Tímarit Þjóðræknisfélags Íslendinga - 01.01.1963, Page 121

ALBERT THORVALDSEN, SCULPTOR
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crowns on his daughter and she
took her mother to live with her.
Thorvaldsen’s friends were deeply
grieved over this unorthodox love
affair, but not so much because of
moral scruples, as was the case in
Rembrandt’s unhappy liaison with
Hendrickje Stoffels, who was of-
fically denounced from every pulpit
by a narrow Calvinistic community,
with an avalanche of abuse breaking
°ver the poor artist’s head. No! But
they felt that Anna Maria Magnani
was most unsuitable as a wife or
companion of our sensitive, dreamy
artist; and they were right. She was
a child of passion and had a pro-
pensity for violence. It is said that
she threatened the estimable Miss
MacKenzie with a jewelled stiletto,
when Thorvaldsen was betrothed to
that lady. Anna was, moreover,
lacking in perception and the pro-
tective warmth that an artist needs
to shield him from the vicissitudes
and irritants of everyday life. She
Was not, like Chopin’s George Sand
(Madame Dudevant) “the b 1 a c k
widow spider, who destroyed her
lovers”, but in every way she was
°t a temperament unsuited to the
gentle, sensitive artist’s nature. But
they loved each other, and he cher-
ished her as the mother of his chil-
dren.
It was not through Anna Maria’s
^oachinations that Thorvaldsen’s en-
Sagement to Miss MacKenzie was
broken; it is doubtful if he was very
^auch attracted to her, although he
was grateful to her because she had
been very good to him,—had nursed
bim through a serious illness, and
she was a good woman, though plain
in appearance, and always very
somberly dressed in grey. Some of
his friends, who were on the other
side of the fence called her the “grey
bat”. But even they were anxious
to break up the affair with Anna
Maria, and knew that if he married
Frances he would be “in good
hands”. But at this time another
woman fell desperately in love with
Thorvaldsen. Perhaps he would have
married the beautiful and accom-
plished Fanny Caspers, but he was
by now almost fifty years old and
so enwrapped in his art that he
could not bring himself to take such
an irrevocable step. Fanny went
sadly back to Vienna, from whence
she wrote him many letters full of
her love and devotion.
When Thorvaldsen, in 1837, de-
cided to give all his art colections
to Copenhagen, Denmark sent their
warship “Rota” to Rome to bring
back the sculptor, and his effects.
His entry into Copenhagen in Sep-
tember, 1839, was even more tri-
umphant t h a n Alexander’s into
Babylon, which he had depicted so
masterfully in the Quirinal frieze.
No king or emperor has ever receiv-
ed such a tumultuous welcome as
Thorvaldsen when he finally ar-
rived back in his native land! As
he stood on deck coming towards
the harbour he could see the whole
sky emblazoned in fantastic fire-
works. There was such a crush of
people along the wharf and on all
ajacent streets that the gendarmes
had their hands full keeping back
the throng, when the ship came
along the landing pier. Hundreds
of small craft came out to meet the