even serves to atone for its deficiencies, as, e.g., in the broad
painted horizontal borders, which take the place, very successfully, of
brick or stone string-courses, which in the construction are entirely
omitted.
It surprised me, I confess, very much, to find a church painted
throughout without any use of gold, and yet with good result; so it is,
however; the effect is most solemn and religious, and there is a very
rich effect of colour; the fact is, that the white ground answers the
same purpose in a degree, though of course not to the full extent, that
gold would.
But if the walls are beautiful in their colour, not less so is the
pavement, which, from one end of the church to the other, remains to
this day to all appearance just as it was on the day that the church was
finished. The nave and transepts are all in one pattern; the spaces
between the columns in a variety of beautiful designs, and divided from
the nave and aisle pavements by a strip of white marble on each side;
and the aisles again are on the same scheme throughout. The colours of
the marble used are white, red, and bluish grey, and the patterns very
simple and generally geometrical in outline, and there is a quiet
richness of effect in their arrangement which is exceedingly beautiful.
Such a pavement must unhappily be for ever Italian, and we in England
can scarce hope ever to attain to anything so exquisite; but we do not
well to forget that by the mixture of a small quantity only of marble
with our encaustic tiles we should attain to much greater beauty of
effect than we can by the use of tiles alone, and there are many
towns--as, e.g., Plymouth--the very pavement of whose streets is of a
material which might most advantageously be introduced, more often than
it has yet been, inside the walls of our sanctuaries, as well as under
the feet of every passer along the streets.
There are some monuments and paintings here quite worth looking at. The
Pellegrini Chapel, next to the choir, has two fine trefoil-headed
monuments in red marble with the background painted with subjects of
about the same age (circa 1392); and in the Cavalli Chapel there is an
admirably painted wall, against which has been put a monument which,
though somewhat rude and coarse in its sculpture, nevertheless produces
a very fine effect of colour and architecture combined.[15]
[Illustration: AISLE WINDOW--STA. ANASTASIA, VERONA.]
The window tracery of Sta. Anastasia is rather singular plate tracery,
consisting of mere piercings through the stone with very little
moulding; most of the windows are of two very lofty trefoiled lights
with circles and trefoils pierced above, very simple and severe, and
remarkable for the quaint way in which the cusping is arranged, not with
some reference to vertical lines, as is ordinarily the case with us, but
just as fancy or chance seems to have dictated. The clerestory windows
are circular openings cusped.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account