Paris: Grant Allen's Historical GuidesAllen, Grant
History
Paris: Grant Allen's Historical Guides
Allen, Grant
Paris (France) -- Description and travel; Paris (France) -- Guidebooks
In the Raphael, the dragon is already wounded: but he has broken the
saint’s lance, with part of which he is transfixed, while the remainder
lies in fragments on the ground behind him. St. George on his prancing
steed is drawing his sword to finish off the monster. In the Michel
Colombe, on the other hand (downstairs in the French Renaissance
Sculpture), the dragon is biting at the lance, which explains why it is
broken here, and also why the St. George in Mantegna’s Madonna holds a
broken shaft as his emblem or symbol. Observe, however, that while the
French sculptor, with questionable taste, makes the dragon occupy the
larger part of the field, so as somewhat to dwarf St. George and his
steed, the Italian sculptor, and still more the Italian painter, have
shewn greater tact in treating the dragon as a comparative accessory,
and concentrating attention upon the militant saint, combating with
spiritual arms the evil demon. In this picture, as Mrs. Jameson well
observes, the conception is on the whole serenely allegorical and
religious in spirit. But Raphael himself painted a second St. George, at
a later date, for the Duke of Urbino to present to Henry VII of England.
In this other picture, which is now in the Hermitage at St. Petersburg,
St. George is treated rather as the patron saint of England than as the
Champion of Right—to mark which fact he wears the Order of the Garter
round his knee, with its familiar motto. As Champion of England, he is
rushing on the monster with fiery energy: the picture is in this case
more military than spiritual. The moment chosen is the one where he is
just transfixing the dragon with his lance: the rescued Princess is here
again in the background.
Note once more that these various works are pictures of the =combat= of
St. George with the Dragon. In =devotional pictures= of the Madonna, St.
George frequently stands by Our Lady’s side, in accordance with the
wishes of the particular donor, as patron saint of that person himself,
or of his town or family. In Venetian pictures, as we have seen, he is
very frequent, being one of the patron saints of Venice, and more
particularly of the Venetian army and the conquered territory. You will
find it interesting, after you have finished the examination of the two
Raphaels, to go round the devotional Italian pictures in the Salle des
Primitifs, the Long Gallery, and the Salon Carré, in order to note his
various appearances. He is usually marked by his lance and his armour:
the absence of wings (a point not always noticed by beginners) will
enable you at once to discriminate him from St. Michael—as man from
angel. The more you learn to look out for such recurrences of saints,
and to account for the reasons for their appearance, the more will you
understand and enjoy picture galleries, and the more will you throw
yourself into the devotional mediæval atmosphere which produced such
pictures.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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