I am Venus
Page 10
Pacheco sighed and rested his head in his hands. “All right,” he grumbled, “I’ll try.”
“Someone of her own class.”
“Of course. Lidia’s a pretty little thing, and I can give her a small dowry. It shouldn’t be that hard to find her a husband.”
“Well, please make sure you don’t forget, father.”
Every day for weeks, Don Antonio Benazar, private physician to the count-duke of Olivares, visited Velázquez with compounds and elixirs. He made compresses of camphor and eucalyptus to open the chest. He prescribed teas of dandelion leaves to clean the blood. Lidia and the other maids wailed and prayed the rosary. How could God allow this to happen to their dear Velázquez? But not everyone was wailing. Rumor had it that the count-duke had petitioned Pope Urban VIII for an ecclesiastical benefice of three hundred ducats a year for the painter, and the pope had granted it. When the other Court painters heard, they were furious. Vicente Carducho and Eugenio Cajés hadn’t been paid for months, and Angelo Nardi had been appointed without any salary at all. To Velázquez’s rivals, it seemed only fair that a serious affliction should befall an artist who was paid far more than they for doing the same work.
Fonseca, who made it his business to know everything that went on at Court, especially as concerned his compatriot Velázquez, kept his ears open. Snippets of conversations floated through the royal atelier and over the din at Court functions. You could gather essential tidbits during a supper, before the theater, after the bullfights, or even during a hunt. Everywhere, Velázquez’s name was spoken in whispers, the “th” of the second and third syllables sounding like a breeze through leaves: Veláthqueth, Veláthqueth, Veláthqueth.
“He paints directly from nature like that Italian barbarian Caravaggio!”
“He shuns the copybooks for real life!”
“He’s nothing but a portraitist, a painter of heads! He can’t paint a story.”
“He’s godless! He hardly finds inspiration in the bible …”
“Or in Our Holy Mother Mary!”
“And he’s the king’s pet, with those stipends and benefices! And his big house on Calle de Convalescientes!”
“They say there’s no money in the royal treasury, but they always find money for him, for Veláthqueth!”
“Now that he’s good and sick, let the Devil take him!”
“The Devil take him!”
Fonseca knew he had to act. Petty gossip would not only destroy the king’s favorite, it would sap the energy of the other royal painters and diminish the quality of the art produced at Court. The honor of the Crown depended on Spain’s ability to produce great artwork, not just her ability to combat Protestants in the north and subdue Indians in the colonies. He had to devise a plan to establish an absolute, unassailable hierarchy among the Court painters. It was the only way to put an end to this jealousy, this backbiting and squabbling. If everything went right, Velázquez would come out on top, and that would be the end of it. But he couldn’t do it alone—he needed help.
Lidia was sweeping leaves off the walkway when Arabela signaled to her to come into the house. “I’m busy!” snapped Lidia. “If I don’t finish this, by tomorrow you won’t be able to find a path across the garden!”
The maid had been ill-tempered of late, observed Arabela. She must suspect that something was brewing. Everyone had heard Doña Juana’s muffled voice through the thick library doors. “Lidia … see to it … attend to it … someone of her own social class …” Like Lidia herself, Arabela assumed that Doña Juana wanted to marry the girl off to some stable boy. But Lidia was going to fight it tooth and nail and not give in. She had no wish to leave the service of Don Francisco.
“You’re wanted in the library.”
Lidia didn’t budge. “I’m too sweaty and messy to go into the library. I’ve been sweeping and cleaning all morning.”
Arabela was a small woman, but she was old enough to be Lidia’s mother. Her son was older than Lidia and she’d nursed the lady of the house with her own breasts. She was not about to take any guff from a cheeky housemaid, a nobody. She marched over to the girl and stood in front of her.
“When the master calls, you obey,” she growled.
“I’ll go in a minute.”
Arabela kicked over the pile of leaves and debris. “You’ll go now!” She grabbed the broom from Lidia’s hands.
The color was rising in the girl’s cheeks. She clutched the edge of her apron. Her knuckles were white. Her jaw was quivering.
“Go!” hissed Arabela.
Lidia grabbed back the broom, then threw it down and marched into the kitchen. She leaned over a basin and splashed water on her face and wiped it with a rag. Finally, she trudged back through the courtyard and into the house. She stood in front of the library door a while, as if trying to muster the courage to knock.
Arabela waited out of sight in an alcove until Lidia entered, then tiptoed into the hallway and strained to hear what was taking place behind the library door. But she could hear nothing.
She expected a shriek or a sob. She expected Lidia to emerge wailing and pawing the ground. Instead, she came out of the library with a confident smile. Chin raised, eyes front, she sashayed past Arabela and disappeared into the yard.
That night, Fonseca was relaxing in front of the fireplace, a glass of brandy in his hand. He sniffed the liquor with his pointy nose, then slouched back in his chair. He smiled. Things were going according to plan. The count-duke had endorsed his idea of an artistic competition, and they had selected February of the following year as the date. The king himself had chosen the subject: Felipe III’s expulsion of the Moriscos. It was a glorious theme intended to celebrate the Habsburgs as champions of the faith, and Fonseca couldn’t be happier. Now Velázquez would be able to demonstrate that he was perfectly capable of producing a narrative painting, that he wasn’t a mere portraitist. The winning canvas would be hung in the salón nuevo of the Alcázar, a place of honor that would give the young man constant exposure.
Of course, Velázquez still had to win, and there could be no slipups. Because the whole purpose of the competition was to enable his fellow Sevillano to crush his rivals, Fonseca couldn’t take any chances. With impartial judges, Velázquez’s victory was not assured. Only a few months earlier Cardinal Francesco Barberini, a highly respected connoisseur of art who was visiting the Court, had called Velázquez’s work melancholy and severe. Well, thought Fonseca, what could you expect from an Italian? They were all daft from the intense sunlight. Overfed and oversexed. Barberini wanted rich colors. He wanted bright reds and oranges! No, thought Fonseca, the competition couldn’t be left in the hands of the likes of Barberini.
Fonseca picked up a quill and scribbled a note to Olivares, then rang for a servant. The next afternoon he and the count-duke sat down without secretaries or assistants to work out a secret strategy.
The count-duke puffed on his pipe and took a sip of chocolate, the favorite drink of aristocrats. “We need friendly judges,” he mused.
“My thoughts exactly,” murmured the royal chaplain. “Not de Fabrizzi. He’s too honest.”
“And not Severino, either. He’s too old-fashioned.”
“You’re right. We need someone who appreciates the modern style, someone who isn’t mired in the old copybooks.”
“Someone who values strong characters drawn from life.”
“Friar Maino?”
“Yes, Maino—of course!”
“And what about Crescenzi?”
“Perfect!”
Both Maino and Giovanni Battista Crescenzi were admirers of Caravaggio. Maino respected Caravaggio’s close imitation of nature, as well as his sense of the dramatic, which he achieved through radical shifts from light to dark. Maino’s use of chiaroscuro and vibrant color showed him to be a true disciple of the master. He had lived in Italy and was up on the latest trends. Of late he painted little, which was an advantage. He wasn’t in competition with Velázquez and so could proba
bly be persuaded to advance the Sevillano’s career.
Crescenzi was even more reliable. He was an Italian who liked the modern style, but he painted mostly flowers, not Madonnas or portraits. In reality, he was more an architect or a designer than a painter. He had adorned many papal buildings, and in Madrid he had helped decorate the Pantheon of the Kings in El Escorial. The king loved him, and Crecenzi was eager to stay in his good graces. If that meant tipping the scales in favor of Don Felipe’s favorite portraitist, Fonseca was confident that Crescenzi would make the right choice.
Within a week, both artists had agreed to serve as judges for the royal painting competition. With this accomplished, Fonseca turned to Velázquez, whose health was slowly improving. He visited him daily, insisting with great urgency that to win this competition, the artist needed accomplish something spectacular. If he didn’t, everyone would suspect the worst, and instead of silencing Velázquez’s rivals, the competition would only provide them with ammunition against him.
I only saw Velázquez’s painting once, and very briefly, so my memory of it is vague. I recall a regal figure with an outstretched arm, and hordes of Moriscos in turbans and marlotas trudging out of Spain toward the golden picture frame. Velázquez told me that the night before the judging, he couldn’t sleep, couldn’t even close his eyes. Fonseca slept like a dead man, certain that his protégé would take home the prize, but Velázquez paced the floor until the first hints of sunrise.
“Things are never as they seem,” he told me years later, when I asked him why he had been so nervous. “You think people are one way, and they turn out to be another. You think they’ll do one thing, and they do something completely different. You see masks. You see mirrors. You never see the truth.”
By the time he told me this, he was an old man. He knew that behind the veneer of propriety and decorum that reigned at Court, everything was rotten to the core—rotten, putrid, and decomposing.
I can remember one other detail about Velázquez’s painting. Among the masses of Moriscos exiting Spain, there were two familiar faces. Faces I never expected to see in The Expulsion of the Moriscos—women’s faces. One belonged to Lidia. The other belonged to a woman whom I had often seen in Court, although I didn’t find out her name until much later. It was Constanza.
If Juana had been a cat, her tail would have been twitching.
“How could you? What were you thinking?” She emitted a low growl, distinctly feline.
“He’s the perfect match, Juana. A carpenter, like Our Lord Jesus Christ.” The tone of Pacheco’s voice made it clear he had no intention of discussing the matter further.
“That’s not the point and you know it!”
“Juana! What’s gotten into you? In God’s name, how dare you speak to me in that tone of voice? I am your father!”
Juana crossed her arms and stared right into his eyes. “You know what I’m talking about. The Gómez boy is an apprentice to Emilio Fuentes Toledo.”
“Exactly. The master carpenter at the Alcázar.”
“And you thought I would approve of Lidia marrying a member of the palace staff?”
“A member of the palace staff? He’s an apprentice carpenter, Juana, not the sumiller mayor!”
“An apprentice carpenter at the palace, father. At the palace!”
“What difference does it make?” Pacheco lowered his gaze. “Oh, Juana, don’t tell me you’re afraid that Lidia …”
“Now Lidia is at the Alcázar night and day … washing laundry, emptying chamber pots, dusting furniture … I don’t know … whatever they give her to do …”
“And you think she’ll find her way into Velázquez’s studio.”
“I’m sure she already has! Maybe they’ve assigned her to some paramour of the king who thinks it’s amusing to help chambermaids wriggle their way into the beds of married men. Everyone knows Don Felipe’s Court is a crucifix-adorned brothel.”
“Juana! Control yourself. You’re speaking about our king, God’s instrument on Earth.”
“Our most Catholic king, who weeps like a magdalene during mass and then screws himself blind in a different bed every night! Don’t play dumb, father. Everyone in Madrid knows about the king’s escapades.”
This was true, of course. Pacheco had to have known what every scullery maid and chandler in Madrid knew: that our most Catholic King Felipe IV had watered more flowers than any gardener. Pacheco pretended to study some sketches on his desk while he tried to decide what to say. He could have ordered Juana out of his office. He could have bared his teeth and lunged. Instead he said calmly, “I wouldn’t worry about it, daughter. Lidia has been married for a month already. I imagine she’ll be with child before long.”
Juana felt hot tears on her lids. Her nose quivered and went runny, and her temples throbbed as though a horse had kicked her in the head. She squinted and turned away so that her father wouldn’t see her cry. Back in her estrado she thought long and hard. In order to protect what was hers—her honor, her self-esteem, her family—she would have to take risks. She would have to work her way into the inner recesses of the Alcázar. The price of failure would be terrible, but Juana was willing to take a chance.
The king himself announced the winner of the competition on February 18, 1627. No one was surprised. All the contestants knew the cards were stacked in favor of Velázquez. Carducho, Cajés, and Nardi had all created respectable paintings, but they had no illusions. Only Velázquez thought the judges might actually render a fair verdict, but in the end, whether they did or not remains their secret. At any rate, everything worked out just as Fonseca had planned. Velázquez was declared winner and crowned with laurels, while the others were fed myrrh. The king was ecstatic because his favorite had proven himself. By then, Barberini had long since left Madrid, so there was no one to contradict the judges.
Rewards soon followed. Less than a month later, Velázquez was named usher of the privy chamber, his first appointment to the royal household. It was a minor assignment, but for a man who wanted desperately to advance in the royal hierarchy, it was a crucial first step. As a mere painter, Velázquez was barred from advancement, but as an usher he could aspire to more grandiose titles in the future. And he could now draw a salary from the budget of the royal household, more substantial and secure than that of the Committee of Works, which was normally tasked with paying artisans. Given his brilliant horizons, Juana knew it was the wrong time to bring up Lidia, so instead, she cooed and smiled and fawned over her husband.
But Velázquez hardly noticed his wife’s hyperbolic displays of affection, her extravagant praise, her brandied flan (prepared by the cook, but ordered by the lady of the house), or her availability in bed. His attention was elsewhere—on the fascinating newcomer to the Court: Peter Paul Rubens.
Velázquez had been writing to Rubens for some time about an engraved portrait of Olivares the great Flemish painter was preparing. Velázquez had supplied the model, but Rubens didn’t care for it and changed it radically. Velázquez bit the bullet and took the great master’s criticisms in stride. Criticism, after all, was a thousand times better than indifference. The fact that Rubens paid any attention to him at all was a compliment.
Anyway, Velázquez liked Rubens and knew that he could learn from him, for the old Flem was exactly the kind of courtier-artist he aspired to be. Rubens was the epitome of sophistication—diplomat, statesman, intellectual. He had come to Madrid to complete the groundwork for a peace treaty with England, but he had not forgotten that the Spanish king was an art lover and had brought many of his paintings with him. A few months later a series of exuberant tapestries for the royal Convent of the Descalzas Reales arrived. Velázquez studied the new works. In his style, Rubens was more Italian than Flemish. His biblical and mythological paintings were replete with luxurious bosoms and cheerfully displayed buttocks. Studying the Flemish painter’s richly sensual work, Velázquez recalled Barberini’s criticisms of his own art: melancholy, drab, lacking in color.
In comparison with his own austere portraits, Rubens’ were vibrant and plastic. The Flemish master placed the monarch in luxurious architectural settings and lush landscapes. Velázquez saw that next to the master’s, his own portraits were drearily unsophisticated. King Felipe noticed it, too, and replaced Velázquez’s equestrian portrait in the new gallery of the Alcázar with one by Rubens.
One day the Flem invited Velázquez to spend a few days with him at the Escorial. “Hijo,” he said, as they wandered around one of the upstairs galleries, “you are a young man of great potential.”
Velázquez smiled at Rubens’s efforts to speak Spanish. “Thank you, Maestro.”
“I think we can both learn important lessons from the great Titian, don’t you?”
Velázquez knew what Rubens was doing. The old master didn’t want to embarrass or lecture the younger man, so instead, he pretended they were both taking lessons from Titian. They walked around the gallery, commenting on the paintings—on the sense of movement produced by a twist of the hand or a creeping shadow, on the element of surprise created by an unexpected grouping.
Over the next few weeks Rubens did a series of copies of works by Titian and as he painted, he commented on the originals. Velázquez came to better understand Titian’s use of light and color and his manipulation of body position. As he walked through the galleries with Rubens at his side, he was overcome by a sense of exuberance, but also by a familiar disquiet. The moon came to mind, the intense white moon that one night in Seville had threatened to fall out of the sky and come crashing down on his head. He was suffocating in Madrid. There was nothing more for him to learn here. In order to grow as an artist, he had to go to Italy. But how could he walk away from his position at Court and cross the Mediterranean? And yet he knew he had to find a way because when he closed his eyes and dreamed, the embrace that beckoned to him was not a woman’s—not Lidia’s or Constanza’s or even Juana’s—but the sumptuous, sensuous embrace of the Italy of his imagination.