ARCHITECTURE AND ART
Venice is the finest city in the world. What could we wish for better than its Moorish architecture in white marble in the midst of the limpid waters, and under a sky truly magnificent; its people so gay, so heedless, so witty, and fond of its music; its gondolas, churches, and picture galleries; those good-looking and elegant women; the murmurs of the sea breaking upon the ear; the moonlights nowhere else to be seen; choruses of gondoliers, sometimes very correct, serenading under every window; cafés full of Turks and Armenians; fine and spacious theatres where you can hear Pasta and Donzelli; gorgeous palaces; a Punch and Judy show far above that of Gustave Malus; delicious oysters, which you can gather on the steps of every house; Cyprian wine at twenty-fivesousa bottle; flowers in the heart of winter, and, in the month of February, a heat as great as that of our month of May?GEORGE SAND.Tintoretto, to be rightly understood, must be sought all over Venice—in the church as well as the Scuola di San Rocco; in the ‘Temptation ofSt.Anthony’ atSt.Trovaso no less than in the Temptations of Eve and Christ; in the decorative pomp of the Scala del Senato, and in the Paradisal vision of the Scala del Gran Consiglio. Yet, after all, there is one of his most characteristic moods, to appreciate which fully we return to the Madonna dell’ Orto. I have called him ‘the painter of impossibilities.’ At rare moments he rendered them possible by sheer imaginative force.JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS.
Venice is the finest city in the world. What could we wish for better than its Moorish architecture in white marble in the midst of the limpid waters, and under a sky truly magnificent; its people so gay, so heedless, so witty, and fond of its music; its gondolas, churches, and picture galleries; those good-looking and elegant women; the murmurs of the sea breaking upon the ear; the moonlights nowhere else to be seen; choruses of gondoliers, sometimes very correct, serenading under every window; cafés full of Turks and Armenians; fine and spacious theatres where you can hear Pasta and Donzelli; gorgeous palaces; a Punch and Judy show far above that of Gustave Malus; delicious oysters, which you can gather on the steps of every house; Cyprian wine at twenty-fivesousa bottle; flowers in the heart of winter, and, in the month of February, a heat as great as that of our month of May?GEORGE SAND.Tintoretto, to be rightly understood, must be sought all over Venice—in the church as well as the Scuola di San Rocco; in the ‘Temptation ofSt.Anthony’ atSt.Trovaso no less than in the Temptations of Eve and Christ; in the decorative pomp of the Scala del Senato, and in the Paradisal vision of the Scala del Gran Consiglio. Yet, after all, there is one of his most characteristic moods, to appreciate which fully we return to the Madonna dell’ Orto. I have called him ‘the painter of impossibilities.’ At rare moments he rendered them possible by sheer imaginative force.JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS.
Venice is the finest city in the world. What could we wish for better than its Moorish architecture in white marble in the midst of the limpid waters, and under a sky truly magnificent; its people so gay, so heedless, so witty, and fond of its music; its gondolas, churches, and picture galleries; those good-looking and elegant women; the murmurs of the sea breaking upon the ear; the moonlights nowhere else to be seen; choruses of gondoliers, sometimes very correct, serenading under every window; cafés full of Turks and Armenians; fine and spacious theatres where you can hear Pasta and Donzelli; gorgeous palaces; a Punch and Judy show far above that of Gustave Malus; delicious oysters, which you can gather on the steps of every house; Cyprian wine at twenty-fivesousa bottle; flowers in the heart of winter, and, in the month of February, a heat as great as that of our month of May?
GEORGE SAND.
Tintoretto, to be rightly understood, must be sought all over Venice—in the church as well as the Scuola di San Rocco; in the ‘Temptation ofSt.Anthony’ atSt.Trovaso no less than in the Temptations of Eve and Christ; in the decorative pomp of the Scala del Senato, and in the Paradisal vision of the Scala del Gran Consiglio. Yet, after all, there is one of his most characteristic moods, to appreciate which fully we return to the Madonna dell’ Orto. I have called him ‘the painter of impossibilities.’ At rare moments he rendered them possible by sheer imaginative force.
JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS.