Voices from the Past Part 81

His skill with jewelry was something to remember. I remember his setting a fire opal in a gold brooch... I'd been his apprentice for several months, maybe a year. Not a word was said while he worked, an entire afternoon. A smile, a nod...

The opal was rectangular and its blob of fire was at its base-resembling a setting sun-the gem surrounded by finely woven wires.

And there was a day when Andrea's famous sphere was polished and ready. How it glistened! How proud he was, how proud all of us artists were! We crowded around; we left the workshop to sing a te deum and drink wine as it was hoisted aloft, to embellish the dome of the cathedral.

"Verrochio...Andrea Verrochio," we yelped.

And the copper sphere is still there, above the red tiles, unharmed by lightning.

He was a flawless craftsman with the porphyry and marble walls of the Medici sarcophagus. And his beautiful putto, boy and dolphin, are loved by everyone.

F's drawings of Andrea's David, and his silverpoint study of Andrea's great bronze horse are treasures of mine.

Well, his bottega was a place of magic...subtleties in metal and wood.

Again it's late. Francesco is playing cards at the chateau-Parisian girls. The cat has disappeared. Lamps need fixing on my table. Will I every finish revising these treatises, re-arranging them?

Di me se mai fu fatta alcuna cosa.

Andrea dead at fifty-three!

Di me se mai...four words...scattered among my mathematical papers, among my drawings: Is anything ever done!

I was twenty...he was thirty-six...genial.

He believed art was the zenith. He asked: What do men respect most? Laws? Writings? They respect the bronze horse, the jeweled necklace...the alabaster vase...the cameo...the bas-relief...great murals...antiquities!

Old thoughts now, but new then, important then.

Andrea often praised such accomplishments. How often we talked in his small garden, trellised with wisteria and grape, his sister, Margharita, looking after us. He had a scar across his right cheek, a special smile because of it. What an aura there was at his home-like nowhere else.

Simple, family accord, everyone doing his part.

I remember something Andrea said:

"When I shivered as a child, I knew an angel had pa.s.sed by."

Cloux

Manor House

Early morning. Good light. Francesco and I worked at our easels until lunch. Cold.

At lunch, F said:

"I lost again at cards last night... I can't speak French well enough to win. It's lucky for me that everyone's leaving here this weekend...off for Paris."

We talked about Paris and the King's departure (how desolate he would leave the chateau!): we talked about the Alps. I mentioned my climbs and the fossils I found...the caves...with sh.e.l.ls on the floor... I showed F my memory-sketch of huge male bison painted on the granite walls of a cave, painted there before any Florentine painted. I tried to find a primitive carving on a piece of bone but couldn't locate it: I wanted him to realize how clever those ancient artists were.

F was interested in the avalanches, and asked me the best season for a climb. He will ask his father to accompany him on an Alpine trip...he's eager to return to his beautiful Vaprio. I certainly understand. Last month the Melzis renewed their invitation but I lack the strength to make another move; perhaps, in a year or two, I might leave here without offending the King-perhaps I can obtain a commission in Milan; then I could use the Villa Vaprio for my base.

In the afternoon, because it was sunny and inviting, we had our horses saddled and rode through the bois...a fox plumed his tail in front of us... I tried to sketch on horseback but my sorrel was very restless. What fascinating shadows in the woodland-when the sun is low!

How to blend them.

I am confused, cold.

I wrote in my journal a day or two ago, it seems; yet, tonight, I can't recall the date; I seem to be in an unknown country, not France, not Switzerland. This place is not my place. I am somewhere by a warm fireplace fire.

What confusion. The fire stares at me.

Through the open doorway I see my canvas of St.

John...the painting a.s.sures me. Ah, the King has gone. F has gone. It is as if I had been asleep.

An a.s.sistant and I are making and repairing brushes; we are also grinding pigments (how hard it is to find someone who cares to do quality work); having discovered that my scale is inaccurate I am checking the grinding.

It is no wonder my Saint John colors blend poorly. A faulty scale is a great hindrance.

I am troubled by the shading in John's face: underneath his eyes-so important.

"Patience," I say to myself.

I have heard that admonition through the years, hollow, utterly s.a.d.i.s.tic.

The pleasure in painting is perfection!

I have heard that.

Pleasure and perfection are illusions, friend!

An artist frames his illusions and gilds the frames and people gape at the illusions and then foster more illusions.

Years ago, as a youngster, I liked to sit in front of the marble facade of Santa Maria Novella.

In the wintertime it could be a balmy spot.

Girls...but I would sit there and imagine that the twin obelisks in front of the church were being lugged off on the backs of their immense bronze turtles, four turtles for each obelisk. (What mad sculptor designed turtles to hold up obelisks!) Ai, the marble columns tottered across the piazza; the monks and priests, with p.e.n.i.ses dangling, dashed out of church and monastery, shrieking to heaven for help.

Maybe it was helpful to think such ridiculous thoughts; maybe it erased problems; there were always problems...on Sunday no hawkers were permitted in the piazza...pigeons took over, kids, wings, laughter.