Pietro Annigoni: Pope John XXIII

Pietro Annigoni's drawing of Pope John XXIII
for Time magazine 

"The Pope seemed even more weary than usual the morning of his third - and last - sitting and spoke again of his terrible insomnia. He was clearly in no mood for conversation and I expected him to keep dozing off. I had begun to despair of getting anything done, when Monsignor Capovilla adroitly rescued me. During his sleepless night the Holy Father had written a speech which he was to deliver shortly after the sitting ended. Monsignor now offered to read the speech aloud so that he and the Pope could check it together. The offer was welcomed and had the effect of reviving the Pope, who settled down, chin in hands, to listen intently. It was my salvation for, apart from occasional interruptions when he suggested a correction, he kept the pose so well that, at last, I had a passably complete drawing. 

During a brief break, when Monsignor had left us alone, the Holy Father looked at me thoughtfully and said: 'I wrote all that last night and now, re-reading it, I realize that when we ponder over what we are writing we often have the illusion that we are saying a great deal, that we are saying important things. Instead, we miss the essential point. The people who are out there waiting for my speech would be happier if I improvised instead of reading it. Human beings prefer to be looked in the eye when they are spoken to, and I would like to look them in the eye and tell them what comes from the heart. Yes, with simplicity, what really comes from the heart and only from the heart. In their eyes I would see their hearts, and that would help me to discover more profoundly what is in my own. But it is not always possible. Speeches must be written, printed, and preserved.' It seemed to me that as he said this he was suddenly isolated in a remote solitude, utterly alone.

Before leaving he came to look at the drawing and said to Monsignor Capovilla, 'This is someone who knows his business.' Then he pointed to the voluminous ear and commented, 'Even that is really lifelike. When I was in the seminary and was rather thin, my ears seemed even bigger than usual. So much so that my classmates, who saw in them a certain resemblance to the ears of pachyderms, used to call me 'The Elephant.'

As he left, I genuflected properly - no mean feat for a man of my size - and even succeeded in snatching his hand on the wing, that hand which he afterwards laid on my shoulder, saying for his only farewell: 'Courage!' A bad model, but a truly holy man. A sweet serenity emanated from him in spite of his evident suffering. With a few words he could bring a man back to the Eternal and remind him, like no one else I have ever known, of the 'vanitas vanitatum [vanity of vanities].'"

To be continued 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.) 

 

Pietro Annigoni: Pope John XXIII and the Pietà

Michelangelo's "Pieta"

"'Time' magazine came to me with a request for a portrait of Pope John, upon which I started work in the Vatican on 5th June. A man from 'Time' took me there and presented me to Monsignor Cardinale, who in turn passed me on to the Pope's secretary, who in his turn, led me into the study of John XXIII. There, bending on one knee as I had been instructed, I kissed, and did not kiss, the hand that was extended to me and withdrawn from me at the same time. The Monsignor introduced me: 'Maestro Annigoni, who is here for the portrait.' 'Young for a maestro,' remarked the Pope with a little smile. 

During one of our conversations as I worked, our principle subject was the proposed shipment of Michelangelo's 'Pietà' to the New York World's Fair in 1964. I had been told that the Pope had promised Cardinal Spellman that the sublime sculpture would go and that there was nothing anyone could do to stop it. All the same, I felt very strongly that it should not and I said so.

He could scarcely wait for me to finish speaking and answered impatiently: 'I don't understand why this project should be so discussed and opposed in so many quarters. If it is sent to the New York World's Fair, this 'Pietà' will give satisfaction and joy to millions of people who would never have a chance to admire it, won't it? So why shouldn't it be sent? Even works of art - even the greatest of them - are things of this world, and we should not become fanatically attached to them.'

Although disheartened, I insisted on telling him that we had the duty of protecting works of art, of not exposing them voluntarily to the risk of being damaged or absolutely destroyed, if we wished to hand them down unharmed to those who come after us, whose number will be vastly greater than that of the beneficiaries of the Fair.

'That's true,' he replied. 'Even so, I was in Paris when Leonardo's 'La Gioconda [Mona Lisa]' was stolen from the Louvre, and what a rumpus there was about it. What a rumpus - for such a little thing.' With his fingers he indicated just how 'little', and continued: 'Of course the thief deserved to be punished, - he mimed the spanking of a child - but, all in all, what exaggeration!'

At that moment I remembered involuntarily how, a few days before I met him, he had been described to me as 'a good parish priest.' It was so true that I had to be careful not to address him by name or give him a comradely slap on the back."

To be continued 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.) 

 

Pietro Annigoni: Bernard Berenson

Ink drawing of Bernard Berenson
by Pietro Annigoni

Before Pietro Annigoni began the portrait the Queen Elizabeth, he returned to Florence and there, as he writes, "gave myself up to painting landscapes and a self-portrait, the one I call 'Gulliver.' I also made a pen and ink drawing of Bernard Berenson, the famous art historian, as he lay ill in bed at him home. When it was finished he looked at it and said, 'In this portrait I am impressive, a personality to be taken seriously. Other people in general, yes, they have taken me seriously. I, never.'

Over the last twelve years of his life BB, as everyone called him, was a good friend to me. We had first met in 1947 when, flatteringly, he had asked, through mutual friends, to meet me. He must have been already eighty then. Later, he supported me when I was campaigning against the reckless cleaning of Old Master paintings in the great museums and art galleries of the world. We shared also, to a great extent, the same feelings about the excesses of much so-called modern art. As a clever businessman, he liked to keep in with everyone, but in private he was very outspoken. One night at 'I Tatti,' his beautiful villa near Settignano, he interrupted some of his guests who were talking about certain abstract painters: 'Stop talking about abstract art, it's so tedious.'

After I had been to India in 1957, he asked me to show him the drawings I had made of Indian scenes - twenty large watercolours and five albums of sketches. Later that same year I saw him again and showed him a colour transparency of the portrait of Princess Margaret that I had just finished. 'I enjoy you,' he said. I envy you your talent, your youth, what you have done, and what you will be able to do.' And he added, 'I don't say this only to your face, I tell it to everyone.' Unaccustomed as I was, and still am, to even a little praise from the intellectuals, I cherish those words, his last to me."

To be continued 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.) 

Pietro Annigoni: Princess Margaret, Pt. 2

 

"Portrait of Princess Margaret" (detail)
by Pietro Annigoni

"With December came the fog and smog and I had often to work by artificial light, which was bad. Once again things were not going well with the portrait and I became increasingly irritated with myself. Irritation turned to depression from which only the company of my friends, always ready to help, could lift me. Usually we had dinner in a restaurant and then adjourned to the Pheasantry Club for a last drink. One night when I was saying my farewells there, intent upon a good night's sleep before going to Clarence House next day, a man came to me and told me to keep quiet while his friend was singing. Something snapped in me and I punched him in the chest and bellowed at him to get out of my way. When my friend, Alex, tried to stop me, I flung him under a table. That night I slept like a log but awoke full of sadness and uncertainty. 

Before leaving for Clarence House, I tried in vain to ring Alex and ask his forgiveness. It was a dark sombre day and the light in the 'studio' was very bad. I felt nervous and could not concentrate and that, in turn, must have made Princess Margaret restless. Her face on the canvas appeared to me deformed. Unloading some of my emotions, I told her the sorry tale of the previous evening, and she laughed and said, 'Be careful you don't end up in jail here, too.' Then she looked at the portrait and exclaimed, 'Oh, what's happened to my eyes? You've done something terrible to them! I was mortified and I worked on in silence until the end of that day's sitting when, to my horror, she asked, 'Is it all right for my mother to come to see it now?' There could not have been a worse time, but of course I had to answer, 'Yes'.

Left alone for a few minutes, I sponged off most of that day's work and corrected some passages, working as if in a trance, which end abruptly when the Princess returned, accompanied by her mother. The Queen Mother greeted me with a warm smile, looked at the portrait, and said immediately: 'But it's beautiful, such a good likeness. Really, I'm so moved. Look at me, there are tears in my eyes.' I looked, and it was true. Then I looked at the painting and suddenly it seemed to me, too, that I had at least achieved a good likeness. I was immensely cheered."

To be continued 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.) 

 

Pietro Annigoni: Princess Margaret

"Portrait of Princess Margaret"
by Pietro Annigoni

"I had first seen Princess Margaret in Florence, when she was, I believe, making her first official overseas visit on her own. But it was not until I met her at Buckingham Palace, while painting the Queen, that I began to think seriously that she might sit for me. Then I let it be known in the right quarters that I would like to paint her and eventually a message came back from the Queen Mother that no member of the Royal Family could accept a gift. In reply I suggested that a nominal fee could be paid, and a sum of two hundred guineas was agreed.

At the end of October a room at Clarence House was allotted to me for my studio and I came over from Florence for the first sittings. But almost from the start nothing seemed to go right with the portrait. The principal reason was that, instead of making preliminary drawings, as was my usual practice, I had begun painting direct on to the canvas. The result was that after six sitting, a total of nine hours, I was so dissatisfied with the painting that I destroyed it. When I told the Princess what I had done and that I would have to start all over again, she was very understanding and promised me an extra six sittings if I needed them. I began work again, this time on a drawing, remarking that I had asked all my friends to pray for me. 'I'll pray for you, too, then,' she said with a little touch of mockery. At the end of the sitting, when she looked at the drawing, she commented, 'I see the Almighty has answered our prayers!'

To be continued 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.) 

 

 

Pietro Annigoni: Commissions Rejected

"Portrait of Don Giulio Facibeni"
by Pietro Annigoni

"Inevitably the exhibition of the Queen's portrait and all the publicity accompanying it brought a new avalanche of requests for portraits, more than I could possibly have painted if I lived a hundred years and did nothing else. Today, when I have given up painting commissioned portraits altogether, it is like a nightmare to recall those days. But how revealing they were of the extraordinary ideas many people have about artists. How many people thought themselves so important that I could not possibly refuse them, and how many more thought that I would change my mind if they offered more than my usual fee.

Then there were people, intelligent and famous people, like Clare Boothe Luce and Queen Juliana of Holland, who apparently thought that I could paint them at one sitting. I offered to make a sketch of Mrs. Luce, who was passing through Florence and had only a few hours, but she wanted a painting, and that was that. For the portrait of the Dutch Queen, I was approached by the Netherlands Embassy in London. When it was suggested that I should have one sitting I replied, 'The Queen of England gave me sixteen sittings. Why should the Queen of Holland give only one?' and that, too, was that.  

Other portraits I didn't paint included the blonde American woman who forced her way into my Florence studio and demanded to be painted immediately, the Emperor Haile Selassie, and Margaret, Duchess of Argyll. The unknown American threatened me, 'If you don't do my portrait I'll go to Dali!' I told her to go to the devil for all I cared. The Emperor was a rather longer problem. The request for a portrait of him with his wife, came to me from the Ethiopian Embassy in Rome. My enthusiasm was somewhat diminished when I learned that, instead of wearing the colourful Ethiopian costume I had expected, he wanted to be painted in military uniform. But I agreed to take the commission and offered to go to Addis Ababa for two months to carry it out. Then I heard no more about it. For seven months I wrote a number of letters asking what was happening. They all went unanswered. Then one day I received a telegram brusquely worded like a royal command: You are expected in Addis Ababa on such and such a date . . .  I ignored it.

I was invited by the Duke and Duchess to lunch at their London home. The Duke treated me as though I was asking him for the favour of being permitted to paint his wife. He spoilt my lunch by lecturing me about his wife's beauty and how I should treat this and that feature in the portrait. Later, he wrote several letters to me explaining what he wanted and telling me to remember this and not to forget that. When I could stand no more of this nonsense, I wrote to him and told him not to worry any more about the portrait because I was not going to paint it." 

To be continued 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.) 

 

Pietro Annigoni: Rights to Queen Elizabeth's Portrait

"The subsequent history of the portrait of Queen Elizabeth is public knowledge. It was shown in the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1955 and received an enormous amount of publicity throughout the world. (The painting, which received immense publicity, had a great popular appeal and the attendance throughout the fifteen weeks reached a total of almost 300,000, the highest for over fifty years.*) But there is one persistent fallacy about it that I would like to kill. It did not make a fortune for me. When I agreed to paint it for a fee of two thousand pounds, I fully expected to earn a considerable sum from the subsequent sale of reproductions. Only after I was offered ten thousand pounds for the reproduction rights did I discover that they were not mine to sell. 

Whereas in Italy an artist retains the copyright of any of his works unless he contracts otherwise, in Britain (as I learned too late) the copyright of a commissioned portrait goes to the buyer unless there is a contract to the contrary. When I appealed to the Fishmongers I was given the rights of reproduction outside Britain as a consolation prize. Then, at the end of 1955, they allowed me to buy the British rights. But by that time the enormous initial demand for reproductions had waned and I had already passed up the ten-thousand-pound offer. (Later, when I painted the Duke of Edinburgh, I sign the portrait with a tiny figure of myself carrying a big fish on my back. The fish symbolised the reproduction rights which, that time, I succeeded in keeping for myself.)

The picture of the Queen was used on postage stamps in dozens of countries all over the world, but few paid any fees. For the British stamps I was paid about thirty pounds. For those of Hong Kong, which were particularly good, I received a specimen sheet of stamps. Several countries also used the portrait on their paper month. One or two graciously sent me a sample banknote - overprinted 'Cancelled'! Most gave me no acknowledgement at all." 

To be continued 

*A note by Robert Wraight, collaborator with Annigoni on his autobiography. 

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.)