Anna Karenina

Chapter 9
The old neglected palazzo, with its lofty carved ceilings and frescoes on the
walls, with its floors of mosaic, with its heavy yellow stuff curtains on the
windows, with its vases on pedestals, and its open fireplaces, its carved
doors and gloomy reception rooms, hung with pictures--this palazzo did
much, by its very appearance after they had moved into it, to confirm in
Vronsky the agreeable illusion that he was not so much a Russian country
gentleman, a retired army officer, as an enlightened amateur and patron of
the arts, himself a modest artist who had renounced the world, his
connections, and his ambition for the sake of the woman he loved.
The pose chosen by Vronsky with their removal into the palazzo was
completely successful, and having, through Golenishtchev, made
acquaintance with a few interesting people, for a time he was satisfied. He
painted studies from nature under the guidance of an Italian professor of
painting, and studied medieval Italian life. Medieval Italian life so
fascinated Vronsky that he even wore a hat and flung a cloak over his
shoulder in the medieval style, which, indeed, was extremely becoming to
him.
"Here we live, and know nothing of what's going on," Vronsky said to
Golenishtchev as he came to see him one morning. "Have you seen
Mihailov's picture?" he said, handing him a Russian gazette he had received
that morning, and pointing to an article on a Russian artist, living in the
very same town, and just finishing a picture which had long been talked
about, and had been bought beforehand. The article reproached the
government and the academy for letting so remarkable an artist be left
without encouragement and support.
"I've seen it," answered Golenishtchev. "Of course, he's not without talent,
but it's all in a wrong direction. It's all the Ivanov-Strauss-Renan attitude to
Christ and to religious painting."
"What is the subject of the picture?" asked Anna.
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"Christ before Pilate. Christ is represented as a Jew with all the realism of
the new school."
And the question of the subject of the picture having brought him to one of
his favorite theories, Golenishtchev launched forth into a disquisition on it.
"I can't understand how they can fall into such a gross mistake. Christ
always has His definite embodiment in the art of the great masters. And
therefore, if they want to depict, not God, but a revolutionist or a sage, let
them take from history a Socrates, a Franklin, a Charlotte Corday, but not
Christ. They take the very figure which cannot be taken for their art, and
then..."
"And is it true that this Mihailov is in such poverty?" asked Vronsky,
thinking that, as a Russian Maecenas, it was his duty to assist the artist
regardless of whether the picture were good or bad.
"I should say not. He's a remarkable portrait-painter. Have you ever seen
his portrait of Madame Vassiltchikova? But I believe he doesn't care about
painting any more portraits, and so very likely he is in want. I maintain
that..."
"Couldn't we ask him to paint a portrait of Anna Arkadyevna?" said
Vronsky.
"Why mine?" said Anna. "After yours I don't want another portrait. Better
have one of Annie" (so she called her baby girl). "Here she is," she added,
looking out of the window at the handsome Italian nurse, who was carrying
the child out into the garden, and immediately glancing unnoticed at
Vronsky. The handsome nurse, from whom Vronsky was painting a head
for his picture, was the one hidden grief in Anna's life. He painted with her
as his model, admired her beauty and medievalism, and Anna dared not
confess to herself that she was afraid of becoming jealous of this nurse, and
was for that reason particularly gracious and condescending both to her and
her little son. Vronsky, too, glanced out of the window and into Anna's
eyes, and, turning at once to Golenishtchev, he said:
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"Do you know this Mihailov?"
"I have met him. But he's a queer fish, and quite without breeding. You
know, one of those uncouth new people one's so often coming across
nowadays, One of those free-thinkers you know, who are reared d'emblee
in theories of atheism, scepticism, and materialism. In former days," said
Golenishtchev, not observing, or not willing to observe, that both Anna and
Vronsky wanted to speak, "in former days the free-thinker was a man who
had been brought up in ideas of religion, law, and morality, and only
through conflict and struggle came to free-thought; but now there has
sprung up a new type of born free-thinkers who grow up without even
having heard of principles of morality or of religion, of the existence of
authorities, who grow up directly in ideas of negation in everything, that is
to say, savages. Well, he's of that class. He's the son, it appears, of some
Moscow butler, and has never had any sort of bringing-up. When he got
into the academy and made his reputation he tried, as he's no fool, to
educate himself. And he turned to what seemed to him the very source of
culture--the magazines. In old times, you see, a man who wanted to educate
himself--a Frenchman, for instance--would have set to work to study all the
classics and theologians and tragedians and historiaris and philosophers,
and, you know, all the intellectual work that came in his way. But in our
day he goes straight for the literature of negation, very quickly assimilates
all the extracts of the science of negation, and he's ready. And that's not
all--twenty years ago he would have found in that literature traces of
conflict with authorities, with the creeds of the ages; he would have
perceived from this conflict that there was something else; but now he
comes at once upon a literature in which the old creeds do not even furnish
matter for discussion, but it is stated baldly that there is nothing
else--evolution, natural selection, struggle for existence--and that's all. In
my article I've..."
"I tell you what," said Anna, who had for a long while been exchanging
wary glances with Vronsky, and knew that he was not in the least interested
in the education of this artist, but was simply absorbed by the idea of
assisting him, and ordering a portrait of him; "I tell you what," she said,
resolutely interrupting Golenishtchev, who was still talking away, "let's go
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and see him!"
Golenishtchev recovered his self-possession and readily agreed. But as the
artist lived in a remote suburb, it was decided to take the carriage.
An hour later Anna, with Golenishtchev by her side and Vronsky on the
front seat of the carriage, facing them, drove up to a new ugly house in the
remote suburb. On learning from the porter's wife, who came out to them,
that Mihailov saw visitors at his studio, but that at that moment he was in
his lodging only a couple of steps off, they sent her to him with their cards,
asking permission to see his picture.
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