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to uphold the Grand Manner, “the beau idéal of the French,” Reynolds said, portraying heroic figures in idealized settings with ancient Roman trappings. The painting of serious, historical scenes was the favored subject. Yet since Reynolds made his living by portraits, he allowed this genre into the official canon, as long as sitters did not wear contemporary clothing. (Nude figures, however, were acceptable.) The idea was to improve upon nature, wiping out any “individual facial peculiarities” and purging the background of “grosser elements of ordinary existence.” In his own work, Reynolds imitated Greek and Roman art, often modeling his subjects on gods and goddesses.

For 100 years, the Academy wielded unmatched authority. By the late nineteenth century, however, it was perceived as an anachronism that enshrined mediocrity and opposed progressive art. The novelist George Moore wrote in 1898, “that nearly all artists dislike and despise the Royal Academy is a matter of common knowledge.”

BAROQUE ARCHITECTURE: ST. PAUL’S CATHEDRAI. England’s main contribution to Baroque architecture was St. Paul’s Cathedral, designed by Sir Christopher Wren (1632 — 1723). In fact, Wren designed more than fifty stone churches in London, a feat necessitated by the Great Fire of London in 1666 that destroyed more than 13,000 houses and eighty-seven churches.

St. Paul’s was Wren’s masterpiece (indeed, his remains are entombed there), intended to rival Rome’s St. Peter’s. The project began inauspiciously, since workers were unable to demolish the sturdy pillars of the burned church. When blasting away with gunpowder didn’t work, they resorted to a medieval battering ram. After a day of “relentless battering,” the last remnants of the old church fell and the new church began to rise — a forty-year undertaking.

Wren was an intellectual prodigy — a mathematician and astronomer praised by Sir Isaac Newton. He used his engineering skills to design the church’s dome, second in size only to St. Peter’s. Its diameter was 112 feet, and at a height of 365 feet, it was higher than a football field. The lantern and cross atop the dome alone weighed 64,000 tons. How to support such a tremendous load? Wren’s pioneering solution was to contruct the dome as a wooden shell covered in thin lead. He could then create a beautiful silhouette on the outside and a high ceiling in the interior with a fraction of the weight. St. Paul’s is one of the major churches of the world. As Wren’s inscription on his tomb in the great cathedral says, “If you seek a monument, look around you.”

Wren, St. Paul’s Cathedral, West facade, 1675-1712, London.

BAROQUE

Baroque art throughout Europe tended to be larger than life — full of motion and emotion — like the grandiose religious works produced in Rome. Yet, rather than merely imitating Italian masterpieces, each country developed its own distinctive style and emphasis.

SPANISH BAROQUE

Spain’s major gift to world art was Diego Velázquez (1599 — 1660). Extraordinarily precocious, while still in his teens he painted pictures demonstrating total technical mastery. At the age of 18, he qualified as a master painter. On a visit to Madrid, Velázquez did a portrait so perfect in execution it attracted the king’s attention. His first painting of Philip IV pleased the monarch so much he declared from then on only Velázquez would do his portrait. At the age of 24, Velázquez became the country’s most esteemed painter and would spend more than thirty years portraying the royal court.

Like Holbein’s, Velázquez’s royal portraits were masterpieces of visual realism, but the Spaniard’s methods were the opposite of Holbein’s linear precision. No outlines are visible in his portraits; he created forms with fluid brushstrokes and by applying spots of light and color, a precursor of Impressionism.

Velázquez differed from most Baroque artists in the simplicity and earthiness of his work. He never forgot his teacher’s advice: “Go to nature for everything.” As a result, he never succumbed to the pompous style of strewing