In this
department, Thorwaldsen is unexceptionably to be admired. The Triumph
of Alexander, originally intended for the frieze of the government
palace at Milan, notwithstanding an occasional poverty, in the
materials of thought, is, as a whole, one of the grandest compositions
in the world; while the delicacy of execution, and poetic feeling, in
the two exquisite pieces of Night and Aurora, leave scarcely a wish
here ungratified. But in statues, Thorwaldsen excels only where the
forms and sentiment admit of uncontrolled imagination, or in which no
immediate recourse can be had to fixed standards of taste, and to the
simple effects of nature. Hence, of all his works, as admitting of
unconfined expression, and grand peculiarity of composition, the
statues of the Apostles, considered in themselves, are the most
excellent. Thorwaldsen, in fine, possesses singular, but in some
respects erratic genius. His ideas of composition are irregular; his
powers of fancy surpass those of execution; his conceptions seem to
lose a portion of their value and freshness in the act of realizement.
As an individual artist, he will command deservedly a high rank among
the names that shall go down to posterity.
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