CURRENT LITERATURE.
ART-BOOKS.
Perugino. By G. C. Williamson. "Great Masters of Painting and Sculpture Series." (G. Bell and Sons. 5s.)—The authorgives all that is known of the facts of the painter's life. These cannot be said to amount to anything very much, but the continuity of Perugino's work is traced both in the text and in the excellent illustrations. Perugino was one of those artists who had one thing to say, and this thing was well worth saying, but when he had said it fully he seemed only capable of repetition in a diluted form. Vasari says that "all the new artists" complained of his repetition, and that Perugino's reply was "I have painted in this work the figures that you formerly com- mended, and which then pleased you greatly ; if they now dis- please you and you no longer extol them, what can I do ? " There is something pathetic in this answer, which shows that the painter, wrapped up in his one idea, could not see the need of a fresh point of view to keep his art a living force. But what was this special point of view to which he adhered so tenaciously? The author indicates with what impressive power Perugino can represent and symbolise illimitable space. The deep-domed blue skies, full of infinite peace, with the white light on the horizon, and the lovely landscapes, with their peaceful hills and lakes, have a quality of far-away solemnity which only one other painter has equalled, and he was the great pupil who enlarged the boundaries of art in a way undreamt of by the master. The Pavia altar-piece in the National Gallery is a splendid example of Perugino's power of playing upon mystical feeling by means of sky and horizon. The composition of this picture is, however, not as imposing as that of the fresco of the Crucifixion at Santa Maria Maddalena del Pazzi in Florence. The grandeur of the disposi- tions of this work Pezugino never excelled. The aloofness of the figures from one another, which Dr. Williamson points out truly as a characteristic of Perugino, here adds greatly to the harmony of the work, and never did the painter exceed the tenderness and grandeur of the figure of St. John. In the present work there is a most interesting chapter on the mediums used by Perugino. Dr. Williamson, after making experiments, concludes that Perugino did not use oil paint, but rather egg tempera, and, in places, colour mixed with Venice turpentine. The great beauty of the colour and the exquisite "quality " of the pointing of Perugine make the study of his technique of much interest. The chapter called "The Story of the Pillage" is most curious. Perugia, rich in the works of the master, who bore the name of the city of his adoption, was mercilessly plundered by the French. Th. Peritgis.ns loved their pictures, and delayed giving them up as long as possible, and the pictures, by a strange irony, only arrived in Paris with the Allies in 1812. It seems that the time for making the Louvre disgorge was short, and many of the pictures were overlooked. Some of the Peruginos were sent back to Rome, and were there impounded by the Vatican. The Pope was desirous of creating a picture gallery, and seems to have adopted Napoleon's method, for, in spite of the prayers of the people of Perugia, the pictures remained in Rome. One of the master's pictures had been given by the French Government to Lyons, the people of which place petitioned the Pope to let them keep it. The Pope determined to gratify the French city by making them a present of the property of the people of Perugia.
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