Observation about the drawing of Mozart’s house
One of our subscribers wrote the following lines regarding the drawing that we published in the
last issue of our Review.
“The author of the article says: The treble clef is frequently repeated there and – something
original – never the bass clef”. It seems that the medium’s eyes did not see all the details of the
rich drawing executed by his hand, since a musician assured us that it is easy to recognize the
bass clef direct and inverted in the decoration of the construction, whose central part shows the
violin bow as in the extension of the decoration, to the left of the theorbo’s tip. In the opinion of
the same musician the old form of the alto clef also appears near the slabs of the stairs, on the
right hand side.”
OBSERVATION: We insert this observation with great satisfaction as it demonstrates how
foreign the medium was to the execution of the drawing. By examining the details of the
indicated parts one can effectively recognize the bass and alto clefs with which the author had
inadvertently decorated his drawing. When we see him working we easily notice the absence of
any premeditated conception and will. His hand, dragged by an occult power, gives the pencil
or chisels the most irregular motion and, at the same time, the most contrary to the elementary
precepts of art since it moves incessantly, with an incredible speed, from an end to the other of
the board, unstoppable and returning to the same point a hundred times. At a first glance this
results into an incoherent piece of work, only understandable when it is finished.
Such an original development is not peculiar to Mr. Sardou. We have seen all drawing mediums
proceeding in the same way. We know a lady who is a skillful painter that teaches drawing skills
and who is also a drawing medium. When she draws like a medium she works regardless of her
own will, against all rules and by a process that would be impossible to follow when working under
her own inspiration in a normal state. Her students, she said, would laugh if she taught them by the
way of the spirits.
ALLAN KARDEC
