[D'après NOLDUS 2008, p. 37-38:] 10 Vous pouvez faire de tout : hachurer et laver selon ce que vous inspire votre nature, mais toujours avec ardeur. En copiant il faut se perfectionner dans le maniement du Charbon et de la Craie sur du Papier gris-cendre {Dessiner sur du Papier teinté facilite les rehauts et les estompés.} ou bleu-pâle, afin de produire des éminences et des enfoncements ; mais n’acceptez jamais que les sombres et les clairs se jouxtent : {Il ne faut pas laisser se voisiner un rehaut et un estompé.} laissez un peu de la couleur de fond visible entre les deux.

[D'après NOLDUS 2008, p. 39-40:] 17 […] Toutefois, en copiant le modèle il vous faut bien veiller à le mettre à sa bonne distance. {Il ne faut pas que le modèle, c’est-à-dire le nu qu’on souhaite contrefaire, soit trop proche.} De nombreux Peintres en effet se sont là fourvoyés. Il ne faut l’installer ni trop haut, ni trop bas ni trop près. Certains utilisent des quadrillés : des cadres tendus de fils croisés pour bannir les erreurs de leur travail. 18 Il s’agit du Velum que j’omets dans le chapitres sur l’ordonnance bien que je veuille laisser libre chacun de l’utiliser, comme d’autres outils. {Ce velum est un cadre tendu de fils en carrés, qu’on trace aussi sur le papier afin de bien placer son sujet qu’on voit à travers le velum.} Peu importe en effet comment on rend plaisante son œuvre et comment on l’amène à la bonne mesure. Il est aussi très utile pour le dessinateur de bien savoir (par l’étude de morts écorchés) où commencent les Muscles et ou ceux-ci s’arrêtent.

[Suggested translation, Marije Osnabrugge:] When the Painters are needed to portray some beautiful and lovely faces, in which one then finds some sort of flaw, says Plutarchus {…}, we then tend to request for this, that they do not neglect that deformed hardness immediately, but neither express it too readily, since it is certain that the Image that is being made that way, would appear either uneven [NDR: not resembling the sitter] or ugly.

PLUTARCHOS

The verb conterfeyten (to portray) is used to describe the specific act of portraying someone’s face. Junius cites Plutarchus, who stated that one should not neglect flaws in the face, nor should these elements be emphasized. If the flaws are too clearly present, the image would be perceived as not resembling the sitter (ongelijk) or ugly (lelijk). [MO]

[Suggested translation, Marije Osnabrugge:] That which resembles something else, he says {…}, necessarily has to have shortcomings and have more gracefulness than the things whose similitude it appears to bear. Because like the things that we take as our example, have nature itself and the true power in them; as such all sorts of imitations, on the other hand, only tend to be portrayed and follow the situation of other things

QUINTILIANUS

[proposition de traduction, Léonard Pouy:] [ndr: Semiramis] (comme Diodore de Sicile le relate à son propos dans le livre 2, chap. 8) ne possédait pas simplement toutes sortes de bêtes imitées en diverses couleurs, comme elles apparaissent dans la nature, mais surtout une très belle peinture de chasse animale dans laquelle elle figurait à dos de cheval, touchant un léopard de sa flèche. Son mari Ninus y était également portraituré, abattant un lion de sa lance. Ainsi la grande perfection de notre art avait donc déjà condamnée au registre de l’oubli la manière monochrome propre à Dinias en raison d’un tel accomplissement.

DINIAS
SICULUS, Diodorus

[suggested translation, Marije Osnabrugge:] As such there are many other cases, in which the Painter should behave himself carefully, if he wants to regain people’s favor. {General remarks to make oneself loved.} In general People always want to be more beautiful than they really are; as everyone likes to please oneself: Therefore in Portraying, the Painter should acquire the habit of flattering fittingly, in a way that is more natural than ostentatious; choosing the posture well in a good pose, beautiful and without unpleasant shadows in the Face, making it truly resemble: because if someone has beauty, he would be glad to see it in his Painting.

[suggested translation, Marije Osnabrugge:] Now when a steady Draughtsman has planted the illustration of these Facial Categories in some way in his memory; (How one should prepare oneself to paint Faces or Portraits after his imagination, that is, from the Mind after Life.} And he will find the opportunity to depict, that is to portray, someone who he has only seen once, as such he has to remember and reproduce in a lively manner, all that comes to his mind about the Expression and Features of the proposed Man, by means of a powerful Imagination; And deliver this to the Expression of some or other Face, or Model; And determine which type or Model of the general illustration coincides best with his Thought, rather stylized and forced, or with the likeness of his mental Image. Then one has to move to the specific feature of the forehead, Nose or Mouth and Chin, and pay attention to which degree of expression the Examples that he has seen have a resemblance with that of the imagined Expression. By doing this one will certainly become aware, that one possesses a means to do this according to a certain Rule. It is written about the Italian Painter Domenico Ghirlandaio that he had mastered the Physiognomy so well, that through Imagination he never missed to notice a clear resemblance, while making a Portrait. In which a certain Francesco Mazzoli [ndr: Parmigianino] also was a fellow craftsman. Other Minds have been able to do it based on the description of others: Such that they made Portraits and Scenes of People who had long been deceased; and whom they had never seen with their own Eyes.

GHIRLANDAIO, Domenico
IL PARMIGIANINO (Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola)

technical note: There is a mistake in the pdf, these are pages 230 and 223 of the pdf. [MO]