“The Best Picture”
Aldous Huxley made the trip from Urbino with his wife Maria to see this remarkable picture in 1925, though others had visited it and wrote about it though Huxley says he has no desire to contribute to this corpus; he does not wish to write another treatise on Piero della Francesca.[1] His essay starts with an account of the uncomfortable travel to Sansepolcro by bus. Then Huxley notes the location of picture before declaring it in the “best picture in the world.” There follows a short digression on what Huxley calls the “absolute standard of artistic merit” as well as making some pointed comments about the futility of connoisseurship. Then Huxley describes the triangular composition formed by the soldiers and the lines to the apex (Christ’s head). Most memorably, Huxley labels Christ a “Plutarchian” rather than Christian hero due to his athletic torso, and he says the whole picture is a “resurrection of the classical idea.” Afterwards Huxley compares Piero’s solidness to Botticelli’s arabesques before proceeding to observe that Piero’s figures have the look of Egyptian sculpture generally, especially the women in the frescoes at Arezzo. He draws attention to Piero’s love of painting headdresses, veils, and drapery like in the Misericordia whose tubular drapery he likens to that of the Charioteer in the Louvre. Huxley says that he is “attracted to his [Piero’s] character by his intellectual power.” He then goes on to say that he would unhesitatingly consign all Botticelli’s works to the flames in order to save Piero’s art. Finally, he lists the art of Piero stating that “anyone who wants to know Piero must go from London to Arezzo, San Sepolcro and Urbino, The essay concludes with musing on the reaction of audience if the principal works of Piero were at Florence and Botticelli’s at San Sepolcro. In this event Huxley has no doubt that “the public estimation of these two masters would be reversed.”
[1] Aldous Huxley, “The Best Picture” in Along the Road: Notes and Essays of a Tourist. (Chatto and Windus, 1925), 177-189.
Comments