Volume 45, Number 10 · June 11, 1998
The Genius of Parma
By Ingrid D. Rowland
Correggio
by David Ekserdjian
Yale University Press, 334 pp., $65.00
Correggio's Frescoes in Parma Cathedral
by Carolyn Smyth
Princeton University Press, 230 pp., $75.00
The cover of David Ekserdjian's new monograph on the Italian painter Antonio Allegri da Correggio (?1489- 1534) shows a young woman being ravished by a cloud. Against the shimmer of her pale flesh, the slate-gray nimbus takes distinct form at only a few points, in a caressing hand, in enough of forehead, eyes, nose, and hinted lips to form the plausible kiss of a shadowy swain. Ostensibly we see that divine philanderer, Jupiter, seducing a Greek girl named Io, but with Correggio there is always a great deal more to the story; he was one of those artists who, like Bernini after him, could disclose sublime ideas in portrayals of physical ecstasy.
Review, 5095 words
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