something that only bore a semblance of truth, he effaced it again and again, changed one brush for another, and yet by no possibility could satisfy himself. At last, quite out of temper with an art, which, in spite of him, would still obtrude itself, he dashed his sponge against the vexatious spot; when behold! the sponge replaced the colors that it had just removed, exactly in accordance with his utmost wishes. Thus did chance reproduce Nature in a painting.
Following his example, Nealces succeeded in representing the foam at a horse's mouth; for on one occasion, when engaged in painting a man holding in a pair of horses and soothing them with his voice, he also dashed his sponge against the picture, with the view of producing a like effect. On account of this Ialysus, which he was apprehensive of destroying, King Demetrius forbore to set fire to the only side of the city of Rhodes by which it was capable of being taken; and thus, in his anxiety to spare a picture, did he lose his only opportunity of gaining a victory. The dwelling of Protogenes was in a little garden in the suburbs in the midst of the camp of Demetrius. The combats that were taking place made no difference whatever to the artist, and in no way interrupted his proceeding with the work which he had commenced. At last he was summoned before the king, who inquired how he could have the assurance thus to remain without the walls. "Because I know," was his answer, "that you are waging war with the Rhodians, and not with the arts." Upon this, the king, delighted at having the opportunity of protecting the hand which he had thus spared, ordered a guard to be placed at his disposal for the especial purpose of his protection. In order, too, that he might not distract the artist's attention by sending for him too often, he would often go, an enemy albeit, to pay him a visit, and, abandoning his aspirations for victory, in the midst of arms and the battering down of walls, would attentively examine the compositions of the painter. Even to this day, the story is still attached to the picture which he was then engaged upon, to the effect, that "Protogenes painted it beneath the sword." Protogenes executed also a Cydippe; a portrait of Philiscus, the tragic poet, in an attitude of meditation: an Athlete; a portrait of King Antigonus, and one of Phæstis, the mother of Aristotle.
Ideas discussed in this chapter
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.