Lecture 35: Poussin and Claude—The Allure of Rome
are quite strong between the two paintings, especially in the dignity of the
subjects. The other painting is Titian’s Man with a Blue Sleeve (Ariosto)
(c. 1512). The gentleman’s right arm is also on the sill—his sleeve seems
to blossom forth—but he has a certain mysterious look. Rembrandt had
seen both of these paintings at auction and, indeed, sketched Baldassare
Castiglione in his catalogue. The sketch was made in 1639 and is in the
Albertina in Vienna. Note that in his sketch, Rembrandt has already changed
the ¿ gure’s hat.At the beginning of the 17th century, word of new art stars rising in Rome
reached the north, attracting other artists and patrons. One French artist
who moved to Rome and spent his career there was Nicholas Poussin
(1593/94–1665). Poussin was born in Normandy in a town near the Seine.
He studied painting in Rouen and Paris and traveled to Rome in 1624. Soon
after his arrival, he worked in the studio of Domenichino, whose art had
an important inÀ uence on Poussin. Poussin was introduced to Cardinal
Francesco Barberini, nephew of Pope Urban VIII, just at the time that
the cardinal was having the family palace rebuilt and decorated. Poussin
received one commission for a large altarpiece for the new St. Peter’s, the
only monumental altarpiece of his career, because he soon developed a loyal
clientele among the French community in Rome.We see Poussin’s Realm [or Kingdom] of Flora (1631), a graceful ballet
of a picture, choreographed with precision and a joyous spirit. Remember
Botticelli’s Primavera from Lecture Seventeen, in which Flora scatters
À owers. Poussin has taken the measured, mostly static composition of
Botticelli and set it into motion. Poussin has also, like Botticelli, taken his
scene from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. In the Botticelli, the nymph Chloris
was literally metamorphosing into Flora, the personi¿ cation of Spring. In
Poussin’s painting, Flora dances in the center; all the characters who complete
the cast are drawn from Ovid and all will metamorphose into À owers. We
see Ajax at left, denied the weapons of the dead Achilles, which were given
instead to Ulysses. Ajax went insane and committed suicide by falling on his
sword; here his blood is transformed into a carnation. We also see Narcissus
and Echo; Narcissus spurned Echo’s love and was condemned to gaze at his
own reÀ ection in the water eternally. He fell in love with his reÀ ection, pined
away until he died, and was transformed into the À ower of his name.