The Salvage of Italian Art
Florentine Art Under Fire. By Frederick Hartt.. (Princeton University Press : Oxford University Press. 365.) THE most remarkable fact that must, I think, strike everybody who reads Mr. Frederick Hartt's fascinating book on the war-time adventures of Florentine art is the low casualty list. Indignation that any damage at all should have been done is constantly checked by amazement and pleasure that the damage and losses were so slight. (In Tuscany the enemy were not only visiteurs du soir; they occupied the land and in their retreat pummelled and hacked at every limb and artery.) Certainly much of the credit for this must go to the first-aid work of Mr. Hartt and the M.F.A.A. team. Florence Nightingale was not more devoted in her care and duty, and Mr. Hartt's enthusiasm and perseverance with " difficult cases " carries one along with him (in his jeep, " lucky 13 ") until the final triumphant, lump-in-the-throat moment when the great convoy of returned art treasures moves slowly through wildly cheering crowds up to the Palazzo Vecchio.
The story that Mr. Hartt tells, though as detailed and precise as a " case " chart, has at the same time the excitement of adventure and the tragedy of crime. Professor Procacci's account, which Mr. Hartt prints in full, of the carefully planned destruction of his beloved Ponte Santa Trinita is almost unbearably poignant, and his tears move one with the misery of a personal loss. This devo- tion of so many Italians to their art treasures (in contrast to Mussolini's " fewer works of art and more banners wrested from the enemy," which Mr. Hartt quotes) is responsible for the meticu- lous and painstaking attention given by them to the restoration of damaged buildings, frescoes and panels. Leonello Tintori's salvage and restoration, from thousands of scattered fragments, of -Filippino Lippi's Madonna and Child fresco in his home in Prato, is, I can confirm, little short of miraculous, but it is not unique. This same skill and absorption can be found in Rome, where a similar jigsaw puzzle is in progress with the fragments from Padua of Mantegna's Eremitani frescoes, and all over Italy.
In Mr. Hartt's area of operation were Siena, Pisa, Arezzo, San Sepolcro and San Gimignano. False rumour once described San Gimignano as razed to the ground, just as later another such printed rumour gave Piero della Francesca's Resurrection at San Sepolcro as an earthquake wreck. Both are almost unscathed ; and the still prevalent belief that Germany had somehow " done away " with so many Italian pictures is here proved to be completely untrue. Only one list of works stored at Montagna has not yet been accounted for, and of these the most serious loss would be two wonderful small panels of Hercules by Antonio Pollaiuolo. The deposits at Montegufoni and the "Mugello after many vicissitudes are now intact—and again for this preservation we must be thankful to the M.F.A.A. team, and to the nagging insistence of the Soprintendenti of the various galleries concerned.
What is by no means so reassuring is the fact that many of the pictures, such as the Fra Angelico Cortona triptych that Mr. Hartt reproduces, which formed part of the noble exhibition of restored and half-restored works held in tlfarlorence Accademia in 1946, are still, four years later, through lack of fun%, in the same condi- tion. They lie bandaged and unattended in their dusty wards. The sight of this picture hospital would appal Mr. Hartt, since only gradually can the great work of recovery, that he saw started with such speed, be finished. At least, however, he can feel certain that his own part of the story was carried out with ability His book will be as invaluable to the scholar who seeks information as to the lay reader who seeks'interest and excitement. DEREK HILL
Previous page
