Teaching Art History with Treefrog Treasures (2 Viewers)

[Poppo]

Why is that?

Also in the school books of history in Italy Garibaldi is portaiyed as a romantic,uninterested in power hero who with a few men destroyed the "corrupted" reign of the two Sicilies, helping the Savoy king of Piemonte, Vittorio Emanuele II to unify the south of Italy to the north.
He was,but, apart from the retoric and the political justifications for the unity of Italy, the reality is more complex: Garibaldi is seen by many( included me) as an adventurer who caused serious trouble; in fact Italy, since the falling of the roman empire has been divided in many states, often de facto colonies or directly occupied by the main europen states like Germany, France, Spain, Austria.....This fact and the italians' cynical, parochial, regional carachter has created a land that can be considered a nation only by some intellectuals and by a writing on a map. The italian states( and even the cities!) had grown through the centuries like totally different realities in customs, economy, traditions, thinking.....Garibaldi is directly connected to the unification of Italy, but people eventually only wanted an independence from the foreign states( ex. the rebellion of the Milan citizens against the austrian occupation in the 19th century). Anyway, the unity of Italy never worked,the north is still totally different from the south, and even the regions from each other. Some years ago the institutions celebrated the 150 years of unity....It was just a commercials to justify the inconsistent national institutions. Today,Italy is pratically bankrupted but the italians can finally find a unity of the country: the Mafia has unified the country and it has become the system in the south as well as in the north. Seen the situation, not many keep Garibaldi in their hearts, even if he is not guilty for all this, of course.

 

[PolarBear]

Also in the school books of history in Italy Garibaldi is portaiyed as a romantic,uninterested in power hero who with a few men destroyed the "corrupted" reign of the two Sicilies, helping the Savoy king of Piemonte, Vittorio Emanuele II to unify the south of Italy to the north.
He was,but, apart from the retoric and the political justifications for the unity of Italy, the reality is more complex: Garibaldi is seen by many( included me) as an adventurer who caused serious trouble; in fact Italy, since the falling of the roman empire has been divided in many states, often de facto colonies or directly occupied by the main europen states like Germany, France, Spain, Austria.....This fact and the italians' cynical, parochial, regional carachter has created a land that can be considered a nation only by some intellectuals and by a writing on a map. The italian states( and even the cities!) had grown through the centuries like totally different realities in customs, economy, traditions, thinking.....Garibaldi is directly connected to the unification of Italy, but people eventually only wanted an independence from the foreign states( ex. the rebellion of the Milan citizens against the austrian occupation in the 19th century). Anyway, the unity of Italy never worked,the north is still totally different from the south, and even the regions from each other. Some years ago the institutions celebrated the 150 years of unity....It was just a commercials to justify the inconsistent national institutions. Today,Italy is pratically bankrupted but the italians can finally find a unity of the country: the Mafia has unified the country and it has become the system in the south as well as in the north. Seen the situation, not many keep Garibaldi in their hearts, even if he is not guilty for all this, of course.

Poppo

Thank you for providing this background for us. I think the United States after the outbreak of the Civil War was looking for someone who could bring the country back together. Garibaldi offered his services to the Union Army and put pressure on Lincoln to free the Slaves. This was the question he asked of Lincoln and the Union:

"Tell me, also, if this agitation is regarding the emancipation of the Negroes or not"-Giuseppe Garibaldi June 27, 1861

Garibaldi came on the scene when the mass media such as the pictorial press and photography were having a major impact on the world aided by the telegraph and the steamship. People were looking for a Hero who stood for freedom and liberty. His actions and the press that he received for them helped to fill that void. Freedom was on the minds of many during the 19th Century. This quest was enhanced by the contemporary movement of Romanticism in philosophy and the arts. Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People 1830 was an expression of that longing.

Randy

 

[PolarBear]

Just a brief reminder that I am working towards an explanation of the significance of the woman and her Red Jacket to my interpretation of Winslow Homer's 1871 The Old Mill. My forthcoming posts will cover these topics:

1. Garibaldi as Media Celebrity
2. Garibaldi-Mania: Art & Collectables
3. America and Garibaldi
4. Winslow Homer & Garibaldi
5. The Old Mill, the Woman in Red and 1870s America

 

[PolarBear]

Part 11A

The Three Musketeers: Garibaldi, Dumas & LeGray:Making A Modern Celebrity

Garibaldi and his heroism during the 2nd War of Italian Unification fully established his global status as a celebrated hero and symbol of the desire for freedom. He did not accomplish this alone, however. The nascent mass media provided the energy and sources that bolstered his adulation. Two Frenchmen played an important role in this happening. They were a popular novelist of swashbuckling adventure tales that were part of the culture of the Romantic era and a photographer who developed a process of printing photographs on paper so that multiple copies were readily available and easily distributed. The novelist was Alexander Dumas most famous for his novels The Three Musketeers (1844) and The Count of Monte Christo (1845-46) that are still popular today. The photographer was Gustave LeGray, the Paris-based photographer known for his exquisite portraits including those of the Empress Eugenie the wife of Napoleon III.

The lives and careers of Garibaldi, Dumas, and LeGray would come together in the Spring of 1860 when Dumas and LeGray left the port of Marseilles in May aboard Dumas's yacht Emma. The mission was the brainchild of Dumas. As a writer of fiction that featured heroes that were bigger than life, Dumas had decided that there was a real life equivalent to be found in Garibaldi who was now fighting the Neapolitan Army and Navy which he would defeat in August of 1860. Dumas was aware that Garibaldi, was a now hot commodity and that publications dealing with the General would be big sellers. The same idea held true for LeGray who knew that images of "The Hero of Two Worlds" would very likely be in demand.

As a result of Dumas's and LeGray's voyage to Sicily while Garibaldi was still there, the two men were able to capture his heroism in the flesh for an adoring public that extended from Europe to the Americas. Dumas would edit and publish at Garibaldi's request the hero's autobiography which was a best seller at home and overseas and available in multiple languages. He would also publish two other related volumes: The Garibaldians in Sicily and On Board the Emma: Adventures with Garibaldi's Thousand in Sicily. Dumas had found in Garibaldi his real-life D'Artagnan. Both the novelist and the soldier/politician were able to profit from the exposure and fame.
Dumas expressed his great admiration for Garibaldi when he described him as

"the man who received from Providence a mission to watch over the awakening masses."

Garibaldi had become the symbol of the new Revolutionary whose quest for freedom captured the spirit of the turbulent times in which he lived and would find its literary expression in Victor Hugo's Les Miserables (1862).

Illustrations:

1. Dumas, Garibaldi, LeGray
2. Dumas by Gustave LeGray
3. Dumas's Three Musketeers 1840 and an English edition
4. The Three Musketeers and D'Artagnan King & Country Treefrog Treasures
5. Dumas's books on Garibaldi

Part 11 Continued on Next Screen

 

[PolarBear]

Part 11B

Gustave LeGray

The Cult of Celebrity that formed around Garibaldi was visually enhanced by the presence of LeGray. The French photographer would document in reproducible and circulating images the 2nd War of Italian Italian Unification (1859-1861) similar to British photographer Roger Fenton's visual record of the Crimean War (1853-1856). The age of war photography would meld the technology of the camera with the new technology of war. Shortly after, Matthew Brady and Timothy O'Sullivan would do the same for the American Civil War.

LeGray's documentation of the war fought by Garibaldi and his 1000 in Sicily would be in two forms: portraits of the participants and views of the destruction done to the city of Palermo. The photographer was told to shoot the ruins because "Europe must know these things: 2800 bombs in a single day."

Among the portraits by LeGray that stand out as iconic images of the military hero are those of Garibaldi and the Hungarian revolutionary and soldier, Istvan Turr, who had deserted the Austrian army to join Garibald's 1000 man army. The editor of the French newspaper Le Monde Illustre had an engraving made of the Garibaldi photograph and published it in the popular newspaper further enhancing the leader's fame. The engraved format was necessary since actual photographs could not be reproduced in print until the late 19th Century when new processes were developed.

Illustrations:

1. Gustave LeGray, Empress Eugenie, Alexander Dumas (All photos by LeGray)
2. LeGray Portraits from Palermo: Garibaldi June 1860. Garibaldi Wood Engraving for Le Monde Illustre after LeGray photo July 21, 1860, Istvan Turr June 1860
3. Variations on the LeGray Garibaldi portrait in other media by other artists
4. LeGray Palazzo after bombardment Palermo June1860
5. LeGray Strada di Toledo showing rubble and barricade Palermo June 1860

 

[PolarBear]

Part 12

Capturing The 1000: The Photography of Alessandro Pavia

I want to look at one other example of the role played by photography in the celebration of Garibaldi's achievements in the military aspects of the Risorgimento and the process of Italian Unification. The photographer was Alessandro Pavia (1826-1889) who worked in Genoa, a city important to Garibaldi, the Risorgimento and the movement's philosopher and leader the revolutionary politician Giuseppe Mazzini. Pavia had established a shop there where in addition to taking photographs, he provided lessons to others and sold cameras.

Portraiture was the main form of photography practiced by Pavia. He entered the field at the time of the rise of Carte de Visite portrait photography. These were 4.5 by 2.5 inch images printed on paper that was then glued on a cardboard backing . They were invented in France and then spread around the world. They got their name from their resemblance to visiting cards of the Victorian Era that were now being replaced by the photographic version. They might be seen as the predecessors to baseball and other sports cards. In fact Carte des Visites of celebrities were highly collectable. Lincoln was a very popular choice.

Pavia was a supporter of Garibaldi and his heroic exploits and in 1862 decided to create a photographic album that would document all those who had served in the 1000 during the fighting in Sicily between 1859 and 1860. He spent the following years tracking down all that he could locate to photograph. For the individuals he was unable to photograph in person, he copied other photographs or works of art. It took Pavia until 1870 to finish the project. His goal was to produce a detailed and accurate visual record of the participants and their role in the history of Italy.

The unusual aspect of Pavia's album was its inclusion of information on not only officers and heroes but the common soldier. The participants were listed and displayed in alphabetical order from Abba to Zuzzi. Among the members of the Expedition of 1000 was a woman: Rosealia (Rose) Montmasson, the wife of Francesco Orsini, a Sicilian revolutionary. Rose had joined the 1000 dressed as a man and sailed South with them. She was present at all the battles as a nurse helping to bring the wounded to safety where they could be cared for.

The purpose of the Album was to serve as a pictorial monument to what the members of the Expedition were able to achieve. To Pavia these individuals were modern heroes who would glory through the portrait photograph.

Pavia dedicated the Album to Garibaldi, emphasizing this through the book's title: "A Giuseppe Garibaldi Duce dei Mille-Album dei Mille". Bronze letters were used on the cover to provide the book's imprimatur. A victory wreath/crown of an oak and laurel branch symbolizing strength and glory were in the center of the cover. Just below that was a Trinacria, the symbol for the island of Sicily where the battle had been won. Inside the book was a hand-colored photo of Garibaldi dressed like the gaucho's he met in Latin America early on in his career. Pavia's dedication to Garibaldi read as follows:

"This work is far from perfection, but my political and national goal has been achieved, and that is enough because I did not aspire to the glory of an artist, but to the dedication of a citizen, thus paying the just homage to those brave soldiers."

The volume was expensive to produce selling for 460 Lira a price too costly for most of the population. As a means of reaching a wider public, however, and advertising the book, Pavia published a 28 page pamphlet that contained an index to all those who were in the original book as well as three sample Carte de Visite photographs. It sold for 1 lira. Pavia, however, was able sell a number of copies of the book to Italian libraries. Eventually, an installment plan for purchasing the book was also offered.

Illustrations:

1. Photograph of Alessandro Pavia, his shop sign, and an advertisement

2. Album dei Mille with sample page and enlarged photo examples. Photo of Rosealia Montmasson (the only female member of the 1000)

3. Dedication page from the album. Photo Portrait of Garibaldi (color tinted by hand)

4. Pamphlet and Alphabetical Index to photographs in the Album dei Mille.
Sample photo of one of the members of the 1000

5. Carte de Visites from the Album in decorative mattes. Both men were officers and celebrities with Garibaldi during the campaign in Sicily

 

[PolarBear]

Coming Next:

Garibaldi-mania: Part 1 Merchandi$ing A Hero

 

[PolarBear]

Supplementary Post: Garibaldi, 1860s Art & Toy Soldiers

Before I post the future parts of this thread, I wanted to report on a fortuitous discovery that I made yesterday. As readers of this thread will recall, I began it as a reflection of my interests in both Art History and collecting toy soldiers. Treefrog Treasures has provided me with an education in both world and military history that has enhanced my training in the history of art. Don Doyle's The Cause of All Nation's: An International History of the American Civil War (2014) got me interested in Garibaldi and the links that existed between the American Civil War and the Italian Risorgimento. Both events involved the quest for freedom and attempts to reunite divided nations. I was surprised to read about the links between Garibaldi and Abraham Lincoln. This meshed nicely with my long time interest in the art of Winslow Homer who early in his career created works of art about both Lincoln and Garibaldi (the subject of a future post). My interest was furthered by the fact that Treefrog carried not only figures of Lincoln but also Garibaldi. In fact Treefrog has an entire Del Prado series on the Wars of Italian Unification as well as several series on the American Civil War, both events occurring in the decade of the 1860s.

Yesterday, I was looking at works of art online by Risorgimento artists and discovered an artist that was new to me: Gioacchino Toma who had painted a scene of three boys playing with toy soldiers reenacting a battle fought by Garibaldi and his volunteers. On the wall just behind them is a drawing of Garibaldi in the pose of the Le Gray photograph. There are other patriotic symbols: the red Garibaldini kepi worn by the boy with the toy gun and several flags. A second painting by the artist entitled Sons of the People shows two boys looking at drawings of Victor Emmanuel, now the King of Italy, on the left and Garibaldi on the right. Beneath the drawings is the date 1862. After Garibaldi's victory in Sicily, he had turned over control of Southern Italy to Victor Emmanuel. The boy seated on the floor is wearing the red kepi. The boy standing holding a stick for a rifle and saluting is wearing a red neckerchief and another style of hat worn by Garibaldi. On the chair is an Italian flag, a gold star, and a Garibaldi red shirt. There are green laurel leaves on the floor and near the drawings of the two leaders, They are traditional Roman symbols of victory.

Gioacchino's choice of subject matter should come as no surprise, since he served in Garibaldi's army in 1860. That service is likely reflected in his 1863 painting Rome or Death! which shows three of Garibaldi's soldiers: one who has been wounded has his arm in a sling watches his comrade writing a patriotic slogan (Roma O Morte Viva Garibaldi) on a stucco wall. The third soldier is seated on the floor holding a newspaper and chatting with a young Sicilian woman. The two standing soldiers are wearing Garibaldi red shirts and one has the red kepi like the boys in the earlier paintings. All three of these Toma paintings have messages of patriotism at their core.

Finally, I would like to compare an American painting from the 1860s with Toma's 1862 painting Young Patriots. The painting in question is by Lily Martin Spencer (1822-1902) and is entitled The War Spirit At Home: Celebrating the Battle at Vicksburg. Painted in 1866 after the conclusion of the Civil War, the painting has a patriotic theme similar to Toma's painting. Set in the kitchen of the artist's home, we see three children parading around the kitchen while their mother is reading the news of the battle and taking care of the family's newest member. The very young boy in the front is carrying a stick over his shoulder as though it was a rifle and has a Scottish terrier on a leash. His older sister wearing an orange dress, is banging a kitchen pan as though it was a drum. On her head is a blue Union kepi that parallels the Garibaldi ones worn by the boys in Toma's paintings. Her older brother blowing on a horn and wearing a military style hat made from folded paper is bringing up the rear. His hat is like that of the middle boy in The Young Patriots by Toma. A housekeeper, stands in the background, watching the children and drying the dishes. There is no evidence that Spencer went to Italy and we do not know if prints were made after Toma's painting that possibly reached North America. Nevertheless, the two paintings make an excellent link between the patriotic responses by both artists and the two wars they represented.

Illustrations:

1. Gioacchino Toma (1862) Young Patriots
2. Gioacchino Toma (1838-1891)
3. Gioacchino Toma (1862) Sons of the People
4. Gioacchino Toma (1863) Rome or Death!
5. Lily Martin Spencer (1866) The War Spirit at Home: Celebrating the Battle at Vicksburg

 

[PolarBear]

Here is the Black Garibaldi Cap worn by the boy saluting in Toma's Sons of the People (1862) from the previous post

 

[PolarBear]

Part 13A Garibaldi-Mania: Merchandising Heroism in the Age of Capital

In May 1840 Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) the Scottish philosopher, historian, and author gave a series of lectures entitled On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History that were subsequently published as a book in 1841. He looked at the hero in six different contexts: The Hero as Divinity, Prophet, Poet, Priest, Man of Letters, and King. Individuals examined were Muhammad, Dante, Shakespeare, Luther, John Knox, Samuel Johnson, Rousseau, Robert Burns, Cromwell, and Napoleon. Anticipating what would transpire across Europe in 1848, the final chapter included a section on Modern Revolutionism. All of his selections were male and the book is considered the foundation of the Great Man Theory of History which dominated historical writing in the nineteenth century into the twentieth.

Giuseppe Garibaldi and his subsequent fame fit nicely into this category. Garibaldi's visit to England in 1864 is a manifestation of Carlyle's concept of hero-worship. Garibaldi's life and exploits fit the model of the Great Man theory. Garibaldi's visit to England played an important role in the genesis of Garibaldi-mania. The crowds that turned out to see him were large and enthusiastic. Such excitement stimulated a market for souvenir items that the public could purchase and place in their homes.

A better understanding of the Garibaldi-mania and its economic manifestations is best seen in the context of the history of the time. This history has been tracked in a trilogy called the "Long 19th Century" by British Historian Eric Hobsbawm. The Age of Revolution 1789-1848, The Age of Capital 1848-1875, and the Age of Empire 1875-1914. Hobsbawm's thesis was that European modernization was the product of dual revolutions: The French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. In this scenario European history meshed with World History with the rise of colonialism and imperialism in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. The three volumes span the lifetime of Garibaldi (1807-1882). Garibaldi's own achievements fall within the Age of Capital. This helps to account for the material aspects of Garibaldi-mania. We have already seen the popularity of the carte de visite photograph of Garibaldi taken by Gustave Le Gray that was an esgerly sought after collectable at the time and was subsequently converted into a variety of other forms for distribution and sale, including color lithographs. The Age of Capital was driven by industrialization and the redultant mass production of items available for sale. In this process the factory and the mill replaced the agrarian farm and individual craftworker. The mass produced commodity with the aid of an enhanced media apparatus helped to spread the fame of popular individuals such as Garibaldi. In the United States such commodification of heroes would produce large quantities of souvenirs and collectables for George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. In Europe the prime example prior to Garibaldi had been Napoleon Bonaparte whose achievements were presented in a series of history paintings by Jacques-Louis David such as his Napoleon Crossing the Alps of 1805. Napoleon, however, did not have the industrial apparatus to mass produce his image that enhanced Garibaldi's reputation. In my upcoming post I will present representative examples of some of the products of Garibaldi-mania.

Illustrations:

1. Thomas Carlyle (1880) by J. A. M. Whistler [Note Whistler used the same pose here that he used for his mother in his famous painting in the Musee d'Orsay, Paris]
2. Carlyle's On Heroes, Hero-Worship, & The Heroic in History
3. The Long 19th Century Trilogy by Eric Hobsbawn
4. Napoleon Crossing the Alps (1801-1805) by Jacques Louis-David
5. Garibaldi on a Cliff Edge on the Island of Caprera (his home)

 

[PolarBear]

Part 13B Garibaldi-Mania: Garibaldi Collectables

Garibaldi's visit to England in 1864 and his reception in London at various venues held in his honor sparked an interest in souvenirs and mementos of that visit by large numbers of the population. The items created ranged from jewelry with his likeness made for individuals to moving panoramas about his exploits for audiences of spectators. For this post, I have selected examples representative of the items produced for individuals who wanted a memento of seeing the heroic leader in person.

Illustration 1 Personal Objects

The examples seen here are a cameo portrait in a metallic frame, a purse made of leather and metal with color portraits of Garibaldi and King Victor Emmanuel, and a set of brass buttons bearing Garibaldi's likeness and his name.

Illustration 2 Paper Souvenirs

These include a color lithograph printed in Italy, showing the hero on horseback, centrally placed amidst the action, a collector's card from a cigarette company in Virginia, and a special edition of Garibaldi's autobiography with color plates.

Illustration 3 Sheet Music

Music written in Garibaldi's honor with lithographed illustrations on the covers. The types of music ranged through marches, galops, polkas, and even some hymns. Examples were largely produced by English firms but some were also from the United States where Garibaldi was a popular icon in the 1860s.

Illustration 4 Ceramics

Perhaps the most popular and collectable items were dishes and figures made by the major English pottery companies in Staffordshire. The examples shown here include a Sunderland lustreware bowl with a portrait of Garibaldi on the outside and Masonic symbols on the inside. Garibaldi was a Freemason and when in England in 1854 and again in 1864 met with members of the fraternal organization. At various times when Garibaldi found himself exiled from his native land, Masonic lodges provided him with asylum including the time he spent as a revolutionary in South America in the 1830s-40s. The middle example is a Staffordshire porcelain figure of Gatibaldi and his white horse. These types of figures were produced in quantity in a variety of poses sometimes including a second figure. The last object in this category is a ceramic pot lid with a portrait of Garibaldi. A pot lid was a cover for a shallow container. The usual contents were bear grease, pomade or cosmetics. Pastes of fish and meat could also be stored in such containers. This particular lid was made circa 1864 by the F & R Pratt Co. of Staffordshire. The two day transfer polychrome printing which was a multi-step process was done by Jesse Austin, an engraver working for Pratt.

Illustration 5 Panoramas

The most ambitious Garibaldi-mania products were the panoramas made in Britain which were shown to audiences in the major cities and ultimately played to audiences in the countryside. The most successful runs were in the big cities where the populations were more familiar with Garibaldi's exploits. This particular panorama was saved and preserved by Brown University. The first illustration shows the restoration process. As seen in this image, this was an example of a moving panorama. Thus the pictures were on a roll of canvas that was unrolled by means of a crank, scene by scene. Since it was painted on both sides the roll was turned around after the first side was finished. There was a narrator whose job it was to explain the contents of each scene. Occasionally, there was some form of musical accompaniment to add to the experience. This particular panorama was painted by a landscape painter named John James Story. It was first exhibited in December of 1860 at a venue in Derby, England. Panoramas like this one were presented not only as entertainment but could also be used for propaganda. This panorama at Brown is the only surviving example of its kind. It should be seen as a predecessor to motion pictures and especially early newsreels or documentaries. The second image shows Garibaldi defending Rome against French forces guarding the Vatican.

 

[PolarBear]

Addendum to Garibaldi & 1860s Art posting from 10/03/16

Roma O Morte (Rome or Death) by Gioacchino Toma 1863

I want to add some material and a correction to my comments on Toma's 1863 painting Rome or Death. First the correction. I previously described the figure sitting on the straw covered floor as a young Sicilian woman. Boy was I wrong on that account. I found a larger image of the painting and lo and behold, the figure has the beginnings of a beard! So all the figures are male and members of Garibaldi's volunteers. In fact, this soldier is wearing a pair of Garibaldi jeans. He has a bandaged foot and the bandana around his head may be covering a head wound, which would account for the red patches on the kerchief.

Here is the story behind the painting that I have now been able to piece together. Although Garibaldi had been successful in his campaign against the Bourbons in the two Sicilies and most of Italy was now unified, two holdouts remained: Venice which was still under the control of Austria and Rome which was ruled by Pope Pius IX and also garrisoned by French troops sent there by Napoleon III.

In June of 1862, Garibaldi decided to organize new volunteers to attack the Papal States and reclaim Rome. He next proclaimed a slogan for the campaign: "Roma O Morte" (Rome or Death) which explains the title Toma chose for his painting. Garibaldi next sailed from Genoa to Palermo, Sicily where he was able to raise a force between 2000 and 3000 volunteers. Once the group was assembled, Garibaldi and his troops sailed across the Strait of Messina and landed at Calabria in the Sicilian region of the Italian peninsula to begin his march on Rome. It was in the Calabrian mountain range called Aspromonte that the Garibaldians were confronted by regular Italian troops under the command of General Enrico Cialdini whose objective was to prevent Garibaldi from reaching Rome. In the melee that followed Garibaldi was wounded and captured. He was taken to the fortress at Varignano (Spezia) where he was imprisoned but received medical attention. He was treated by the noted French French physician and surgeon Auguste Nelaton who successfully removed a bullet from Garibaldi's ankle. The Garibaldian volunteers who were captured by Cialdini were marched north to Genoa where they were imprisoned. This is the subject and location of Toma's 1863 painting. The soldier's defiance of the Italian government is expressed by the slogans that one of them writes on the wall of their cell: Roma O Morte and Viva Garibaldi.

Illustrations:

1. Roma O Morte by G. Toma (1863)
2. Garibaldi Wounded on Aspromonte by Gerolamo Induno
3. Fortress at Varignano where Garibaldi was imprisoned
4. Garibaldi's Room at Varignano 1862
5. Dr. Auguste Nelaton and Garibaldi

 

[PolarBear]

Supplement: Garibaldi with Personifications of the Cities of Venice and Rome

In my previous post I referred to Garibaldi’s goal of capturing Rome towards the completion of the unification of Italy. In this post I examine another Risorgimento painting celebrating the achievement of that goal.

This oil painting of Garibaldi with Personifications of the Cities of Venice and Rome is by an unknown Italian artist. It probably dates from 1870 or later for it was not until 1870 that both Venice and Rome were part of Italian Unification. It represents the ultimate desire of Garibaldi to live in a unified nation. He holds a sword and has his hand over the personification of Rome: a woman with Romulus and Remus seen in the far right of the painting and on her left side the she-wolf who suckled the twin brothers. Their story is the mythical founding of Rome. On the left side we see Venice also represented as a woman but this time accompanied by a winged lion with a sword, a bronze sculpture in the Plaza San Marco. The lion was a symbol of St. Mark, the patron saint of Venice. Venice became part of the Kingdom of Italy in 1866. Rome in 1870. Garibaldi with his sword drawn and his hand over Rome is basically saying "Mission Accomplished". His dream for Italy was now complete.

Illustrations:

1. Garibaldi with Personifications of the Cities of Venice and Rome--Unknown Artist circa 1870
2. Venetian Lion with Sword, San Marco, Venice
3. Venetian Flag with Lion
4. Roman sculpture of Romulus and Remus fed by the She Wolf. Rome

 

[PolarBear]

The Taste of Freedom: Introduction

This is the transitional point of my thread. Having provided background on aspects of both Winslow Homer and Giuseppe Garibaldi, I now want to focus primarily on Homer and my interpretation of his 1871 painting The Old Mill with a focus on the significant role played by the woman in red.

The 19th Century interest in Freedom is at the center of this interpretation. It was the quest for freedom that linked America and Italy in the 19th Century and led to communications between Lincoln and Garibaldi after the outbreak of the Ameican Civil War in 1861. The decade's leading up to the Civil War were characterized by reform moments in the United States. Two of the most prevalent were the Abolitionist movement against slavery and the movement for the Rights of Women. The two were actually intertwined. African American abolitionist Frederick Douglass attended the Women's Rights convention convened by Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton in Seneca Falls on July 18, 1848. This first meeting for the rights of women was contemporary with the 1848 Revolutions that broke out across Europe. Those revolutions built upon the quests for freedom in the American, French, and Haitian "Atlantic Revolutions" of the late 18th and early 19th Centuries. The mid 19th Century revolutions added the plight of labor and economic inequality. It was in 1848 that Karl Marx published his Communist Manifesto that dealt with those issues. It should be recalled that Marx wrote this while living and working in England during the explosive development there of the Industrial Revolution. In America, the developing labor movement was influenced by the Abolitionist Movement which focused on transforming slave labor into free labor. Since many of the workers in the factories were women, the issue of women's rights entered the mix. This was especially true in the United States where the earliest New England textile mills were staffed primarily by women operatives under the supervision of men. As the labor situation in those factories evolved in the decades leading up to the Civil War with conditions becoming more unsatisfactory, northern workers saw their plight as related to the slaves in the American South. The phrase Lords of the Lash and Lords of the Loom became common in what has been described as the Empire of Cotton by Harvard historian Sven Beckert.

Wage slavery and working conditions were definitely on the mind of Winslow Homer when he described his working conditions as an apprentice lithographer to the firm of John H. Bufford in Boston during the 1850s to art critic George Sheldon in 1878. ( see the quotation below the illustration). It was after this experience that Homer became a freelance artist for the remainder of his career, choosing his assignments. We have already looked at Homer's art works about the textile mills and their workers. In the upcoming posts I shall be looking at what I describe as Homer's 1860 Trilogy of Freedom which includes his Harper's Weekly prints of Lincoln, Garibaldi and Frederick Douglass

 

[PolarBear]

Supplement to Garibaldi-Mania: $1000 Delta Garibaldi Fountain Pen


I will be starting my discussion Homer’s 1860 Freedom Trilogy this coming week.

Today I ran across this current Delta Garibaldi Commemorative Fountain Pen that sells for about $1000. It is one of several versions done by the company. So even in 2016 Garibaldi’s legend continues and his collectable items still sell. The pen is in Garibaldi Red, has two sculpted images of Garibaldi: One on the barrel of the pen showing him riding his horse and the other a portrait head on the top of the cap. The top is made in the style of the cap that he sometimes wore and includes a copy of the embroidered decoration around the sides. This type of cap was described as a Victorian Smoking Cap. Victorian gentlemen enjoyed smoking in the large and sometimes drafty rooms of their clubs. The cap was meant to go with a smoking jacket and keep the smoker’s head warm.

Illustrations:

1. Garibaldi Fountain Pen

2. Detail of sculpture on barrel

3. Detail of embroidery motif on cap and nib

4. Details of cap and nib showing embroidery motif and photograph of Garibaldi in his smoking cap

5. Packaging for the pen

Illustrations Continued on next screen

 

[PolarBear]

Additional Illustrations from previous screen:

6. Victorian Man in smoking jacket and cap

7. Reproduction of Victorian Style Smoking Cap

8. 1872 pattern for making a smoking cap from Peterson’s Magazine February 1872

9. Garibaldi Brand Cigars

 

[PolarBear]

Part 14A Homer's 1860 Trilogy of Freedom: Abraham Lincoln

The first of Winslow Homer's 1860 "Portraits of Freedom" was a depiction of Lincoln that appeared in the November 10th issue of Harper's Weekly. This was titled Hon. Abraham Lincoln, Born in Kentucky February 12,1809. The wood engraving appeared on the cover of Harper's just four days after his election as the President of the United States. Homer's portrait shows the 51 year old former Illinois Congressman without his beard. Homer based his engraving on the 1860 photograph of Lincoln taken by Matthew Brady on February 27th. It is known as the Cooper Union portrait, since it was taken on the day that Lincoln addressed an audience of Republicans at the Cooper Union in New York. Lincoln later stated that his Cooper Union speech and the Brady portrait got him elected: an early example of the role of the media in politics. The first thing you will notice about the print is that the pose is the reverse of the photograph. This is a result of Homer drawing it on the woodblock in the same direction as Brady's. When a print is then made from the engraved woodblock, it comes out in the reverse as a mirror image. Homer would have had to do a reverse drawing on the woodblock to replicate the pose of the photograph. Although created at a time of expanding prewar enmity between the North and South, none of that friction or incipient conflict is evident in Homer's print. Rather the setting that Homer has created is much more placid. Homer has placed him in front of a curtained window that looks out on tranquil setting: a group of buffaloes grazing a prairie. A grape vine and bunch of grapes are seen just outside the window. The grapes foreshadow Julia Ward Howe's Battle Hymn of the Republic which was published in 1862 and became a popular tune during the Civil War. Here are the most famous lines:

"Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on."

The object of Homer's modified setting was to downplay conflict and suggest that the new president might be able to resolve the political crisis facing the two sections of the nation. Another change was to add an inkstand near the books that Lincoln has his hand on. Homer scholar David Tatham has suggested that the books and the added inkstand symbolize the contemplative and active sides of Lincoln's life respectively.

Homer followed this Lincoln print with The Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln as President of the U.S. at the Capitol, Washington, March 4, 1861 which appeared in Harper's Weekly March 16, 1861. Although there was no hint of the issues facing the nation in the 1860 portrait by Homer, in the Inauguration print, however, Homer has two figures in the crowd that are there to witness the new president sworn into office. In the front row of the crowd which is predominantly white are a black male on the left and a black woman on the right who looks directly at anyone looking at the print. They represent the key to what would become Lincoln's central issue during his presidency: the status of the African American in the United States: Slave or Free. In the 1850s Lincoln believed in colonization, an idea that had been put forth by the American Colonization Society in 1816. At first Lincoln believed that all the slaves should be freed but that they should be transported to Liberia in Africa to establish their own nation. In August 1862 during the time Lincoln was drafting the Emancipation Proclamation, he met with a group of freed slaves and tried to persuade them to migrate to Central America. Black leaders and abolitionists opposed such an idea and lobbied for U.S. citizenship. Lincoln ultimately abandoned the scheme and issued his Emancipation Proclamation in January 1863.

On November 19, 1863 during his address at Gettysburg, he concluded with these words to his audience:

"that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

He had come a long way since the 1850s. Initially the war for Lincoln was about preserving the Union, but by 1863 he saw that a new freedom needed to be the key to what historians have described as the second American Revolution which would expand on the ideas of America's Founding Fathers

Illustrations:

1.Hon. Abraham Lincoln, Born in Kentucky February 12,1809 Harper's Weekly November 10, 1860 by Winslow Homer
2.Cooper Union Photograph of Abraham Lincoln by Matthew Brady 1861
3.The Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln as President of the U.S. at the Capitol, Washington, March 4, 1861 Harper's Weekly March 16, 1861 by Winslow Homer
4.Lincoln delivering the Gettysburg Address An Artist's reconstruction
5.Lincoln Toy Soldiers: W. Britain and Wm. Hocker

TO BE CONTINUED

 

[PolarBear]

My 7 year old MAC died today and along with it all my files and software. So I will need to postpone this for now.
I guess that explains why Pogo below looks depressed.
Randy

 

[REVWARBUFF]

This is a great thread Randy! I have thoroughly enjoyed reading it and I hope that you can get your MAC situation fixed so that this thread can continue.

Mark

 

[ivanmoe]

My 7 year old MAC died today and along with it all my files and software.

Randy, you should be able to recover all of your files. Just make sure that you have an Apple tech do the work. A lot of MS/Windows "geeks" would make hash of it. I'm a Windows user, btw, so I know that of which I comment!

-Moe