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diff --git a/29532.txt b/29532.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b77da55 --- /dev/null +++ b/29532.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11648 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Six Centuries of Painting, by Randall Davies + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Six Centuries of Painting + +Author: Randall Davies + +Release Date: July 28, 2009 [EBook #29532] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIX CENTURIES OF PAINTING *** + + + + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Chuck Greif and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +SIX CENTURIES OF PAINTING + +[Illustration; VITTORE PISANO + +(CALLED PISANELLO) + +ST ANTHONY AND ST GEORGE + +_National Gallery, London_] + + + + +SIX CENTURIES OF + +PAINTING + +BY + +RANDALL DAVIES + +[Illustration] + +LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK + +67 LONG ACRE, W.C., AND EDINBURGH + + + + +CONTENTS + + +TUSCAN SCHOOLS-- PAGE + +I. GIOVANNI CIMABUE 1 + +II. GIOTTO DI BONDONE 10 + +III. THE EARLIER QUATTROCENTISTS 18 + +IV. THE LATER QUATTROCENTISTS 26 + +V. LEONARDO DA VINCI 33 + +VI. MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI 40 + +VII. RAFFAELLO DI SANTI 47 + + +VENETIAN SCHOOLS-- + +I. THE VIVARINI AND BELLINI 59 + +II. TIZIANO VECELLIO 78 + +III. PAOLO VERONESE AND IL TINTORETTO 99 + + +SPANISH SCHOOL 109 + + +FLEMISH SCHOOL-- + +I. HUBERT AND JAN VAN EYCK 121 + +II. PETER PAUL RUBENS 143 + +III. THE PUPILS OF RUBENS 157 + + +DUTCH SCHOOL-- + +I. FRANS HALS 165 + +II. REMBRANDT VAN RYN 171 + +III. PAINTERS OF _GENRE_ 183 + +IV. PAINTERS OF ANIMALS 191 + +V. PAINTERS OF LANDSCAPE 202 + + +GERMAN SCHOOLS 211 + + +FRENCH SCHOOL-- + +I. THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 225 + +II. THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 235 + + +THE ENGLISH SCHOOL-- + +I. THE EARLY PORTRAIT PAINTERS 251 + +II. WILLIAM HOGARTH 258 + +III. SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS AND THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH 267 + +IV. THE CLOSE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 295 + + +THE NINETEENTH CENTURY-- + +I. THE SPIRIT OF REVOLT 305 + +II. EUGENE DELACROIX 309 + +III. RUSKIN AGAINST THE PHILISTINES 313 + +IV. MANET AND WHISTLER AGAINST THE WORLD 324 + +V. THE ROYAL ACADEMY 329 + + +INDEX 335 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + +VITTORE PISANO (called PISANELLO)--St Anthony +and St George _Frontispiece_ +National Gallery, London + +PLATE FACING PAGE + +I. FILIPPO LIPPI--The Annunciation 22 +National Gallery, London + +II. SANDRO BOTTICELLI(?)--The Virgin and Child 26 + +National Gallery, London + +III. SANDRO BOTTICELLI--Portrait of a Young Man 28 +National Gallery, London + +IV. SANDRO BOTTICELLI--The Nativity 32 +National Gallery, London + +V. LEONARDO DA VINCI--The Virgin of the Rocks 36 +National Gallery, London + +VI. PIETRO PERUGINO--Central Portion of Altar-Piece 50 +National Gallery, London + +VII. RAPHAEL--The Ansidei Madonna 52 +National Gallery, London + +VIII. RAPHAEL--La Belle Jardiniere 52 +Louvre, Paris + +IX. RAPHAEL--Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione 56 +Louvre, Paris + +X. CORREGGIO--Mercury, Cupid, and Venus 58 +National Gallery, London + +XI. ANDREA MANTEGNA--The Madonna della Vittoria 68 +Louvre, Paris + +XII. GIOVANNI BELLINI--The Doge Loredano 72 +National Gallery, London + +XIII. GIORGIONE--Venetian Pastoral 78 +Louvre, Paris + +XIV. TITIAN--Portrait said to be of Ariosto 84 +National Gallery, London + +XV. TITIAN--The Holy Family 86 +National Gallery, London + +XVI. TITIAN--The Entombment 88 +Louvre, Paris + +XVII. TINTORETTO--St George and the Dragon 102 +National Gallery, London + +XVIII. VELAZQUEZ--The Infante Philip Prosper 112 +Imperial Gallery, Vienna + +XIX. VELAZQUEZ--The Rokeby Venus 118 +National Gallery, London + +XX. MURILLO--A Boy Drinking 120 +National Gallery, London + +XXI. JAN VAN EYCK--Jan Arnolfini and His Wife 128 +National Gallery, London + +XXII. JAN VAN EYCK--Portrait of the Painter's Wife 132 +Town Gallery, Bruges + +XXIII. JAN MABUSE--Portrait of Jean Carondelet 136 +Louvre, Paris + +XXIV. SIR PETER PAUL RUBENS--Portrait of Helene Fourment, +the Artist's Second Wife, and two of Her Children 150 +Louvre, Paris + +XXV. FRANS HALS--Portrait of a Lady 168 +Louvre, Paris + +XXVI. REMBRANDT--Portrait of Hendrickje Stoffels 176 +Louvre, Paris + +XXVII. REMBRANDT--Portrait of an Old Lady 182 +National Gallery, London + +XXVIII. TERBORCH--The Concert 186 +Louvre, Paris + +XXIX. GABRIEL METSU--The Music Lesson 188 +National Gallery, London + +XXX. PIETER DE HOOCH--Interior of a Dutch House 190 +National Gallery, London + +XXXI. JAN VERMEER--The Lace Maker 192 +Louvre, Paris + +XXXII. "THE MASTER OF ST BARTHOLOMEW"--Two Saints 212 +National Gallery, London + +XXXIII. HANS HOLBEIN--Portrait of Christina, Duchess of +Milan 224 +National Gallery, London + +XXXIV. ANTOINE WATTEAU--L'Indifferent 236 +Louvre, Paris + +XXXV. JEAN-BAPTISTE GREUZE--The Broken Pitcher 244 +Louvre, Paris + +XXXVI. JEAN HONORE FRAGONARD--L'Etude 248 +Louvre, Paris + +XXXVII. HANS HOLBEIN--Anne of Cleves 256 +Louvre, Paris + +XXXVIII. WILLIAM HOGARTH--The Shrimp Girl 260 +National Gallery, London + +XXXIX. SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS--Lady Cockburn and Her Children 274 +National Gallery, London + +XL. SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS--The Age of Innocence 284 +National Gallery, London + +XLI. THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH--The Market Cart 290 +National Gallery, London + +XLII. GEORGE ROMNEY--The Parson's Daughter 298 +National Gallery, London + +XLIII. GEORGE ROMNEY--Mrs Robinson--"Perdita" 300 +Hertford House, London + +XLIV. JACQUES LOUIS DAVID--Portrait of Mme. Recamier 306 +Louvre, Paris + +XLV. EUGENE DELACROIX--Dante and Virgil 310 +Louvre, Paris + +XLVI. JOHN CONSTABLE--The Hay Wain 312 +National Gallery, London + +XLVII. J. M. W. TURNER--Crossing the Brook 316 +National Gallery of British Art, London + +XLVIII. EDOUARD MANET--Olympia 326 +Louvre, Paris + +XLIX. J. M. WHISTLER--Lillie in Our Alley 328 +In the possession of John J. Cowan, Esq. + + + + +_INTRODUCTORY_ + + +So far as it concerns pictures painted upon panel or canvas in tempera +or oils, the history of painting begins with Cimabue, who worked in +Florence during the latter half of the thirteenth century. That the art +was practised in much earlier times may readily be admitted, and the +life-like portraits in the vestibule at the National Gallery taken from +Greek tombs of the second or third century are sufficient proofs of it; +but for the origin of painting as we are now generally accustomed to +understand the term we need go no further back than to Cimabue and his +contemporaries, from whose time the art has uninterruptedly developed +throughout Europe until the present day. + +Oddly enough it is to the Christian Church, whose early fathers put +their heaviest ban upon all forms of art, that this development is +almost wholly due. The reaction against paganism began to die out when +the Christian religion was more firmly established, and representations +of Christ and the Saints executed in mosaic became more and more to be +regarded as a necessary, or at any rate a regular embellishment of the +numerous churches which were built. For these mosaics panel paintings +began in time to be substituted; but it was long before any of the human +feeling of art was to be found in them. The influence of S. Francis of +Assisi was needed to prepare the way, and it was only towards the close +of the thirteenth century that the breath of life began to be infused +into these conventional representations, and painting became a living +art. + +As it had begun in Italy, under the auspices of the Church, so it +chiefly developed in that country; at first in Florence and Siena, later +in Rome, whither its greatest masters were summoned by the Pope, and in +Venice, where, farther from the ecclesiastical influence, it flourished +more exuberantly, and so became more capable of being transplanted to +other countries. In Germany, however, and the Low Countries it had +appeared early enough to be considered almost as an independent growth, +though not till considerably later were the northern schools capable of +sustaining the reputation given them by the Van Eycks and Roger Van der +Weyden. + +But for the effects of the Renaissance in Italy in the fifteenth century +it is questionable whether painting would ever have spread as it did in +the sixteenth and seventeenth to Spain and France. But by the close of +the fifteenth century such enormous progress had been made by the +Italian painters towards the realisation of human action and emotion in +pictures, that from being merely an accessory of religious +establishments, painting had become as much a part of the recognised +means of intellectual enjoyment of everyday life as music, sculpture, or +even the refinements of food and clothing. + +Portraiture, in particular, had gradually advanced to a foremost place +in painting. Originally it was used exclusively for memorials of the +dead--as we have seen in the case of the paintings from the Greek +tombs--and on coins and medals. But gradually the practice arose, as +painters became more skilful in representing the appearance of the +model, of introducing the features and figures of actual personages into +religious pictures, in the character of "donors," and as these increased +in importance, the sacred personages were gradually relegated to the +background, and ultimately dispensed with altogether. At the beginning +of the sixteenth century we find Hans Holbein (as an example) +recommended by Erasmus to Sir Thomas More as a portrait painter who +wished to try his fortunes in England; and during the rest of his life +painting practically nothing but portraits. + +By the end of the sixteenth century, if not earlier, painting had become +almost as much a business as an art, not only in Italy but in most other +countries in Europe, and was established in each country more or less +independently. So that making every allowance for the various foreign +influences that affected each different country, it is convenient to +trace the development of painting in each country separately, and we +arrange our chapters accordingly under the titles of Tuscan and Venetian +(the two main divisions of Italian painting), Spanish, Flemish, Dutch, +German, French, and British Schools. In each country, as might be +expected--and especially in Italy--there are subdivisions; but, broadly +speaking, the lover of pictures will be quite well enough equipped for +the enjoyment of them if he is able to recognise their country, and +roughly their period, without troubling about the particular district or +personal influence of their origin. + +For while it is undoubtedly true that the more one knows about the +history of painting in general the greater will be the appreciation of +the various excellences which tend to perfection, it is absolutely +ridiculous to suppose that only the learned in such matters are capable +of deriving enjoyment from a beautiful picture, or of expressing an +opinion upon it. In the first place, the picture is intended for the +public, and the public have therefore the best right to say whether it +pleases them or not--and why. And it may be noted as a positive fact +that whenever the public, in any country, have a free choice in matters +of art, that choice generally turns out to be right, and is ultimately +endorsed by the best critics. Most of the vulgar art to be found in +advertisements and the illustrated papers is put there by ignorant and +vulgar providers, who imagine that the whole public are as ignorant and +vulgar as themselves; whereas whenever a better standard of taste is +given an opportunity, it never fails to find a welcome. Until Sir Henry +Wood inaugurated the present regime, the Promenade Concerts at Covent +Garden were popularly supposed to represent the national taste in music. +Until the Temple Classics and Every Man's Library were published it was +commonly supposed that the people at large cared for nothing but Bow +Bells, the Penny Novelette, or such unclassical if alluring provender. +In the domain of painting, the Royal Academy has such a firm and ancient +hold on the popular imagination of the English that its influence is +difficult to dispel; but there are many signs that its baneful +ascendency is at length on the decline; and it is well known that the +National Gallery is attracting more and more visitors and Burlington +House less and less as the years go on. + +In the following attempt at a general survey of the history of +painting--imperfect or ill-proportioned as it may appear to this or that +specialist or lover of any particular school--I have thought it best to +assume a fair amount of ignorance of the subject on the part of the +reader, though without, I hope, taking any advantage of it, even if it +exists; and I have therefore drawn freely upon several old histories and +handbooks for both facts and opinions concerning the old masters and +their works. In some cases, I think, a dead lion is decidedly better +than a live dog. + +R. D. + +CHELSEA, 1914. + + + + +_TUSCAN SCHOOLS_ + + + + +I + +GIOVANNI CIMABUE + + +By the will of God, in the year 1240, we are told by Vasari, GIOVANNI +CIMABUE, of the noble family of that name, was born in the city of +Florence, to give the first light to the art of painting. Vasari's +"Lives of the Painters" was first published in Florence in 1550, and +with all its defects and all its inaccuracies, which have afforded so +much food for contention among modern critics, it is still the principal +source of our knowledge of the earlier history of painting as it was +revived in Italy in the thirteenth century. + +Making proper allowance for Vasari's desire to glorify his own city, and +to make a dignified commencement to his work by attributing to Cimabue +more than was possibly his due, we need not be deterred by the very +latest dicta of the learned from accepting the outlines of his life of +Cimabue as an embodiment of the tradition of the time in which he +lived--two centuries and a quarter after Cimabue--and, until +contradicted by positive evidence, as worthy of general credence. In the +popular mind Cimabue still remains "The Father of modern painting," and +though his renown may have attracted more pictures and more legends to +his name than properly belong to him, it is certain that Dante, his +contemporary, wrote of him thus:-- + + Credette Cimabue nella pintura + Tener lo campo, ed ora ha Giotto il grido + Si che la fama di colui s'oscura. + +This is at least as important as anything written by a contemporary of +William Shakespeare; and even if we are required to believe that some of +his most important works are by another hand, his influence on the +history of art is beyond question. Let us then follow Vasari a little +further, and we shall find, at any rate, what is typical of the +development of genius. + +"This youth," Vasari continues, "being considered by his father and +others to give proof of an acute judgment and a clear understanding, was +sent to Santa Maria Novella to study letters under a relation who was +then master in grammar to the novices of that convent. But Cimabue, +instead of devoting himself to letters, consumed the whole day in +drawing men, horses, houses, and other various fancies on his books and +different papers--an occupation to which he felt himself impelled by +nature." + +This is exactly what is recorded of Reynolds, it may be noted, and very +much the same as in the case of Gainsborough, Benjamin West--and many a +modern painter. + +"This natural inclination was favoured by fortune, for the governors of +the city had invited certain Greek (probably Byzantine) painters to +Florence, for the purpose of restoring the art of painting, which had +not merely degenerated but was altogether lost. These artists, among +other works, began to paint the chapel of the Gondi in Santa Maria +Novella, and Cimabue, often escaping from the school, and having +already made a commencement of the art he was so fond of, would stand +watching these masters at their work. His father, and the artists +themselves, therefore concluded that he must be well endowed for +painting, and thought that much might be expected from him if he devoted +himself to it. Giovanni was accordingly, much to his delight, placed +with these masters, whom he soon greatly surpassed both in design and +colouring. For they, caring little for the progress of art, executed +their works not in the excellent manner of the ancient Greeks, but in +the rude modern style of their own day. Wherefore, though Cimabue +imitated them, he very much improved the art, relieving it greatly from +their uncouth manner and doing honour to his country by the name that he +acquired and by the works which he performed. Of this we have evidence +in Florence from the pictures which he painted there--as for example the +front of the altar of Saint Cecilia and a picture of the Virgin, in +Santa Croce, which was and still is (_i.e._ in 1550) attached to one of +the pilasters on the right of the choir." + +Unfortunately the very first example cited pulls us up short alongside +the official catalogue of the Uffizi Gallery (where the picture was +placed in 1841), in which it is catalogued (No. 20) as "Unknown ... +Vasari erroneously attributes it to Cimabue." + +Tiresome as it may seem to be thus distracted, at the very outset, by +the question of authenticity, it is nevertheless desirable to start with +a clear understanding that in surveying in a general way the history and +development of painting, it will be quite hopeless to wait for the final +word on the supposed authorship of every picture mentioned. In this +instance, as it happens, there is no reason to question the modern +catalogue, though that is by no means the same thing as denying that +Cimabue painted the picture which existed in the church of S. Cecilia in +Vasari's time. Is it more likely, it may be asked, that Vasari, who is +accused of unduly glorifying Cimabue, would attribute to him a work not +worthy of his fame, or that during the three centuries since Vasari +wrote a substitution was effected? The other picture, the _Madonna and +Child Enthroned_, which found its way into our National Gallery in 1857, +is still officially catalogued as the work of Cimabue, and it is to be +hoped that this precious relic, together with the Madonnas in the +Louvre, the Florence Academy, and in the lower church at Assisi, may be +long spared to us by the authority of the critics as "genuine +productions" of the beloved master. + +On the general question, however, let me reassure the reader by stating +that so far as possible I have avoided the mention of any pictures, in +the following pages, about which there is any grave doubt, save in a few +cases where tradition is so firmly established that it seems heartless +to disturb it until final judgment is entered--of which the following +examples of Cimabue's reputed work may be taken as types. The latest +criticism seeks to deprive him of every single existing picture he is +believed to have painted; those mentioned by Vasari which have perished +may be considered equally unauthentic, but, as before mentioned, his +account of them gives us as well as anything else the story of the +beginnings of the art. + +Having afterwards undertaken, Vasari continues, to paint a large picture +in the Abbey of the Santa Trinita in Florence for the monks of +Vallombrosa, he made great efforts to justify the high opinion already +formed of him and showed greater powers of invention, especially in the +attitude of the Virgin, whom he depicted with the child in her arms and +numerous angels around her, on a gold ground. This is the picture now in +the Accademia in Florence. The frescoes next described are no longer in +existence:-- + +"Cimabue next painted in fresco at the hospital of the Porcellana at the +corner of the Via Nuova which leads into the Borgo Ogni Santi. On the +front of this building, which has the principal door in the centre, he +painted the Virgin receiving the Annunciation from the angel, on one +side, and Christ with Cleophas and Luke on the other, all the figures +the size of life. In this work he departed more decidedly from the dry +and formal manner of his instructors, giving more life and movement to +the draperies, vestments and other accessories, and rendering all more +flexible and natural than was common to the manner of those Greeks whose +work were full of hard lines and sharp angles as well in mosaic as in +painting. And this rude unskilful manner the Greeks had acquired not so +much from study or settled purpose as from having servilely followed +certain fixed rules and habits transmitted through a long series of +years by one painter to another, while none ever thought of the +amelioration of his design, the embellishment of his colouring, or the +improvement of his invention." + +After describing Cimabue's activities at Pisa and Assisi with equal +circumstance, Vasari passes to the famous _Rucellai Madonna_, now +supposed to be by the hand of Duccio of Siena. However doubtful the +story may appear in the light of modern criticism, historical or +artistic, it certainly forms part of the history of painting--for its +spirit if not for its accuracy--and as such it can never be too often +quoted:-- + +"He afterwards painted the picture of the Virgin for the Church of +Santa Maria Novella, where it is suspended on high between the chapel of +the Rucellai family and that of the Bardi. This picture is of larger +size than any figure that had been painted down to those times, and the +angels surrounding it make it evident that although Cimabue still +retained the Greek manner, he was nevertheless gradually approaching the +mode of outline and general method of modern times. Thus it happened +that this work was an object of so much admiration to the people of that +day--they having never seen anything better--that it was carried in +solemn procession, with the sound of trumpets and other festal +demonstration, from the house of Cimabue to the Church, he himself being +highly rewarded and honoured for it. It is further reported, and may be +read in certain records of old painters, that while Cimabue was painting +this picture in a garden near the gate of S. Pietro, King Charles the +Elder of Anjou passed through Florence, and the authorities of the city, +among other marks of respect, conducted him to see the picture of +Cimabue. When this work was thus shown to the King, it had not before +been seen by anyone; wherefore all the men and women of Florence +hastened in great crowds to admire it, making all possible demonstration +of delight." + +Now whether or not Vasari was right in crediting Cimabue with these +honours in Florence instead of Duccio in Siena, makes little difference +in the story of the origin and early development of the art of painting. +One may doubt the accuracy of the mosaic account of the Creation, the +authorship of the Fourth Gospel or the Shakespearean poems, or the list +of names of the Normans who are recorded to have fought with William the +Conqueror. But what if one may? The Creation, the poems and plays of +Shakespeare and the battle of Hastings are all of them historic facts, +and neither science, nor literature, nor history is a penny the worse +for the loose though perfectly understandable conditions under which +these facts have been handed down to us. When we come down to times +nearer to our own the accuracy of data is more easily ascertainable, +though the confusion arising out of them often obscures their real +significance; but in looking for origins we are content to ignore the +details, provided we can find enough general information on which to +form an idea of them. To these first chapters of Vasari, then, we need +not hesitate to resort for the main sources of the earlier history of +painting. Even so far as we have gone we have learnt several important +facts as to the nature of the foundations on which the glorious +structure was to be raised. + +First of all, it is apparent that the practice of painting, though +strictly forbidden by the earliest Fathers of the Church, was used by +the faithful in the Eastern churches for purposes of decoration, and was +introduced into Italy--we may safely say Tuscany--for the same purpose. + +Second, that being transplanted into this new soil, it put forth such +wonderful blossoms that it came to be cultivated with much more regard; +and from being merely a necessary or conventional ornament of certain +portions of the church, was soon accounted its greatest glory. + +Third, that it was accorded popular acclamation. + +Fourth, that its most attractive feature in the eyes of beholders was +its life-like representation of the human form and other natural +objects. + +Prosaic as these considerations may appear, they are nevertheless the +fundamental principles that underlie the whole of the subsequent +development of painting; and unless every picture in the world were +destroyed, and the art of painting wholly lost for at least a thousand +years, there could not be another picture produced which would not refer +back through continuous tradition to one or every one of them. First, +the basis of religion. Second, the development peculiar to the soil. +Third, the imitation of nature. Fourth, the approbation of the +public--there we have the four cardinal points in the chart of painting. + +It would be easy enough to contend that painting had nothing whatever to +do with religion--if only by reference to the godless efforts of some of +the modernists; but such a contention could only be based on the +imperfect recognition of what religion actually means. In Italy in the +thirteenth century, as in Spain in the seventeenth, it meant the Church +of Rome. In Germany of the sixteenth, as in England in the eighteenth, +it meant something totally different. To put it a little differently, +all painting that is worth so calling has been done to the glory of God; +and after making due allowance for human frailties of every variety, it +is hard to say that among all the hundreds of great and good painters +there has ever been one who was not a good man. + +As for the influence of environment, or nationality, this is so +universally recognised that the term "school" more often means locality +than tuition. We talk generally of the French, English, or Dutch +schools, and more particularly of the Paduan, Venetian, or Florentine. +It is only when we hesitate to call our national treasure a Botticelli +or a Bellini that we add the words "school of" to the name of the master +who is fondly supposed to have inspired its author. The difference +between a wood block of the early eighteenth century executed in +England and Japan respectively may be cited as an extreme instance of +the effect of locality on idea, when the method is identical. + +With reference to the imitation of nature, at the mere mention of which +modernists become so furious, it is worth recalling that the earliest +story about painting relates to Zeuxis, who is said to have painted a +bunch of grapes with such skill that the birds ignored the fruit and +pecked at the picture. In later times we hear of Rembrandt being the +butt of his pupils, who, knowing his love of money, used to paint coins +on the floor; and there are plenty of stories of people painting flies +and other objects so naturally as to deceive the unwary spectator. +Vasari is continually praising his compatriots for painting "like the +life." + +Lastly, the approbation, or if possible the acclamation, of the public +has seldom if ever been unconsidered by the artist. Where it has, it has +only been the greatest genius that has been able to exist without it. A +man who has anything to say must have somebody to say it to; and though +a painter may seem to be wasting the best part of his life in trying to +make the people understand what he has to say in his language instead of +talking to them in their own common tongue, it is rarely that he fails +in the end, even if, alas for him, the understanding comes too late to +be of any benefit to himself. + +Cimabue's last work is said to be a figure, which was left unfinished, +of S. John, in mosaic, for the Duomo at Pisa. This was in 1302, which is +supposed to be the date of his death, though Vasari puts it two years +earlier, at the time he was engaged with the architect Arnolfo Lapi in +superintending the building of the Duomo in Florence, where he is +buried. + + + + +II + +GIOTTO DI BONDONE + + +While according all due honour, and probably more, to Cimabue as the +originator of modern painting, it is to his pupil, GIOTTO, that we are +accustomed to look for the first developments of its possibilities. Had +Cimabue's successors been as conservative as his instructors, we might +still be not very much better off than if he had never lived. For much +as there is to admire in Cimabue's painting, it is only the first flush +of the dawn which it heralded, and though containing the germ of the +future development of the art, is yet without any of the glory which in +the fulness of time was to result from it. + +To Giotto, Vasari considers, "is due the gratitude which the masters in +painting owe to Nature, seeing that he alone succeeded in resuscitating +art and restoring her to a path that may be called the true one; and +that the art of design, of which his contemporaries had little if any +knowledge, was by his means effectually recalled to life." This seems to +detract in some degree from his eulogies of Cimabue; but it is to the +last sentence that our attention should be directed, which implies that +in profiting by the master's example he succeeded in extending the +possibilities of the new art beyond its first limits. Cimabue, we may +believe, drew his Virgins and Saints from living models, whereas his +predecessors had merely repeated formulas laid down for them by long +tradition. Giotto went further, and extended his scope to the world at +large. For the plain gold background he substituted the landscape, thus +breaking down, as it were, a great wall, and seeing beyond it. Nor was +this innovation merely a technical one--it was the man's nature that +effected it and made his art a living thing. + +Giotto, who was born in 1276, was the son of a simple husbandman, who +lived at Vespignano, about fourteen miles from Florence. Cimabue chanced +upon the boy when he was only about ten years old, tending his father's +sheep, and was astonished to find that he was occupied in making a +drawing of one of them upon a smooth piece of rock with a sharp stone. +He was so pleased with this that he asked to be allowed to take him back +to Florence, and the boy proved so apt a pupil that before very long he +was regularly employed in painting. + +His influence was not confined to Florence, or even to Tuscany, but the +whole of Italy was indebted to him for a new impulse in art, and he is +said to have followed Pope Clement V. to Avignon and executed many +pictures there. Giotto was not only a painter, but his name is also +famous in the history of architecture: the wonderful Campanile adjoining +the Duomo in Florence was designed by him, and the foundations laid and +the building erected under his instructions. On sculpture too he +exercised a considerable influence, as may be seen in the panels and +statues which adorn the lower part of the tower, suggested if not +actually designed by Giotto, and carved by Andrea Pisano. + +Chief of the earlier works of Giotto are his frescoes in the under +church at Assisi, and in these may be seen the remarkable fertility of +invention with which he endowed his successors. Instead of the +conventional Madonna and Child, and groups of saints and angels, we have +here whole legends represented in a series of pictures of almost +dramatic character. In the four triangular compartments of the groined +vaulting are the three vows of the Franciscan Order, namely, Poverty, +Chastity, and Obedience, and in the fourth the glorification of the +saint. In the first, the Vow of Poverty, it is significant to find that +he has taken his subject from Dante. Poverty appears as a woman whom +Christ gives in marriage to S. Francis: she stands among thorns; in the +foreground are two youths mocking her, and on either side a group of +angels as witnesses of the holy union. On the left is a youth, attended +by an angel, giving his cloak to a poor man; on the right are the rich +and great, who are invited by an angel to approach, but turn scornfully +away. The other designs appear to be Giotto's own invention. Chastity, +as a young woman, sits in a fortress surrounded by walls, and angels pay +her devotion. On one side are laymen and churchmen led forward by S. +Francis, and on the other Penance, habited as a hermit, driving away +earthly love and impurity. S. Francis in glory is more conventional, as +might be expected from the nature of the subject. + +In the ancient Basilica of S. Peter in Rome Giotto made the celebrated +mosaic of the _Navicella_, which is now in the vestibule of S. Peter's. +It represents a ship, in which are the disciples, on a stormy sea. +According to the early Christian symbolisation the ship denoted the +Church. In the foreground on the right the Saviour, walking on the +waves, rescues Peter. Opposite sits a fisherman in tranquil expectation, +typifying the confident hope of the simple believer. This mosaic has +frequently been moved, and has undergone so much restoration that only +the composition can be attributed to Giotto. + +Of the paintings of scriptural history attributed to Giotto very few +remain, and the greater part of those have in recent times been +pronounced to be the work of his followers. Foremost, however, among the +undoubted examples are paintings in the Chapel of the Madonna dell'Arena +at Padua, which was erected in 1303. In thirty-eight pictures, extending +in three rows along the wall, is contained the life of the Virgin. The +ground of the vaulting is blue studded with gold stars, among which +appear the heads of Christ and the prophets, while above the arch of the +choir is the Saviour in a glory of angels. Combined with these sacred +scenes and personages are introduced fitting allusions to the moral +state of man, the lower part of the side walls containing, in medallions +painted in monochrome, allegorical figures of the virtues and vices--the +former feminine and ideal, the latter masculine and individual--while +the entrance wall is covered with the wonderful _Last Judgment_. + +Here, as in his allegorical pieces, Giotto appears as a great innovator, +a number of situations suggested by the Scriptures being now either +represented for the first time or seen in a totally new form. Well-known +subjects are enriched with numerous subordinate figures, making the +picture more truthful and more intelligible; as in the Flight into +Egypt, where the Holy Family is accompanied by a servant, and three +other figures are introduced to complete the composition. In the Raising +of Lazarus, too, the disciples behind the Saviour on the one side and +the astonished multitude on the other form two choruses, an arrangement +which is followed, but with considerable modification, in Ouwater's +unique picture of the same subject now in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum at +Berlin. This approach to dramatic reality sometimes assumes a character +which, as Kugler puts it, oversteps the strict limits of the higher +ecclesiastical style. It is worth noting, however, that the early +Netherlandish school--as we shall see in a later chapter--developed this +characteristic to a far greater extent, continuing the tradition handed +down, quite independently of Giotto, through illuminated manuscripts, +and with less of that expression of the highest religious or moral +feeling which is so evident in Giotto. + +The few existing altar-pieces of Giotto are less important than his +frescoes, inasmuch as they do not admit of the exhibition of his higher +and most original gifts. Two signed examples are a _Coronation of the +Virgin_ in Santa Croce at Florence, and a _Madonna_, with saints and +angels on the side panels, originally in S. Maria degli Angeli at +Bologna, and now in the Brera at Milan. The latter, however, is not now +recognised as his. The earliest authentic example is the so-called +Stefaneschi altar-piece, painted in 1298 for the same patron who +commissioned the _Navicella_. Giotto's highest merit consists especially +in the number of new subjects which he introduced, in the life-like and +spiritual expression with which he heightened all familiar occurrences +and scenes, and in the choice of the moment of representation. In all +these no earlier Christian painter can be compared with him. Another and +scarcely less important quality he possessed is in the power of +conveying truth of character. The faces introduced into some of his +compositions bear an inward guarantee of their lively resemblance to +some living model, and this characteristic seems to have been eagerly +seized upon by his immediate followers for emulation, as is noticeable +in two of the principal works--in the Bargello at Florence, and in the +church of the Incoronata at Naples--formerly attributed to him but now +relegated to his pupils. The portrait of Dante in a fresco on the wall +of the Bargello shows a deep and penetrating mind, and in the +_Sacraments_ at Naples we find heads copied from life with obvious +fidelity and such a natural conception of particular scenes as brings +them to the mind of the spectator with extraordinary distinctness. + +Of Giotto's numerous followers in the fourteenth century it is +impossible in the present work to give any particular account, but of +his influence at large on the practice as on the treatment and +conception of painting at this stage of its development, one or two +examples may be cited as typical of the progress he urged, such as the +frescoes in the Campo Santo at Pisa. This wonderful cloister, which +measures four hundred feet in length and over a hundred in +width--traditionally the dimensions of Noah's ark--was founded by the +Archbishop Ubaldo, before 1200, on his return from Palestine bringing +fifty-three ships laden with earth from the Holy Land. On this soil it +was erected, and surrounded by high walls in 1278. The whole of these +walls were afterwards adorned with paintings, in two tiers. + +So far as concerns the history of painting, the question of the +authorship of these frescoes--which are by several distinct hands--is +altogether subordinate to that of the subjects depicted and the manner +in which they are treated, and we shall learn more from a general survey +of them than by following out the fortunes of particular painters. The +earliest are those on the east side, near the chapel, but more important +are those on the north, of about the middle of the fourteenth century, +which show a decided advance, both in feeling and execution, beyond +Giotto. The first is _The Triumph of Death_, in which the supernatural +is tempered with representations of what is mortal to an extent that +already shows that painting was not to be confined to religious uses +alone. All the pleasures and sorrows of life are here represented, on +the earth; it is only in the sky that we see the demons and angels. On +one side is a festive company of ladies and cavaliers, with hawks and +dogs, seated under orange trees, with rich carpets at their feet, all +splendidly dressed. A troubadour and a singing girl amuse them with +songs, _amorini_ flutter around them and wave their torches. On the +other side is another group, also a hunting party, on splendidly +caparisoned horses, and accompanied by a train of attendants. On the +mountains in the background are several hermits, who in contrast to the +votaries of pleasure have attained in a life of contemplation and +abstinence the highest term of human existence. Many of the figures are +traditionally supposed to be portraits. + +The centre foreground is devoted to the less fortunate on earth, the +beggars and cripples, and also corpses of the mighty; and with these we +may turn to the allegorical treatment of the subject. To the first group +descends the angel of death, swinging a scythe, and to her the +unfortunate are stretching out their arms in supplication for an end to +their sorrows. The second group, it will be seen, are tracing a path +which leads to three open coffins in which lie the bodies of three +princes in different stages of decay, while a monk on crutches--intended +for S. Macarius--is pointing to them. The air is filled with angels and +demons, some of whom receive the souls of the dead. + +A second picture is _The Last Judgment_, and a third _Hell_, the +resemblance between which and the great altar-piece in the Strozzi +Chapel in Santa Maria Novella at Florence, painted by Andrea Orcagna in +1357, was formerly considered proof of the same authorship. They are +now attributed to an unknown disciple of Pietro Lorenzetti, who was +painting in Siena between 1306 and 1348, and is assumed to have been a +pupil of Duccio. + +The fourth picture, apparently by another hand--possibly that of +Lorenzetti himself--is _The Life of the Hermits_ in the wilderness of +Thebais, composed of a number of single groups in which the calm life of +contemplation is represented in the most varied manner. In front flows +the Nile, and a number of hermits are seen on its banks still subjected +to earthly occupations; they catch fish, hew wood, carry burdens to the +city, etc. Higher up, in the mountains, they are more estranged from the +world, but the Tempter follows them in various disguises, sometimes +frightful, sometimes seducing. As a whole this composition is +constructed in the ancient manner--as in Byzantine art--several series +rising one above the other, each of equal size, and without any +pretension to perspective: the single groups, at the same time, are +executed with much grace and feeling. + +Next to this are six pictures of the history of S. Ranieri, and as many +of the lives of S. Efeso and S. Potito. The latter are known to have +been painted in 1392 by Spinello of Arezzo, or Spinello Aretino as he is +called, of whose work we have some fragments in the National +Gallery--alas too few! Two of these fragments are from his large fresco +_The Fall of the Rebellious Angels_, painted for the church of S. Maria +degli Angeli at Arezzo, which after being whitewashed over were rescued +on the conversion of the church to secular uses. Vasari relates that +when Spinello had finished this work the devil appeared to him in the +night as horrible and deformed as in the picture, and asked him where he +had seen him in so frightful a form, and why he had treated him so +ignominiously. Spinello awoke from his dream with horror, fell into a +state of abstraction, and soon afterwards died. + +On the third part of the south wall is represented the history of Job, +in a series of paintings which were formerly attributed to Giotto +himself, though it is now recognised that they cannot be of an earlier +date than about 1370. + +The _Temptation of Job_ is by Taddeo Gaddi, and the others, painted in +1372, are probably by Francesco da Volterra--not to be confused with the +sixteenth century painter Daniele da Volterra. + +The paintings on the west wall are of inferior workmanship, while those +on the north were the crowning achievement of Benozzo Gozzoli a century +later. + + + + +III + +THE EARLIER QUATTROCENTISTS + + +COMING to the second period in the development of the new art--roughly, +that is to say, from 1400 to 1450--Vasari observes that even where there +is no great facility displayed, yet the works evince great care and +thought; the manner is more free and graceful, the colouring more varied +and pleasing; more figures are employed in the compositions, and the +drawing is more correct inasmuch as it is closer to nature. It was +Masaccio, he says, who during this period superseded the manner of +Giotto in regard to the painting of flesh, draperies, buildings, etc., +and also restored the practice of foreshortening and brought to light +that modern manner which has been followed by all artists. More natural +attitudes, and more effectual expression of feeling in the gestures and +movements of the body resulted, as art seeking to approach the truth of +nature by more correct drawing and to exhibit so close a resemblance to +the face of the living person that each figure might at once be +recognised. _Thus these masters constantly endeavoured to reproduce what +they beheld in nature and no more; their works became consequently more +carefully considered and better understood._ This gave them courage to +lay down rules for perspective and to carry the foreshortenings +precisely to the point which gives an exact imitation of the relief +apparent in nature and the real form. Minute attention to the effects of +light and shade and to various technical difficulties ensued, and +efforts were made towards a better order of composition. Landscapes also +were attempted; tracts of country, trees, shrubs, flowers, clouds, the +air, and other natural objects were depicted with some resemblance to +the realities represented; insomuch that the art might be said not only +to have become ennobled, but to have attained to that flower of youth +from which the fruit afterwards to follow might reasonably be looked +for. + +Foremost among the painters of this period was FRA ANGELICO, or to give +him his proper title, Frate Giovanni da Fiesole, who was born in 1387 +not far from Florence, and died in 1455. When he was twenty years old he +joined the order of the preaching friars, and all his painting is +devoted to religious subjects. He was a man of the utmost simplicity, +and most holy in every act of his life. He disregarded all worldly +advantages. Kindly to all, and temperate in all his habits, he used to +say that he who practised the art of painting had need of quiet, and +should live without cares and anxious thoughts; adding that he who would +do the work of Christ should perpetually remain with Christ. He was most +humble and modest, and in his painting he gave evidence of piety and +devotion as well as of ability, and the saints that he painted have more +of the air of sanctity than have those of any other master. + +It was the custom of Fra Angelico to abstain from retouching or +improving any painting once finished. He altered nothing, but left all +as it was done the first time, believing, as he said, that such was the +will of God. It is also affirmed that he would never take his brushes in +hand until he had first offered a prayer, and he is said never to have +painted a crucifix without tears streaming from his eyes, and in the +countenance and attitude of his figures it is easy to perceive proof of +his sincerity, his goodness, and the depth of his devotion to the +religion of Christ. + +This is well seen in the picture of the _Coronation of the Virgin_, +which is now in the Louvre (No. 1290). "Superior to all his other +works," Vasari says of this masterpiece, "and one in which he surpassed +himself, is a picture in the Church of San Domenico at Fiesole; in this +work he proves the high quality of his powers as well as the profound +intelligence he possessed of the art he practised. The subject is the +Coronation of the Virgin by Jesus Christ; the principal figures are +surrounded by a choir of angels, among whom are a vast number of saints +and holy personages, male and female. These figures are so numerous, so +well executed in attitudes, so various, and with expressions of the head +so richly diversified, that one feels infinite pleasure and delight in +regarding them. Nay, one is convinced that those blessed spirits can +look no otherwise in heaven itself, or, to speak under correction, could +not if they had forms appear otherwise; for all the saints male and +female assembled here have not only life and expression most delicately +and truly rendered, but the colouring also of the whole work would seem +to have been given by the hand of a saint or of an angel like +themselves. It is not without sufficient reason therefore that this +excellent ecclesiastic is always called Frate Giovanni Angelico. The +stories from the life of Our Lady and of San Domenico which adorn the +predella, moreover, are in the same divine manner; and I for myself can +affirm with truth that I never see this work but it appears something +new, nor can I ever satisfy myself with the sight of it or have enough +of beholding it." + +No less beautiful are the five compartments of the predella to the +altar-piece still in San Domenico at Fiesole--which were purchased for +the National Gallery in 1860 at the then alarming price of L3500--with +no less than two hundred and sixty little figures of saintly personages, +"so beautiful," as Vasari says, "that they appear to be truly beings of +Paradise." + +FRA FILIPPO LIPPI, born in Florence about 1406, and dying there in 1469, +was the exact antithesis of Fra Angelico, both in his private life and +in the method of his painting. He was just as earthly in both respects +as Fra Angelico was heavenly. As a child he was put with the Carmelites, +and as he showed an inclination for drawing rather than for study, he +was allowed every facility for studying the newly painted chapel of the +Branacci, and followed the manner of Masaccio so closely that it was +said that the spirit of that master had entered into his body. It is +only fair to Masaccio to add that this means his artistic spirit, for +Filippo's moral character was by no means exemplary. The story of one of +his best-known works, _The Nativity_, which is now in the Louvre (No. +1343), is thus related by Vasari:--"Having received a commission from +the nuns of Santa Margherita, at Prato, to paint a picture for the high +altar of their church, he chanced one day to see the daughter of +Francesco Buti, a citizen of Florence, who had been sent to the convent +as a novice. Filippo, after a glance at Lucrezia--for that was her +name--was so taken with her beauty that he prevailed upon the nuns to +allow him to paint her as the Virgin. This resulted in his falling so +violently in love with her that he induced her to run away with him. +Resisting every effort of her father and of the nuns to make her leave +Filippo, she remained with him, and bore him a son who lived to be +almost as famous a painter as his father. He was called Filippino +Lippi." + +The picture of S. John and six saints in the National Gallery (No. 677) +also recalls the story of his wildness, inasmuch as it came from the +Palazzo Medici, where Filippo worked for the great Cosimo di Medici. It +was well known that Filippo paid no attention to his work when he was +engaged in the pursuit of his pleasures, and so Cosimo shut him up in +the palace so that he might not waste his time in running about while +working for him. But Filippo after a couple of days' confinement made a +rope out of his bed clothes, and let himself down from the window, and +for several days gave himself up to his own amusements. When Cosimo +found that he had disappeared, he had search made for him, and at last +Filippo returned; after which Cosimo was afraid to shut him up again in +view of the risk he had run in descending from the window. + +Vasari considers that Filippo excelled in his smaller pictures--"In +these he surpassed himself, imparting to them a grace and beauty than +which nothing finer could be imagined. Examples of this may be seen in +the predellas of all the works painted by him. He was indeed an + +[Illustration: PLATE I.--FILIPPO LIPPI + +THE ANNUNCIATION + +_National Gallery, London_] + +artist of such power that in his own time he was surpassed by none; +therefore it is that he has not only been always praised by +Michelangelo, but in many particulars has been imitated by him." + +As a contributor to the progress of the art of painting he is credited +by Vasari with two innovations, which may be seen in his paintings in +the church of San Domenico at Prato, namely (1) the figures being larger +than life, and thereby forming an example to later artists for giving +true grandeur to large figures; and (2) certain figures clothed in +vestments but little used at that time, whereby the minds of other +artists were awakened and began to depart from that sameness which +should rather be called obsolete monotony than antique simplicity. + +It is noticeable that despite his bad character--which is said to have +been the cause of his death by poison--all his work was in religious +subjects. He was painting the chapel in the Church of Our Lady at +Spoleto when, in 1469, he died. + +PAOLO UCCELLO, as he was called, was born at Florence in 1397, and died +there in 1475. His real name was Paolo di Dono, but he was so fond of +painting animals and birds--especially the latter--that he officially +signed himself as Paolo Uccello. He devoted so much of his time, +however, to the study of perspective, that both his life and his work +suffered thereby. His wife used to relate that he would stand the whole +night through beside his writing table, and when she entreated him to +come to bed, would only say, "Oh, what a delightful thing is this +perspective!" Donatello, the sculptor, is said to have told him that in +his ceaseless study of perspective he was leaving the substance for the +shadow; but Donatello was not a painter. + +Before his time the painters had not studied the question of +perspective scientifically. Giotto had made no attempt at it, and +Masaccio only came nearer to realising it by chance. Brunelleschi, the +architect, laid down its first principles, but it was Uccello who first +put these principles into practice in painting, and thereby paved the +way for his successors to walk firmly upon. + +How he struggled with the difficulties of this vitally important subject +may be seen in the large battle-piece at the National Gallery, and +however crude and absurd this fine composition may seem at first sight +to those who are only accustomed to looking at modern pictures, it must +be remembered that Uccello is here struggling, as it were, with a savage +monster which to succeeding painters has, through his efforts, been a +submissive slave. + +This picture is one of four panels executed for the Bartolini family. +One of the others is in the Louvre, and a third in the Uffizi. +Another--or indeed almost the only other--work of Uccello which is now +to be seen is the colossal painting in monochrome (_terra-verde_) on the +wall of the cathedral at Florence. Strangely enough, this equestrian +portrait commemorates an Englishman, Sir John Hawkwood, whose name is +Italianized in the inscription into Giovanni Acuto. He was born at Sible +Hedingham in Essex, the son of a tanner, and adventuring under Edward +III. into France, found his way to Florence, where he served the State +so well that they interred him, on his death in 1393, at the public +expense, and subsequently commissioned Uccello to execute his monument. + +With all his devotion to science, the artist has committed the strange +mistake of making the horse stand on two legs on the same side, the +other two being lifted. + +TO MASACCIO, born in or about 1400, and dying in 1443, we owe a great +step in art towards realism. It was he, says Vasari, who first attained +the clear perception that _painting is only the close imitation, by +drawing and colouring simply, of all the forms presented by nature +showing them as they are produced by her, and that whoever shall most +perfectly effect this may be said to have most nearly approached the +summit of excellence_. The conviction of this truth, he adds, was the +cause of Masaccio's attaining so much knowledge by means of perpetual +study that he may be accounted among the first by whom art was in a +measure delivered from rudeness and hardness; it was he who led the way +to the realisation of beautiful attitudes and movements which were never +exhibited by any painter before his day, while he also imparted a life +and force to his figures, with a certain roundness and relief which +render them truly characteristic and natural. Possessing great +correctness of judgment, Masaccio perceived that all figures not +sufficiently foreshortened to appear standing firmly on the plane +whereon they are placed, but reared up on the points of their feet, must +needs be deprived of all grace and excellence in the most important +essentials. It is true that Uccello, in his studies of perspective, had +helped to lessen this difficulty, but Masaccio managed his +foreshortenings with much greater skill (though doubtless with less +science) and succeeded better than any artist before him. Moreover, he +imparted extreme softness and harmony to his paintings, and was careful +to have the carnations of the heads and other nude parts in accordance +with the colours of the draperies, which he represented with few and +simple folds as they are seen in real life. + +Masaccio's principal remaining works are his frescoes in the famous +Branacci Chapel at the Carmine convent in Florence. The work of +decorating the chapel was begun by Masolino, but finished by Masaccio +and Filippo Lippi. Vasari states it as a fact that all the most +celebrated sculptors and painters had become excellent and illustrious +by studying Masaccio's work in this chapel, and there is good reason to +believe that Michelangelo and Raphael profited by their studies there, +without mentioning all the names enumerated by Vasari. Seeing how +important the influence of Masaccio was destined to become, I have +ventured to italicise Vasari's opinions on the causes which operated in +creating the Florentine style and in raising the art of painting to +heights undreamt of by its earliest pioneers. + + + + +IV + +THE LATER QUATTROCENTISTS + + +THREE names stand out conspicuously from the ranks of Florentine +painters in the latter half of the fifteenth century. But progress being +one of the essential characteristics of the art at this period, as in +all others, it is not surprising that the order of their fame coincides +(inversely) pretty nearly with that of their date. First, ANTONIO +POLLAIUOLO; second, SANDRO BOTTICELLI; and lastly, LEONARDO DA VINCI. + +It is important to note that Pollaiuolo was first apprenticed to a +goldsmith, and attained such proficiency in that craft that he was +employed by Lorenzo Ghiberti in the carving of the gates of the +Baptistry, and subsequently set up a workshop for himself. In +competition with Finiguerra he "executed various stories," says Vasari, +"wherein he fully equalled his competitor in careful execution, while he +surpassed him in beauty of design. The guild of merchants, being +convinced + +[Illustration: PLATE II.--SANDRO BOTTICELLI (?) + +THE VIRGIN AND CHILD + +_National Gallery, London_] + +of his ability, resolved to employ him to execute certain stories in +silver for the altar of San Giovanni, and he performed them so +excellently that they were acknowledged to be the best of all those +previously executed by various masters.... In other churches also in +Florence and Rome, and other parts of Italy, his miraculous enamels are +to be seen." + +Now whether or not Antonio, like others, continued to exercise this +craft, the account given by Vasari, as follows, of his learning to paint +is extremely significant as showing how painting was regarded in +relation to the kindred arts so widely practised in +Florence:--"Eventually, considering that this craft did not secure a +long life to the work of its masters, Antonio, desiring for his labours +a more enduring memory, resolved to devote himself to it no longer; and +his brother Piero being a painter, he joined himself to him for the +purpose of learning the modes of proceeding in painting. He then found +this to be an art so different from that of the goldsmith that he wished +he had never addressed himself to it. But being impelled by shame rather +than any advantage to be obtained, he acquired a knowledge of the +processes used in painting in the course of a few months, and became an +excellent master." + +As early as 1460 he had painted the three large canvases of _Hercules_ +for Lorenzo de'Medici, now no longer existing, but probably reflected in +the two small panels of the same subject in the Uffizi. These alone are +enough to mark him as one of the greatest artists of his time. The +magnificent _David_, at Berlin, soon followed, and the little _Daphne +and Apollo_ in our National Gallery. These were all accomplished +unaided, but a little later he worked in concert with his brother Piero, +to whom we are told to attribute parts of the painting of the large _S. +Sebastian_ in the National Gallery, painted in 1475 for Antonio Pucci, +from whose descendant it was purchased. "For the chapel of the Pucci in +the church of San Sebastian," says Vasari, "Antonio painted the +altar-piece--a remarkable and wonderfully executed work with numerous +horses, many nude figures, and singularly beautiful foreshortenings. +Also the portrait of S. Sebastian taken from life, that is to say, from +Gino di Ludovico Capponi. This picture has been more extolled than any +by Antonio. He has evidently copied nature to the utmost of his power, +as we see more especially in one of the archers, who, bending towards +the ground, and resting his bow against his breast, is employing all his +force to prepare it for action; the veins are swelling, the muscles +strained, and the man holds his breath as he applies all his strength to +the effort. All the other figures in the diversity of their attitudes +clearly prove the artist's ability and the labour he has bestowed on the +work." + +It is in his superb rendering of the figure, especially in the nude, +that Antonio Pollaiuolo marks a decisive step in the progress of +painting, and is entitled to be regarded as "the first modern artist to +master expression of the human form, its spirit, and its action." But +for him we should miss much of the strength and vigour that +distinguishes the real from the false Botticelli. + +"In the same time with the illustrious Lorenzo de Medici, the elder," +Vasari writes, "which was truly an age of gold for men of talent, there +flourished a certain Alessandro, called after our custom Sandro, and +further named di Botticello, for a reason which we shall presently see. +His father, Mariano Filipepi, a Florentine citizen, brought him up with +care; but although the boy readily acquired whatever he had a mind to +learn, + +[Illustration: PLATE III.--SANDRO BOTTICELLI + +PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG MAN + +_National Gallery, London_] + +yet he was always discontented, nor would he take any pleasure in +reading, writing, or accounts; so that his father turned him over in +despair to a friend of his called Botticello, who was a goldsmith. + +"There was at that time a close connection and almost constant +intercourse between the goldsmiths and the painters, wherefore Sandro, +who had remarkable talent and was strongly disposed to the arts of +design, became enamoured of painting and resolved to devote himself +entirely to that vocation. He acknowledged his purpose forthwith to his +father, who accordingly took him to Fra Filippo. Devoting himself +entirely to the vocation he had chosen, Sandro so closely followed the +directions and imitated the manner of his master, that Filippo conceived +a great love for him, and instructed him so effectually that Sandro +rapidly attained a degree in art that none could have predicted for +him." + +The influence of the Giottesque tradition which was thus handed on to +the youthful Botticelli by Filippo Lippi is traceable in the beautiful +little _Adoration of the Magi_--the oblong, not the _tondo_--in the +National Gallery (No. 592). This was formerly attributed to Filippino +Lippi, but is now universally recognised as one of Sandro's very +earliest productions, when still under the immediate influence of +Filippo, and prior to the _Fortitude_, painted before 1470, which is now +in the Uffizi, and is the first picture mentioned by Vasari, +thus--"While still a youth he painted the figure of Fortitude among +those pictures of the virtues which Antonio and Pietro Pollaiuolo were +executing in the Mercatanzia or Tribunal of Commerce in Florence. In +Santo Spirito (Vasari continues, naming a picture which is probably _The +Virgin Enthroned_, now at Berlin (No. 106)), he painted a picture for +the Bardi family; this work he executed with great diligence, and +finished it very successfully, depicting the olive and palm trees with +extraordinary care." + +The influence of Pollaiuolo is more evident in his two next productions, +the two small panels of _Holofernes_ and the _Portrait of a Man with a +Medal_, in the Uffizi, and again in the _S. Sebastian_ now at Berlin, +which was painted in 1473. + +About 1476 the second _Adoration of the Magi_ in the National Gallery +was painted, and a year or two later the famous and more splendid +picture of the same subject which is in the Uffizi. With this he +established his reputation, showing himself unmistakably as an artist of +profound feeling and noble character besides being a skilful painter. It +was commissioned for the church of Santa Maria Novella. "In the face of +the oldest of the kings," says Vasari, "there is the most lively +expression of tenderness as he kisses the foot of the Saviour, and of +satisfaction at the attainment of the purpose for which he had +undertaken his long journey. This figure is the portrait of Cosimo +de'Medici, the most faithful and animated likeness of all now known of +him. The second of the kings is the portrait of Giuliano de' Medici, +father of Pope Clement VII., and he is presenting his gift with an +expression of the most devout sincerity. The third, who is likewise +kneeling, seems to be offering thanksgiving as well as adoration; this +is the likeness of Giovanni, the son of Cosimo. + +"The beauty which Sandro has imparted to these heads cannot be +adequately described; all the figures are in different attitudes, some +seen full face, others in profile, some almost entirely turned away, +others bent down; and to all the artist has given an appropriate +expression, whether old or young, showing numerous peculiarities, which +prove the mastery he possessed over his art. He has even distinguished +the followers of each king, so that one can see which belong to one and +which to another. It is indeed a most wonderful work; the composition, +the colouring, and the design are so beautiful that every artist to-day +is amazed at it, and at the time it acquired so great a fame for Sandro +that Pope Sixtus IV. appointed him superintendent of the painting of the +chapel he had built in Rome." + +The visit to Rome was in 1481, and meantime Botticelli had produced the +wayward _Primavera_, and the more stern and harsh _S. Augustine_ in the +church of Ognissanti. Of his frescoes in the Pope's chapel nearly all +have survived, including _Moses slaying the Egyptian_, _The Temptation_, +and _The Destruction of Korah's Company_, besides such of the heads of +the Popes as were not painted by Domenico Ghirlandaio and his other +assistants in the work. + +Returning to Florence in 1482, he was for twenty years without a rival +in the city--after the departure of Leonardo to Milan--and he appears to +have been subjected to no new influences, but steadily to have developed +the immense forces within him. Before 1492 may be dated the two examples +in the National Gallery, the _Portrait of a Youth_ and the fascinating +_Mars and Venus_, which was probably intended as a decoration for some +large piece of furniture. The beautiful and extraordinarily life-like +frescoes in the Louvre (the only recognised works of the master in that +Gallery) from the Villa Lemmi, representing Giovanna Tornabuoni with +Venus and the Graces, and Lorenzo Tornabuoni with the Liberal Arts, are +assigned to 1486. Of this period are also the more familiar _Birth of +Venus_; _The Tondo of the Pomegranate_ and the _Annunciation_ in the +Uffizi, and the San Marco altar-piece, the _Coronation of the Virgin_ +in the Florence Academy. + +To the influence of Savonarola, however great or little that may have +been, is attributed the seriousness of his latest work. Professor Muther +characterises Botticelli as "the Jeremiah of the Renaissance," but +whether or not this is a rhetorical overstatement, the "tendency to +impassioned and feverish action, so evident in the famous _Calumny of +Apelles_, reflects, no doubt, the agitation of his spiritual stress."[1] + +This is the latest of Sandro's works which are in public galleries, and +there is every probability that the last years of his life were not very +productive. "This master is said to have had an extraordinary love for +those whom he knew to be zealous students in art," Vasari tells us, "and +is affirmed to have gained considerable sums of money, but being a bad +manager and very careless, all came to nothing. Finally, having become +old, unfit for work, and helpless, he was obliged to go on crutches, +being unable to stand upright, and so died, after long illness and +decrepitude, in his seventy-eighth year. He was buried at Florence, in +the church of Ognissanti in the year 1510." + +The large and beautiful _Assumption of the Virgin_, with the circles of +saints and angels, in the National Gallery, which has only of late years +been taken out of the catalogue of Botticelli's works, is now said to +have been executed by his early pupil FRANCESCO BOTTICINI (_c._ +1446-1497) in 1470 or thereabouts. "In the church of San Pietro," Vasari +writes of Botticelli, "he executed a picture for Matteo Palmieri, with a +very large number of figures. The subject is the Assumption of our Lady, +and the zones or circles of heaven are + +[Illustration: PLATE IV.--SANDRO BOTTICELLI + +THE NATIVITY + +_National Gallery, London_] + +there painted in their order. The patriarchs, prophets, apostles, +evangelists, martyrs, confessors, doctors, virgins, and the hierarchies; +all of which was executed by Sandro according to the design furnished to +him by Matteo, who was a very learned and able man. The whole work was +conducted and finished with the most wonderful skill and care; at the +foot were the portraits of Matteo and his wife kneeling. But although +this picture is exceedingly beautiful, and ought to have put envy to +shame, yet there were certain malevolent and censorious persons who, not +being able to fix any other blame upon it, declared that Matteo and +Sandro had fallen into grievous heresy." It is apparent that the picture +has suffered intentional injury, and it is known that in consequence of +this supposed heresy the altar which it adorned was interdicted and the +picture covered up. + +In view of all the circumstances it is certain that it was designed by +Botticelli, and very possibly executed under his immediate supervision +and with some assistance from him. If we do not see the real Botticelli +in it, we see his influence and his power far more clearly than in the +numerous _tondi_ of Madonna and Child that have been assigned to him in +less critical ages than our own. For the real Botticelli was something +very real indeed, and though it was easy enough to imitate his +mannerisms, neither the style nor the spirit of his work were ever +within reach of his closest followers. + + + + +V + +LEONARDO DA VINCI + + +Twelve years younger than Botticelli was LEONARDO DA VINCI (1452-1520), +whose career as a painter commenced in the workshop of Andrea +Verrocchio, goldsmith, painter, and sculptor. That so extraordinary a +genius should have fixed upon painting for his means of expression +rather than any of his other natural gifts is the most telling evidence +of the pre-eminence earned for that art by the efforts of those whose +works we have been considering. For once we may go all the way with +Vasari, and accept his estimate of him as even moderate in comparison +with those of modern writers. "The richest gifts," he writes, "are +sometimes showered, as by celestial influence, on human creatures, and +we see beauty, grace, and talent so united in a single person that +whatever the man thus favoured may turn to, his every action is so +divine as to leave all other men far behind him, and to prove that he +has been specially endowed by the hand of God himself, and has not +obtained his pre-eminence by human teaching. This was seen and +acknowledged by all men in the case of Leonardo da Vinci, in whom, to +say nothing of the beauty of his person, which was such that it could +never be sufficiently extolled, there was a grace beyond expression +which was manifested without thought or effort in every act and deed, +and who besides had so rare a gift of talent and ability that to +whatever subject he turned, however difficult, he presently made himself +absolute master of it. Extraordinary strength was in him joined with +remarkable facility, a mind of regal boldness and magnanimous daring. +His gifts were such that his fame extended far and wide, and he was held +in the highest estimation not in his own time only, but also and even to +a greater extent after his death; and this will continue to be in all +succeeding ages. Truly wonderful indeed and divinely gifted was +Leonardo." + +To his activities in directions other than painting, I need not allude +except to say that they account in a great measure for the scarcity of +the pictures he has left us, and to emphasise the significance of his +having painted at all. To a man of such supreme genius the circumstances +in which he found himself, rather than any particular technical +facility, determined the course of his career, and in another age and +another country he might have been a Pheidias or a Newton, a Shakespeare +or a Beethoven. + +But if the pictures he has left us are few in number--according to the +present estimate not more than a dozen--they are altogether greater than +anything else in the realm of painting, and with their marvellous beauty +and subtlety have probably had a wider influence, both on painters and +on lovers of painting, than those of any other master. They seem to be +endowed with a spirit of something beyond painting itself, and in the +presence of _The Last Supper_ or the _Mona Lisa_ the babble of +conflicting opinions on questions of style, technique, and what not is +silenced. + +Similarly, in writing of Leonardo's pictures, every one of which is a +masterpiece, it seems superfluous to say even a word about what the +whole world already knows so well. All that can be usefully added is a +little of the tradition, where it is sufficiently authenticated, +relating to the circumstances under which they came into existence, and +such of the circumstances of his life as concern their production. + +When still quite a youth Leonardo was apprenticed to Andrea Verrocchio, +and the story goes that it was the marvellous painting of the angel, by +the pupil, in the master's _Baptism_ in the Academy at Florence, that +induced Verrocchio to abandon painting and devote himself entirely to +sculpture. This angel has been attributed to the hand of Leonardo from +the earliest times, but can hardly be taken, at any rate in its present +condition, as a decided proof of the genius that was to be displayed in +manhood. More certain are the _S. Jerome_ in the Vatican, and the +_Adoration of the Kings_ in the Uffizi, though neither is carried beyond +the earlier stages of "under-painting." A few finished portraits are now +assigned with tolerable certainty to his earlier years; but for his +famous masterpieces we must jump to the year 1482, when he left Florence +and went to Milan, where for the next sixteen years he was +intermittently engaged in the execution of the great equestrian statue, +which was destroyed by the French mercenaries before it was actually +completed. + +It appears that he was recommended by Lorenzo de'Medici to Lodovico il +Moro, Duke of Milan, probably for the very purpose of executing this +statue. However that may be, it is now certain that in 1483 he was +commissioned by the Franciscan monks to paint a picture of the Virgin +and Child for their church of the Conception, and that between 1491 and +1494 Leonardo and his assistant, Ambrogio di Predis, petitioned the Duke +for an arbitration as to price. This was the famous _Virgin of the +Rocks_, now in the Louvre, and the similar, and though not precisely +identical, composition in our National Gallery is generally supposed to +be a replica, painted by Ambrogio under the supervision of, and possibly +with some assistance from, Leonardo himself. + +Between 1495 and 1498 Leonardo was engaged on the painting of _The Last +Supper_. In the Forster Library at the Victoria and Albert Museum is a +notebook which contains his first memoranda for the wonderful design of +this masterpiece. At Windsor are studies for the heads of S. Matthew, S. +Philip, and + +[Illustration: PLATE V.--LEONARDO DA VINCI + +THE VIRGIN OF THE ROCKS + +_National Gallery, London_] + +Judas, and for the right arm of S. Peter. That of the head of the Christ +in the Brera at Milan has been so much "restored" that it can hardly be +regarded as Leonardo's work. Vasari's account of the delays in the +completion of the painting is better known, and probably less +trustworthy, than one or two notices of about the same date, quoted by +Mr H. P. Horne, in translating and commenting on Vasari. In June 1497, +when the work had been in progress over two years, Duke Lodovico wrote +to his secretary "to urge Leonardo, the Florentine, to finish the work +of the Refectory which he has begun, ... and that articles subscribed by +his hand shall be executed which shall oblige him to finish the work +within the time that shall be agreed upon." Matteo Bandello, in the +prologue to one of his _Novelle_, describes how he saw him actually at +work--"Leonardo, as I have more than once seen and observed him, used +often to go early in the morning and mount the scaffolding (for _The +Last Supper_ is somewhat raised above the ground), and from morning till +dusk never lay the brush out of his hand, but, oblivious of both eating +and drinking, paint without ceasing. After that, he would remain two, +three, or four days without touching it: yet he always stayed there, +sometimes for one or two hours, and only contemplated, considered, and +criticised, as he examined with himself the figures he had made." + +Vasari's story of the Prior's head serving for that of Judas is related +with less colour, but probably more truth, in the Discourses of G. B. +Giraldi, who says that when Leonardo had finished the painting with the +exception of the head of Judas, the friars complained to the Duke that +he had left it in this state for more than a year. Leonardo replied that +for more than a year he had gone every morning and evening into the +Borghetto, where all the worst sort of people lived, yet he could never +find a head sufficiently evil to serve for the likeness of Judas: but he +added, "If perchance I shall not find one, I will put there the head of +this Father Prior who is now so troublesome to me, which will become him +mightily." + +In 1500 Leonardo was back again in Florence, and his next important work +was the designing, though probably not the actual painting, of the +beautiful picture in the Louvre, _The Virgin and Child with S. Anne_, +the commission for which had been given to Filippino Lippi, but resigned +by him on Leonardo's return. In 1501 Isabella d'Este wrote to know +whether Leonardo was still in Florence, and what he was doing, as she +wished him to paint a picture for her in the palace at Mantua, and in +the reply of the Vicar-General of the Carmelites we have a valuable +account of the artist and his work. "As far as I can gather," he writes, +"the life of Leonardo is extremely variable and undetermined. Since his +arrival here he has only made a sketch in a cartoon. It represents a +Christ as a little child of about a year old, reaching forward out of +his mother's arms towards a lamb. The mother, half rising from the lap +of S. Anne, catches at the child as though to take it away from the +lamb, the animal of sacrifice signifying the Passion. S. Anne, also +rising a little from her seat, seems to wish to restrain her daughter +from separating the child from the lamb; which perhaps is intended to +signify the Church, that would not wish that the Passion of Christ +should be hindered. These figures are as large as life, but they are all +contained in a small cartoon, since all of them sit or are bent; the +figure of the Virgin is somewhat in front of the other, turned towards +the left. This sketch is not yet finished. He has not executed any +other work, except that his two assistants paint portraits and he, at +times, lends a hand to one or another of them. He gives profound study +to geometry, and grows most impatient of painting." + +The history of this cartoon--as indeed of the Louvre picture--is +somewhat obscure, but it is certain that the beautiful cartoon of the +same subject in the possession of the Royal Academy is not the one above +described. + +Lastly, there is the famous--or, may we say, now more famous than +ever--portrait of _Mona Lisa_. "Whoever wishes to know how far art can +imitate nature," Vasari writes, "may do so in this head, wherein every +detail that could be depicted by the brush has been faithfully +reproduced. The eyes have the lustrous brightness and watery sheen that +is seen in life, and around them are all those rosy and pearly tints +which, like the eyelashes too, can only be rendered by means of the +deepest subtlety; the eyebrows also are painted with the closest +exactitude, where fuller and where more thinly set, in a manner that +could not be more natural. The nose, with its beautiful and delicately +roseate nostrils, seems to be alive. The mouth, wonderful in its +outline, shows the lips perfectly uniting the rose tints of their colour +with that of the face, and the carnation of the cheek appears rather to +be flesh and blood than only painted. Looking at the pit of the throat +one can hardly believe that one cannot see the beating of the pulse, and +in truth it may be said that the whole work is painted in a manner well +calculated to make the boldest master tremble. + +"Mona Lisa was exceedingly beautiful, and while Leonardo was painting +her portrait he kept someone constantly near her to sing or play, to +jest or otherwise amuse her, so that she might continue cheerful, and +keep away the melancholy that painters are apt to give to their +portraits. In this picture there is a smile so pleasing that the sight +of it is a thing that appears more divine than human, and it has ever +been considered a marvel that it is not actually alive." + +It is worth observing that while these rapturous expressions of wonder +at the life-like qualities of the portrait may seem somewhat tame and +childish in comparison with the appreciation accorded to Leonardo's work +in these times--notably that of Walter Pater in this case--they are in +reality at the root of all criticism. If Vasari, as I have already +pointed out, pitches upon this quality of life-likeness and direct +imitation of nature for his particular admiration, it is only because +the first and foremost object of the earlier painters was in fact to +represent the life; and though in the rarefied atmosphere of modern talk +about art these naive criticisms may seem out of date, it is significant +that between Vasari and ourselves there is little, if any, difference of +opinion as to which masters were the great ones, and which were not. +"Truly divine" is a phrase in which he sums up the impressions created +in his mind by the less material qualities of some of the greatest, but +before even the greatest could create such an impression they must have +learnt the rudiments of the art in the school of nature. + + + + +VI + +MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI + + +IN the opening years of the sixteenth century the art of painting had +attained such a pitch of excellence that unless carried onward by a +supreme genius it could hardly hope to escape from the common lot of +all things in nature, and begin to decline. After Botticelli and +Leonardo, the works of Andrea del Sarto, "the perfect painter" as he has +been called, fall rather flat; and no less a prodigy than Michelangelo +was capable of excelling his marvellous predecessors, or than Raphael of +rivalling them. + +Vasari prefaces his life to ANDREA DEL SARTO (1486-1531) with something +more definite than his usual rhetorical flourishes. "At length we have +come," he says, "after having written the lives of many artists +distinguished for colour, for design, or for invention, to that of the +truly excellent Andrea del Sarto, in whom art and nature combined to +show all that may be done in painting when design, colouring, and +invention unite in one and the same person. Had he possessed a somewhat +bolder and more elevated mind, had he been distinguished for higher +qualifications as he was for genius and depth of judgment in the art he +practised, he would beyond all doubt have been without an equal. But +there was in his nature a certain timidity of mind, a sort of diffidence +and want of strength, which prevented those evidences of ardour and +animation which are proper to the highest characters from ever appearing +in him which, could they have been added to his natural advantages, +would have made him truly a divine painter, so that his works are +wanting in that grandeur, richness, and force which are so conspicuous +in those of many other masters. + +"His figures are well drawn, and entirely free from errors, and perfect +in all their proportions, and for the most part are simple and chaste. +His airs of heads are natural and graceful in women and children, while +both in youth and old men they are full of life and animation. His +draperies are marvellously beautiful. His nudes are admirably executed, +simple in drawing, exquisite in colouring--nay, they are truly divine." + +And yet? Well, let us turn to Michelangelo. + +"While the best and most industrious artists," says Vasari, "were +labouring by the light of Giotto and his followers to give the world +examples of such power as the benignity of their stars and the varied +character of their fantasies enabled them to command, and while desirous +of imitating the perfection of Nature by the excellence of Art, they +were struggling to attain that high comprehension which many call +intelligence, and were universally toiling, but for the most part in +vain, the Ruler of Heaven was pleased to turn the eyes of his clemency +towards earth, and perceiving the fruitlessness of so many labours, the +ardent studies pursued without any result, and the presumptuous +self-sufficiency of men which is farther from truth than is darkness +from light, he resolved, by way of delivering us from such great errors, +to send to the world a spirit endowed with universality of power in each +art, and in every profession, one capable of showing by himself alone +what is the perfection of art in the sketch, the outline, the shadows, +or the lights; one who could give relief to painting and with an upright +judgment could operate as perfectly in sculpture; nay, who was so highly +accomplished in architecture also, that he was able to render our +habitations secure and commodious, healthy and cheerful, +well-proportioned, and enriched with the varied ornaments of art." + +A more prosaic passage follows presently, occasioned by the innuendoes +of Condivi as to Vasari's intimacy with Michelangelo and his knowledge +of the facts of his life at first hand. Vasari meets this accusation by +quoting the following document relating to the apprenticeship of +Michelangelo to Domenico Ghirlandaio when fourteen years old. "1488. I +acknowledge and record this first day of April that I, Lodovico di +Buonarroti, have engaged Michelangelo my son to Domenico and David di +Tommaso di Currado for the three years next to come, under the following +conditions: That the said Michelangelo shall remain with the above named +all the said time, to the end that they may teach him to paint and to +exercise their vocation, and that the above named shall have full +command over him paying him in the course of these three years +twenty-four florins as wages...." + +Besides this teaching in his earliest youth, it is considered probable +that in 1494, when he visited Bologna, he came under influences which +resulted in the execution at about that time of the unfinished +_Entombment_ and the _Holy Family_, which are two of our greatest +treasures in the National Gallery. As he took to sculpture, however, +before he was out of Ghirlandaio's hands, there are few traces of any +activity in painting until 1506, when he was engaged on the designs for +the great battle-piece for the Council Hall at Florence. The one easel +picture of which Vasari makes any mention, the _tondo_ in the Uffizi, is +the only one besides those already noted which is known to exist. "The +Florentine citizen, Angelo Doni," Vasari says, "desired to have some +work from his hand as he was his friend; wherefore Michelangelo began a +circular painting of Our Lady for him. She is kneeling, and presents the +Divine Child to Joseph. Here the artist has finely expressed the delight +with which the Mother regards the beauty of her Son, as is clearly +manifest in the turn of her head and fixedness of her gaze; equally +evident is her wish that this contentment shall be shared by that pious +old man who receives the babe with infinite tenderness and reverence. +Nor was this enough for Michelangelo, since the better to display his +art he has grouped several undraped figures in the background, some +upright, some half recumbent, and others seated. The whole work is +executed with so much care and finish that of all his pictures, which +indeed are but few, this is considered the best." + +After relating the story of the artist's quarrel with his friend over +the price of this masterpiece (for which he at first only asked sixty +ducats), Vasari goes on to describe the now lost cartoons for the great +fresco in the Council Hall at Florence, in substance as follows:-- + +"When Leonardo was painting in the great hall of the Council, Piero +Soderini, who was then Gonfaloniere, moved by the extraordinary ability +which he perceived in Michelangelo [he calls him in a letter a young man +who stands above all his calling in Italy; nay, in all the world], +caused him to be entrusted with a portion of the work, and our artist +began a very large cartoon representing the Battle of Pisa. It +represented a vast number of nude figures bathing in the Arno, as men do +on hot days, when suddenly the enemy is heard to be attacking the camp. +The soldiers spring forth in haste to arm themselves. One is an elderly +man, who to shelter himself from the heat has wreathed a garland of ivy +round his head, and, seated on the ground, is labouring to draw on his +hose, hindered by his limbs being wet. Hearing the sound of the drums +and the cries of the soldiers he struggles violently to get on one of +his stockings; the action of the muscles and distortion of the mouth +evince the zeal of his efforts. Drummers and others hasten to the camp +with their clothes in their arms, all in the most singular attitudes; +some standing, others kneeling or stooping; some falling, others +springing high into the air and exhibiting the most difficult +foreshortenings.... The artists were amazed as they realised that the +master had in this cartoon laid open to them the very highest resources +of art; nay, there are some who still declare that they have never seen +anything to equal it, either from his hand or any other, and they do not +believe that genius will ever more attain to such perfection. Nor is +this an exaggeration, for all who have designed from it and copied +it--as it was the habit for both natives and strangers to do--have +become excellent in art, amongst whom were Raphael, Andrea del Sarto, +Franciabigio, Pontormo, and Piero del Vaga." + +In 1508 Michelangelo began to prepare the cartoons for the ceiling of +the Sistine Chapel. Space forbids me to attempt any description of +these, but the story of their completion as related by Vasari can hardly +be omitted. "When half of them were nearly finished," he says, "Pope +Julius, who had gone more than once to see the work--mounting the +ladders with the artist's help--insisted on having them opened to public +view without waiting till the last touches were given, and the chapel +was no sooner open than all Rome hastened thither, the Pope being first, +even before the dust caused by removing the scaffold had subsided. Then +it was that Raphael, who was very prompt in imitation, changed his +manner, and to give proof of his ability immediately executed the +frescoes with the Prophets and Sibyls in the church of the Pace. +Bramante (the architect) also laboured to convince the Pope that he +would do well to entrust the second half to Raphael.... But Julius, who +justly valued the ability of Michelangelo, commanded that he should +continue the work, judging from what he saw of the first half that he +would be able to improve the second. Michelangelo accordingly finished +the whole in twenty months, without help. It is true that he often +complained that he was prevented from giving it the finish he would have +liked owing to the Pope's impatience, and his constant inquiries as to +when it would be finished, and on one occasion he answered, "It will be +finished when I shall have done all that I believe necessary to satisfy +art." "And we command," replied Julius, "that you satisfy our wish to +have it done quickly," adding finally that if it were not at once +completed he would have Michelangelo thrown headlong from the +scaffolding. Hearing this, the artist, without taking time to add what +was wanting, took down the remainder of the scaffolding, to the great +satisfaction of the whole city, on All Saints' Day, when the Pope went +into his chapel to sing Mass." + +Michelangelo had much wished to retouch some portions of the work _a +secco_, as had been done by the older masters who had painted the walls; +and to add a little ultramarine to some of the draperies, and gild other +parts, so as to give a richer and more striking effect. The Pope, too, +would now have liked these additions to be made, but as Michelangelo +thought it would take too long to re-erect the scaffolding, the pictures +remained as they were. The Pope would sometimes say to him, "Let the +chapel be enriched with gold and bright colours; it looks poor." To +which Michelangelo would reply, "Holy Father, the men of those days did +not adorn themselves with gold; those who are painted here less than +any; for they were none too rich. Besides, they were holy men, and must +have despised riches and ornaments." + + + + +VII + +RAFFAELLO DI SANTI + + +The character and the influence of RAPHAEL are well expressed in the +following sentences with which Vasari concludes his biography:--"O happy +and blessed spirit! every one speaks with interest of thee; celebrates +thy deeds; admires thee in thy works! Well might Painting die when this +noble artist ceased to live; for when his eyes were closed she remained +in darkness. For us who survive him it remains to imitate the excellent +method which he has left for our guidance; and as his great qualities +deserve, and our duty bids us, to cherish his memory in our hearts, and +keep it alive in our discourse by speaking of him with the high respect +which is his due. For through him we have the art in all its extent +carried to a perfection which could hardly have been looked for; and in +this universality let no human being ever hope to surpass him. And, +beside this benefit which he conferred on Art as her true friend, he +neglected not to show us how every man should conduct himself in all the +relations of life. Among his rare gifts there is one which especially +excites my wonder; I mean, that Heaven should have granted him to infuse +a spirit among those who lived around him so contrary to that which is +prevalent among professional men. The painters--I do not allude to the +humble-minded only, but to those of an ambitious turn, and many of this +sort there are--the painters who worked in company with Raphael lived in +perfect harmony, as if all bad feelings were extinguished in his +presence, and every base, unworthy thought had passed from their minds. +This was because the artists were at once subdued by his obliging +manners and by his surpassing merit, but more than all by the spell of +his natural character, which was so full of affectionate kindness, that +not only men, but even the very brutes, respected him. He always had a +great number of artists employed for him, helping them and teaching them +with the kindness of a father to his children, rather than as a master +directing his scholars. For which reason it was observed he never went +to court without being accompanied from his very door by perhaps fifty +painters who took pleasure in thus attending him to do him honour. In +short, he lived more as a sovereign than as a painter. And thus, O Art +of Painting! thou too, then, could account thyself most happy, since an +artist was thine, who, by his skill and by his moral excellence exalted +thee to the highest heaven!" + +Raphael was the son of Giovanni Sanzio, or di Santi, of Urbino. He +received his first education as an artist from his father, whom, +however, he lost in his eleventh year. As early as 1495 probably, he +entered the school of Pietro Perugino, at Perugia, where he remained +till about his twentieth year. + +The "Umbrian School," in which Raphael received his first education, and +in which he is accordingly placed, is distinguished from the Florentine, +of which it may be said to have been an offshoot, by several +well-defined characteristics. Chief of these are, first, the more +sentimental expression of religious feeling, and second, the greater +attention paid to distance as compared with the principal figures; both +of which are explainable on the ground of local circumstances. They +reflect the difference between the bustling intellectual activity of +Florence and the dreamy existence but broader horizon of the dwellers +in the upper valley of the Tiber. In the beautiful _Nativity_ of PIERO +DELLA FRANCESCA (No. 908 in the National Gallery) we see something akin +to the Florentine pictures, and yet something more besides. Piero shared +with Paolo Uccello the eager desire to discover the secrets of +perspective; but in addition he seems to have been influenced by the +study of nature herself, in the open air, as Uccello never was. His +pupil, LUCA SIGNORELLI (1441-1523), was more formal and less +naturalistic, as may be seen by a comparison between the _Circumcision_ +(No. 1128 in the National Gallery) and Piero's _Baptism of Christ_ on +the opposite wall. PIETRO PERUGINO (1446-1523)--his real name was +Vannucci--was influenced both by Signorelli and by Verrocchio. In the +studio of the latter he had probably worked with Leonardo and Lorenzo di +Credi, so that in estimating the influences which went to form the art +of Raphael we need not insist too strongly on the distinction between +"Umbrian" and "Florentine." + +Raphael's first independent works (about 1500) are entirely in +Perugino's style. They bear the general stamp of the Umbrian School, but +in its highest beauty. His youthful efforts are essentially youthful, +and seem to contain the earnest of a high development. Two are in the +Berlin Museum. In the one (No. 141) called the _Madonna Solly_, the +Madonna reads in a book; the Child on her lap holds a goldfinch. The +other (No. 145), with heads of S. Francis and S. Jerome, is better. +Similar to it, but much more finished and developed, is a small round +picture, the _Madonna Casa Connestabile_, now at St. Petersburg. + +A more important picture of this time is the _Coronation of the +Virgin_, painted for the church of S. Francesco at Perugia in 1503, but +now in the Vatican. In the upper part, Christ and the Madonna are +throned on clouds and surrounded by angels with musical instruments; +underneath, the disciples stand around the empty tomb. In this lower +part of the picture there is a very evident attempt to give the figures +more life, motion, and enthusiastic expression than was before attempted +in the school. + +After this, Raphael appears to have quitted the school of Perugino, and +to have commenced an independent career: he executed at this time some +pictures in the neighbouring town of Citta di Castello. With all the +features of the Umbrian School, they already show the freer impulse of +his own mind,--a decided effort to individualize. The most excellent of +these, and the most interesting example of this first period of +Raphael's development, is the _Marriage of the Virgin_ (Lo Sposalizio), +inscribed with his name and the date 1504, now in the Brera at Milan. +With much of the stiffness and constraint of the old school, the figures +are noble and dignified; the countenances, of the sweetest style of +beauty, are expressive of a tender, enthusiastic melancholy, which lends +a peculiar charm to this subject. + +In 1504 Raphael painted the two little pictures in the Louvre, _S. +George_ and _S. Michael_ (Nos. 1501-2) for the Duke of Urbino. _The +Knight Dreaming_, a small picture, now in the National Gallery (No. +213), is supposed to have been painted a year earlier. + +In the autumn of 1504 Raphael went to Florence. Tuscan art had now +attained its highest perfection, and the most celebrated artists were +there contending for the palm. From this period begins his +emancipation + +[Illustration: PLATE VI.--PIETRO PERUGINO + +CENTRAL PORTION OF ALTAR-PIECE + +_National Gallery, London_] + +from the confined manner of Perugino's school; the youth ripens into +manhood and acquires the free mastery of form. + +To this time belong the celebrated _Madonna del Granduca_, now in the +Pitti Gallery, and another formerly belonging to the Duke of Terra +Nuova, and now at Berlin (No. 247a). In the next year we find him +employed on several large works in Perugia; these show for the first +time the influence of Florentine art in the purity, fullness, and +intelligent treatment of form; at the same time many of the motives of +the Peruginesque school are still apparent. The famous _Cowper Madonna_, +recently sold to an American for L140,000, also belongs to the year +1505, when the blending of the two influences resulted in a picture +which has been extolled by the sanest of critics as "the loveliest of +Raphael's Virgins." An altar-piece, executed for the church of the +Serviti at Perugia, inscribed with the date 1506, is the famous _Madonna +dei Ansidei_, purchased for the National Gallery from the Duke of +Marlborough. Besides the dreamy religious feeling of the School of +Perugia, we perceive here the aim at a greater freedom, founded on +deeper study. + +Raphael was soon back in Florence, where he remained until 1508. The +early paintings of this period betray, as might be expected, many +reminiscences of the Peruginesque school, both in conception and +execution; the later ones follow in all essential respects the general +style of the Florentines. + +One of the earliest is the _Virgin in the Meadow_, in the Belvedere +Gallery at Vienna. Two others show a close affinity with this +composition; one is the _Madonna del Cardellino_, in the Tribune of the +Uffizi, in which S. John presents a goldfinch to the infant Christ. The +other is the so-called _Belle Jardiniere_, inscribed 1507, in the +Louvre. + +It is interesting to observe Raphael's progress in the smaller pictures +which he painted in Florence--half-figures of the Madonna and Child. +Here again the earliest are characterised by the tenderest feeling, +while a freer and more cheerful enjoyment of life is apparent in the +later ones. The _Madonna della Casa Tempi_, at Munich, is the first of +this series. In the picture from the Colonna Palace at Rome, now in the +Berlin Museum (No. 248), the same childlike sportiveness, the same +maternal tenderness, are developed with more harmonious refinement. A +larger picture, belonging to the middle time of his Florentine period, +is in the Munich Gallery--the _Madonna Canignani_, which presents a +peculiar study of artificial grouping, in a pyramidal shape. Among the +best pictures of the latter part of this Florentine period are the _S. +Catherine_, now in the National Gallery, formerly in the Aldobrandini +Gallery at Rome, and two large altar-pieces. One of these is the +_Madonna del Baldacchino_, in the Pitti Gallery. The other, _The +Entombment_, painted for the church of S. Francesco at Perugia, is now +in the Borghese Gallery at Rome. This is the first of Raphael's +compositions in which an historical subject is dramatically developed; +but in this respect the task exceeded his powers. The composition lacks +repose and unity of effect; the movements are exaggerated and mannered; +but the figure of the Saviour is extremely beautiful, and may be placed +among the greatest of the master's creations. + +About the middle of the year 1508, when only in his twenty-fifth year, +Raphael was invited by Pope + +[Illustration: PLATE VII.--RAPHAEL + +THE ANSIDEI MADONNA + +_National Gallery, London_] + +[Illustration: PLATE VIII.--RAPHAEL + +LA BELLE JARDINIERE + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +Julius II. to decorate the state apartments in the Vatican. With these +works commences the third period of his development, and in these he +reached his highest perfection. The subjects, more important than any in +which he had hitherto been occupied, gave full scope to his powers; and +the proximity of Michelangelo, who at this time began the painting of +the Sistine Chapel, excited his emulation. + +At this period, just before the Reformation, the Papal power had reached +its proudest elevation. To glorify this power--to represent Rome as the +centre of spiritual culture--were the objects of the paintings in the +Vatican. They cover the ceilings and walls of three chambers and a large +saloon, which now bear the name of the "Stanze of Raphael." + +The execution of these paintings principally occupied Raphael to the +time of his death, and were only completed by his scholars. + +In 1513 and 1514 Raphael also executed designs for the ten tapestries +intended to adorn the Sistine Chapel, representing events from the lives +of the apostles. Seven of these magnificent cartoons are now in the +South Kensington Museum. + +Beside these important commissions executed for the Papal court, during +twelve years, many claims were made on him by private persons. Two +frescoes executed for Roman churches may be mentioned. One, in S. Maria +della Pace, represents four Sibyls surrounded by angels, which it is +interesting to compare with the Sibyls of Michelangelo. In each we find +the peculiar excellence of the two great masters; Michelangelo's figures +are grand, sublime, profound, while the fresco of the Pace exhibits +Raphael's serene and ingenious grace. In a second fresco, the prophet +Isaiah and two angels, in the church of S. Agostino at Rome, the +comparison is less favourable to Raphael, the effort to rival the +powerful style of Michelangelo being rather too obvious. + +Like all other artists, Raphael is at his best when, undisturbed by +outside influences, he follows the free original impulse of his own +mind. His peculiar element was grace and beauty of form, in so far as +these are the expression of high moral purity. + +The following works of his third period are especially deserving of +mention. + +The _Aldobrandini Madonna_, now in the National Gallery--in which the +Madonna is sitting on a bench, and bends down to the little S. John, her +left arm round him. The _Madonna of the Duke of Alba_, in the Hermitage +at St. Petersburg. _La Vierge au voile_, in the Louvre; the Madonna is +seated in a kneeling position, lifting the veil from the sleeping Child +in order to show him to the little S. John. The _Madonna della +Seggiola_, in the Pitti at Florence (painted about 1516), a circular +picture. The _Madonna della Tenda_ at Munich; a composition similar to +the last, except that the Child is represented in more lively action, +and looking upwards. + +A series of similar, but in some instances more copious compositions, +belong to a still later period; they are in a great measure the work of +his scholars, painted after his drawings, and only partly worked upon by +Raphael himself. Indeed many pictures of this class should perhaps be +considered altogether as the productions of his school, at a time when +that school was under his direct superintendence, and when it was +enabled to imitate his finer characteristics in a remarkable degree. + +In this class are the _Madonna dell'Impannata_, in the Pitti, which +takes its name from the oiled-paper window in the background. The large +picture of a _Holy Family_ in the Louvre, painted in 1518, for Francis +I., is peculiarly excellent. The whole has a character of cheerfulness +and joy: an easy and delicate play of graceful lines, which unite in an +intelligible and harmonious whole. Giulio Romano assisted in the +execution. + +With regard to the large altar-pieces of his later period in which +several Saints are assembled round the Madonna, it is to be observed +that Raphael has contrived to place them in reciprocal relation to each +other, and to establish a connection between them; while the earlier +masters either ranged them next to one another in simple symmetrical +repose, or disposed them with a view to picturesque effect. + +Of these the _Madonna di Foligno_, in the Vatican, is the earliest. In +the upper part of the picture is the Madonna with the Child, enthroned +on the clouds in a glory, surrounded by angels. Underneath, on one side, +kneels the donor, behind him stands S. Jerome. On the other side is S. +Francis, kneeling, while he points with one hand out of the picture to +the people, for whom he entreats the protection of the Mother of Grace; +behind him is S. John the Baptist, who points to the Madonna, while he +looks at the spectator as if inviting him to worship her. + +The second, the _Madonna del Pesce_ has much more repose and grandeur as +whole, and unites the sublime and abstract character of sacred beings +with the individuality of nature in the happiest manner. It is now in +Madrid, but was originally painted for S. Domenico at Naples, about +1513. It represents the Madonna and Child on a throne; on one side is +S. Jerome; on the other the guardian angel with the young Tobias who +carries a fish (whence the name of the picture). The artist has imparted +a wonderfully poetic character to the subject. S. Jerome, kneeling on +the steps of the throne, has been reading from a book to the Virgin and +Child, and appears to have been interrupted by the entrance of Tobias +and the Angel. The infant Christ turns towards them, but at the same +time lays his hand on the open book, as if to mark the place. The Virgin +turns towards the Angel, who introduces Tobias; while the latter +dropping on his knees, looks up meekly to the Divine Infant. S. Jerome +looks over the book to the new-comers, as if ready to proceed with his +occupation after the interruption. + +But the most important is the famous _Madonna di San Sisto_, at Dresden. +Here the Madonna appears as the queen of the heavenly host, in a +brilliant glory of countless angel-heads, standing on the clouds, with +the eternal Son in her arms; S. Sixtus and S. Barbara kneel at the +sides. Both of them seem to connect the picture with the real +spectators. This is a rare example of a picture of Raphael's later time, +executed entirely by his own hand. + +Two large altar pictures still claim our attention; they also belong to +Raphael's later period. One is the _Christ Bearing the Cross_, in +Madrid, known by the name of _Lo Spasimo di Sicilia_, from the convent +of Santa Maria dello Spasimo at Palermo, for which it was painted. Here, +as in the tapestries, we again find a finely conceived development of +the event, and an excellent composition. The other is the +_Transfiguration_, now in the Vatican, formerly in S. Pietro at +Montorio. + +[Illustration: PLATE IX.--RAPHAEL + +PORTRAIT OF BALDASSARE CASTIGLIONE + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +This was the last work of the master (left unfinished at his death); the +one which was suspended over his coffin, a trophy of his fame, for +public homage. + +"I cannot believe myself in Rome," wrote Count Castiglione, on the death +of the master, "now that my poor Raphael is no longer here." Men +regarded his works with religious veneration as if God had revealed +himself through Raphael as in former days through the prophets. His +remains were publicly laid out on a splendid catafalque, while his last +work, the _Transfiguration_, was suspended over his head. He was buried +in the Pantheon, under an altar adorned by a statue of the Holy Virgin, +a consecration offering from Raphael himself. Doubts having been raised +as to the precise spot, a search was made in the Pantheon in 1833, and +Raphael's bones were found; the situation agreeing exactly with Vasari's +description of the place of interment. On the 18th of October, in the +same year, the relics were reinterred in the same spot with great +solemnities. + + * * * * * + +The schools of Lombardy and the Emilia, which derive their +characteristics from Florentine rather than from Venetian influences, +may here be briefly mentioned before turning to the consideration of the +Venetian School. In 1482, it will be remembered, Leonardo went to Milan, +where he remained till the end of the century; and the extent of his +influence may be judged from many of the productions of BERNADINO LUINI +(1475-1532) and GIOVANNI ANTONIO BAZZI, known as SODOMA (1477-1549). Of +AMBROGIO DI PREDIS we have already heard in connection with the painting +of our version of Leonardo's _Virgin of the Rocks_. GIOVANNI ANTONIO +BOLTRAFFIO (1467-1516) was a pupil of VINCENZO FOPPA, but he soon +abandoned the manner of the old Lombard School, and came under the +influence of the great Florentine, of whom he became a most enthusiastic +disciple. + +More independent--indeed, he is officially characterised as "an isolated +phenomenon in Italian Art"--was ANTONIO ALLEGRI, commonly called +CORREGGIO, from the place of his birth. In 1518 he settled at Parma, +where he remained till 1530, so that he is usually catalogued as of the +School of Parma, which for an isolated phenomenon serves as well as any +other. Of late years his popularity has been somewhat diminished by the +increasing demands of private collectors for works which are +purchasable, and most of Correggio's are in public galleries. At Dresden +are some of the most famous, notably the _Nativity_, called "La Notte," +from its wonderful scheme of illumination, and two or three large +altar-pieces. The _Venus Mercury and Cupid_ in our National Gallery, +though sadly injured, is still one of his masterpieces. It was purchased +by Charles I. with the famous collection of the Duke of Mantua. Our +_Ecce Homo_ is entitled to rank with it, as is also the little _Madonna +of the Basket_. + +[Illustration: PLATE X.--CORREGGIO + +MERCURY, CUPID, AND VENUS + +_National Gallery, London_] + + + + +_VENETIAN SCHOOLS_ + + + + +I + +THE VIVARINI AND BELLINI + + +In Venice the Byzantine style appears to have offered a more stubborn +resistance to the innovators than in Tuscany, or, in fact, in any other +part of Italy. Few, if any, of the allegorical subjects with which +Giotto and his scholars decorated whole buildings are to be found here, +and the altar pictures retain longer than anywhere else the gilt +canopied compartments and divisions, and the tranquil positions of +single figures. It was not until a century after the death of Cimabue +and Duccio that the real development of the Venetian School was +manifested, so that when things did begin to move the conditions were +not the same, and the results accordingly were something substantially +different. + +The influence of the Byzantine style still hangs heavily over the work +of NICOLO SEMITECOLO, who was working in Venice in the middle of the +fourteenth century, as may be seen in the great altar-piece ascribed to +him in the Academy--the Coronation of the Virgin with fourteen scenes +from the life of Christ. In this work there is little of the general +advancement visible in other parts of Italy. It corresponds most nearly +with the work of Duccio of Siena, though without attaining his +excellence; while the gold hatchings and olive brown tones are still +Byzantine. + +An altar-piece, by MICHELE GIAMBONO, also in the Academy, painted during +the first half of the fifteenth century, shows a more decided advance, +and even anticipates some of the later excellences of the Venetian +School. The drapery is in the long and easy lines which we see in the +Tuscan pictures of the period, and what is especially significant, in +view of the subsequent development of Venetian painting, the colouring +is rich, deep, and transparent, and the flesh tints unusually soft and +warm. This is signed by Giambono, and is one of his most important +works, as well as the most complete, as it exists in its original state +as an _ancona_ or altar-piece divided into compartments by canopies of +joiners' work. It is unusual in form, inasmuch as the central panel, +though slightly larger than the pair on either side, contains but a +single figure. This figure was generally supposed to be the Saviour, but +it has recently been pointed out that it is S. James the Great, the +others being SS. John the Evangelist, Philip Benizi, Michael, and Louis +of Toulouse. Some of Giambono's finest work was in mosaic, and the walls +and roof of the Cappella de'Mascoli in S. Mark's may be regarded as the +highest achievement in mosaic of the early Venetian School. While this +species of decoration had given place to fresco painting elsewhere, it +was here, in 1430, brought to a pitch of perfection by Giambono which +entitles this work to a prominent place in the history of painting. + +But the two chief pioneers of the early fifteenth century were Giovanni, +or JOHANNES ALAMANUS, and ANTONIO DA MURANO. The former appears from his +surname to have been of German origin, the latter belonged to the family +of VIVARINI, and they used to work together on the same pictures. Two +excellent examples of this combination are in the Academy at Venice. +The one, dated 1440, is a Coronation of the Virgin, with many figures, +including several boys, and numerous saints seated. In the heads of the +saints we may trace the hand of Alamanus, in the Germanic type of +countenance which recalls the style of Stephen of Cologne. A repetition +of this, if it is not actually the original, is in S. Pantalone at +Venice. The other picture, dated 1446, of enormous dimensions, +represents the Virgin enthroned, beneath a canopy sustained by angels, +with the four Fathers of the Church at her side. The colouring is fully +as flowing and splendid as that of Giambono. + +We do not recognise here, as Kugler rightly observes, the influence of +the school of Giotto, but rather the types of the Germanic style +gradually assuming a new character, possibly owing to the social +condition of Venice itself. There was something perhaps in the nature of +a rich commercial aristocracy of the middle ages calculated to encourage +that species of art which offered the greatest splendour and elegance to +the eye; and this also, if possible, in a portable form; thus preferring +the domestic altar or the dedication picture to wall decorations in +churches. The contemporary Flemish paintings, under similar conditions, +exhibit analogous results. With regard to colour, the depth and +transparency observable in the works of the old Venetian School had long +been a distinguishing feature in the Byzantine paintings on wood, and +may therefore be traceable to this source without assuming an influence +on the part of Padua, or from the north through Giovanni Alamanus. + +The two side panels of an altar-piece, representing severally SS. Peter +and Jerome, and SS. Francis and Mark, now in the National Gallery (Nos. +768 and 1284), are ascribed to Antonio Vivarini alone, though the centre +panel, the Virgin and Child, now in the Poldi Pezzoli collection at +Milan is said to be the joint work of Alamanus and Antonio. However that +may be, there is no longer any dispute about the fascinating Adoration +of the Kings in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum at Berlin, formerly supposed +to be the work of Gentile da Fabriano, but now catalogued as that of +Antonio. + +In 1450 the name of Alamanus disappears altogether, and that of +BARTOLOMMEO VIVARINI, Antonio's younger brother, replaces it in an +inscription upon the great altar-piece commissioned by Pope Nicholas V. +in commemoration of Cardinal Albergati, now in the Pinacoteca of +Bologna. The change is noticeable as introducing the Paduan influence of +Squarcione, under whom Bartolommeo had studied, instead of the northern +influence of Alamanus, into Antonio's workshop, and while this work of +1450, as might be supposed, bears a general resemblance to that of 1446, +the change of partnership is at least perceptible, and had a determining +influence on the development of the Venetian style. + +A slightly earlier work of Bartolommeo alone is a Madonna and Child +belonging to Sir Hugh Lane, signed and dated 1448. An altar-piece in the +Venice Academy is dated 1464, a Madonna and Four Saints, in the Frari, +1482, and S. Barbara, in the Academy, 1490. Bartolommeo is supposed to +have died in 1499. + +ALVISE, or LUIGI, VIVARINI was the son of Antonio, and though he worked +under him and his uncle Bartolommeo, as well as under Giovanni Bellini, +the Paduan influence is apparent in his work. He was born in 1447, and +his first dated work is an altar-piece at Montefiorentino, in 1475. In +the Academy at Venice is a Madonna dated 1480, and at Naples a Madonna +with SS. Francis and Bernard, 1485. Another Madonna at Vienna is dated +1489, and the large altar-piece in the Basilica at the Kaiser Friedrich +Museum in Berlin is assigned to about the same time. This is the first +of his works in which the influence of Bellini rather than that of his +family is traceable, while of the "Redentore" Madonna at Venice, of +about five years later, Mr Bernhard Bernson says that, "As a composition +no work of the kind by Giovanni Bellini even rivals it." In 1498 he had +advanced so far as to be spoken of as anticipating Giorgione and Titian, +in the effect of light and in the roundness and softness of the figures +of the _Resurrection_, at Bragora. His last work, the altar-piece at the +Frari, was completed after his death in 1504 by his pupil Basaiti. +Bartolommeo Montagna, Jacopo da Valenza and Lorenzo Lotto were the chief +of his other pupils. + +In connection with the Vivarini must be mentioned CARLO CRIVELLI, who +studied with Bartolommeo under Antonio and Squarcione. But there was +something fierce and uncongenial about Crivelli which takes him out of +the main body of Venetian painters, and seems to have given him more +pride in being made a knight than in his pictorial achievements, +remarkable as they were. In his ornamentation of every detail with gold +and jewels he recalls the style of Antonio Vivarini, but while the +master used it as accessory merely, Crivelli positively revelled in it. +An inventory of the precious stones, ornaments, fruits and flowers, and +other detached items in the great "Demidoff Altar-Piece" in the National +Gallery would fill several pages. Of the eight examples in this gallery +the earliest is probably the _Dead Christ_, presumably painted in 1472. +The Demidoff altar-piece is dated 1476. The _Annunciation_ (No. 739), +which may be considered his masterpiece, was ten years later. In 1490 +Crivelli was knighted by Prince Ferdinand of Capua, and from that date +onward he was careful to add to his signature the title _Miles_--as +appears in our _Madonna and Child Enthroned_, with SS. Jerome and +Sebastian--called the Madonna della Rondine:---- + +CAROLUS CRIVELLUS VENETUS MILES PINXIT. This was painted for the Odoni +Chapel in S. Francesco at Matelica, the coat of arms of the family being +painted on the step. + +Our _Annunciation_ was executed for the convent of the Santissima +Annunziata at Ascoli, and is dated 1486. Three coats of arms on the +front of the step at the bottom of the picture are those of the Bishop +of Ascoli, Pope Innocent VII., the reigning Pontiff, and the City of +Ascoli. Between these are the words _Libertas Ecclesiastica_, in +allusion to the charter of self-government given in 1482 by the Pope to +the citizens of Ascoli. The patron saint of the city, S. Emidius, is +represented as a youth kneeling beside the Archangel, holding in his +hands a model of it. The Virgin is seen through the open door of a +house, and in an open loggia above are peacocks and other birds. Amid +all the rich detail, the significance of the group of figures at the top +of a flight of steps must not be missed, amongst which a child and a +poet are the only two who are represented as noticing the mystic event. + +Another painter of the earlier half of the fourteenth century may be +mentioned here, though as he was more famous as a medallist his +influence on the main course of painting is not observable. VITTORE +PISANO, called PISANELLO, was born in Verona before 1400, and died in +1455. Of the few pictures attributed to him we are fortunate in having +two such beautiful examples as the _SS. Anthony and George_ and _The +Vision of S. Eustace_ in the National Gallery. Both exhibit his two most +noticeable characteristics, namely, the minute care and exquisite +feeling that made him the most famous of medallists, and his wonderful +drawing of animals. The latter, it is worth remarking, was attributed by +a former owner to Albert Duerer. The other is signed "Pisanus"; in the +frame are inserted casts of two of his medals, representing Leonello +d'Este, his patron, and a profile of himself. + +Another very considerable factor in the development of Venetian painting +was the influence of GENTILE DA FABRIANO (_c._ 1360-1430), who settled +in Venice in the latter part of his life, and there formed the closest +intimacy with Antonio Vivarini. The remarkable _Adoration of the Kings_ +in the Berlin Museum was until lately given to Gentile, though it is now +catalogued as the work of Antonio. Of Gentile's education little is +known, and of the numerous works which he executed at Fabriano, in Rome +and in Venice very few have survived. From those that exist, however, we +can form an estimate of his talents and of the difference between his +earlier and later styles. To the first belong a fresco of the Madonna in +the Cathedral at Orvieto, and the beautiful picture of the Madonna and +saints which is now in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum at Berlin. Also the +fine _Adoration of the Kings_, inscribed with his name and the date +1423, formerly in the sacristy of S. Trinita at Florence, and now in the +Accademia. This, his masterpiece, is one of the finest conceptions of +the subject as well as one of the most excellent productions of the +schools descended from Giotto. Of his later period the _Coronation of +the Virgin_ (called the _Quadro della Romita_) in the Brera gallery at +Milan is one of the finest. In many respects his work is like that of +Fra Angelico, and was aptly characterised by Michelangelo when he said +that "Gentile's pictures were like his name." Apart from the influence +of the Paduan School, which will next be noticed, the Venetian owed most +to Gentile da Fabriano, if only as the master of Jacopo Bellini, whose +son, Giovanni Bellini, may be regarded as the real head of the Venetian +School as developed by his pupils Giorgione and Titian at the opening of +the sixteenth century. + +Whether or not Giotto left any actual pupils in Padua after completing +the frescoes in the chapel of the arena there, it must be admitted that +the older school of painting in Padua, which centred round the church +containing the body of S. Anthony, was an offshoot of the Florentine, +and that as Giotto was the great leader in Florence he must be +considered the same here; though his followers differ so much from each +other in style that beyond their indebtedness to their founder they have +no distinctive feature in common. But with the opening of the fifteenth +century one particular tendency was developed under the fostering +influence of FRANCESCO SQUARCIONE, born in 1394, which affected in a +very sensible degree the style of the great painters of the next +generation in Venice. This, in a word, was the cult of the antique. + +Among the Florentines, as we have seen, the study of form was chiefly +pursued on the principle of direct reference to nature, the especial +object in view being an imitation in two dimensions of the actual +appearances and circumstances of life existing in three. In the Paduan +School it now came to be very differently developed, namely, by the +study of the masterpieces of antique sculpture, in which the common +forms of nature were already raised to a high ideal of beauty. This +school has consequently the merit, as Kugler points out, of applying the +rich results of an earlier, long-forgotten excellence in art to modern +practice. Of a real comprehension of the idealising principle of classic +art there does not appear any trace; what the Paduans borrowed from the +antique was limited primarily to mere outward beauty. Accordingly in the +earliest examples we find the drapery treated according to the antique +costume, and the general arrangement more resembling bas-relief than +rounded groups. The accessories display in like manner a special +attention to antique models, particularly in the architecture, and the +frequent introduction of festoons of fruit; while the exaggerated +sharpness in the marking of the forms due to the combined influence of +the study of the antique and the naturalising tendency of the time, +sometimes borders on excess. + +The immediate cause of this almost sudden outbreak of the cult of the +antique--whatever natural forces were behind it--was the visit of +Squarcione to Greece, and Southern Italy, to collect specimens of the +remains of ancient art. On his return to Padua his collection soon +attracted a great number of pupils anxious to avail themselves of the +advantages it offered; and by these pupils, who poured in from all parts +of Italy, the manner of the school was afterwards spread throughout a +great portion of the country. Squarcione himself is better known as a +teacher than as an artist, the few of his remaining works being of no +great importance. There is no example in the National Gallery, but of +the work of his great pupil, Mantegna, we have as much, at any rate, as +will serve to commemorate the master. + +ANDREA MANTEGNA was born at Vicenza in 1431, and when no more than ten +years old was inscribed in the guild of Padua as pupil and adopted son +of Squarcione. As early as 1448 he had painted an altar-piece for Santa +Sophia, now lost, and in 1452 the fresco in San Antonio. In 1455 he was +engaged with Nicolo Pizzolo (Donatello's assistant), and others, on the +six frescoes in the Eremitani Church at Padua. The whole of the left +side of the chapel of SS. James and Christopher--the life of S. +James--and the martyrdom of S. Christopher are his, and in these, his +earliest remaining works, we already see the result of pedantic +antiquarianism combined with his extraordinary individuality. + +In 1460 he went to Mantua, where he remained for the greater part of his +life, visiting Florence in 1466 and Rome in 1488. + +Among his earlier works are the small _Adoration of the Kings_ in the +Uffizi at Florence, the _Death of the Virgin_ and the _S. George_ in the +Venice Academy. From 1484 to 1494 he was intermittently engaged on the +nine great cartoons of _The Triumph of Caesar_, which are now at Hampton +Court, having been acquired by Charles I. with many other gems from the +Duke of Mantua's collection. On the completion of these he painted the +celebrated _Madonna della Vittoria_, now in the Louvre--a large +altar-piece representing a Madonna surrounded by saints, with Francesco +Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, and his wife, kneeling at her feet. It is a +dedication picture for a victory obtained over Charles VIII. of France +in 1495. It is no less remarkable for its superb execution than for a +softer treatment of the flesh than is usual in Mantegna's work. Two +other pictures in the Louvre are, however, distinguished by similar +qualities--the _Parnassus_, painted in 1497, and the _Triumph of +Virtue_. + +[Illustration: PLATE XI.--ANDREA MANTEGNA + +THE MADONNA DELLA VITTORIA + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +In our own collection we have _The Agony in the Garden_, painted in +1459--to which I shall refer presently--two monochrome paintings (Nos. +1125 and 1145), the beautiful _Virgin and Child Enthroned_, with SS. +Mary Magdalen and John the Baptist, which is comparable with the more +famous Louvre _Madonna_, and, lastly, the _Triumph of Scipio_, in +monochrome, painted for Francesco Cornaro, a Venetian nobleman, +completed in 1506, only a few months before the painter's death. In this +we see that Mantegna's antiquarianism was not simply a youthful phase, +but lasted till the very end of his career. The subject is the reception +of the Phrygian mother of the gods among the recognised divinities of +the Roman State, as is indicated on the plinth by the inscription. In +the centre is Claudia Quinta about to kneel before the bust of the +goddess. Behind is Scipio, and in the background are monuments to his +family. The composition includes twenty-two figures. It is significant +that the subject and its treatment are so entirely classic as only to be +appreciated by references to Latin literature. + +Another significance attaches to the _Agony in the Garden_ above +mentioned, which is one of the very earliest, as the _Scipio_ is the +very latest, of Mantegna's pictures, being painted before he left Padua +to go to Mantua. In this we find that the original suggestion for the +design appears to have been taken from a drawing in the sketch-book of +his father-in-law, Jacopo Bellini, which is now in the British Museum; +and the same design appears to have served Giovanni Bellini in the +composition of the picture in our gallery (No. 726). This takes us back +to Venice, and accounts for the Paduan influence traceable in the works +of the Bellini family and their pupils. + +JACOPO BELLINI, whose considerable talents have been somewhat obscured +by the fame of his two sons, Gentile and Giovanni, was originally a +pupil of Gentile da Fabriano, after whom he named his eldest son. He was +working in Padua in the middle of the fifteenth century, in rivalry with +Squarcione, and in 1453 his daughter Nicolosia married Andrea Mantegna. +Thus it happened that both of his sons came under the influence of +Mantegna, and evidently, too, of the sculptor Donatello, when working at +Padua between 1450 and 1460. + +Very few authentic pictures by Jacopo are known to us. _A Crucifixion_ +(much repainted) was in the sacristy of the Episcopal Palace at Verona; +and another, which recalls the treatment of his master, Gentile da +Fabriano, at Lovere, near Bergamo. In the sketch-book above mentioned, +the contents of which consist of sacred subjects, and studies from the +antique, both in architecture and in costume, we see the peculiar +tendency of the Paduan School expressed in the most complete and +comprehensive manner. These drawings constitute the most remarkable link +of connection between Mantegna and the sons of Jacopo Bellini, all three +of whom must have studied from them. The book was inherited by Gentile +on his mother's death, and bequeathed by him to his brother on condition +that he should finish the picture of _S. Mark_, on which Gentile was +engaged at the time of his death. + +GIOVANNI BELLINI was born in 1428 or 1430 and lived to 1516. Albert +Duerer, writing from Venice in 1506, says that "he is very old, but is +still the best in painting." + +The greater number of Bellini's pictures are to be found in the +galleries and churches in Venice, all of those which are dated being +the work of his old age. Of his earlier pictures we are fortunate in +having two fine examples in the National Gallery, _Christ's Agony in the +Garden_ (No. 726) and _The Blood of the Redeemer_ (No. 1233). In both of +these the influence of his famous brother-in-law Andrea Mantegna, is +traceable,--the former being till lately attributed to him. Both +Giovanni and Gentile worked in Padua, where Mantegna was established, in +1460 or thereabouts, and where another influence, that of the sculptor +Donatello, must have had its effect on the young brothers. Similar in +character, and even more beautiful in some respects, is the _Redeemer_, +a single half figure in a landscape, recently acquired for the +Louvre--the first authentic example of the master in that collection. + +In 1464, Giovanni had returned to Venice, and it was some years before +the severe Paduan influence melted before "the sensuous feeling of the +true Venetian temperament." In 1475, however, the arrival of Antonello +da Messina in Venice, bringing with him the practice of painting in oil, +effected a revolution, in which Giovanni, if not one of the foremost, +was certainly one of the most successful in adopting the new method. His +later works, so far from showing any diminution of power, may be said to +anticipate the Venetian style of the sixteenth century in the clearest +manner. One of the chief, dated 1488, is the large altar-piece in the +sacristy of S. Maria di Frari, a _Madonna Enthroned_ with two angels and +four saints. The two little angels are of the utmost beauty; the one is +playing on a lute, and listens with head inclined to hear whether the +instrument is in tune; the other is blowing a pipe. The whole is +perfectly finished and of a splendid effect of colour. To the year 1486 +belongs a _Madonna Enthroned with Six Saints_, now in the Academy at +Venice. The famous head of the Doge Loredano in the National Gallery +must have been painted in or after 1501. In 1507, he completed the large +picture of _S. Mark Preaching at Alexandria_, now in the Brera Gallery +at Milan, begun by his brother Gentile. Within three years of his death, +namely in 1513, he could produce such a masterwork as the altar-piece in +S. Giovanni Crisostomo. His last work, the landscape in which was +finished by Titian, is dated 1514. This is the famous _Bacchanal_ now in +the collection of the Duke of Northumberland. + +The influence of Bellini on the Venetian School was paramount, and his +noble example helped more than anything else to develop the excellences +observable in the works of Cimada Conegliano, Vincenzo Catena, Lorenzo +Lotto, Palma Vecchio and Basaiti, to say nothing of his great pupils +Titian and Giorgione. It is impossible to conjecture what course the +genius of this younger generation would have taken without his guidance, +but when we consider that in 1500 Bellini was seventy years old, and had +stored within his mind the experience of his early association with his +brother-in-law Andrea Mantegna in Padua, the introduction of the use of +oil paints by Antonello da Messina in 1475, since which date he had +sedulously developed the new practice; when we also take into account +the dignity and gravity of his own works, and the indication they afford +of the man himself, it is not difficult to judge how much his pupils and +successors owed to him. + +The works of GENTILE BELLINI, the elder brother of Giovanni, are of less +importance, but of considerable interest, especially in view of his +journey to Constantinople in 1479 at the request of the Sultan, whose +portrait he painted there in the following year. A replica + +[Illustration: PLATE XII.--GIOVANNI BELLINI + +THE DOGE LOREDANO + +_National Gallery, London_] + +of this portrait has been bequeathed to the National Gallery by Sir +Henry Layard, and it is to be hoped that the difficulties raised by the +Italian government as to its removal from Venice will shortly be +overcome. The picture of _S. Mark Preaching at Alexandria_ already +mentioned as having been finished by Giovanni, is remarkable for the +Oriental costumes of all the figures in it. Gentile's pictures are often +ascribed to his brother; in two examples at the National Gallery (Nos. +808 and 1440) there is actually a false signature on a cartellino. In +the latter instance Messrs Ludwig and Molmenti are still of opinion that +the picture is the work of Giovanni. + +VINCENZO CATENA (_c._ 1470-1530) is not known to have been a pupil of +Bellini, but he began by so modelling his style upon him that one of his +works in the National Gallery was until quite lately officially ascribed +to him, namely the _S. Jerome in his Study_. Another, a later work, _A +Warrior Adoring the Infant Christ_ was similarly ascribed to Giorgione. +This is a proof that Catena was very susceptible to various influences, +and was "an artist of extraordinary suppleness of mind, never too old to +learn or to appreciate new ideals and new sentiments." In a manner more +his own is the _Madonna with Four Saints_ in the Berlin Gallery (No. +19). The _S. Jerome_ and the _Warrior_ are among the most popular +pictures in the National Gallery--partly perhaps on account of their +supposed illustrious parentage, but by no means entirely. A painter who +could so absorb the characteristics of two such masters must needs be a +master himself. + +CIMA DA CONEGLIANO, so called from his birthplace in Friuli--the rocky +height of which serves as a background in some of his pictures--settled +in Venice in 1490, when he was about thirty years old. The influence of +Bellini may be seen in the temperamental as well as the technical +qualities of his work, which is distinguished by sound drawing and +proportion, fine and brilliant colour, as well as by sympathetic types +of countenance. One of his best and earliest pictures is the _S. John +the Baptist_ with four other saints, in Santa Maria del Orto in Venice. +Another is the _Madonna with S. Jerome and S. Louis_, now in the Vienna +Gallery. A smaller but peculiarly attractive piece is the _S. Anianus of +Alexandria_ healing a shoemaker's wounded hand, at Berlin, distinguished +for its beautiful clear colours and the life-like character of the +heads. + +ANDREA PREVITALI, born in Bergamo in 1480, came to Venice to study under +Bellini, whom he succeeded in imitating with remarkable success. _The +Mystic Marriage of S. Catherine_ (No. 1409) in the National Gallery was +formerly attributed to Bellini. If he had not the originality to carry +the art any farther, his pictures are nevertheless a decided and very +agreeable proof of the advance that was being made in it at the +beginning of the sixteenth century, before the full splendour of +Giorgione and Titian had unfolded. + +MARCO BASAITI, though probably not a pupil of Bellini, nevertheless +acquired many of his characteristics. The picture in the National +Gallery known as _The Madonna of the Meadow_ was until lately assigned +to Bellini, and another of his, in the Giovanelli Palace at Venice, +which is identical in technique, tone, and general effect with this one, +is still so ascribed. Whether or not he learnt from Bellini, he was +certainly an assistant to Alvise Vivarini, on whose death he completed +the large altar-piece in the Church of S. Maria de Friari at Venice, +representing _S. Ambrose surrounded by Saints_. His _Christ on the Mount +of Olives_ and _The Calling of Zebedee_, both dated 1510, are now in the +Academy at Venice, and together with the _Portrait of a Man_, dated +1521, in the Bergamo Gallery, and _The Assumption_ in S. Pietro Martire +at Murano, may be considered his best performances. + +More remote from Bellini, yet not so far as to be entirely free from his +influence in some of their more important compositions, was the school +formed by LAZZARO DI BASTIANI or SEBASTIANI, of which the chief ornament +was Vittore Carpaccio, and among the lesser ones Giovanni Mansueti and +Benedetto Diana. The history of this independent group of painters has +only of late years been elucidated; Kugler, after a page devoted to +Carpaccio, dismissed them with the remark that Mansueti and Bastiani +were both pupils of Carpaccio, and that Benedetto Diana was "less +distinguished." Our national collection was without any example until +1896, when Mansueti's _Symbolic representation of the Crucifixion_ was +purchased. In 1905 the National Art-Collections Fund secured Bastiani's +_Virgin and Child_, and in 1910 Sir Claude Phillips presented Diana's +_Christ Blessing_. Alas! that we are still without anything from the +hand of Vittore Carpaccio. Seven portraits by Moroni do not fill a gap +like this. + +The name of Lazzaro de Bastiani first occurs in Venice as a witness to +his brother's will in 1449, and as early as 1460 he was painting an +altar-piece for the Church of San Samuele. Ten years later, the brothers +of the Scuolo di San Marco ordered a picture of the _Story of David_ +from him, promising him the same payment as they gave to Jacobo Bellini, +who had been working for them with his two sons Gentile and Giovanni. +In 1474, another proof of his rank and repute as a painter is afforded +by a letter from a gentleman in Constantinople, asking for a picture by +him, but that Giovanni Bellini should paint it in the event of Bastiani +being already dead. He was thus, it would seem, preferred to Bellini, +though it will be remembered that five years later, when the Sultan +expressed the wish that a distinguished portrait-painter should be sent +him from Venice, it was Gentile Bellini who was nominated. All the same, +Gentile was a portrait-painter, and Bastiani was not; and it is fairly +evident that the latter was at least in the front rank. One of his +best-known pictures the _Vergine dai begli occhi_ in the Ducal Palace at +Venice used to be attributed to Giovanni Bellini; but though he appears +to have drawn inspiration for his larger and more important compositions +from Jacobo Bellini, his style was chiefly developed through that of +Giambono. His most important work is now in the Academy at Vienna--an +altar-piece painted for the Church of Corpus Domini, Venice, _S. +Veneranda Enthroned_. In the Imperial Gallery at Vienna are a _Last +Communion_ and _Funeral of S. Girolamo_. In the Academy at Venice are +_S. Anthony of Padua_, seated between the branches of a walnut-tree, +with Cardinal Bonaventura and Brother Leo on either side, a large +picture of a _Miracle of the Holy Cross_, and a remarkable rendering of +_The Madonna Kneeling_, the child being laid under an elaborate canopy. +An _Entombment_ in the Church of S. Antonino at Venice is reminiscent of +Giovanni Bellini at his best. + +In 1508, the name of VITTORE CARPACCIO occurs with that of Bastiani in +connection with the frescoes of Giorgione upon the facade of the Fondaco +de Tedeschi, about which there was a dispute. To Carpaccio we are +indebted for the most vivid realization of the contemporary life of +Venice; for although his subjects were nominally taken from sacred +history or legend, they are treated in a thoroughly secular fashion, +giving the clearest idea of the buildings, people, and costume of the +Venice of his time, with the greatest variety and richest development. +His object is not only to represent single events, but a complete scene, +and while we observe this characteristic in one or two pictures by the +Bellini, Carpaccio not only shows it much oftener, but carries it to a +much fuller development--possibly influenced by the Netherlandish +masters. + +Many of his works are in the Academy at Venice; eight large pictures, +painted between 1490 and 1495, represent the history of S. Ursula and +the eleven thousand virgins. Such a wealth of charming material might +have embarrassed a less capable painter, but "the monotonous incident +which forms the groundwork of many of them," as Kugler coldly puts it, +"is throughout varied and elevated by a free style of grouping and by +happy moral allusions." Another series is that of the _Miracles of the +Holy Cross_, among which may be especially noticed the cure of a man +possessed by a devil; the scene is laid in the loggia of a Venetian +palace, and is watched from below by a varied group of figures on the +Canal and its banks. Larger and broader treatment may be seen in the +_Presentation in the Temple_, painted in 1510, which is also in the +Academy, and in the altar-piece of _S. Vitale_, dated 1514. This last +brings Carpaccio into closer comparison with the later Venetian +painters, being in the nature of a _Santa Conversazione_, where the holy +personages are grouped in some definite relation to each other, and not +independent figures. + +PALMA VECCHIO (1480-1528), so called to distinguish him from Giacomo +Palma the younger--Palma Giovane,--was so much influenced by Giorgione +and Titian that his indebtedness to Bellini appears to have been +comparatively slight. The beautiful _Portrait of a Poet_ in the National +Gallery has been attributed both to Giorgione and to Titian. + +The number of pictures which are now permitted by the experts to be +called Giorgione's is so small, that we may learn more about him as an +influence on the work of other painters--especially Titian--than from +the meagre materials available for his own biography. The only +unquestioned examples of his work are three pictures at the Uffizi, _The +Trial of Moses_, _The Judgment of Solomon_, and _The Knight of Malta_; +the _Venus_ at Dresden; _The Three Philosophers_ at Vienna; and the +famous _Concert Champetre_ in the Louvre. But until the critics deprive +him even of these, we are able to agree that "his capital achievement +was the invention of the modern spirit of lyrical passion and romance in +pictorial art, and his magical charm has never been equalled." + + + + +II + +TIZIANO VECELLIO + + +TITIAN occupies almost, if not quite, as important a place in the +history of painting as does Shakespeare in that of literature. His fame, +his popularity, the wide range as well as the immense quantity of his +works, entitle him to be ranked with our poet, if only for the + +[Illustration: PLATE XIII.--GIORGIONE + +VENETIAN PASTORAL + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +enormous influence they have both exercised on posterity: and without +carrying the parallel farther than the limits imposed by the difference +of their circumstances and their method of expression, it may fairly be +said that Titian, in painting, stands for us to-day much as Shakespeare +stands for in letters. "Titian," says M. Caro Delvaille,[2] "is the +father of modern painting. As the blood of the patriarchs of old infused +the veins of a whole race, so the genius of the most productive of +painters was destined to infuse those of artists through all the ages +even to the present day. He bequeathed, in his enormous _oeuvre_, a +heritage in which generations of painters have participated." + +Not only was he the father of modern painting, but he was himself the +first modern painter, just as Shakespeare was, to all present intents +and purposes, the first modern writer. Among a thousand readers of +Shakespeare, there is possibly not more than one who has ever read a +line of Chaucer, or who has ever heard of any of his other predecessors. +So it is with Titian. To the connoisseur, Titian is one of the latest +painters; to the public he is the earliest. "In certain of his +portraits," we read in the National Gallery Catalogue, "he ranks with +the supreme masters; in certain other aspects he is seen as the greatest +academician, as perhaps he was the first." + +As it happens, too, Titian stands in much the same relation to Giorgione +as Shakespeare did to Marlowe. Giorgione was really the great innovator, +and Giorgione died young, leaving Titian to carry on the work. It has +always been supposed that Titian and Giorgione, like Marlowe and +Shakespeare, were born within the same year; but in this respect the +parallel is no longer admissible, as Mr Herbert Cook has shown to the +verge of actual proof that the story of Titian being born in 1577, and +having lived to be ninety-nine years old, is unworthy of acceptance. If +this were merely a question of biography, it would not be worth dwelling +upon; but as it seriously affects the whole study of early Venetian +painting, it is necessary to point out that the probability, according +to a critical study of all the evidence available, is that Titian was +not born till 1488 or 1489, and was thus really the pupil rather than +the contemporary of Giorgione, and therefore more slightly influenced by +Giovanni Bellini than has been generally supposed. + +Without going into all the evidence adduced by Mr Cook (_Reviews and +Appreciations,_ Heinemann, 1913) it is nevertheless pretty evident that +in the account given by his friend and contemporary, Lodovico Dolce, +published in 1557, we have the most authentic story of Titian's early +years, and from this it is quite clear that Titian was considerably +younger than Giorgione. "Being born at Cadore," he writes, "of +honourable parents, he was sent, when a child of nine years old, by his +father to Venice, to the house of his father's brother, in order that he +might be put under some proper master to study painting; his father +having perceived in him even at that tender age strong marks of genius +towards the art.... His uncle directly carried the child to the house of +Sebastanio, father of the _gentilissimo_ Valerio and of Francesco +Zuccati (distinguished masters of the art of mosaic, ...) to learn the +principles of the art. From them he was removed to Gentile Bellini, +brother of Giovanni, but much inferior to him, who at that time was at +work with his brother in the Grand Council Chamber. But Titian, impelled +by nature to greater excellence and perfection in his art, could not +endure following the dry and laboured manner of Gentile, but designed +with boldness and expedition. Whereupon Gentile told him he would make +no progress in painting because he diverged so much from the old style. +Thereupon Titian left the stupid Gentile and found means to attach +himself to Giovanni Bellini; but not perfectly pleased with his manner, +he chose Giorgio da Castel Franco. Titian, then, drawing and painting +with Giorgione, as he was called, became in a short time so accomplished +in art that when Giorgione was painting (in 1507-8) the facade of the +Fondaco de'Tedeschi, or Exchange of the German merchants, which looks +towards the Grand Canal, Titian was allotted the other side which faces +the market place, being at the time scarcely twenty years old. Here he +represented a Judith of wonderful design and colour, so remarkable +indeed, that when the work came to be uncovered it was commonly thought +to be the work of Giorgione, and all the latter's friends congratulated +him (Giorgione) as being by far the best thing he had produced. +Whereupon Giorgione, in great displeasure, replied that the work was +from the hand of his pupil, who showed already how he could surpass his +master and (what is more) Giorgione shut himself up for some days at +home, as if in despair, seeing that a young (_i.e._ younger) man knew +more than he did." + +Again, in speaking of the famous altar-piece--the _Assumption_, now in +the Academy at Venice--painted by Titian in 1516, Dolce mentions him +twice as "giovinetto." "Not long afterwards he was commissioned to paint +a large picture for the high altar of the Church of the Frate Minori, +where Titian, quite a young man, painted in oil the Virgin ascending to +Heaven.... This was the first public work which he painted in oil, and +he did it in a very short time, and while still a young man." + +Vasari's account of Titian's early years is substantially the same, but +unfortunately opens with the statement that he was "born in the year +1480." This might easily have been a slip of the pen or a printer's +mistake for 1488 or 1489, and subsequent passages in the life bear out +this supposition. But partly because Titian was a Venetian and not a +Florentine, and partly, no doubt, because he was still alive, and had +been producing picture after picture for over sixty years at the time +Vasari published his second edition in 1568, the whole account is so +confused and inaccurate that its credit has been severely shaken by +modern critics, with the result that it is hardly nowadays considered +authentic in any respect. The following extracts, however, there seems +no reason to question:---- + +"About the year 1507, Giorgione not being satisfied [with the +old-fashioned methods of Bellini and others] began to give his works an +unwonted softness and relief, painting them in a very beautiful manner." +And a little later "Having seen the manner of Giorgione, Titian early +resolved to abandon that of Gian Bellino, although well grounded +therein. He now, therefore, devoted himself to this purpose, and in a +short time so closely imitated Giorgione that his pictures were +sometimes taken for those of this master, as will be related below. +Increasing in age, judgment and facility of hand, our young artist +executed numerous works in fresco.... At the time when he began to adopt +the manner of Giorgione, being then not more than eighteen, he took the +portrait of a gentleman of the Barberigo family, who was his friend, and +this was considered very beautiful, the colouring being true and +natural, the hair so distinctly painted that each one could be counted, +as might also the stitches in a satin doublet painted in the same work; +in a word, it was so well and carefully done that it would have been +taken for a work of Giorgione if Titian had not written his name on the +dark ground." + +With this we may leave the question of Titian's birth date, and consider +the exceptional interest attaching to the question of this Barberigo +portrait. According to Mr. Cook, and also, under reserve, to several +other eminent authorities, it is no other than the so-called _Ariosto_, +which was purchased for the National Gallery in 1904. The chief +difficulties in deciding the question are, first, whether it is possible +that a youth of eighteen could have painted such a masterpiece, second, +that the signature _Titianus_ is supposed not to have been used by the +artist before about 1520, and lastly, that the head, at any rate, is +decidedly more in the manner of Giorgione than that of Titian. This +last, of course, did not trouble Vasari, and his testimony is therefore +all the more valuable; but all difficulties vanish if we accept Mr. +Cook's theory that the portrait was begun by Giorgione in 1508, was left +incomplete at his sudden death in 1510, and finished by Titian in 1520. +That is to say, the head and general design is that of Giorgione, the +marvellous finish of the sleeve and other parts that of Titian. + +Of works left unfinished at a master's death and completed by a pupil +there are numerous instances; the famous _Bacchanal_ at Alnwick is one +which takes us a step further in Titian's career. This was begun by +Giovanni Bellini, and Titian was invited by the Duke of Ferrara, in +1516, to finish it. The landscape is entirely his. To complete the +decoration of the apartment in which the picture was hung, he was +called upon to paint two others of the same size, one the _Triumph of +Bacchus_, or as it is usually called _Bacchus and Ariadne_ (now in the +National Gallery) and the other a similar subject, the _Bacchanal_, now +in the Prado (No. 418, formerly 450). + +Ridolfi, in his life of Titian characterises our picture as one to whose +unparalleled merits he is inadequate to do justice; "There is," he says, +"such a graceful expression in the figure of Ariadne, such beauty in the +children--so strongly marked both in the looks and attitudes is the +joyous character of the licentious votaries of Bacchus--the roundness +and correct drawing of the man entwined with snakes, the magnificence of +the sky and landscape, the sporting play of the leaves and branches of +the most vivid tints, and the detailed herbage on the ground tending to +enliven the scene, and the rich tone of colour throughout, form +altogether such a whole that hardly any other work of Titian can stand +in competition with it." + +In the composition of the second picture, _The Bacchanal_ at Madrid, a +number of the votaries of Bacchus are assembled on the bank of a +rivulet, flowing with red wine from a hill in the distance; some of them +are distributing the liquor to their associates, while a nymph and two +men are dancing. The nymph is supposed to be a portrait of Violante, +Titan's mistress, as he has painted, in allusion to her name, a violet +on her breast and his own name round her arm. Her light drapery is +raised by the breeze, and discovers the beautiful form and _morbidezza_ +of her limbs. In the foreground Ariadne lies asleep, her head resting on +a rich vase in place of a pillow.[3] + +[Illustration: PLATE XIV.--TITIAN + +PORTRAIT SAID TO BE OF ARIOSTO + +_National Gallery, London_] + +Cumberland says that Raphael Mengs, who lived long at Madrid at the time +when this picture was in the reception room of the New Palace, was of +opinion that Titian's superior taste was nowhere more strikingly +displayed, and remarks that he himself could never pass by it without +surprise and admiration, more particularly excited by the beauty of the +sleeping Ariadne in the foreground. + +Respecting the merits of both pictures the testimony of Agostino +Carracci should not be omitted; when he viewed them in the possession of +the Duke of Ferrara he declared that he considered them the first in the +world, and that no one could say he was acquainted with the most +marvellous works of art without having seen them. + +Commenting upon another picture of Titian's early period, Sir Joshua +Reynolds delivers himself of the following criticisms on Titian as +compared with Raphael, "It is to Titian that we must turn," he says, "to +find excellence in regard to colour, and light and shade in the highest +degree. He was both the first and the greatest master of this art; by a +few strokes he knew how to mark the general image and character of +whatever object he attempted, and produced by this alone a truer +representation of nature than his master, Giovanni Bellini, or any of +his predecessors, who finished every hair. His greatest object was to +express the general colour, to preserve the masses of light and shade, +and to give by opposition the idea of that solidity which is inseparable +from natural objects.... + +"Raphael and Titian seemed to have looked at nature for different +purposes; they both had the power of extending their view to the whole, +but one looked only at the general effect as produced by form, the +other as produced by colour. We cannot refuse Titian the merit of +attending to the general form of the object, as well as colour; but his +deficiency lay--a deficiency at least when he is compared with +Raphael--in not possessing the power, like him, of correcting the form +of his model by any general idea of beauty in his own mind. Of this his +_St. Sebastian with other Saints_ (in the Vatican) is a particular +instance. This figure appears to be a most exact representation both of +the form and colour of the model which he then happened to have before +him, and has all the force of nature, and the colouring of flesh itself; +but unluckily the model was of a bad form, especially the legs. Titian +has with much care preserved these defects, as he has imitated the +beauty and brilliancy of the colouring...." + +Of the Sebastian, Vasari says very much the same as Reynolds. "He is +nude," he writes, "and has been exactly copied from the life without the +slightest admixture of art, no efforts for the sake of beauty have been +sought in any part--trunk or limbs; all is as nature left it, so that it +might seem to be a sort of cast from the life. It is nevertheless +considered very fine, and the figure of our Lady with the infant in her +arms, whom all the other figures are looking at, is also accounted most +beautiful." + +Two more of the pictures of Titian's earliest period are in the National +Gallery--the _Christ appearing to Mary Magdalen_ (No. 270), and the +_Holy Family_ (No. 4). The former is ascribed to about the year 1514, +partly on the ground that the group of buildings in the landscape is +identical, line for line, with that in the Dresden _Venus_ painted by +Giorgione but completed by Titian after his death. The same landscape +also occurs in the beautiful little _Cupid_ in the Vienna + +[Illustration: PLATE XV.--TITIAN + +THE HOLY FAMILY + +_National Gallery, London_] + +Academy, and, as Mr Herbert Cook suggests, possibly represents some +cherished spot in Titian's memory connected with his mountain home at +Pieve di Cadore. + +The _Holy Family_, above mentioned, is a most charming example of the +_sacra conversazione_ as developed by Titian from the somewhat formal +and austere conception of Bellini and his contemporaries into something +eminently characteristic of the secular side of his genius. The very +titles of two of his most beautiful and most famous pictures of this +sort proclaim the hold they have taken on the popular mind. The one is +the _Madonna of the Cherries_, in the Vienna Gallery. The other is the +_Madonna with the Rabbit_, in the Louvre. In our picture the +distinguishing feature is the kneeling shepherd, with his little +water-cask slung on his belt, who puts us at once in touch with the +whole scene by the simple appeal to our common human experience. Raphael +could move our religious feelings to revere the godhead in the child, +but could seldom, like Titian, stir our human emotions and bring home to +us that Christ was born on earth for our sakes. + +If this particular characteristic of Titian were confined to the +pastoral setting of these Holy Conversations, it might be taken as +merely accidental, and without further significance than should be +accorded to a youthful fancy. But in the wonderful _Entombment_, now in +the Louvre, in which he displays "the full splendour of his early +maturity," the human element is such an important factor in the +presentment of the divine tragedy that even a painter, M. +Caro-Delvaille, must postpone his description of the picture to +sentences like these:--"Sur un ciel tourmente," he writes, in phrases +which it is impossible to render adequately in English, "se profile le +groupe tragique. Aucun geste superflu; le drame est interieur. La +Douleur plane dans l'air alourdi du crepuscule, comme une aile +fatale--Jesus est mort! Le grand cadavre livide, que les apotres +angoisses soutiennent, n'a rien dans sa robustesse inerte de la +depouille emaciee des Christs mystiques. Le fils de Dieu semble un +patriarche douloureusement frappe par le decret d'en haut. + +"Une aprete primitive, ou les larmes se cachent comme une faiblesse, +communique a l'oeuvre un pathetique si poignant que le mystere de la +mort s'etend jusqu'a nous. + +"La Vierge et la Madeleine sont la. Elle, la Mere, doute de la realite, +tant elle souffre! Son regard fixe sur le corps cheri, elle ne peut +croire que tout est consomme. La pecheresse pitoyable la prend dans ses +bras pour essayer de l'arracher a l'horreur de cette vision. + +"Drame humain et divin! ne sont-ce point des fils qui ramenent le +cadavre de leur pere a la poussiere? Tous ceux qui passerent par ces +epreuves se souviennent de ce deuil qui semble se prolonger dans la +nature entiere." + +Titian's first period may be said to end in 1530, by which time he had +completed the famous _Peter Martyr_, which was destroyed by fire in +1867. In 1530, too, Titian's wife died. This event of itself need not be +supposed to have greatly influenced his career, as there is no evidence +of her having appealed to his artistic nature as did his daughter +Lavinia. As it happened, however, a more certain influence was nearly +coincident with this event--the arrival in Venice of the notorious +Aretine, who, chiefly as it appears, with an eye to business, entered +into the most intimate relations with Titian. The accession of the +sculptor + +[Illustration: PLATE XVI.--TITIAN + +THE ENTOMBMENT + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +Sansovino to the comradeship earned for the group the name of the +Triumvirate. + +So far from Titian being corrupted by the society of Aretine, there is +direct evidence in one of the poet's letters to him that he was not. +"You must come to our feast to-night," he writes, "but I may as well +warn you that you had better leave early, as I know how particular you +are about certain things." Nor is there anything in the artist's works +of this next period--which we may roughly date from 1530 to 1550, that +betrays a more serious devotion to the sensual side of life than can be +accounted for by the demands of the high and mighty patrons that Aretine +was soon to find for him. As an artist he looked upon woman as a +beautiful creature, as a man he most probably never troubled about her, +or was troubled by her. There is no proof that any of his pictures are +rightly called "Titian's mistress," and we may conclude that he was as +good a husband and a father as was Rubens, who revelled in painting +woman, or Velasquez, who seems to have frankly disliked it. Like +Rowlandson, whom the general public only know as a caricaturist, but who +when he once got away from London was the most pure minded and poetical +artist, so Titian, when once dissociated from the demands of corrupt +patrons, like Philip II., never reveals himself as having fallen under +the influence of Aretine--if indeed at all. The _Danae_ and the _Venus +and a Musician_ at the Prado are the only examples it is possible to +cite--unless it be the _Venus_, to which popular opinion would hardly +deny its place of honour in the Tribune at the Uffizi. + +At the same time the difference in circumstances, the fuller, richer +life that he must have led in these years of patronage and prosperity, +accounts for a certain "shallowness and complacency" which +distinguishes his work during this period as sharply from that which +preceded as from that which followed it; and fine as is his +accomplishment during these years, especially in portraiture, it +includes fewer of those masterpieces which appeal to the heart as much +as to the eye. + +To 1538 belongs the large and beautiful picture of the _Presentation of +the Virgin Mary in the Temple_, painted for the Scuola della Carita in +Venice, which is now occupied by the Academy, where it still hangs, as +is said, in its original place. It is twenty-two feet in length, and +contains several portraits, among which are those of his daughter +Lavinia (the Virgin, as is supposed), Andrea Franchescini, grand +chancellor of Venice, in a scarlet robe; next him, in black, Lazzaro +Crasso, a lawyer, and certain monks of the convent following them. + +We now find Titian employed by the Duke of Urbino on some of the +principal works of this period. Among these were the Uffizi _Venus_, +said to be a portrait of the Duchess herself. The _Girl in a Fur Mantle_ +at Vienna, portraits of the Duke and of the Duchess (1537), and the +so-called _La Bella_ at the Uffizi. The so-called _Duke of Norfolk_ at +the Pitti, supposed to represent the young Duke Guidobaldo of Urbino. +Also the _Isabella d'Este_ at Vienna, and somewhat earlier, the +_Cardinal Ippolito_ in Hungarian dress, at the Pitti; and the _Daughter +of Robert Strozzi_, at Berlin. + +The large _Ecce Homo_ in the Vienna Gallery, dated 1543, measuring 11 +ft. 3 in. by 7 ft. 7 in. was for some years in London, and with better +fortune might still be in this country if not in our national +collection. It was one of the nineteen pictures by Titian in the +wonderful collection of Rubens, which the Duke of Buckingham persuaded +him to sell to him for a fabulous price. The collection was shipped to +England in 1625, when the pictures were taken to York House in the +Strand, and the statues and gems to Chelsea. In 1649 a portion of the +collection was sold at Brussels, and the _Ecce Homo_ was purchased there +by the Archduke Leopold for his gallery at Prague, which now forms part +of that at Vienna. The Earl of Arundel offered the Duke of Buckingham +L7000 for it--an unheard of price, especially when we remember the +greater value of money at that time. + +With another masterpiece--fortunately still preserved in the Prado, +though not entirely uninjured by fire--we may close the second period. +This is the magnificent equestrian portrait of _The Emperor Charles V._ +which was painted at Augsburg in 1548. A few years later the Emperor +abdicated in favour of his egregious son, Philip II., of whom Titian +painted three portraits in succession. The second of these, now in the +Prado, has an especial interest for us, inasmuch as it was painted for +the benefit or the enticement of Queen Mary before her marriage to +Philip. As might be expected, it is a highly flattering likeness,--in +white and gold, in half armour. To quote M. Caro-Delvaille, this king of +_auto da fes_ and sunken galleys is here nothing more than a gallant +cavalier--neurasthenic but elegant. For England was also painted the +_Venus and Adonis_, in 1554; but unfortunately the original is now in +Madrid, and only a copy in our National Gallery. However, the remains of +Philip are there too, and not in Westminster Abbey! + +A copy of another famous picture painted by Titian for the Emperor +Charles V. was also in the collection of the Duke of Buckingham, who +probably brought it with him when he returned from his madcap expedition +with Prince Charles to Madrid. It is described in his catalogue as "One +great Piece of the Emperor Charles, a copy called Titian's Glory, being +the principal in Spain, now in the Escurial." This was the great +_Paradise_, or Apotheosis of Charles V. which Charles took with him into +Spain at the time of his abdication and placed in the monastery of St. +Juste, in Estramadura, to which he retired. After his death it was +removed by Philip II. to Madrid. + +Of the two versions of _The Crowning with Thorns_, the earlier one at +the Louvre, painted in 1560, is more familiar to, and probably more +popular with, the general public than the much later one at Munich +painted in 1571. But for the real merits of the two we need not hesitate +to accept M. Caro-Delvaille's judgment, since if he had any bias it +would be in favour of his own country's treasure. The former he +characterises as an incoherent composition, in which useless +gesticulation diminishes the dramatic effect, while striving to force +it; and adds that all the false romanticism of painting comes from this +sort of theatrical pathos. Of the other he writes "It was the picture at +the Louvre which shocked me with its violent declamation and its forced +blows that never hit anything. But here at Munich a mystery so profound +broods over the drama that the melodramatic element disappears. The +scene becomes tragic, lamentable, hopelessly sad. The great artist with +a brush that trembles in his aged hands paints but the sentiment of it, +to exhale from his work like a plaintive sigh. The veil of death +descends and spreads over life.... Titian might seem to have painted it +as an offering to Rembrandt when he, too, should feel the approach of +death." + +Another of his latest pictures, the _Adam and Eve in Paradise_, is in +the Prado (No. 429, formerly 456). This was copied, or one might almost +say travestied, by Rubens when he was at Madrid in 1629, and his work +was hung in the same room with it. As the colouring is of a lower tone +than is usual with Titian, and the attitudes of the figures extremely +simple and natural, the contrast is all the more marked, and was well +expressed by Cumberland, who said that "when we contemplate Titian's +picture of Adam and Eve we are convinced they never wore clothes; turn +to the copy, and the same persons seem to have laid theirs aside." + +A more generous comparison between these two painters is made by +Reynolds in a note on du Fresnoy's poem on Painting respecting the +qualities of regularity and uniformity. "An instance occurs to me where +those two qualities are separately exhibited by two great painters, +Rubens and Titian: the picture of Rubens is in the Church of S. +Augustine at Antwerp, the subject (if that may be called a subject where +no story is represented) is the Virgin and Infant Christ placed high in +the picture on a pedestal with many saints about them and as many below +them, with others on the steps to serve as a link to unite the upper and +lower part of the picture. The composition of this picture is perfect in +its kind; the artist has shown the greatest skill in composing and +contrasting more than twenty figures without confusion and without +crowding; the whole appearing as much animated and in motion as it is +possible where nothing is to be done. + +"The picture of Titian which we would oppose to this is in the Church +of the S. Frari at Venice (the "Pesaro Madonna," where the two donors +kneel below the Virgin enthroned). One peculiar character of this piece +is grandeur and simplicity, which proceed in a great measure from the +regularity of the composition, two of the principal figures being +represented kneeling directly opposite to each other, and nearly in the +same attitude. This is what few painters would have had the courage to +venture; Rubens would certainly have rejected so unpicturesque a mode of +composition had it occurred to him. Both these pictures are excellent in +their kind, and may be said to characterize their respective authors. +There is a bustle and animation in the work of Rubens, a quiet solemn +majesty in that of Titian. The excellence of Rubens is the picturesque +effect he produces; the superior merit of Titian is in the appearance of +being above seeking after any such "artificial excellence." + +The most important artist besides Titian who was a pupil of Giorgione +was SEBASTIANO DEL PIOMBO, as he was called--his father's name was +LUCIANI. But as two other notable influences determined his career, he +is not to be taken as typical of the Venetian School in general or that +of Giorgione in particular. Born in Venice about the year 1485, he first +studied under Giovanni Bellini, as appears from the signature as well as +from the style of a _Pieta_ by him in the Layard collection, which we +may hope soon to see in the National Gallery. Of his Giorgionesque +period there is only one important picture known to us, the beautiful +altar-piece in S. Giovanni Crisostomo in Venice, which is not far +removed from the richness of Titian's earlier work. The picture +represents the mild and dignified S. Chrysostom seated, reading aloud at +a desk in an open hall; S. John the Baptist leaning on his cross is +looking attentively at him; behind him are two male and on the left two +female saints listening devoutly, and in the foreground the Virgin +looking majestically out of the picture at the spectator--a splendid +type of the full and grand Venetian ideal of female beauty of that time. +The true expression of a _Santa Conversazione_ could not be more +worthily given than in the relation in which the listeners stand to the +reader, and in glow of colour this work is not inferior to the best of +Giorgione's or Titian's. + +As early as 1510, however, he not only left Venice, but also his +Venetian manner. He was invited to Rome by the rich banker and patron of +the arts, Agostino Chigi, where he met Raphael, and with astonishing +versatility succeeded as well in emulating the excellences of that +master as he had those of Bellini and Giorgione. The half-length +_Daughter of Herodias_ bequeathed to the National Gallery by George +Salting is dated 1510, and in 1512 he painted the famous _Fornarina_ in +the Uffizi, which until the middle of the last century was supposed to +be a _chef d'oeuvre_ of Raphael. To this period also belongs the _S. +John in the Desert_, at the Louvre. + +Within the next seven years a still mightier influence found him, that +of Michelangelo, and how far he was capable of responding to it may be +judged by our great _Raising of Lazarus_, painted at Rome in 1517-19 for +Giulio de'Medici, afterwards Pope Clement VII., to be placed with +Raphael's _Transfiguration_ in the Cathedral of Narbonne. Both pictures +were publicly exhibited in Rome, and by some people Sebastiano's was +preferred to Raphael's. According to Waagen the whole composition was +designed by Michelangelo, with whom Sebastiano had entered into the +closest intimacy; and Kugler states that the group of Lazarus and those +around him was actually drawn by the master. However that may be, we can +hardly fail to see how entirely the Venetian influence is obscured by +that of the great Florentine, and to recognise the extraordinary genius +of a painter who could do something more than imitate from such masters +as Bellini, Giorgione, Raphael and Michelangelo. + +The last traces of the Vivarini influence are to be seen in the earlier +works of LORENZO LOTTO(1480-1556), who was a pupil of Alvise, though his +pictures after 1508, when he had left Venice, Treviso and Reccanti, +where he had been employed, show the effect of his changed surroundings. +To this date is assigned the _Portrait of a Young Man_, at Hampton +Court. At Rome in 1509 he was painting with Raphael in the Vatican, and +in his next dated work, the _Entombment_, at Jesi, the echoes of +Raphael's Disputation and the _School of Athens_ are clear. The Dresden +_Madonna and Child with S. John_ was probably painted at Bergamo in +1518, and the _Madonna and Saints_, lately bequeathed to the National +Gallery, is dated 1521. + +At Madrid is a picture by him of _A Bride and Bridegroom_ dated 1523, to +which year probably belongs the _Family Group_ in the National Gallery. +These are early instances of the comparatively rare inclusion of more +than a single figure in a pure portrait. In our example the father and +mother and two children are composed into a delightful picture, in which +for once we may see the actual people of the time in something like +their natural surroundings, instead of being posed, however effectively, +to assist in the representation of some historic or legendary scene. + +In 1527 Lotto was back again in Venice, and was probably influenced by +Palma Vecchio when he painted the superb portrait of the sculptor +_Odoni_, which is at Hampton Court. A little later the influence of +Titian is more visible. Two other portraits are in our National Gallery, +those of the Protonotary Juliano and of Agostino and Niccolo della +Torre. + +BONIFAZIO DI PITATI (1487-1553), sometimes called Bonifazio Veronese or +Veneziano, was born at Verona, but studied in Venice under Palma +Vecchio. The influence of his native city distinguishes his work in some +degree from the pure Venetian, as it did that of the more famous Paolo +in later years; but the atmosphere created by Giorgione was so strong as +to cause Bonifazio's masterpiece (if we except the _Dives and Lazarus_ +at the Academy in Venice) to be attributed until quite lately to +Giorgione. It is thus described by Kugler:--"A picture in the Brera in +Milan, very deserving of notice, is perhaps one of Giorgione's most +beautiful works; it is historic in subject, but romantic in conception. +The subject is the finding of Moses; all the figures are in the rich +costume of Giorgione's time. In the centre the princess sits under a +tree, and looks with surprise at the child who is brought to her by a +servant. The seneschal of the princess, with knights and ladies, stand +around. On one side are seated two lovers on the grass, on the other +side musicians and singers, pages with dogs, a dwarf with an ape, etc. +It is a picture in which the highest earthly splendour and enjoyment are +brought together, and the incident from Scripture only gives it a more +pleasing interest. The costume, however inappropriate to the story, +disturbs the effect as little as in other Venetian pictures of the same +period, since it refers more to a poetic than to a mere historic truth, +and the period itself was rich in poetry; its costume too assists the +display of a romantic splendour. This picture, with all its glow of +colour, is softer than the earlier works of the master, and reminds us +of Titian...." + +The beautiful _Santa Conversazione_ in the National Gallery, again, +which was formerly in the Casa Terzi at Bergamo, was there attributed to +Palma Vecchio. Here the Virgin in a rose-coloured mantle is the centre +of the composition, with the Child on her knee, whose foot the little S. +John is bending to kiss. On the right is S. Catherine and on the left S. +James the Less and S. Jerome. In the landscape are seen a shepherd lying +beside his flock, while other shepherds are fleeing from a lion who has +seized their dog. A copy of this composition is in the Academy at +Venice. + +Oddly enough it was a pupil of Bonifazio who employed the grand Venetian +manner in the humbler and more commonplace walks of life, and neglecting +alike the _Sacra Conversazione_ and the pompous scenes of festivity, +developed into the first Italian painter of _genre_. This was JACOPO DA +PONTE, called from his birthplace BASSANO, who was working in Venice +under Bonifazio as early as 1535. He afterwards returned to Bassano, and +selecting those scenes in which he could most extensively introduce +cottages, peasants, and animals, he connected them with events from +sacred history or mythology. A peculiar feature by which his pictures +may be known is the invariable and apparently intentional hiding of the +feet of his figures, for which purpose sheep and cattle and household +utensils are introduced. He confines himself to a bold, straightforward +imitation of familiar objects, united, however, with pleasing +composition, colour, and chiaroscuro. His colours, indeed, sparkle like +gems, particularly the greens, in which he displays a brilliancy quite +peculiar to himself. His lights are boldly infringed on the objects, +and are seldom introduced except on prominent parts of the figures. In +accordance with this treatment his handling is spirited and peculiar, +somewhat in the manner of Rembrandt; and what on close inspection +appears dark and confused, forms at a distance the very strength and +magic of his colouring. The picture of the _Good Samaritan_ in the +National Gallery is a good example, and was formerly in the collection +of Reynolds, who it is said always kept it in his studio. The _Portrait +of a Man_ (No. 173) is excelled by that of an _Old Man_ at Berlin. + + + + +III + +PAOLO VERONESE AND IL TINTORETTO + + +It cannot be said that the Venetian artists of the second half of the +sixteenth century equalled in their collective excellence the great +masters of the first, but in single instances they are frequently +entitled to rank beside them. At the head of these is JACOPO ROBUSTI +(1518-1594), called IL TINTORETTO (the dyer), in allusion to his +father's trade. He was one of the most vigorous painters in all the +history of art; one who sought rather than avoided the greatest +difficulties, and who possessed a true feeling for animation and +grandeur. If his works do not always charm, it should be imputed to the +foreign and non-Venetian element which he adopted, but never completely +mastered; and also to the times in which he lived, when Venetian art had +fallen somewhat into the mistaken way of colossal and rapid +productiveness. His off-hand style, as Kugler calls it, is always full +of grand and significant detail, and with a few patches of colour he +sometimes achieves the liveliest forms and expressions. But he fails in +that artistic arrangement of the whole and in that nobility of motives +in the parts which are necessary exponents of a really high ideal. His +compositions are achieved less by finely studied degrees of +participation in the principal action than by great masses of light and +shade. Attitudes and movements are taken immediately from common life, +not chosen from the best models. With Titian the highest ideal of +earthly happiness in existence is expressed by beauty; with Tintoretto +in mere animal strength, sometimes of an almost rude character. + +For a short time he was a pupil of Titian, but for some unknown reason +he soon left him, and struck out for himself. In the studio which he +occupied in his youth he had inscribed, as a definition of the style he +professed, "The drawing of Michelangelo, the colouring of Titian." He +copied the works of the latter, and also designed from casts of +Florentine and antique sculpture, particularly by lamplight--as did +Romney a couple of centuries later--to exercise himself in a more +forcible style of relief. He also made models for his works, which he +lighted artificially, or hung up in his room, in order to master +perspective. By these means he united great strength of shadow with the +Venetian colouring, which gives a peculiar character to his pictures, +and is very successful when limited to the direct imitation of nature. +But apart from the impossibility of combining two such totally different +excellences as the colouring of Titian and the drawing of Michelangelo, +it appears that Tintoretto's acquaintance with the works of the latter +only developed his tendency to a naturalistic style. That which with +Michelangelo was the symbol of a higher power in nature was adopted by +Tintoretto in its literal form. Most of his defects, it is probable, +arose from his indefatigable vigour, which earned for him the nickname +of _Il Furioso_. Sebastian del Piombo said that Tintoretto could paint +as much in two days as would occupy him two years. Other sayings were +that he had three brushes, one of gold, one of silver, and a third of +brass, and that if he was sometimes equal to Titian he was often +inferior to Tintoretto! In this last category Kugler puts two of his +earliest works, the enormous _Last Judgment_, and _The Golden Calf_, in +the church of S. Maria dell'Orto, while on his much later _Last Supper_ +he is still more severe. "Nothing more utterly derogatory," he writes, +"both to the dignity of art and to the nature of the subject can be +imagined. S. John is seen with folded arms, fast asleep, while others of +the Apostles with the most burlesque gestures are asking, 'Lord, is it +I?' Another Apostle is uncovering a dish which stands on the floor +without remarking that a cat has stolen in and is eating from it. A +second is reaching towards a flask; a beggar sits by, eating. Attendants +fill up the picture. To judge from an overthrown chair the scene appears +to have been a revel of the lowest description. It is strange that a +painter should venture on such a representation of this subject scarcely +a hundred years after the creation of Leonardo da Vinci's _Last +Supper_." + +It was in 1548, when but thirty years old, that Tintoretto first became +famous, with the large _Miracle of S. Mark_, now in the Venice Academy. +This is perhaps his finest as well as his most celebrated work; but the +greatest monument to his industry and general ability is the Scuola +di'San Rocco, where he began to work in 1560 under a contract to produce +three pictures a year for an annuity of a hundred ducats. In all there +are sixty-two of his pictures in this building, the greater part of +them very large, the figures throughout being of the size of life. _The +Crucifixion_, painted in 1565, is the most extensive of them, and on the +whole the most perfect. In 1590, four years before his death, he +completed the enormous _Paradise_ in the Sala del Gran Consiglio, +measuring seventy-four feet in length and thirty in height. + +In the National Gallery we have three characteristic examples, +fortunately on a smaller scale, namely, the _S. George_ on a white +horse, which, with its greyish flesh tones and the blue of the +princess's mantle, is cooler in tone than the generality of his +pictures; _Christ washing the Disciples' Feet_, and the very beautiful +and radiant _Origin of the Milky Way_, purchased from Lord Darnley in +1890. At Hampton Court a still finer example, _The Nine Muses_, is so +discoloured by age and hung in such a difficult light that it is +impossible to enjoy its full beauty. + +PAOLO CALIARI, better known as VERONESE, was born ten years later than +Tintoretto, and died six years before him (1528-1588). He studied in his +native city of Verona till he was twenty, and after working for some +time at Mantua he came to Venice in 1555, where he was quickly +recognised by Titian and by Sansovino, the sculptor and Director of +Public Buildings, and was commissioned in that year to paint a +_Coronation of the Virgin_ and other works in the church of S. +Sebastian. The _Martyrdom of S. Giustino_, now in the Uffizi, and the +_Madonna and Child_ in the Louvre are also among his earlier works. As +early as 1562 he was at work on the enormous _Feast at Cana_, now in the +Louvre, and a similar work at Dresden is of the same date. In 1564 he +went to Rome, where he studied the works of Raphael and Michelangelo. On +his return to Venice in + +[Illustration: PLATE XVII.--TINTORETTO + +ST GEORGE AND THE DRAGON + +_National Gallery, London_] + +1565--after visiting Verona, where he painted in his parish church, and +also married--he was employed to decorate the Ducal Palace, but much of +his best work there was destroyed by fire. Two of his most important +works completed before 1573 are in the Academy at Venice, _The Battle of +Lepanto_ and the _Feast in the House of Levi_. In this last he incurred +strictures from the Inquisition more severe than those of Kugler upon +Tintoretto's _Last Supper_, and possibly with as much reason, it being +objected that the introduction of German soldiery, buffoons, and a +parrot was "irreligious." His _Family of Darius_, now in the National +Gallery, was one of his latest works. + +Veronese, even more than Titian, whom in colouring he sought to emulate, +and Tintoretto, whom in this respect he certainly excelled, expresses +the spirit of the Venetians of his time--a powerful and noble race of +human beings, as Kugler calls them, elate with the consciousness of +existence, and in full enjoyment of all that renders earth attractive. +By the splendour of his colour, assisted by rich draperies and other +materials, by a very clear and transparent treatment of the shadows, he +infused a magic into his great canvases which surpasses almost all the +other masters of the Venetian School. Never had the pomp of colour, on a +large scale, been so exalted and glorified as in his works. This, his +peculiar quality, is most decidedly and grandly developed in scenes of +worldly splendour; he loved to paint festive subjects for the +refectories of rich convents, suggested of course from particular +passages in the Scriptures, but treated with the greatest freedom, +especially as regards the costume, which is always of his own time. +Instead, therefore, of any religious sentiment, we are presented with a +display of the most cheerful human scenes and the richest worldly +splendour. That which distinguishes him from Tintoretto, and which in +his later period, after the death of Titian and Michelangelo, earned for +him the rank of the first living master, was that beautiful vitality, +that poetic feeling, which as far as it was possible he infused into a +declining period of art. At the same time it becomes more and more +evident, as our attention is turned to the deeper and nobler spirit of +the earlier masters in Venice, that the beauty of his figures is more +addressed to the senses than to the soul, and that his naturalistic +tendencies are often allowed to run wild. + +The most celebrated, and as it happens the most historically +interesting, of his great pictures is the _Feast at Cana_, in the +Louvre, measuring thirty feet wide and twenty feet high. This was +formerly in the refectory of S. Giorgio Maggiore in Venice. The scene is +a brilliant atrium, surrounded by majestic pillars. The tables at which +the guests are seated form three sides of a parallelogram. The guests +are supposed to be almost entirely contemporary portraits, so that the +figures of Christ and His mother, of themselves insignificant enough, +lose even more in the general interest of the subject. Servants occupy +the foreground, while on the raised balustrades and the balconies of +distant houses are innumerable onlookers. The most remarkable feature of +the whole composition is a group of musicians in the centre of the +foreground, which are portraits of the artist himself and Tintoretto, +playing on violon-cellos, and Titian, in a red robe, with the +contra-bass. + +_Christ in the House of Simon_, the Magdalen washing His feet, is +another scarcely less gigantic picture in the Louvre; but it is much +simpler in arrangement, and is distinguished by the fineness of the +heads, especially that of the Christ. An interesting piece of technical +criticism on the _Feast at Cana_ occurs in Reynolds's Eighth +Discourse:-- + +"Another instance occurs to me," he says, "where equal liberty may be +taken in regard to the management of light. Though the general practice +is to make a large mass about the middle of the picture surrounded by +shadow, the reverse may be practised, and the spirit of rule may still +be preserved.... In the great composition of Paul Veronese, the +_Marriage at Cana_, the figures are for the most part in half shadow; +the great light is in the sky; and indeed the general effect of this +picture, which is so striking, is no more than what we often see in +landscapes, in small pictures of fairs and country feasts; but those +principles of light and shadow, being transferred to a large scale, to a +space containing near a hundred figures as large as life, and conducted +to all appearance with as much facility and with an attention as +steadily fixed upon the _whole together_ as if it were a small picture +immediately under the eye, the work justly excites our admiration; the +difficulty being increased as the extent is enlarged." + + * * * * * + +With the death of the great Venetians, Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul +Veronese, in the last quarter of the sixteenth century, the history of +Italian painting of the first rank comes to an end. In Florence, the +imitation of Michelangelo was the chief object striven after, and, as +might be expected, the attempt was not eminently successful. The greater +number of the Italian painters of the early seventeenth century who +attained any fame are known by the name of Eclectics, from their having +endeavoured, instead of imitating any one of their great predecessors, +to select and unite the best qualities of each, without, however, +excluding the direct study of nature. The fallacy of this aim, when +carried to an extreme, is, of course, that the greatness of the earlier +masters consisted really in their individual and peculiar qualities, and +to endeavour to unite characteristics essentially different involves a +contradiction. + +The most important of the Eclectic schools was that of the Carracci, at +Bologna, which was founded by LODOVICO CARRACCI (_c_. 1555-1619), a +scholar of Prospero Fontana and Passignano at Florence. In his youth he +was nicknamed "the ox," partly from his slowness, but possibly also for +his study of long-forgotten methods, by which he arrived at the decision +that reform was necessary to counteract the independence of the +mannerists. He therefore obtained the assistance of his two nephews, +AGOSTINO and ANNIBALE CARRACCI, sons of a tailor, and in concert with +them opened an academy at Bologna in 1589. This he furnished with casts, +drawings, and engravings, and provided living models and gave +instruction in perspective, anatomy, etc. In spite of opposition this +academy became more and more popular, and before long all the other +schools of art in Bologna were closed. + +The principles of their teaching was succinctly expressed in a sonnet +written by Agostino, in substance as follows:--"Let him who wishes to be +a good painter acquire the design of Rome, Venetian action and +chiaroscuro, the dignified colouring of Lombardy (that is to say, of +Leonardo da Vinci), the terrible manner of Michelangelo, Titian's truth +and nature, the sovereign purity of Correggio, and the perfect symmetry +of Raphael. The decorum and well-grounded study of Tibaldi, the +invention of the learned Primaticcio, and a _little_ of the grace of +Parmigiano." + +This "patchwork ideal," as Kugler calls it, was, however, but a +transition step in the history of the Carracci and their art. In the +prime of their activity they threw off a great deal of their +eclecticism, and attained an independence of their own. The merit of +Lodovico is chiefly that of a reformer and a teacher, and the pictures +by Agostino are few and of no great account. But in Annibale we find +much more than imitation of the characteristics of great masters. In his +earlier works there are rather obvious traces of Correggio and Paul +Veronese, but under the influence of the works of Raphael and +Michelangelo and of the antique, as he understood it, he developed a +style of his own. Though in recent years he is a little out of fashion +with the public, there is no question about his having a place among the +greater artists. To show how opinion can change, I venture to quote a +passage from a letter written to me on the subject of Carracci's _The +Three Maries_, lately presented to the National Gallery by the Countess +of Carlisle:--"I saw the gallery at Castle Howard in 1850. _The Three +Maries_ was then still regarded as one of _the_ great pictures of the +world; and they told the story of how Lord Carlisle and Lord Ellesmere +and Lord----, who shared the Paris purchases [after the Peace of 1815] +between them, had to cast lots for this, because it was thought to be +worth more than all the rest of the spoil." + +The most important, or at any rate one of the most popular, of the +pupils of Carracci was DOMENICO ZAMPIERI, commonly called DOMENICHINO +(1581-1641). If we are less enthusiastic about him at the present, it +may still be remembered that Constable particularly admired him, but it +is significant that the four examples in the National Gallery are +numbered 48, 75, 77 and 85--there is no more recent acquisition. He had +great facility, and his compositions--not always original--are treated +with great charm if with no real depth. His most famous picture, the +_Communion of S. Jerome_, now in the Vatican, is closely imitated from +Agostino Carracci's. + +GUIDO RENI (1575-1642), even more popular in the eighteenth and early +nineteenth centuries than Domenichino, was as skilful in some respects, +but hardly as admirable. The _Ecce Homo_, bequeathed by Samuel Rogers to +the National Gallery, is an excellent example of his ability to charm +the sentimentalist, and if ever there should be a popular revival of +taste in the direction of the now neglected school of the Carracci, he +will possibly resume all the honour formerly paid to him. The same can +hardly be predicted for the far inferior Carlo Maratti, Guercino, and +Carlo Dolce. + +Space forbids me more than the bare mention in these pages of the +brilliant revival of painting in Venice during the earlier part of the +eighteenth century by ANTONIO CANALE (1697-1768), GIOVANNI BATTISTA +TIEPOLO (1692-1769), PIETRO LONGHI (1702-1785), and FRANCESCO GUARDI +(1712-1793). Charming as their excellent accomplishments were, they must +give place to more important claims awaiting our attention in other +countries. + + + + +_SPANISH SCHOOL_ + + +One of the sensations of the Exhibition of Spanish Old Masters at the +Grafton Gallery in the autumn of 1913 was an altar panel, dated 1250, +which was acquired by Mr Roger Fry in Paris, and catalogued as of the +"Early Catalan School." In view of the fact that this picture is +"certainly to be regarded as one of the very oldest of primitive +pictures painted on wood in any country ... a decade earlier than the +picture by Margaritone in the National Gallery," it seems somewhat +dogmatic to assert that while retaining a strongly Byzantine character +"the style is distinctly that of Catalonia." What was the style of +Catalonia? + +So far as the history of the art is concerned, the chapter on Spain is, +with one exception, a very short and a singularly uninteresting one, +whether Mr Fry's panel was painted in Catalonia or whether it was not; +and in spite of every effort to find in this uncongenial country that +expansion of painting that might reasonably have been expected to flow +from Italy and moisten its barren soil for the production of so +wonderful a genius as Velasquez, there is positively nothing earlier +than Velasquez, and not very much after him, that has more than what we +may call a documentary interest. While in Italy or the Netherlands the +names of scores of painters earlier than the seventeenth century are +endeared to us by the recollection of the works they have left us, the +enumeration of those of the few Spaniards of whom we have any knowledge +awakens no such thrill, and if we have ever heard of them, their works +mean little more to us than their names. Only when we come within touch +of Velasquez does our interest awaken--as in the case of Ribera and +Zurbaran--and that is less because of them than because of Velasquez. El +Greco was not a Spaniard by birth, but a Cretan; and if he were ranged +with the Italians, to whom he more properly belongs, he would scarcely +be more famous than some Bolognese masters whose names are now--or +perhaps we ought to say, at the present moment--almost forgotten. The +announcement that one of his portraits has been sold to an American for +L30,000 is of commercial rather than of artistic interest. + +If one had to sum up the career and the art of Velasquez in a sentence, +it might be done by calling him a Court painter who never flattered. +After recording his life from the time when he left his master Pacheco +to enter the service of Philip IV. to the day that he died in it, we +shall find that only a bare percentage of his work was not commissioned +by the king; and in all his pictures which were not simply portraits +there is little if anything to be found which is not as literal and +truthful a presentment of the model in front of him as the life-like +representations of Philip and those about his Court, of which the +supreme quality is that of living resemblance, or to put it in more +general terms, vivid realism. Gifted as he must have been with an +extraordinary vision and a still rarer, if not unique, ability to put +down on canvas what he saw, he confined himself entirely within the +limits of actuality, and thereby attained to heights which his great +contemporaries Rubens and Rembrandt in their noblest flights of +imagination never reached. + +Velasquez was baptised on the 6th of June 1599, in the church of S. +Peter at Seville. He was the son of well-to-do parents; his father, a +native of Seville, was named Juan Rodriguez de Silva, his mother +Geronima Velasquez. At thirteen years old he had displayed so strong an +inclination towards painting that he was put to study under Francisco de +Herrera, then the most considerable painter in Spain (his son, also +Francisco, was the painter of the _Christ Disputing with the Doctors_, +in the National Gallery), but owing to Herrera's violent temper +Velasquez was shortly transferred to the studio of Francisco Pacheco, +whose daughter he eventually married. + +Pacheco who was, besides being an accomplished artist, a man of literary +tastes, and much sought after in Seville by the more intellectual class +of society, was exceedingly proud of his pupil, and said of him that he +was induced to bestow the hand of his daughter upon him "by the +rectitude of his conduct, the purity of his morals, and his great +talents, and from the high expectation he entertained of his natural +abilities and transcendent genius," adding that the honour of having +been his instructor was far greater than that of being his +father-in-law, and that he felt it no demerit to be surpassed by so +brilliant a pupil. + +In 1649 Pacheco published a book on painting, in which we are told that +the first attempts of Velasquez were studies in still life, or simple +compositions of actual figures, called _bodegones_ in Spanish, of which +we have a fair example at the National Gallery in the _Christ at the +House of Martha_. Sir Frederick Cook, at Richmond, has another, an _Old +Woman Frying Eggs_, and the Duke of Wellington two more, of which _The +Water Carrier of Seville_ is probably the summit of the young painter's +achievement before he left Seville, in 1623, and entered the service of +Philip IV. as Court painter. + +His first portrait of the king was the magnificent whole length in the +Prado Gallery, now numbered 1182, standing in front of a table with a +letter in his right hand. No. 1183 is the head of the same portrait, +possibly done as a study for it. Philip was so pleased with this that he +ordered all existing portraits of himself to be removed from the palace, +and appointed Velasquez exclusively as his painter. + +Another of his earliest successes at Court was the whole length portrait +of the king's brother, Don Carlos, holding a glove in his right hand; +and the picture now in the Museum at Rouen of _A Geographer_ is probably +of this date. + +In 1628, when Velasquez was still quite young, and had fallen under no +influence save that of Pacheco and the school of Seville, he was charged +by the king to entertain Rubens, who came to the Spanish Court on a +diplomatic mission, and show him all the treasures in the palace. If any +one could influence Velasquez, we might suppose it would have been +Rubens, who was not only a great painter, but a man of the most +captivating manners and disposition, ever ready to help younger artists. +But not only did he have no perceptible effect on the style of +Velasquez, but in the picture of _The Topers_, which must have been +painted while Rubens was at Madrid, or very shortly after he left, we +can almost see a determination not to be influenced by him; for the +subject was a favourite one of Rubens's, and yet there is nothing in +this most realistic presentment of + +[Illustration: PLATE XVIII.--VELAZQUEZ + +THE INFANTE PHILIP PROSPER + +_Imperial Gallery, Vienna_] + +actual figures under the title of Bacchus and his votaries which has +anything at all in common with the florid and imaginative compositions +of the Flemish painter. Velasquez had begun as a realist, and a realist +he was to continue till the end of his days. + +Shortly after painting this picture he left his native country for the +first time, and visited Venice and Rome. At Venice he made copies of +Tintoretto's _Last Supper_ and _Crucifixion_; but little if any of +Tintoretto's influence is to be seen in the two pictures he painted in +Rome--_The Forge of Vulcan_ and _Joseph's Coat_, both of which are still +as realistic as ever in treatment, though showing great advances in +technical skill. Soon after his return to Spain in 1631, he probably +painted the magnificent whole length _Philip IV._ in the National +Gallery, which compares so well, on examination with the more popular +and showy _Admiral Pulido Pareja_ purchased some years ago from Longford +Castle. Senor Beruete, who has studied the work of Velasquez more +closely and more intelligently than any one else, considers that whereas +there is not a single touch upon the former that is not from the brush +of Velasquez, the latter cannot be properly attributed to him at +all--any more than can another popular favourite, the _Alexandro del +Borro_ in the Berlin Gallery, now given to Bernard Strozzi. + +To this period may be also assigned the _Christ at the Column_ in the +National Gallery, a picture which though not at first sight attractive, +is nevertheless as fine in technique, and in sentiment, as any other +picture in the Spanish room, and deserves far more attention than is +usually given to it. Its simple realism and its pathetic sweetness are +qualities which are wanting in many a more showy or sensational +composition, and the more it is studied the nearer we find we are +getting to the real excellences that distinguish Velasquez from any +painter who has ever lived. The _Crucifixion_ at the Prado is perhaps +more wonderful, but the familiar subject helps the imagination of the +spectator to admire it, whereas the unfamiliar setting of our picture is +apt at first sight to repel. + +The most important composition undertaken by Velasquez in this middle +period of his career--that is to say between his two visits to Italy in +1629 and 1649--is the famous _Surrender of Breda_, or, as it is +sometimes called, _The Lances_. Soon after his arrival in Madrid he had +once painted an historical subject, _The Expulsion of the Moors_, in +competition with his rivals who had asserted that he could paint nothing +but heads. In this competition the prize was awarded to him, but as the +picture has perished we are unable to judge of its merits for ourselves. +But apart from this, and such unimportant groups of figures as we have +mentioned, he had been occupied wholly in painting single portraits, and +it is a marvellous proof of his genius that he should produce such a +masterpiece of composition as _The Lances_ with so little practice in +this branch of his art. Here, at least, we might have expected to trace +the influence of Rubens, but there is actually no sign of it; and if he +sought any inspiration at all from other painters, it was from what he +recalled of Tintoretto's work which he had seen and studied in Venice. + +In the king's eldest boy, _Baltazar Carlos_, who was born in 1629, +Velasquez found a model for two or three of his most charming pictures. +One is at Castle Howard; a second the equestrian portrait, on a +galloping pony, at the Prado; and a third the full length hunting +portrait, also at the Prado, in which we see the little prince standing +under a tree, gun in hand, with an enormous dog lying beside him. +Another is at Vienna, representing him as of about eleven years old, +full length, with his hand resting on the back of a chair. All of these +owe some of their charm to the youth and attractive personality of the +subject; but if we want to see the power of Velasquez without any +outside element to help us to appreciate it, there is the portrait of +the sculptor _Martinez Montanes_ at the Prado. "The head is wonderful in +its colour and its modelling," writes Senor Beruete; "and what a lesson +in technique! The eyes, lightly touched with colour, are set deep in +their sockets, and surmounted by a strongly marked forehead. The high +lights are of a rich _impasto_, manipulated with extraordinary skill; +the greyer tones of the flesh, so true and so delicate, are painted in a +way that brings out with marvellous truth, both the soft parts of the +cheeks and the harder structure of the face, under which one can follow +the bones of the nose and forehead.... Everything in the picture is +spontaneous, and one can see that it is a pledge of friendship given by +one artist to another; there is nothing here of that artificial +arrangement that spoils commissioned portraits even when they are the +work of a painter as independent as Velasquez was. One feels here the +assurance of an artist who knows that his work will be understood by his +friend in the spirit in which it was executed." M. Lefort, the French +critic, is even more enthusiastic. "Ah! these redoubtable neighbours," +he exclaims, seeing it surrounded by the works of other painters at the +Prado. "This canvas makes them look like mere imitations--dead +conventional likenesses. Van Dyck is dull, Rubens oily, Tintoret yellow; +it is Velasquez alone who can give us the illusion of life in all its +fulness!" + +In 1649 Velasquez paid his second visit to Rome, where he painted the +famous portrait of His Holiness, _Pope Innocent X._ which is now in the +Doria palace. This is exceptional in treatment, inasmuch as it is the +only portrait by Velasquez in which the subject is seated--excepting of +course equestrian portraits--and instead of the usual quiet tones of +grey and brown which he was so fond of employing, the picture of the +Pope is a radiant harmony of rose red and white. In its realism it is +even more surprising than most of the other portraits, considering how +ugly the face had to be made to resemble nature, although the sitter was +of a still higher rank than Velasquez's royal master. + +Returning to Madrid in 1651, Velasquez never again left Spain, and the +remaining twenty years of his life may be considered the third period of +his artistic development, inasmuch as no special influence was exerted +upon him outside the ordinary and somewhat tedious course of his +employment at the Court. To this period are assigned twenty-six +pictures--Senor Beruete only admits the authenticity of eighty-three in +all, it may be mentioned--twelve of which are royal portraits, seven +those of buffoons and dwarfs, three mythological and two sacred +subjects, and the two famous pieces of real life, _Las Meninas_ and _Las +Hilanderas_. + +Of the royal portraits those of the _Infanta Margarita_ are among the +most fascinating, no less from their technical excellence than on +account of the youthful charm of the little Princess. The one at Vienna +represents her as about three years old, dressed in red, standing by a +little table. Of this, Senor Beruete says that it is "one of the most +beautiful inspirations of Velasquez, and perhaps one that reveals better +than any other his power as a colourist; it is a flower, perfumed with +every infantine grace." Another standing portrait, though only a half +length, when she was not many years older, is that in the Salon Carre at +the Louvre, which is more familiar to us being nearer home and more +often reproduced. M. de Wyczewa praises it thus:--"The perfect +_chefs-d'oeuvre_ collected in this glorious salon pale in the presence +of this child portrait; not one of them can bear comparison with this +simple yet powerful painting, which seems to aim only at external +resemblance and without other effort to attain a mysterious beauty of +form and colour." At Frankfort again is a charming picture of the little +Princess, whole length, at the age of six or seven--a replica of which +is at Vienna. She is dressed in greyish white with trimmings of black, +and her hoop skirt is so enormous that her arms have to be stretched out +straight to allow her hands to reach the edge of her coat. + +Of the three mythological subjects two are in the Prado, namely the +_Mars_ and the _Mercury and Argus_, while the third and most beautiful +is the _Venus at the Mirror_ recently purchased for our national +collection. These were all of them painted for the decoration of the +royal palaces, and we may therefore suppose that the artist was not +entirely at liberty either in the choice of his subject or in his method +of treating it. Certainly he does not seem to have been fond of painting +the nude, unless with men, and it is noticeable that he has posed his +model in this case with more modesty and reserve than is to be observed +in the pictures of Rubens and Titian. The Holy Church was sternly averse +to this class of painting, in which, accordingly, none of the Spanish +school indulged; but at the same time the royal galleries did not +exclude the most exuberant fancies of Rubens, Titian, Tintoretto, and +others, and Velasquez was in all probability commissioned by Philip to +paint this Venus--and another which has perished--along with the Mars +and Mercury without regard to the ecclesiastical authorities. But it is +hardly surprising if Velasquez availed himself less fully of the +privilege than a Flemish or Italian painter would no doubt have done, +and has given us so chaste and beautiful a realisation of the goddess. +Having regard to the scepticism with which this masterpiece was received +in England at the time of its purchase for the nation it is worth +quoting Senor Beruete's remarks upon it in that connection. "The +authenticity of this work," he writes "has found numerous doubters in +Spain, less on account of its subject--being the only nude female figure +in the whole _oeuvre_ of Velasquez--than because so few people ever +suspected its existence; but after it was exhibited at Manchester in +1857 and in London in 1890, it was recognised that its attribution to +Velasquez was well founded. At the sight of the canvas all doubt +vanishes. There, indeed, is the style, the inimitable technique of +Velasquez." + +This, from the connoisseur who has devoted years of study to the work of +the master, and who rejects such well established examples as the +Dulwich _Philip IV._ and the _Admiral Pulido Pareja_, is surely more +conclusive than the academic pedantry of ignorance masquerading as +authority. + + * * * * * + +BARTOLOME ESTEBAN MURILLO (1617-1682) has always been accounted the most +popular of the Spanish painters, and it is only in recent times that his +popularity has faded into comparative insignificance on the fuller +recognition and understanding of the genius of Velasquez. The intensely +Anglican feeling in this country during the eighteenth and nineteenth +centuries + +[Illustration: PLATE XIX.--VELAZQUEZ + +THE ROKEBY VENUS + +_National Gallery, London_] + +seems to have found peculiar relief in the sentimental aspirations of +the followers of Raphael in the rendering of religious subjects from the +Romish point of view. At the present time we are readier to estimate +Murillo's justly high place in the annals of painting by such a picture +as his own portrait, lent by Lord Spencer to the recent Exhibition, than +to allow it on the strength of our recollection of the Madonnas and Holy +Families, Immaculate Conceptions and Assumptions, of which there exist +so many copies in the dining rooms of country rectories. The _Boy +Drinking_, which is here reproduced, if it is the least "important" of +the four examples in the National Gallery, is certainly not the least +excellent. + +From the miserable state into which Spain had fallen by the end of the +seventeenth century, it could hardly be expected that anything further +in the nature of art would result, and it was not until towards the end +of the eighteenth that another genius arose, in the person of FRANCISCO +GOYA (1746-1828). Of this extraordinary phenomenon in the firmament of +art it is impossible to say more than a very few words in this place. +Like a meteor, he is rather to be pointed at than talked about, when +there are so many stars and planets whose regular courses have to be +observed and recorded. He was like a sharp knife drawn across the face +of Spain, gashing it here and there, but for the most part just touching +it lightly enough to sting and to leave a mark. As a Court painter he +was an unqualified success, his salary under Charles IV. rising in ten +years from 15,000 to 50,000 reals; but his official productions are not +the less devoid of interest on that account, and are sometimes the more +satirical from the necessity for concealment. In his more outspoken +works, such as the _Disasters of War_, and the series of prints called +_Los Caprichos_ and _Tauromachia_, he is too brutal not to affect the +ordinary observer's judgment upon his artistic qualities. Velasquez +himself could scarcely stop short enough, when painting dwarfs and +idiots and cripples, to let us admire his genius unhampered by shivers +of repulsion. Goya, being exactly the opposite of Velasquez in +temperament, had no scruples about expressing the utmost of his subject; +and even in decorating a church was reproved for "falling short of the +standard of chastity" required. But between the extremes of brutality +and conventionalism there is such a wide expanse of pure joy of painting +that nothing can diminish the reputation of Goya, however much it is +likely to be enhanced. To the modern Spanish painter he is probably as +fixed a beacon as Velasquez. + +[Illustration: PLATE XX.--MURILLO + +A BOY DRINKING + +_National Gallery, London_] + + + + +_FLEMISH SCHOOL_ + + + + +I + +HUBERT AND JAN VAN EYCK + + +In 1383, on the death of Louis de Maele, his son-in-law Philip the +Hardy, Duke of Burgundy, assumed the government of Flanders. In the same +year Philip founded the Carthusian Convent at Dijon and employed a +Flemish painter named Melchin Broederlam to embellish two great shrines +within it. To the strong-handed policy of Philip and his successors +during the ensuing century may be attributed the rise of Netherlandish +art which, though existing before their time, required their vigorous +repression of intestine feuds to give it an opportunity of developing. +Under Louis and his predecessors Flanders and its cities had risen to +great commercial importance, but its rulers had neither the strength nor +the prestige to keep the turbulent spirit of their subjects in due +bounds. The school of painting which now arose so rapidly to perfection +under the Dukes of Burgundy thus owed a portion of its progress to the +wealth and independence of the commercial classes. The taste, power, and +cultivation of a Court gave it an additional spur; and the clergy +throwing in their weight, added their support in aid of art. + +Two wings of one of the Dijon shrines are still preserved in the museum +there, and in these Messrs Crowe and Cavalcaselle observe the +characteristics of much that was to follow:--"Although Melchior's style +was founded on the study of the painters of the Rhine, his composition +was similar to the later productions of the Flemish school. A tendency +to realism already marks this early Fleming, and is the distinctive +feature of a manner in which the painter strives to imitate nature in +its most material forms. Idealism and noble forms are lacking, but +Broederlam is a fair imitator of the truth. Distinctive combination and +choice of colours in draperies, and vigorous tone, characterise him as +they do the early works at Bruges and other cities of the Netherlands +which may be judged by his standard." And again, "the painter evidently +struggled between the desire to give a material imitation, and the +inspirations of graceful teachers like those of Cologne.... Penetrated +with similar ideas the early Flemings might under similar circumstances +have risen to a sweet and dignified conception of nature; and if we fail +to discover that they attained this aim we must attribute the failure to +causes peculiar to Flanders. Amongst these we may class the social +status of the Flemish painters, whose positions in the household of +princes subjected them perhaps to caprices unfavourable to the +development of high aspirations, or the contemplation and free communion +with self which are the soul of art." + +It is interesting to compare these observations, so far as they refer to +the realism which characterises Netherlandish painting, with those of Dr +Waagen, who it will be seen explains it on the broader grounds of +national temperament. "Early Netherlandish painting," he contends, "in +its freedom from all foreign influence, exhibits the contrast between +the natural feeling of the Greek and the German races respectively in +the department of art--these two races being the chief representatives +of the cultivation of the ancient and the modern world. In this +circumstance consists the high significance of this school when +considered in reference to the general history of art. While it is +characteristic of the Greek feeling--from which was derived the +Italian--to idealise,--and to idealise, be it observed, not only the +conceptions of the ideal world but even such material objects as +portraits,--by the simplification of forms and the prominence given to +the more important parts of a work of art, the early Netherlanders, on +the other hand, conferred a portrait-like character upon the most ideal +personifications of the Virgin, the Apostles, Prophets, and Martyrs, and +in actual portraiture aimed at rendering even the most accidental +peculiarities of nature, like warts and wrinkles, with excruciating +fidelity. + +"While the Greeks expressed the various features of outward nature--such +as rivers, fountains, hills, trees, etc.--under abstract human forms, +the Netherlanders endeavoured to express them as they had seen them in +nature, and with a truth which extended to the smallest details. + +"In opposition to the ideal, and what may be called the personifying +tendency of the Greeks, the Netherlanders developed a purely realistic +and landscape school. + +"In this respect the other Teutonic nations are found to approach them +most nearly, the Germans first, and then the English." + +But whatever may have been the causes which produced the distinguishing +features of Netherlandish painting, we have still to enquire the origin +from which the practice of painting in northern Europe proceeded. For +in taking Melchior Broederlam as a starting-point we are only going as +far back--with the exception of certain rude wall paintings--as the +earliest examples take us; and having seen how in Italy the whole +history of the art is traceable to Cimabue, Duccio, and Giotto, through +the Byzantines, at least a century before Broederlam comes under our +notice, we might naturally conclude that it was from Italy that it +spread to Cologne, and from Cologne to the Netherlands. So far as is +known, however, this was not the case, and we must look elsewhere than +to Italy for the influences which formed this school. Nevertheless it +was a collateral branch of the same stock--Byzantine art--and the family +resemblance comes out none the less strongly from the two branches +having developed under different circumstances. In Italy, as we have +seen, the Byzantine seed, sown in such fertile soil, attained suddenly a +great luxuriance. In the north, transplanted by Charlemagne to +Aix-la-Chapelle in the ninth century, it grew slowly and more timidly, +but none the less surely, under the cover of Monasticism, in the +manuscripts illuminated with miniatures; and thus when it did burst +forth into fuller blossom, the boldness of the Italian masters, who +worked at large in fresco, was wanting, and a detailed and almost +meticulous realism was its chief characteristic. Another point worth +noticing is that though primarily introduced for religious purposes, as +in Italy, namely the decoration of the cathedral erected by Charlemagne +at Aix-la-Chapelle, the paintings in his palace showed forth events in +his own life, such as his campaigns in Spain, seiges of towns and feats +of arms by Frankish warriors. At Upper Ingelheim, likewise, his chapel +was adorned with scenes from the Old and New Testaments, while the +banqueting hall exhibited on one wall the deeds of great Pagan rulers, +such as Cyrus, Hannibal, and Alexander, and on the other those of +Constantine and Theodosius, the seizure of Acquitaine by Pepin, and +Charlemagne's own conquest over the Saxons and finally himself enthroned +as conqueror. Although no trace remains of these paintings, contemporary +manuscripts executed by his order are still in existence in the +libraries of Paris, Treves, and elsewhere from which we can form some +idea of the style in which they were rendered and of the source from +which they were derived. + +Of these we need only mention the Vulgate decorated by JOHN OF BRUGES, +painter to King Charles V. of France, in 1371, which contains a portrait +of the king in profile with a figure kneeling before him, and a few +small historical subjects. From these it is evident that the art of +painting, at any rate in little, had made considerable progress in the +Netherlands at that date, and the express designation of _pictor_ +applied to John of Bruges, while the ordinary miniaturist was called +_illuminator_, shows the probability of his having painted pictures on a +larger scale. The high development of realistic feeling as it first +appears to us in the pictures of Hubert and Jan van Eyck is thus partly +accounted for, especially when we also consider the wholesale +destruction of larger works of art that took place in the disturbed +condition of the Netherlands in the sixteenth century. The main points, +however, to be borne in mind is that whereas Cimabue and Duccio started +painting on walls under the influence of Byzantine teachers, Hubert van +Eyck, a century later, began painting on wooden panels under that of +illuminators and painters in books. + +To these, nevertheless, there must be added another scarcely less +important, namely, that the early Italians were ignorant of the use of +what we now call oil paints, and worked entirely in tempera--that is to +say, there was no admixture of oil or varnish with their pigments. To +Hubert van Eyck is attributed the invention of the modern practice, as +Vasari relates with more colour than historic truth in his life of +Antonello da Messina, who is supposed to have carried it into Italy. Be +that as it may, the works of the van Eycks and their successors are all +in oils, and there is no doubt that the employment of this medium from +the first considerably influenced the style, colour, and execution of +all the works of this school. + +HUBERT VAN EYCK who according to the common acceptation was born in the +year 1366 at Maaseyck, a small town not far from Maestricht, must have +been settled before the year 1412 in Bruges, when we hear of him as a +member of the Brotherhood of the Virgin with Rays. + +There can be little doubt that Hubert van Eyck was acquainted with the +work of this John of Bruges, and that it had a considerable influence on +him. But while on the one hand he carried the realistic tendencies of +such works to an extraordinary pitch of excellence, it is evident that +in many essential respects he was actuated by a more ideal feeling and +imparted to the realism of his contemporaries, by means of his far +richer powers of representation, greater distinctness, truth to nature, +and variety of expression. Throughout his works is seen an elevated and +highly energetic conception of the stern import of his labours in the +service of the Church. + +The prevailing arrangement of his subjects is symmetrical, holding fast +to the earliest rules of ecclesiastical art. His heads appear to aim at +an ideal beauty and dignity only combined with actual truth to nature. +His draperies exhibit the purest taste and softness of folds, the +realistic principle being apparent in that greater attention to detail +which a delicate indication of the material of the drapery necessitates. +Nude figures are studied from nature with the utmost fidelity; undraped +portions of figures are also given with much truth, especially the +hands. But what is the principal distinguishing characteristic of his +art is the hitherto unprecedented power, depth, transparency and harmony +of his colouring. Whatever want of exact truth there may be in the story +as related by Vasari's story of the discovery of oil painting, there is +no doubt that Hubert Van Eyck succeeded in preparing so transparent a +varnish that he could apply it without disadvantage to all colours. + +The chief work by Hubert Van Eyck is the large altar-piece painted for +the cathedral of S. Bavon at Ghent;--parts of this have been removed and +are now in the Berlin Gallery, and supplemented with excellent copies of +the rest, the whole of the wonderful composition may there be well +studied; a large photograph of the whole altar piece may also be seen in +the library at the Victoria and Albert Museum, which shows how the work +was originally designed. It was painted for Jodocus Vyts, Burgomaster of +Ghent, and his wife Elizabeth, for their mortuary chapel in the +cathedral. + +The subject of the three central panels of the upper portion is the +Deity seated between _the Virgin and S. John the Baptist_. Underneath +these, of the same width, is the famous _Adoration of the Lamb_. These +together formed the back of the altar-piece, and were covered by wings +which opened out on hinges on either side. + +The three large figures of the upper part are designed with all the +dignity and statuesque repose belonging to an earlier style, and they +are painted on a ground of gold and tapestry, as was constantly the +practice in earlier times: but united with the traditional type we +already find a successful representation of life and nature in all their +truth. They stand as it were on the frontier of two different styles, +and from the excellence of both form a wonderful and most impressive +whole. The Heavenly Father sits directly fronting the spectator, in all +the solemnity of ancient dignity, His right hand raised to give the +benediction to the Lamb and to all the multitude of figures below; in +His left hand is a crystal sceptre; on His head the triple crown, the +emblem of the Trinity. The features are such as are ascribed to Christ +by the traditions of the Church, but noble and well proportioned; the +expression is forcible, though passionless. + +The tunic and the mantle of this figure are of a deep red, the latter +being fastened over the breast by a clasp, and falling down in ample +folds over the feet. Behind, as high as the head, is a hanging of green +tapestry which is ornamented with a golden pelican--a symbol of the +Redeemer. Behind the head the ground is gold, and on it in a semicircle +are three inscriptions describing the Trinity as almighty, all-good, and +all-bountiful. The figures of S. John and of the Virgin display equal +majesty; both are reading holy books, as they turn towards the centre +figure. The countenance of S. John expresses ascetic seriousness, but in +that of the Virgin we find a serene grace and a purity of form which +approach very nearly to the happier effects of Italian art. + +The arrangement of the lower central picture, the worship of the Lamb, +is strictly symmetrical, as the mystic nature of the allegorical subject +might seem to + +[Illustration: PLATE XXI.--JAN VAN EYCK + +JAN ARNOLFINI AND HIS WIFE + +_National Gallery, London_] + +have demanded; but there is such beauty in the landscape, in the pure +atmosphere, in the bright green of the grass, in the masses of trees and +flowers--even in single figures which stand out from the four principal +groups--that we no longer perceive either hardness or severity in this +symmetry. + +The landscape of this composition and that part of it containing the +patriarchs and prophets are generally supposed to have been completed by +JAN VAN EYCK (_c._ 1385-1441), whose name till within a comparatively +recent period had almost obscured that of Hubert. For although there is +little doubt that the elder brother was the first to develop the new +method of painting, yet the fame of it did not extend beyond Belgium and +across the Alps until after the death of Hubert, when the celebrity it +so speedily acquired throughout Europe was transferred to Jan Van Eyck. +Within fifteen years after his death, 1455, Jan was commemorated in +Italy as the greatest painter of the century, while the name of Hubert +was not even mentioned. It was Jan van Eyck to whom Antonello da Messina +is said by Vasari to have resorted in Bruges in order to learn the new +style of painting; he alone also is mentioned in Vasari's first edition +of 1550, Hubert not until the second edition in 1568, and then only +incidentally. + +Fortunately there are in existence various authentic pictures by Jan Van +Eyck in which his original powers are more easily recognised than in the +part he took in the execution of the great altar-piece at Ghent, in +which he doubtless accommodated himself with proper fraternal piety both +to the composition and to the style of his elder brother--who was also +his master. In these we can see that he possessed neither the enthusiasm +for the rich imagery and symbolism of the ecclesiastical art of the +Middle Ages, nor that feeling for beauty in human forms or in drapery +which belonged to his elder brother. His feeling, on the other hand, led +him to the closest and truest conception of individual nature. Where he +had to paint portraits only--a task which was most congenial to the +tendency of his mind--he attained a life-like truth of form and +colouring in every part, extending even to the minutest details, such as +no other artist of his time could rival, and which art in general has +seldom produced. In his actual brush work he shows greater facility than +was ever attained by Hubert, by which he was enabled to render the +material of every substance with marvellous fidelity. + +What little we know of the personal history of Jan Van Eyck is of +exceptional interest, inasmuch as we find him employed on diplomatic +errands to foreign countries, like his great successor Rubens; and as it +happens he landed in England, though not intentionally, in the course of +one of these voyages, being driven into Shoreham and Falmouth by adverse +weather. It was in 1425 that he was taken into the service of Philip +III., Duke of Burgundy, as painter and "varlet de chambre," shortly +after which he went to Lille. In the following year he was sent on a +pilgrimage as the Duke's proxy, and again on two secret missions. In +1428 he went with the Duke's Embassy to the King of Portugal which was +to sue for the hand of Isabella, the Portuguese princess. It was on this +occasion that he was driven on to our shores. Arriving at Lisbon he +painted two portraits of Isabella, one of which was sent home by sea and +the other overland. After a happy and successful career he died in 1441 +at Bruges, where he had married and settled down on his return from +Portugal. + +The most beautiful example of Jan Van Eyck's work in England is the +portrait of Jean Arnolfini and Jeanne de Chenany his wife, now in the +National Gallery (No. 186). This is dated with the charming inscription, +"Johannes de Eyck fuit hic 1434"--that is to say, instead of simply +signing the picture, he writes, "Jan Van Eyck was here, 1434." No other +picture shows so high a development of the master's extraordinary power +and charm. Besides every other quality peculiar to him, we observe here +a perfection of tone and of chiaroscuro which no other specimen of this +whole period affords. It is recorded that Princess Mary, sister of +Charles V. and Governess of the Netherlands, purchased this picture from +a barber to whom it belonged at the price of a post worth a hundred +gulden a year. Among its subsequent possessors were Don Diego de +Guevara, majordomo of Joan, Queen of Castile, by whom it was presented +to Margaret of Austria. In 1530 it was acquired by Mary of Hungary, and +later it returned to Spain. In 1789 it was in the palace at Madrid, and +soon after it was taken by one of the French Generals, in whose quarters +Major-General Hay found it after the battle of Waterloo. + +Two other portraits in the National Gallery bear the signature of Jan +Van Eyck. No. 222, An elderly man, head and shoulders, on the frame of +which is the painter's motto, "als ich can," and his signature, +"Johannes de Eyck me fecit anno 1433, 21 Octobris." The other, No. 290, +is a younger man, half length, standing inside an open window, on the +sill of which is inscribed "[Greek: Timotheos]," and "Leal Souvenir," +and below the date and signature, "Actum anno domini 1432, 10 die +Octobris a Iohanne de Eyck." + +Among the Netherlandish scholars and followers of the Van Eycks of whom +any record has been preserved some appear to have been gifted with +considerable powers, though none attained the excellence of their great +precursors. Although a number of works representing this school still +exist in the various countries of Europe, yet compared with the actual +abundance of them at one time they constitute but a scanty remnant. + +Though not actually a pupil of Jan Van Eyck, ROGER VAN DER WEYDEN +acquired after him the greatest celebrity. As early as 1436 he filled +the honourable post of official painter to the city of Brussels. The +chief work executed by him in this capacity was an altar-piece for the +Chamber of Justice in Hotel de Ville. According to the custom of the +time, it set forth in the most realistic fashion examples of stern +observance of the law for the admonition of those placed in authority. +The principal picture showed how Herkenbald, a judge in the eleventh +century, executed his own nephew (convicted of a grave crime, but who +would otherwise have escaped the penalty of the law) with his own hands; +and how the sacramental wafer which, on the plea of murder, was denied +to him by the priest, reached the lips of the upright judge by means of +a miracle. The wings contained an example of the justice of the Emperor +Trajan. These pictures are unfortunately no longer in existence, having +probably been burned when Brussels was besieged in 1695. + +In the Museum of the Hospital at Beaune is one of the most important of +his works still in existence, _The Last Judgment_, though in this it is +generally supposed he was assisted by Dirk Bouts and Hans Memling. It +contains several portraits, notably those of the Pope, Eugenius IV., who +stands behind the Apostles in the right wing, and next to him Philip the +Good. The crowned female in the opposite wing is probably Philip's + +[Illustration: PLATE XXII.--JAN VAN EYCK + +PORTRAIT OF THE PAINTER'S WIFE + +_Town Gallery, Bruges_] + +second wife, Isabella of Portugal, whose portrait Jan Van Eyck went to +Lisbon to paint before her marriage. On the outer sides are excellently +painted portraits of the founder of the Hospital, Nicolas Rolin, and his +wife. This work has been classed with the Van Eycks' _Adoration of the +Lamb_, and the _Adoration of the Shepherds_ by Hugo Van der Goes, as +crystallizing the finest expression of early northern painting. + +In 1450 he visited Italy, where he painted the beautiful little +altar-piece which is now in the Staedel Institute at Frankfort, for Piero +and Giovanni de'Medici. + +Another very fine example of his work is the triptych, now in the Berlin +Museum, executed for Pierre Bladelin. In the centre is the Nativity, +with a portrait of Bladelin kneeling, and angels. On the one side is the +annunciation of the Redeemer to the ruler of the West--the Emperor +Augustus--by the agency of the Tiburtine Sibyl; on the other to those of +the East--the Three Kings--who are keeping watch on a mountain, where +the child appears to them in a star. + +One of the largest as well as of the finest of the master's works is a +triptych in the Munich Gallery--the _Adoration of the Kings_, with the +_Annunciation_ and the _Presentation in the Temple_ in the wings. The +figure of the Virgin in the _Presentation_ is particularly pleasing for +its simple and unaffected realism. _S. Luke painting the Virgin_, also +in the Munich Gallery, is ascribed to Roger. + +No painter of this school, the Van Eycks even not excepted, exercised so +great and widely extended an influence as Roger Van der Weyden. Not only +were Hans Memling--the greatest master of the next generation in +Belgium--and his own son, also named Roger, his pupils, but innumerable +works other than pictures were produced, such as miniatures, +block-books, and engravings, in which his form of art is recognisable. +It was under his auspices that the realistic tendency of the Van Eycks +pervaded all Germany; for it was only after the death of Jan Van Eyck, +in 1441, that the widespread fame of Roger Van der Weyden induced +Germans to visit his studio at Brussels. Martin Schongauer, one of the +greatest German masters of the sixteenth century, is known to have been +his pupil, and it is certain that there must have been many others. + +It is in HANS MEMLING (_c._ 1435-1494), whom Vasari states to have been +the pupil of Roger, that the early Netherlandish School attains the +highest delicacy of artistic development. His poetical and profoundly +human qualities had a special attraction for the "Pre-Raphaelite +Brotherhood" inaugurated by Rossetti and Holman Hunt in the middle of +the nineteenth century. This unusual tenderness of feeling is probably +also the origin of the legend that Memling was taken into the Hospital +of S. John at Bruges--where he painted most of his masterpieces--as a +sick soldier after the battle of Nancy. In feeling for beauty and grace +he was more gifted than any painter except Hubert Van Eyck, and this +quality, conspicuous amid the somewhat ugly realism of most of his +contemporaries, has ensured him perhaps a little more popularity than is +rightly his share. Compared with the works of his master, Roger Van der +Weyden, his figures are certainly of better proportions and less +meagreness of form; his hands and feet truer to nature; the heads of his +women are sweeter, and those of his men less severe. His outlines are +softer, and in the modelling of his flesh parts more delicacy of half +tones is observable. His colours are still more luminous and +transparent. On the other hand he is inferior to Van der Weyden in the +carrying out of detail, such as the materials of his draperies or the +rendering of the full brilliancy of gold. + +In 1467 Memling was a master painter at Bruges, and painted the portrait +of the medallist, Nicolas Spinelli, which is now in the Royal Museum at +Antwerp, and a small altar-piece now at Chatsworth. His most famous +works, those in the Hospital at Bruges, belong to a somewhat later date, +the _Shrine of S. Ursula_ not being completed till 1489. The _Adoration +of the Kings_ and the altar-piece were some ten years earlier. The +famous shrine of S. Ursula is about four feet in length, and the whole +of the outside is adorned with painting. On each side of the cover are +three medallions, a large one in the centre and two smaller at the +sides. The latter contain angels playing on musical instruments; in the +centre on one side is a Coronation of the Virgin, on the other the +Glorification of S. Ursula and her companions, with two figures of +Bishops. On the gable-ends are the Virgin and Child with two sisters of +the hospital kneeling before them, and S. Ursula with the arrow, the +instrument of her martyrdom, and virgins seeking protection under her +mantle. On the longer sides of the reliquary itself, in six rather +larger compartments, is painted the history of S. Ursula. + +Of about the same period, possibly a little earlier, is the _Marriage of +S. Catherine_, which is also in S. John's Hospital at Bruges. The +central figure is that of the Virgin, seated under a porch, with +tapestry hanging down behind it; two angels hold a crown over her head: +beside her is S. Catherine kneeling, whose head is one of the finest +ever painted by Memling. Behind her is an angel playing on the organ, +and further back S. John the Baptist. On the other side kneels S. +Barbara, reading: behind her another angel holds a book to the Virgin, +and still further back is S. John the Evangelist, a figure of great +beauty, and of a singularly mild and thoughtful character. Through the +arcades of the porch we look out, on either side of the throne, on a +rich landscape, in which are represented scenes from the lives of the +two S. Johns. The panel on the right contains the beheading of the +Baptist, on the left the Evangelist in the Isle of Patmos, where the +vision of the Apocalypse appears to him--the Almighty on a throne in a +glory of dazzling light, encompassed with a rainbow. + +The whole forms a work strikingly poetical and most impressive in +character; it is highly finished, both in drawing and composition. + +IAN GOSSAERT (_c._ 1472-1535), called JAN VAN MABUSE from his native +town of Maubeuge, was the son of a bookbinder who worked for the Abbey +of Sainte-Aldegonde. It is possible therefore that he might have formed +an early acquaintance with illuminated manuscripts before studying the +art of painting in the studio of a master. Memling, Gerard, David, and +Quentin Massys have been suggested as his instructors, but it is not +known for certain that he was actually a pupil of any of them. In 1508 +he went to Italy, where he appears to have been greatly influenced both +by the work of the Renaissance painters and by the antique. The +_Adoration of the Kings_, which was lately purchased from Castle Howard +for the National Gallery for L40,000, was painted before he went to +Italy. + +Towards the end of the fifteenth century, in consequence of the transfer +of commerce from Bruges to Antwerp, this latter city first became and +long continued the centre of art, and especially of Netherlandish +painting. Here it is that we find QUENTIN MASSYS, the greatest Belgian +painter of this later time. He was born + +[Illustration: PLATE XXIII.--JAN MABUSE + +PORTRAIT OF JEAN CARONDELET + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +probably in 1466. His father is said to have been a blacksmith and +clockmaker, and there is a tradition that Quentin only forsook the +hammer for the brush at instigation of a tender passion for a beautiful +lady. Be that as it may, he is an important figure in the history of +Belgian art. He distinguishes, broadly speaking, the close of the last +period and the beginning of the next. A number of pictures representing +sacred subjects exhibit, with little feeling for real beauty of form, +such delicacy of features, beauty and earnestness of feeling, tenderness +and clearness of colouring and skill in finish, as worthily recall the +religious painting of the Middle Ages, though at the very end of them. +In his draperies, especially, we observe a charm which is peculiar to +Massys. At the same time, in the subordinate figures introduced into +sacred subjects, such as the executioners, etc., he seems to take +pleasure in coarse and tasteless caricatures. + +In subjects taken from common life, such as money changers, loving +couples, or ugly old women, he uses his brush with evident zest, and +with great success. The pictures of his later period are also +distinguished from those of other painters by the large size of the +figures, which for the first time in his country are of three-quarters +or even actual life size. + +Among his most original and attractive pictures are the half-length +figures of Christ and the Virgin. These must have been very popular in +his own time, for he has left several repetitions of them. Two heads of +this class are at Antwerp, and two others of equal beauty are in the +National Gallery in one frame (No. 295). + +The most celebrated of his subject pictures is that known by the name of +_The Misers_, or _The Money Changers_, at Windsor Castle--of which there +are numerous copies, and this is not supposed to be the original. _The +Money Changer and His Wife_ at the Louvre is undoubtedly his. + +LUCAS VAN LEYDEN, as he was called (his real name being Luc Jacobez), +was born in 1494, and died in 1533. He was a pupil of a little known +artist, Cornelis Engelbrechstein, who was a follower if not a pupil of +Memling. Lucas was an artist of multifarious powers and very early +development. He painted admirably--though his authenticated works are +very scarce--drew, and engraved. He pursued the path of realism in the +treatment of sacred subjects, but with less beauty or elevation of mind. +His heads are generally of a very ugly character. At the same time his +form of expression found sympathy in the feeling of the period, and by +the skill with which it was expressed, especially in his engravings, +attracted a number of followers. In scenes from common life he is full +of truth and delicate observation of nature, though showing now and then +a somewhat coarse sense of humour. One of his most important works is a +large composition of _The Last Judgment_, which is at Leyden. + +Very early in the sixteenth century--beginning in fact, as we have seen, +with Jan Mabuse in 1508--the Netherlandish and German artists made it +the fashion to repair to Italy, attracted by the reputation of the great +masters; so that from this time onwards their work ceases to exhibit the +purely northern characteristics of their predecessors. For it appears +that precisely those qualities most opposed to their own native feeling +for art made the deepest impression on their minds; more especially such +general qualities as grandeur, beauty, simplicity of forms, drawing of +the nude, unrestrained freedom, boldness, and grace of movement--in +short, all that is comprised in art under the term "ideal." + +But the attempt to appropriate all these qualities could lead to no +successful result. Being based on no inherent want on the part of their +own original feeling for art, it became only the outward imitation of +something foreign to themselves, and they never therefore succeeded in +mastering the complete understanding of form, or in adopting the true +feeling for beauty of line or grace of movement; and in aiming at them +they only degenerated into artificiality, exaggeration in drawing, and +violence in attitude. The pictures of this class, even of religious +subjects, have accordingly but little to attract the eye, and when they +selected scenes from ancient mythology, and allegories decked out with +an ostentation of learning, the result is positively disagreeable. + +The most satisfactory productions of this period will be found in the +department of portrait painting, which, by its nature, threw the artist +upon the exercise of his own original feeling for art. As in every other +respect this epoch is far more important as a link in the chain of +history than from any pleasure arising from its own works, it will be +sufficient to mention only the more important painters and a few of +their principal pictures. + +The first painter who deserted his native style of art was, as before +mentioned, Jan Mabuse. After the large _Adoration of the Kings_ in the +National Gallery the most important picture of his pre-Italian period is +the _Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane_ at Berlin. Nearly all his works +subsequent to 1512, by which time he had settled in Brussels, are +characterised by all the faults above mentioned. Their redeeming quality +is their masterly treatment. Among those of religious subjects the +smallest are as a rule the best. The _Ecce Homo_ at Antwerp, so +frequently copied by contemporary painters, is a specimen of masterly +modelling and vigorous colour. He is less successful with his life-size +_Adam and Eve_, of which there are repetitions at Brussels, Hatfield, +Hampton Court and Berlin. But his most unpleasing efforts are the +mythological subjects such as the _Danae_ at Munich, and the _Neptune +and Amphitrite_ at Berlin. On the other hand, his portraits are +attractive both from being more original, and less influenced by his +acquired mannerisms of style Four of these are in the National Gallery, +and the _Girl weighing Gold Pieces_, in the Berlin gallery, is also +worthy of mention. + +BERNARD VAN ORLEY, born at Brussels in 1471, is characterised in the +catalogue of the National Gallery as "taking his place after Massys and +Mabuse on the downward slope of Netherlandish painting." He has been +immortalised by the fine portrait head of him by Albert Duerer which is +now in the Dresden Gallery. He was Court painter to Margaret of Austria, +Governess of the Low Countries, and retained the same post under her +successor, Mary of Hungary. He is said to have visited Rome in 1509, and +there made the acquaintance of Raphael, whose influence is certainly +apparent, though hardly his inspiration, in the _Holy Family_ in the +Louvre. A more Netherlandish work, both in feeling and in treatment, is +the _Pieta_ in the Gallery at Brussels. + +IAN SCOREL, born in 1495, was a pupil of Mabuse, and appears to have +been the first to introduce the Italian style into his native +country--Holland. When on a pilgrimage to Palestine he happened to pass +through Rome at the time his countryman was raised to the papal dignity +as Adrian VI., and after painting his portrait he was appointed overseer +of the art treasures of the Vatican. Returning to Utrecht, where he +died, he painted the picture of the _Virgin and Child_, with donors, +which is now in the Town Hall. + +A fine portrait by Scorel of Cornelius Aerntz van der Dussen is in the +Berlin Gallery. + +The decided and strongly realistic style in which Quentin Massys had +painted scenes from common life, as for instance the Misere or Money +Changers, became the model for various painters in their treatment of +similar subjects. First among these was his son, JAN MASSYS, born about +1500, who followed closely but rather clumsily in his father's +footsteps, and need only be mentioned for carrying on the tradition. +More interesting were the Breughels, namely, PIETER BREUGHEL the elder, +born about 1520, called Peasant Breughel, and his two sons Pieter and +Jan. Old Breughel is best studied at Vienna, where there are good +examples of his various subjects, notably a _Crucifixion_ and _The Tower +of Babel_--both dated 1563--and secular scenes like _A Peasant Wedding_ +and a _Fight between Carnival and Lent_, which are full of clever and +droll invention. + +His elder son, Pieter, was called Hell Breughel, from his choice of +subject. He is far inferior to his father or to his younger brother Jan, +called Velvet Breughel, born in 1568. Though more especially a landscape +painter, Jan also takes an important place in the development of subject +pictures, which, though seldom rising above a somewhat coarse reality, +are of a lively character, and worthy forerunners of the more +accomplished productions of Teniers, Ostade, and Brouwer. + +It is in portrait painting, however, that the Netherlandish School +chiefly distinguished itself during its decline in the seventeenth +century, and had all its sons remained in the country to enhance its +glory, it is probable that the effect on the general practice of +painting would have been more than beneficial. But portrait painters +have not always been content to sit at home and wait for sitters to come +to them, especially when the state of society in which they happen to +find themselves makes waiting rather a long and tedious process. From +the Reformation onwards, for over two centuries, there was a steady +demand for portrait painters in England, and after the foundation of a +really English school of painting by Reynolds in the middle of the +eighteenth century, the stream of foreign, especially Netherlandish, +talent never entirely ceased to flow. But confining ourselves for the +present to the sixteenth century, we find that all the considerable +Netherlandish portrait painters were employed for the most part outside +their own country. + +Typical of these is JOOS VAN CLEEF, of Antwerp, who died in 1540. +According to Vasari he visited Spain and painted portraits for the Court +of France. At all events it is certain that he worked for a time in +England, where the great success of Sir Antonio Mor is said to have +disordered his brain. The few pictures that can be assigned to him with +any certainty thoroughly justify the high reputation he enjoyed in his +time--the two male portraits for example at Berlin and Munich, the +portraits of himself and his wife at Windsor, and his own at Althorp. +His style may be classed as between that of Holbein and Antonio Mor. His +well-drawn forms are decided without being hard, and his warm and +transparent colouring recalls the great masters of the Venetian School. + + + + +II + +PETER PAUL RUBENS + + +Dr Waagen thus summarises the history of painting in the Netherlands +during the interval of about a century and a half that elapsed between +the death of Jan van Eyck in 1440 and the birth of PETER PAUL RUBENS in +1577. + +"The great school of the brothers van Eyck," he writes, "which united +with a profound and genuine enthusiasm for religious subjects a pure and +healthy feeling for nature, and a talent for portraying her minutest +details with truth and fidelity, had continued till the end of the +fifteenth century, and in some instances even later, to produce the most +admirable works, combining the utmost technical perfection in touch and +finish with most vivid and beautiful colouring. To this original school, +however, had succeeded a perverted rage for imitating the Italian +masters, which had been introduced into the Netherlands by a few +painters of talent, particularly by Jean Mabuse and Bernard van Orley. +To display their science by throwing their figures into forced and +difficult positions and strongly marking the muscles, by which they +thought to emulate the grandeur of Michel Angelo, and to exhibit their +learning by the choice of mythological and allegorical subjects, became +the aim of succeeding painters, and before these false and artificial +views of art, the spirit of religious enthusiasm and the pure, naive +perception of the truth and beauty of nature gradually disappeared. + +"In proportion as the Flemish painters lost the proper conception of +form, and the feeling for delicacy and beauty of outline, it followed +of course that they became more and more removed from nature in their +desire to rival each other in the forced attitudes of their figures, and +in the exhibition of nudity, until at last such disgusting caricatures +were produced as we find in the works of Martin Heemskirk or Franz +Floris, artists who were even deficient in good colouring, the old +inheritance of the school. + +"Some few painters, however, whose feeling for truth and nature repelled +them instinctively from a path so far removed from both, took to +portraying scenes of real life with considerable humour and vivacity; or +they delineated nature in her commonest aspects with great minuteness of +detail; and thus _tableaux de genre_ and landscape originated. Although +a few isolated efforts to introduce a better state of things were +visible towards the end of the sixteenth century, it was reserved for a +mind of no common power to bring about a complete revolution." + +That Rubens was possessed of a "mind of no common power" will be readily +admitted. He was an extraordinary person, in whom were combined such a +variety of excellent qualities that there seems to have been no room +left in him for any of the inferior ones which are usually necessary, as +one must almost admit, for an alloy that will harden the finer metal for +the practical purposes of success. With all his feeling for religion, he +was seldom prudish; his amazing vitality never led him into excess or +intemperance. His intense patriotism was all for peace; classical +learning never made him dry or bumptious, nor the favour of kings +servile. As fine a gentleman as Buckingham, he had no enemies. + +Something more than temperament and natural ability, however, was +necessary to make Rubens exactly what he turned out to be, and that was +environment. Had he remained in Flanders all his life we should have +been deprived of much that is most characteristic in his art. He was too +big, that is to say, for the flower pot. He needed to be bedded out, so +that his exuberant natural genius might have the proper opportunities +for expanding under suitable conditions. It was in Venice and Mantua, in +Florence and Rome that he found himself, and took his measure from the +giants. + +Rubens was born in 1577 at Cologne, where his father, a jurist of +considerable attainments, had taken refuge from the disturbances at +Antwerp in 1566. He was christened Peter Paul in honour of the saints on +whose festival his birthday fell--29th June. At the age of sixteen he +was placed as a page in the household of the widowed Countess of +Lalaing, but as he showed a remarkable love for drawing he was +apprenticed first to Tobias Verhaegt, a landscape painter, and then to +Adam Van Oort. The latter was so unsuitable a master, however, that +Rubens was soon committed to the care of Otto Vennius, at that time +Court painter to the Infanta Isabella and the Archduke Albert, her +husband; he prospered so well that in 1600 Vennius advised him to go to +Italy to finish his education as a painter. + +Rubens was now in his twenty-third year, and besides being proficient in +painting he was so well grounded in the classics and in general +education and manners that he was recommended by the Archduke to +Vincenzio, Duke of Gonzaga, whose palace at Mantua was famous for +containing an immense collection of art treasures, a great part of which +within the next quarter of a century were purchased by King Charles, the +Duke of Buckingham, and the Earl of Arundel. The influence exerted on +the young painter by surroundings like these is exemplified in a note by +Waagen:-- + +"Rubens during his residence at Mantua was so pleased with the _Triumph +of Julius Caesar_ by Mantegna (the large cartoons now at Hampton Court +Palace), that he made a free copy of one of them. His love for the +fantastic and pompous led him to choose that with the elephants carrying +the candelabra; but his ardent imagination, ever directed to the +dramatic, could not be contented with this. Instead of a harmless sheep, +which, in Mantegna, is walking by the side of the foremost elephant, +Rubens has introduced a lion and a lioness, which growl angrily at the +elephant. The latter is looking furiously round, and is on the point of +striking the lion a blow with his trunk." + +That Rubens should have been so specially attracted by Mantegna may seem +a little surprising, until we remember that both were lovers and +students of classical antiquities--a fact that is often forgotten in +recalling only the principal achievements of either. But it is important +to know what sort of foundations underlie the most splendid erections if +we wish to understand how they came into existence and what their place +is in the history of the arts. A glance through Lempriere's _Dictionary_ +may furnish a modern Academician with a subject for a popular +picture,--but that is stucco rather than foundation. The roots of tall +trees go deep. Rubens when he was in Rome studied the antiquities of the +place with the utmost diligence and zeal, as is evidenced by a book +published by his brother Philip in 1608. + +It was in the autumn of this year that he received the news, when at +Genoa, of his mother's illness, which induced him to return to Antwerp +forthwith. On his arrival he found she had died before the messenger +had reached Genoa. + +After four months of mourning he was ready to return to Flanders; his +sojourn of eight years in Italy had so far influenced him that he might +have remained there indefinitely had it not been for the Archduke and +the Infanta pressing him to remain at Brussels and attach himself to +their Court. Another circumstance may possibly have weighed with him; +for within a year we find him married to Elizabeth Brant, the daughter +of a magistrate of Antwerp, and it was not at Brussels, but at Antwerp, +that he took up his quarters. Here he proceeded to build a wonderful +house--said to have cost him 60,000 florins--after designs of his own in +the Italian style, which he filled with the treasures he had collected +in Italy. + +Rubens's first pictures were nearly all of them religious subjects. +Before he went to Italy he had painted an _Adoration of the Kings_, a +_Holy Trinity_, and the _Dead Christ in the Arms of God the Father_, +which was engraved by Bolswert. When Vincenzio sent him to Rome to copy +pictures there for him, he found time to execute a commission which he +received from the Archduke Albert to paint three pictures for the Church +of Santa Croce di Gerusalamme, namely, the _Crowning with Thorns_, the +_Crucifixion_, and the _Finding of the Cross_. A year later--after +returning from a journey to Madrid--he painted the altar-piece for the +Church of Santa Maria in Vallicella, in which the influence of Paul +Veronese is conspicuous. At Genoa, he painted the Circumcision and S. +Ignatius for the church of the Jesuits. + +One of the first pictures which he painted on his return to Antwerp was +an altar-piece for the private chapel of the Archduke Albert, of the +Holy Family. This picture was so much admired that the members of the +fraternity of S. Ildefonso, at the head of which was the Archduke +Albert, commissioned him to paint an altar-piece for the Chapel of the +Order of S. James near Brussels. This picture, which is now at Vienna, +represents the Virgin enthroned, surrounded by four female saints, +putting the Cloak of the Order on the shoulders of S. Ildefonso. On the +wings are the portraits of the Archduke and Isabella, with their patron +saints. + +Thus we find that, like the earliest painters in his own country as well +as in Italy, the beginning of Rubens's art was under the influence of +the Church. Further, we find that the most celebrated work of his +earlier period, the _Descent from the Cross_, in the cathedral at +Antwerp, was undertaken in circumstances which abundantly show how +thoroughly he was imbued with the principles of the religion he +professed. The story is that when preparing the foundations of his new +house he had unwittingly trespassed upon a piece of ground belonging to +the Company of Arquebusiers at Antwerp. A lawsuit was threatened, and +Rubens, with all the vivacity of his nature, prepared measures of +resistance. But when his friend Rockox, a lawyer, had proved him that he +was in the wrong, he immediately drew back, and offered to paint a +picture by way of compensation. The offer was accepted, and the +Arquebusiers asked for a representation of their patron, S. Christopher, +to be placed in his chapel in the cathedral. In the magnificent spirit +which always distinguished the man, he presented to his adversaries not +merely the figure of the great Saint, but an elaborate and significant +illustration of his name (Christ-bearer). Thus, in the centre, the +disciples are lifting the Saviour from the Cross; in the wings the +Visitation--S. Simeon with Christ in his arms, S. Christopher with +Christ on his shoulders, and an old hermit bearing a light. + +Among the earlier examples of secular pictures one of the most famous is +the portrait of himself and his bride, which is now in the Munich +Gallery. This was painted in 1609, when Rubens was over thirty years +old. + +In 1627 Rubens went to Madrid on a diplomatic errand, but still as a +painter, as we shall see when discussing his relations with Velasquez. + +Towards the end of the year 1629 he was sent on another diplomatic +mission, this time to England. The choice of an ambassador could not +have fallen on anyone better calculated to suit the personal character +of Charles I., who was a passionate lover of art and easily captivated +by men of cultivated intellect and refined manners. Rubens therefore, in +whom the most admirable and attractive qualities were united to the +rarest genius as an artist, soon succeeded in winning the attention and +regard of the king. At Paris, too, Rubens had made friends with +Buckingham, who had purchased his whole collection of statues, +paintings, and other works of art for about ten thousand pounds. + +It was during his stay in London that he painted the picture now in the +National Gallery, called _Peace and War_ (No. 46). This was intended as +an allegory representing the blessings of peace and the horrors of war, +which he presented to the king as a tangible recommendation of the +pacific measures which he had come to propose. After the dispersion of +the Royal Collection during the Commonwealth this picture was acquired +by the Doria family at Genoa, where it was called, oddly enough, +_Rubens's Family_. As a matter of fact the children are those of +Balthazar Gerbier. He also painted the _S. George and the Dragon_, +which is now at Windsor Castle, and made the sketches for the nine +pictures on the ceiling of the Banqueting Hall--now the United Service +Institution Museum--in Whitehall. It was on this occasion, too, that he +received the honour of knighthood from Charles I., who is said to have +presented him with his own sword. + +In the following year, 1630, Rubens married his second wife, Helena +Fourment, who was only sixteen years old--he was now fifty-two or +fifty-three. She belonged to one of the richest and most respectable +families in Antwerp, and was by no means unworthy of the compliment of +being painted in the character of the Virgin receiving instruction from +S. Anne, in the picture which is still at Antwerp. + +In 1633 his painting was again interrupted by a diplomatic mission, this +time to Holland; and his remaining years were subject to more +distressing interruptions, from the gout, to which he finally succumbed +in 1640. + +When we come to consider the English School of painting we shall see how +much of its revival in the middle of the eighteenth century was due to +the personality as well as to the genius of Sir Joshua Reynolds. In the +Netherlands, likewise, it was not merely a great painter that was +required to raise the art to life, but a great personality as well; and +to the influence of Rubens may be attributed much if not all of the +extraordinary fertility of the Flemish and Dutch Schools of the +seventeenth century. Making every allowance for the difference in the +times in which the Van Eycks and Rubens were working, there is no doubt +that the former lived in too rarefied an atmosphere ever to influence +their fellows, and with the exception of Hans Memling they left no + +[Illustration: PLATE XXIV.--RUBENS + +PORTRAIT OF HELENE FOURMENT, THE ARTIST'S SECOND WIFE, AND TWO CHILDREN + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +one worthy to carry on their tradition. Rubens showed his contemporaries +that art was a mistress who could be served in many ways that were yet +unthought of, and that she did not by any means disdain the tribute of +other than religious votaries. Beginning, as we have pointed out, with +sacred subjects, Rubens soon turned to the study of the classics, and +found in them not so much the classical severity that Mantegna had +sought for as the pagan spirit of fulness and freedom. "I am convinced +that to reach the highest perfection as a painter," he himself writes +"it is necessary, not only to be acquainted with the ancient statues, +but we must be inwardly imbued with the thorough comprehension of them. +An insight into the laws which pertain to them is necessary before they +can be turned to any real account in painting. This will prevent the +artist from transferring to the canvas that which in sculpture is +dependent on the material employed--marble, for instance. Many +inexperienced and indeed experienced painters do not distinguish the +material from the form which it expresses--the stone from the figure +which is carved in it; that which the artist forces from the dead +marble, from the universal laws of art which are independent of it. + +"One leading rule may be laid down, that inasmuch as the best statues of +antiquity are of great value for the painter, the inferior ones are not +only worthless but mischievous: for while beginners fancy they can +perform wonders if they can borrow from these statues, and transfer +something hard, heavy, with sharp outlines and an exaggerated anatomy to +their canvas, this can only be done by outraging the truth of nature, +since instead of representing flesh with colours, they do but give +colour to marble. + +"In studying even the best of the antique statues, the painter must +consider and avoid many things which are not connected with the art of +the sculptor, but solely with the material in which he worked. I may +mention particularly the difference in the shading. In nature, owing to +the transparency of the flesh, the skin, and the cartilages, the shading +of many parts is moderated, which in sculpture appear hard and abrupt, +for the shadows become doubled, as it were, owing to the natural and +unavoidable thickness of the stone. To this must be added that certain +less important parts which lie on the surface of the human body, as the +veins, folds of the skin, etc., which change their appearance with every +movement, and which owing to the pliancy of the skin become easily +extended or contracted, are not expressed at all in the works of +sculptors in general--though it is true that sculptors of high talent +have marked them in some degree. The painter, however, must never omit +to introduce them--with proper discretion. + +"In the manner in which lights fall, too, statues are totally different +from nature; for the natural brilliancy of marble, and its own light, +throws out the surface far more strongly than in nature, and even +dazzles the eye." + +I have quoted rather more of this passage (from Mrs Jameson's +translation) than I at first intended, because it discloses one of the +most important secrets of the successful painting of figures, by other +artists besides Rubens himself--George Romney for example. The +advantages of a "classical education" at our English public schools and +universities are questioned, and there can be no doubt that for the bulk +of the pupils they are questionable. But Rubens shows that the case is +exactly the same for painters studying classical art as for scholars +acquainting themselves with classical literature. A superficial study of +the antique, just because it is antique, is of no use at all, but rather +a hindrance. But if the study is properly undertaken, there is no surer +foundation, in art or literature, on which to build. It makes no +difference what is built; the foundation is there, beneath the surface, +and whatever is placed upon it will stand for all time. + +The remarkable freedom and originality of Rubens's treatment of +classical subjects is thus accounted for. Under the surface is his +familiarity with the antique, but instead of carrying this above ground, +he builds on it a palace in accordance with the times and circumstances +in which he lived. The principles of classical art underlie the modern +structure. Among his numerous works of classical mythology the picture +at Munich of _Castor and Pollux_ carrying off the daughters of Leucippus +is worthy of being first mentioned. The Dioscuri mounted on spirited +steeds, one of which is wildly rearing, are in the act of capturing the +two damsels. The calm expression of strength in the male, and the +violent but fruitless resistance of the female figures, form a striking +contrast. Although the former are merely represented as two coarse and +powerful men, and the women have only common and rather redundant forms +and Flemish faces, yet the picture produces as a whole such a striking +effect, owing to the admirable manner in which the subject is conceived, +the power of imagination which it displays, and the exquisite colouring +and tone, that it would never occur to any unprejudiced spectator to +regret the absence of antique forms and character. + +Two other pictures of this class are singled out for description by +Waagen as masterpieces. One is the _Rape of Proserpine_, at +Blenheim,--Pluto in his car, drawn by fiery brown steeds, is carrying +off the goddess, who is struggling in his arms. The other is the _Battle +of the Amazons_, in the Munich Gallery, which was painted by Rubens for +Van der Geest. With great judgment he has chosen the moment when the +Amazons are driven back by the Greeks over the river Thermodon: the +battle takes place upon a bridge, and thus the horror of the scene is +carried to the highest pitch. + +Both in Flanders and in Italy Rubens had been brought into close contact +with all the magnificence and splendour which belonged to those gorgeous +times, and he delighted in representing the pomp of worldly state and +everything connected with it. Of all sacred subjects none afforded such +a rich field for display as the _Adoration of the Kings_; he has painted +this subject no less than twelve times, and his fancy appears quite +inexhaustible in the invention of the rich offerings of the eastern +sages. Among the subjects of a secular character the history of Marie +de'Medici, the triumph of the Emperor Charles V., and the Sultan at the +head of his Army, gave him abundant opportunities of portraying Oriental +and European pageantry, with rich arms and regalia, and all the pomp and +circumstance of war. Profusion--pouring forth of abundance, that was one +of Rubens's most salient characteristics. Exuberance, plenty, fatness. + +As a painter of animals, again, Rubens opened out a new field for the +energy of his fellow-countrymen, which was tilled so industriously by +Frans Snyders and Jan Fyt, and in a lesser degree by the Dutchmen Jan +Weenix, father and son, and Hondecoeter. That the naive instincts, +agility, and vivacity of animals must have had a great attraction for +Rubens is easily understood. Those which are remarkable for their +courage, strength, intelligence, swiftness--as lions, tigers, wild +boars, wolves, horses, dogs--particularly interested him. He paid +special attention to animals, seized every opportunity of studying them +from nature, and attained the most wonderful skill and facility in +painting them. It is related that he had a remarkably fine and powerful +lion brought to his house in order to study him in every variety of +attitude, and that on one occasion observing him yawn, he was so pleased +with the action that he wished to paint it. He therefore desired the +keeper to tickle the animal under the chin to make him repeatedly open +his jaws: at length the lion became savage at this treatment, and cast +such furious glances at his keeper, that Rubens attended to his warning +and had the beast removed. The keeper is said to have been torn to +pieces by the lion shortly afterwards: apparently the animal had never +forgotten the affront put upon him. + +By such means--though it is to be hoped not always with such lamentable +results--Rubens succeeded in seizing and portraying the peculiar +character and instinct of animals--their quick movements and +manifestations of strength--with such perfect truth and energy that not +one among the modern painters has approached him in this +respect--certainly not Landseer, as Mrs Jameson would ask us to believe. + +The celebrated _Wolf Hunt_, in the collection of Lord Ashburton, was one +of the earliest, painted in 1612 for the Spanish General Legranes only +three years after Rubens's return from Italy. In this picture, his bold +creative fancy and dramatic turn of mind are remarkably +conspicuous--even at this early stage in his career. Catherine Brant, +his first wife, on a brown horse, with a falcon in her hand, is near her +husband; a second huntsman on horseback, three on foot, another old +wolf and three young ones, with several dogs, complete the composition, +which is most carefully painted in a clear and powerful tone throughout. + +Of scenes of peasant life, one of his earliest, and yet the most famous, +is the _Kermesse_, which is now in the Louvre. A boisterous, merry party +of about seventy persons are assembled in front of a country ale-house; +several are wildly dancing in a circle, others are drinking and +shouting; others, again, are making love. + +_The Garden of Love_, equally famous, was one of Rubens's latest +pictures. Of this there are several versions in existence, of which +those at Dresden and Madrid may be considered as originals. Several +loving couples in familiar conversation are lingering before the +entrance of a grotto, the front of which is ornamented with a rustic +portico. Amongst them we recognise the portraits of Rubens and his +second wife, his pupil Van Dyck, and Simon de Vos. + +As Rubens united to such great and various knowledge the disposition to +communicate it to others in the most friendly and candid manner, it was +natural that young painters of talent who were admitted into his atelier +should soon attain a high degree of skill and cultivation. + +At "the House in the Wood," not far from the Hague, there is a salon +decorated entirely by the pupils of Rubens. The principal picture, which +is one of the largest oil paintings in the world, is by Jacob Jordaens, +and represents the triumph of Prince Frederick Henry--the object of the +whole scheme being the glorification of the House of Orange, in 1649. +Most of the other pictures are of Theodore van Thulden, who in these +works has emulated his illustrious master in the force and brilliance of +his colouring. + +But it is not in any particular salon or palace that we must look for +the effects of Rubens' influence; it was far wider than to be able to be +contained within four walls. In portraiture he gave us Van Dyck; in +historical subjects, Jacob Jordaens; in animal painting and still life, +Frans Snyders, Jan Fyt, and the brothers Weenix. In pictures of everyday +life he gave us Adrian Brouwer and David Teniers; in landscape, +Everdingen, Ruisdael and Waterloo. "Thus was the art of painting in the +Netherlands remodelled in every department," says Waagen in the +concluding sentence of his memoir, "by the energies of a single great +and gifted mind. Thus was Rubens the originator of its second great +epoch, to which we are indebted for such numerous and masterly +performances in every branch of the art." + + + + + +III + +THE PUPILS OF RUBENS + + +DAVID TENIERS the elder, who was born at Antwerp in 1582, received the +first rudiments of his art from Rubens, who soon perceived in him the +happy advances towards excelling in his profession that raised him to +the head of his school. The prejudice in favour of his son, David +Teniers the younger, is so great that the father is generally esteemed +but a middling painter; and his pictures not worth the inquiry of a +collector. His hand is so little distinguished, however, that the +paintings of the father are often taken for those of the son. The father +was certainly the inventor of the manner, which the son, who was his +pupil, only improved with what little was wanting to perfection. + +Rubens was astonished at his early success, and though he followed the +manner of Adrian Brouwer, looked on him as his most deserving pupil by +the brightness of genius that he showed. He soon saved enough money to +undertake the journey to Italy, and when at Rome he established himself +with Adam Elsheimer, who was then in great vogue. In Elsheimer's manner +he soon became a perfect master, without neglecting at the same time the +study of other and greater masters, endeavouring to penetrate into the +deepest mysteries of their practice. An abode of ten years in Italy, and +the influence of Elsheimer combined with that of Rubens, formed him into +what he became. + +When he returned to his own country he employed himself entirely in +painting small pictures filled with figures of people drinking and +merry-making, and numbers of peasants and country women. He displayed so +much taste in these that the demand for them was universal. Even Rubens +thought them an ornament to his collection. + +Teniers drew his own character in his pictures, and in the subjects he +usually expressed everything tends to joy and pleasure. Always employed +in copying after nature whatsoever presented itself, he taught his two +sons, David and Abraham, to follow his example, and accustomed them to +paint nothing but from that infallible model, by which means they both +became excellent painters. These were his only disciples, and he died at +Antwerp in 1649. + +The only distinction between his works and those of his son, David +Teniers the younger, is that in the latter you discover a finer touch, a +fresher brush, a greater choice of attitudes, and a better disposition +of the figures. The father, too, retained something of the tone of +Italy in his colouring, which was stronger than his son's; but his +pictures have less harmony and union--though to tell the truth, when the +father took pains to finish his picture, he very nearly resembled his +son. + +The latter, DAVID TENIERS the younger, was born in 1610. He was +nicknamed the Ape of painting, from his powers of imitation. The +Archduke Leopold William made him a gentleman of his bedchamber, and he +made copies of all his pictures. He came to England to buy several +Italian pictures for Count Fuensaldegna, who on his return heaped +favours upon him. Don John of Austria and the King of Spain set so great +a value upon his pictures that they built a gallery set apart to +preserve them--there are no less than fifty-two in the Prado Gallery +to-day. + +His principal talent was landscape adorned with small figures. He +painted men drinking and smoking, alchemists, corps de garde, +temptations of S. Anthony, and country fairs and merry-makings. His +small pictures are superior to his large ones. His execution displays +the greatest ease; the leafing of his trees is light, his skies are +admirable: his small figures have an exquisite expression and a most +lively touch, and the characters are marked out with the greatest truth. +From the thinness of the colours his works seem to have been finished at +once; they are generally clear in all their parts, and Teniers had the +art, without dark shades, to relieve his lights by other lights, so well +managed as to produce the effect he wanted, an art which few besides +himself have attained. He died at Antwerp in 1694. + +FRANS SNYDERS was born at Antwerp in the year 1587, ten years later, +that is to say, than Rubens. He received his first instruction in the +art of painting from Henry van Balen. His genius at first displayed +itself only in painting fruit. He afterwards attempted animals, in +which kind of study he succeeded so well that he surpassed all that had +ever excelled before him. He stayed for some time in Italy, and the +works he met with there by Castiglione proved a spur to his genius to +attempt outdoing him in painting animals. When he returned to Flanders +he fixed his ordinary abode at Brussels, where he was made painter to +the Archduke and Duchess, and became attached to the house of Spain. +Twenty-two of his pictures are in the Prado Gallery. + +When Snyders required large figures in his compositions both Rubens and +Jordaens took pleasure in assisting him, and Rubens in turn borrowed the +assistance of Snyders to paint the ground of his pictures; thus they +mutually assisted each other in their labours, while Snyders' manly and +vigorous manner was quite able to hold its own even when joined with +that of the great master. + +ANTHONY VAN DYCK was born at Antwerp in 1599, less than three months +before Velasquez at Seville. Both became so famous in their capacity of +Court painters that the rest of their achievement is popularly regarded +as little more than a bye-product. + +In the case of Van Dyck there is the more excuse for the English public, +inasmuch as, like Holbein before him, he was exclusively employed while +in this country in the production of portraits; and as "his works are so +frequent in England," as Horace Walpole observes in the opening sentence +of his memoir in the "Anecdotes of Painting," "that the generality of +our people can scarce avoid thinking him their countryman," it is easy +enough to forget that he only spent the last nine years of his life +here. + +Again, the insatiable craze of the English and American public for +portraits has helped to obscure the extent of Van Dyck's capabilities in +other directions, and while the National Gallery contains not a single +subject-piece from his hand, more and more thousands are continually +spent in the acquisition of more and more portraits. The bewitching +_Cupid and Psyche_ in Queen Mary's closet at Hampton Court, painted a +year before his death, is scarcely known to exist! + +At the same time it would be useless to deny that Van Dyck's principal +claim to his place among the greatest masters rests chiefly upon +portraiture. The point I wish to make is that portrait painting never +yet made a great master, but that none but a great master ever became a +great portrait painter; and so long as we are only permitted to see the +particular achievement of the artist in our public galleries, so long is +it likely that we shall continue to be flooded with mediocre likenesses +of fashionable people by painters whose highest or whose only +achievement they constitute. Anyone can write a "short story" for the +cheaper sort of modern journal; only writers like Hardy, Stevenson, or +Kipling can give us a masterpiece in little. + +It was said that Rubens advised Van Dyck to devote himself to +portraiture out of jealousy: but that is hardly in accordance with what +we know of his generous nature. If the advice was given at all we may be +sure that it was given in a friendly spirit. But there was something in +the temperament of Van Dyck which peculiarly fitted him for the Court, +apart from any question as to his excellence in any particular branch of +his art, and it is evident that the personality of Rubens, and his +connection with the rich and mighty of the earth, influenced him almost +as much as did his art. How much he owed to Rubens, and how much Rubens +owed to him in painting is a matter that is arguable. He had been +several years with Van Balen before he entered the studio of Rubens, +when eighteen years old, not as a pupil but as an assistant. Here he not +only had the practical task of painting Rubens's compositions for him, +in company with numerous others, but had also the advantage of studying +the works of Titian and other of the great Italian masters in Rubens's +famous collection. If the hand of Van Dyck is traceable in some of the +pictures of Rubens at this period, so the spirit of Rubens is very +obvious in those of Van Dyck. The chief thing to be remembered is that +in these early days he was not painting portraits. His earliest works, +in which the influence of Titian is perceptible as well as that of +Rubens, are the _Christ bearing the Cross_, in S. Paul's at Antwerp, +painted in 1618; the _S. Sebastian_ at Munich, and the _Christ Mocked_, +at Berlin. The familiar portrait of _Cornelius van der Geest_ in the +National Gallery, is one of his very earliest, probably before 1620. +Again, on his first visit to Genoa, in 1621, on the advice of Rubens, +his ambition was not to paint portraits, as on his second visit some +years later, but to rival Rubens in the composition of great historical +pieces. It was not until 1627, when he left behind him in Genoa the +superb series of Balbi, Brignole-Sala, Cattaneo, and Lomellini +portraits, and returned to Antwerp to undertake those such as the _Le +Roys_ at Hertford House, or the _Beatrice de Cusance_ at Windsor, that +he had really become a portrait painter. Even then, he was still +determined not to yield to Rubens at Antwerp, and painted, amongst other +subjects, the _Rinaldo and Armida_ for Charles I. It was only at the +solicitation of George Geldorp, a schemer as well as a painter, that he +consented at length, in 1632, to come to England; and it was only the +welcome afforded to him by Charles that induced him to settle here. + +Two considerations of personal vanity may be suggested as actuating +Charles to be specially indulgent to Van Dyck--an indulgence of which +the results posterity should not omit to credit to the sad account of +the martyr--first, that his father had failed to retain the painter in +his service, and second, that Velasquez, who had made a sketch of him on +his mad visit to Madrid in 1623, was then immortalising Philip. +Velasquez being out of the question, why not Van Dyck! An excellent +idea! Especially when instead of dwarfs, buffoons, and idiots, the +English Court contained some exceedingly fine material besides the royal +family for the artist to exercise his talent upon. + +After this, Flanders knew Van Dyck no more, save for a year or two's +sojourn from 1633-1635 when he painted one or two magnificent portraits, +and then returned to England, where he died in 1641. With the death of +Rubens the year before, Flemish painting had suffered another eclipse; +and though Snyders lived till 1657, and Jordaens and the younger Teniers +continued till late in the century, no fresh seedlings appeared, and the +soil again became barren. Rubens and Van Dyck were both too big for the +little garden--their growth overspread Europe. + + + + +_DUTCH SCHOOL_ + + + + +I + +Frans Hals + + +Meantime we must turn our attention to Holland, where FRANS HALS, who +was born only three years later than Rubens, namely in 1580, was the +forerunner of Rembrandt, Van der Helst, Bol, Lely, and a host more of +greater or less painters, who made their country as famous in the +seventeenth century for art as their fathers had made it in the +sixteenth for arms. Without going into the complications of the +political history of the Netherlands at this period, it is important +nevertheless to remember that while the Flemish provinces remained +Catholic under Spain, the northern states, after heroic struggles, +formed themselves into a Republic; so that while it is difficult to draw +a hard and fast line between what was Dutch and what was Flemish in +estimating the influence of one particular painter upon another, there +is no question at all as to vital difference between the conditions +which led to the production of the pictures of the two schools. The +Flemish pictures were for the Church and for the Court, the Dutch for +the house, the Guildhall, or the bourgeoisie. The former were +aristocratic, the latter democratic. Rubens and Van Dyck were +aristocrats, Hals and Rembrandt democrats. Rubens painted altar-pieces, +for the great churches or cathedrals or for the chapels of his patrons. +Rembrandt painted Bible stories for whoever would purchase them. Van +Dyck painted the portraits of kings and nobles. Hals painted the rough +soldiers and sailors, singly, or in the great groups into which they +formed themselves as Guilds. For the first time in the history of +painting, neither Church nor Court were its patrons. + +In any age or under any circumstances Frans Hals would have seemed a +remarkable painter, but to measure his extraordinary genius to its full +height we must try to realise what those times and those circumstances +were. In Florence and Venice, as we have seen, there were great schools +of painting, and in Florence especially, the whole city existed in an +atmosphere of art. There was no escape from it. In Haarlem, where Hals +spent his youth (he was born in Antwerp), there was no such state of +affairs. There were no chapels to be decorated, no courtiers to be +flattered. The country was seething with the effects of war, and the +whole population were ready for it again at a moment's notice. There +were plenty of heroes--every man was one--but not of the romantic sort. +They were all bluff, hardy fellows, who wanted to get on with their +business. Who would have thought that they wanted to have their +portraits painted? And who, accordingly, could have induced them to do +so except a bluff, roystering genius like Hals, who slashed them down on +canvas before they had time to stop him? Once it got wind that Hals was +such a good fellow, and that he dashed off a portrait to the life in as +little time as it took to pass the time of day with him, he had plenty +of business, and from painting single portraits he was commissioned to +glorify the Guilds by depicting their banquets, which he did with +almost as much speed and considerably more fidelity than the limelight +man at a City dinner in these times. His first great group--_The Archers +of S. George_, at Haarlem--has all the appearance of being painted +instantaneously as the banqueters stood around the table before +dispersing. + +When we think of the cultured Rubens, brought up in the atmosphere of +Courts, and studying for years among the finest paintings and painters +in Italy, and compare him with this low, ignorant fellow, who had never +been outside the Netherlands, do we not find his genius still more +amazing? Nowadays we see a portrait by Hals surrounded with the finest +works of the greatest painters in all times and in all lands, and see +how well it stands the comparison. But our admiration must be increased +a hundredfold, when we know that he was without any of the training or +tradition of a great artist, and that it must have been by sheer +character and genius alone that he forced his art upon his commercial, +though heroic public. + +One thing especially it is interesting to notice about the Dutch +portraits of the early Republican period, namely, that they are +obviously inspired by the pleasure of having a living, speaking likeness +rather than by pride and ostentation. Bluff and swaggering as some of +Hals's portraits of men appear to be--notably _The Laughing Cavalier_, +at Hertford House--that is only because the subjects were bluff and +swaggering fellows--swaggering, that is to say, in the consciousness of +their ability and their readiness to defend their country and their +homes again, if need be, against the tyrant. But these swaggerers are +the exception, and the prevailing impression conveyed is that of +honest, if determined, bluffness. They are not posing, these jolly +Dutchmen, they are sitting or standing, for Hals to paint them just as +they would sit or stand to be measured for a suit of clothes. Look at +the heads of the man and the woman in the National Gallery. Could +anything be more natural and unassuming? Look at the _Laughing +Cavalier_, and ask if it is not the man himself, as Hals saw and knew +him, not a faked up hero? Hals caught him in his best clothes, that is +all. He did not put them on to be painted in--he was out on a jaunt. +Look at Hals's women, how pleased they are to be painted, just as they +are. + +Poor Hals, he was a good, honest fellow, though sadly given to drink and +low company. But for sheer genius he has never had an equal. The vast +number of his paintings--many of which now only exist in copies--shows +that with every predilection to ease and comfort, he could not help +painting--it simply welled out of him. It was a natural gift which seems +to have needed no labour and no study. + +It is certain that this fecundity was a very potent factor in the +development of the Dutch School of painting. Had Hals confined his +talent to painting the portraits of the highest in the land, which would +never have been seen by the public at large, it is improbable that such +a business-like community would have produced many painters. But Hals +must have popularised painting much more than we generally suppose. An +example occurs to me in the picture of _The Rommelpot Player_, of which +no less than thirteen versions are enumerated by De Groot, none of which +can claim to be the original. One is at Wilton, another in Sir Frederick +Cook's gallery at Richmond, and a third at Arthingworth Hall in +Northamptonshire. + +[Illustration: PLATE XXV.--FRANS HALS + +PORTRAIT OF A LADY + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +The subject is an old beggar man playing in front of the door of a +cottage on a ridiculous instrument consisting of an earthen pot covered +over like a jampot with a lid of parchment, on which he makes a rude +noise with a stick, to the intense delight of a group of children. A +picture like this, then, it is evident, instead of hanging in solitary +confinement in the house of a great person, was so widely popular that +it was copied on all sides, and must have been seen by thousands of +people. + +Next to Hals, in point of time, was HENDRIK GERRITZ POT, who was born, +probably at Haarlem, in 1585. It is to him rather than to Ostade, who +was a quarter of a century later, that we must trace the origin of +smaller _genre_ pictures of the Dutch School which in later years became +its principal product. Pot's works are neither very important nor very +numerous, but as a portrait painter he is represented in the Louvre by a +portrait of Charles I., which was probably painted when he was in +England in 1631 or thereabouts; while at Hampton Court is a beautiful +little piece by him which is catalogued under the title of _A Startling +Introduction_. This belonged to Charles I., for his cypher is branded on +the back of the panel on which it is painted, and it was sold by the +Commonwealth as "a souldier making a strange posture to a Dutch lady by +Bott." The painter's monogram H.P. appears on the large chimney piece +before which the "soldier" is standing. + +GERARD HONTHORST, born at Utrecht in 1590, can hardly be said to belong +to the Dutch School at all. When he was only twenty he went to Rome, +where his devotion to painting effects of candle-light earned him the +sobriquet of "Gherardo della Notte." In 1628 he was elected Dean of the +Guild of St. Luke at Utrecht, but he was in no sense a national painter, +and neither took nor gave anything in the way of national influence. He +was in England for a few months in 1628, to which chance we are indebted +for the picture of the Duke of Buckingham and his family which is in the +National Portrait Gallery, and another group of the Cavendish family +which is at Chatsworth. Pictures of the nobility, or of celebrities like +Harvey, the discoverer of the circulation of the blood, were more in his +line than those of his republican patriots, and consequently he plays no +part in the development of the school we are now considering. + +BARTHOLOMEW VAN DER HELST, born in Amsterdam, 1613, died there 1670. He +is by far the most renowned of the Dutch portrait-painters of this +period. Although nothing is known as regards the master under whom he +studied, it is probable that if Hals was not actually his teacher, his +works were the models whence Van der Helst formed himself. We see this +in the portrait of Vice-Admiral Kortenaar at Amsterdam, where the +conception of forms, and the unscumbled character of the strokes of the +brush, recall Hals. The same may be observed in two larger pictures with +archers in the Town Hall at Haarlem, where the inartistic arrangement +and monotony of the otherwise warm flesh tones point to the earlier time +of the painter. By about the year 1640 his character was more fully +developed. His arrangement of portrait-pieces with numerous figures +became very artistic and easy, his tone excellent, and his drawing +masterly. This standard of excellence he retained till about 1660. The +following are principal pictures of this period:--A scene from the +Archery Guild of Amsterdam in 1639, including thirty figures. The +celebrated picture inscribed 1648, an Archery Festival commemorating the +Peace of Westphalia, and consisting of a party of twenty-four persons, +at Amsterdam. The chief charm of this work consists in the strong and +truthful individuality of every part, both in form and colour; in the +capital drawing, which is especially conspicuous in the hands; in the +powerful and clear colouring; and finally, in a kind of execution which +observes a happy medium between decision and softness. In 1657 he +executed the picture of the Archery Guild known by the name "het +Doelenstueck" at Amsterdam Gallery. This work represents three of the +overseers of the Guild, with golden prize vases, and a fourth supposed +to be the painter himself. It is almost surpassed by a replica on a +smaller scale executed in the following year, which is now in the +Louvre. At all events, this picture is in better preservation, and +offers one of the most typical examples of portrait-painting that the +Dutch School produced. + + + + +II + +REMBRANDT VAN RYN + + +But the greatest of all the Dutch painters, in some ways the greatest +painter that has ever lived, was REMBRANDT VAN RYN (1606-1669). Beside +him all the rest seem merely commonplace, and their works the product of +this or that demand, according to their different times and +circumstances, executed with more or less skill. For Rembrandt there +seems no place among them all--he must stand somewhere alone; and there +is no standard by which to judge his perfections and imperfections +except the man himself. + +Perhaps the greatest difference between Rembrandt and any other painter +is that he never seems to have tried to please the public, but only +painted to please himself. It is for this reason, no doubt, that he was +never popular with the public, and is never likely to be; but just as +Beethoven is only understandable by the really musical soul, so +Rembrandt's appeal is to those who have the feeling for something in +painting beyond the mere representation of familiar or heroic scenes and +persons on canvas. For the public it is enough that one of his +landscapes should be sold for L100,000, and they all flock to see it; +but put a fine Rembrandt portrait in a shop-window without a name to it, +and there would be little fear of the pavement being blocked. + +This failure of Rembrandt to please the public of his own day brings out +the truth that the practice of painting had up to then subsisted only so +long as it supplied a popular demand; and when we come to consider what +that demand was, we find that it is for nothing else but a pleasing +representation of natural objects, which may or may not embody some +sentimental or historical association, but must first and foremost be a +fair representation of more or less familiar things. + +The oldest story about pictures is that of Zeuxis and the bunch of +grapes, which relates that he painted the fruit so like nature that the +birds came and pecked at the painting--some versions, I believe, adding +that the fruit itself was there but they preferred the painting. Similar +stories with innumerable variations are told of later artists. Rembrandt +himself is said to have been deceived by his pupils who, knowing he was +careful about collecting money in small quantities, however extravagant +he might be in spending it, painted coins on the floor of the studio, +and enjoyed the joke of seeing him stoop to pick them up. We have heard, +too, of flies painted with surprising skill in conspicuous places to +deceive the unwary. But apart from these little pleasantries, one has +only to remember how the earlier writers on painting have expressed +themselves to see how much importance, consciously or unconsciously, was +attached to life-like resemblance to the object painted. Vasari is +constantly using phrases in which he extols the painter for having made +a figure look like the life, as though that were the real thing to be +aimed at. We remember Ben Jonson's lines under Shakespeare's +portrait---- + + "Wherein the graver had a strife + With nature to outdo the life." + +And though Ben Jonson was not a critic, and if he had been there was +little enough art in his time in England for him to criticize, still he +expresses the general feeling of the public for any work of art. + +With the Dutch people this was most certainly the case, and the +popularity of the painters of scenes of everyday life is a proof of it. +That Hals, Brouwer, or Ostade were great painters was not half so +important to them, if indeed they thought of it all, as that they were +capable of turning out pictures which reflected their everyday life like +a mirror. + +So long as Rembrandt painted portraits like those of the Pellicornes and +their offspring--the two pictures at Hertford House--or a plain +straightforward group like Dr Tulp's _Anatomy Lesson_ (though in this he +was already getting away from convention), he was tolerated. And it was +not so much his freedom in living and his extravagant notions of the +pleasures of life that brought about his downfall, as his failure to +realize that when he took the money subscribed for the group of Captain +Banning Cocq's Company, the subscribers expected something else for +their money than a picture (_The Night Watch_) which might be a +masterpiece according to the painter's notions, but was certainly not a +portrait group of the subscribers. + +Here, then, for the first time in the history of painting, we find an +artist definitely at issue with the public. I do not say that this was +the first time that an artist had failed to please the public, but it is +the first occasion on which it was decided that if a painter was to +undertake commissions, he must consider the wishes of the patron, or +starve. It was something new for a painter of Rembrandt's repute to be +told that not he, but the persons who commissioned the work, were to be +the judges of whether or not it was satisfactory. + +The consequences were important. For Rembrandt, instead of taking the +matter as a man of business, devoted the rest of his life to being an +artist, and leaving the business of painting to men like Backer, Helst, +and others, betook himself seriously to developing his art irrespective +of what the public might or might not think of it. As a result, we have +in the later work of Rembrandt something that the world--I mean the +artistic part of it--would be very sorry to do without. Now the meaning +of this is, not that Rembrandt was ill-advised in deserting his patrons, +or in suffering them to desert him, but that for the first time in the +history of painting an artist had the personality--I will not say the +conscious determination--to realize that his art was something quite +apart from the affairs of this world, and that what he could express on +canvas was _not_ merely a representation of natural objects designed to +please his contemporaries, but something more than human, something that +would appeal to humanity for all time. That many before him had felt +that of their art, to a lesser or greater degree, is unquestionable--but +none of them had ever realised it. Duerer, certainly, may be cited as an +exception, especially when contrasted with his phlegmatic and +business-like compatriot Holbein. But then Duerer, a century before, and +in totally different circumstances, was never assured of regular +patronage as was Rembrandt. + +Rembrandt was the son of a miller named Harmann Geritz, who called +himself Van Ryn, from the hamlet on the arm of the Rhine which runs +through Leyden. His mother was the daughter of a baker. He was entered +as a student at the University of Leyden, his parents being comfortably +off; but he showed so little taste for the study of the law, for which +they intended him, that he was allowed to follow his own bent of +painting, in the studio of a now forgotten painter, Jacob van +Swanenburg. Here he studied for about three years, after which he went +to Amsterdam and was for a short time with another painter named +Lastman, who was a clever but superficial imitator of the Italian School +then flourishing in Rome. + +Returning to Leyden, Rembrandt set up his easel and remained there +painting till 1631, when he went to Amsterdam. His works during this +first period are not very well known in this country, but at Windsor and +at Edinburgh are portraits of his mother, which must belong to it. + +The next decade was the happiest and most prosperous in Rembrandt's +career. At Amsterdam he soon found favour with wealthy patrons, and his +happiness and success were completed by his marrying Saskia van +Ulenburgh, the sister of a wealthy connoisseur and art dealer, with whom +Rembrandt had formed an intimate friendship. To this period belong the +numerous portraits of himself and Saskia, alone or together, most of +which are characterized by a barbaric splendour of costume, utterly +different from the profusion of Rubens, but far more intense. Living +among the wealthiest Jews in Amsterdam, he seems to have been strongly +attracted by their orientalism, and while Rubens gloried in natural +abundance of every sort, and painted the bounty of nature in the full +sunlight, Rembrandt chose out the treasures of art, and painted costume +and jewels gleaming out of the darkness. The portraits of himself in a +cap at Hertford House (No. 52), and of the Old Lady in the National +Gallery (No. 775), both painted in 1634, are notable examples of this +period, though they have none of the orientalism to be seen in the +various portraits of Saskia, or in _The Turk_ at Munich. The two double +portraits at Hertford House of Jean Pellicorne and his wife with their +son and daughter respectively, were among the commissions which he +received after he set up at Amsterdam, and are therefore less +interesting as self-revelations. Prosperity is not always the best +condition under which to produce the highest work, and the temperament +of Rembrandt was so peculiar that there is little wonder that the prim +Dutchmen were not entirely captivated by his exuberant sensuality, or +that we ourselves reserve our admiration principally for the more sombre +and mysterious products of his later years after misfortune began to +fall upon him. + +[Illustration: PLATE XXVI.--REMBRANDT + +PORTRAIT OF HENDRICKJE STOFFELS + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +In 1642 the beloved Saskia died, leaving an only child, Titus, whose +features are familiar to us in the portrait at Hertford House. As though +this were not affliction enough, Rembrandt had the mortification of +offending his patrons over the commission to paint Captain Banning +Cocq's Company. From this time onward, as the world and Rembrandt +drifted farther and farther apart, his work becomes more and more +wonderful. + +Dr Muther, in his _History of Painting_, observes that perhaps it is +only possible to understand Rembrandt by interpreting his pictures not +as paintings but as psychological documents. "A picture by Rembrandt in +the Dresden Gallery," he says, "represents _Samson Putting Riddles to +the Philistines_; and Rembrandt's entire activity, a riddle to the +philistines of his time, has remained puzzling to the present day.... As +no other man bore his name, so the artist, too, is something unique, +mocks every historical analysis, and remains what he was, a puzzling, +intangible, Hamlet nature--Rembrandt." The author's theory of the +psychological document is hardly a solution of the admitted puzzle, +though it is interesting to follow him in tracing it out in Rembrandt's +religious pictures, from the _Samson_ already mentioned to his last +dated work, in 1668, the Darmstadt _Crucifixion_. What distinguishes +Rembrandt from all painters up to, and considerably later than his time, +and in particular from those of his own school, is the mental, as +compared with the physical activity that his pictures represent. Perhaps +this is only another way of stating Dr Muther's theory of the +psychological documents, but it enables us to test that theory by +comparing his work with that of others. In technical skill Beruete +claims a far higher place for Velasquez, going so far as to say that +the _Lesson in Anatomy_ is not a lesson in painting. But the difference +between the two is not as great as that in technique, though infinitely +wider in the mental process which led to the production of a picture. A +reproduction of the _Portrait of an Old Pole_, at S. Petersburg, is in +front of me, as it happens, as I am writing; and I see in this no +inferiority in firmness and precision, in truth and vigour, to any +portrait by Velasquez. + +In their technical ability to present the life-like portrait of a real +man, we can place Rembrandt, Velasquez, Hals, and Van Dyck on pretty +much of a level; if we had _Van der Geest_, _Montanes_, the _Old Pole_ +and the _Laughing Cavalier_ all in a row, we should find there was not +much to choose between them for downright realization. But while in the +work of Velasquez we see the working of a fine and sensitive +appreciation of his friend's personality, and the most exquisite +realization of what was before him, in that of Rembrandt we seem to see +less of the Pole and more of Rembrandt himself. It is as though he were +singing softly to himself while he was painting, thinking his own +thoughts: while Velasquez was simply concerned with the appearance and +the thoughts of his model. + +That Rembrandt's pictures are self-revelations, or psychological +documents, is certainly true; and a proof of it is in the extraordinary +number of portraits of himself. The famous Dresden picture of himself +with Saskia on his knee can only be regarded in that light, and that +brings into the category all the numerous pictures of Saskia and of +Hendrike Stoffels, who formed so great a part of his life. If to these +we add, with Dr Muther, his Biblical subjects, we find that there is +not so very much left, and when we turn to the life's work of Rubens, +Titian, Velasquez, or in fact any of the great painters, the difference +is at once apparent. So that in the pictures of Rembrandt we may expect +to find less of what we look for in those of others in the way of +display, but infinitely more of the qualities which, to whatever extent +they exist in other artists, are bound to be sacrificed to display. When +we are asked to a feast, we find the room brilliantly lit, and our host +the centre of an assemblage for whom he has felt it his duty to make a +display consistent with his means and his station. If we were to peep +into his house one night we might find him in a room illumined only with +his reading-lamp, absorbed in his favourite study; but instead of only +exchanging a few conventional phrases with him, and passing on to mingle +with his guests and to enjoy his hospitality, we might sit and talk with +him into the small hours. That is the difference between the success of +Hals with his _Feast of S. George_, and the failure of Rembrandt with +_The Night Watch_. Hals was at the feast, and of it. Rembrandt was +wrapped up in himself, and didn't enter into the spirit of the +company--he was carried away by his own. That is why his pictures are so +dark--not of deliberate technical purpose, like those of the +_Tenebrosi_, but because to him a subject was felt within him rather +than seen as a picture on so many square feet of canvas. When we call up +in our own minds the recollection of some event of more than usually +deep significance in our past, we only see the deathbed, the two +combatants, the face of the beloved, or whatever it may be; the +accessories are nothing, unless our imagination is stronger than the +sentiment evoked, and sets to work to supply them. It is this +characteristic which so sharply distinguishes the work of Rembrandt +from that of his closest imitators. There is a large picture in the +National Gallery, _Christ Blessing the Children_, catalogued as "School +of Rembrandt," in which we see as near an approach to his manner as to +justify the attribution, but that is all. I do not know why it has never +been suggested that this is the work of NICOLAS MAES, who was actually +his pupil, and who was one of the few Dutch artists to paint life-sized +groups, as he is known to have done in his earlier days when still under +the influence of Rembrandt. _The Card Players_, close beside it, has +marked affinities in style, and especially in the very natural +characterization of the faces, which is also apparent in that of the +child in the other picture, and another on the extreme left of the +picture. That it cannot be Rembrandt's is quite evident; the grouping +and the lighting of it proclaim the picture seen on the canvas, and not +felt within the artist's own consciousness. + +The realistic tendency which, as has already been pointed out, was so +characteristic of the whole art of the Netherlands, showed the most +remarkable and original results in the work of an idealist like +Rembrandt. Sandrart, one of the earliest writers on painting, says that +Rembrandt "usually painted things of a simple and not thoughtful +character, but which were pleasing to the eyes, and +picturesque"--_schilderachtig_, as the Netherlanders called it. This +combination of realism and picturesqueness, assisted by his marvellous +technical power, put him far above and apart from all his compeers. In +the absence of any pictures by his masters Van Swanenburg and Pinas, it +is difficult to ascertain what, if anything, he learnt from them. From +Peter Lastman we may be sure he learnt nothing in the way of technique. +Kugler--who in these paragraphs is my principal authority--suggests that +it is highly probable that in this respect he formed himself from the +pictures of Frans Hals, with which he must have been early acquainted in +the neighbouring town of Haarlem. At all events unexampled freedom, +spirit, and breadth of his manner is comparable with that of no other +earlier Dutch master. But all these admirable qualities would offer no +sufficient compensation for the ugly and often vulgar character of his +heads and figures, and for the total subversion of all the traditional +rules of art in costume and accessory, and would fail to account for the +great admiration which his works enjoy, if he had not been possessed, +besides, of an intensely artistic individuality. + +In his earliest pictures his touch is already masterly and free, but +still careful, while the colour of the flesh is warm and clear and the +light full. _Dr Tulp's Anatomy_, painted in 1632, is the most famous of +this period. In _The Night Watch_, at Amsterdam, dated 1642, the light +is already restricted, falling only on isolated objects; the local tone +of the flesh is more golden; the touch more spirited and distinct. +Later, that is to say from about 1654 onwards, the golden flesh tones +become still more intense, passing sometimes into a brown of less +transparency, and accompanied frequently with grey and blackish shadows +and sometimes with rather cool lights. The chief picture of this epoch, +dated 1661, is _The Syndics_, also at Amsterdam, a group of six men. +This, in the depth of the still transparent golden tone, in the +animation of the heads, and in body and breadth of handling, is a true +masterpiece. + +With respect to his treatment of Biblical subjects, two older writers, +Kolloff and Guhl, accord him an honour which, as we shall see, Kugler +gives to Duerer a century earlier, namely that of being the painter of +the true spirit of the Reformed Church. Though it is certain, Kugler +admits, that no other school of painting in Rembrandt's time--neither +that of Rubens, nor that of the Carracci, nor the French nor Spanish +schools--rendered the spiritual import of Biblical subjects with the +purity and depth exhibited by the great Dutch master. Here the kindly +element of deep sentiment combines most happily with his feeling for +composition, as in the _Descent from the Cross_, at Munich, in _The Holy +Family_, in the Louvre, and above all in _The Woman taken in Adultery_, +in the National Gallery. In this last, a touching truthfulness and depth +of feeling, with every other grand quality peculiar to Rembrandt, are +seen in their highest perfection. Of hardly less excellence, also, is +our _Descent from the Cross_. + +Endowed with so many admirable qualities, it follows that Rembrandt was +a portrait painter of the highest order, while his peculiar style of +lighting, his colouring and treatment, distinguish his portraits from +those by all other masters. Even the works of his most successful +pupils, who followed his style in this respect, are far behind him in +energy of conception and execution. The number of his admirable +portraits is so large that it is difficult to know which to mention as +most characteristic. No other artist ever painted his own portrait so +frequently, and some of these may first be mentioned. That in the +Louvre, dated 1633, represents him in youthful years, fresh and full of +hope. It is spiritedly painted in the bright tone of his earlier period. +Another in the same gallery, of the year 1660, painted with +extraordinary breadth and certainty of hand of that later period, shows +a man weighed down with the cares of life, with grey hair and deeply +furrowed forehead. + +[Illustration: PLATE XXVII.--REMBRANDT + +PORTRAIT OF AN OLD LADY + +_National Gallery, London_] + +The one at Hertford House, already mentioned, and two in the National +Gallery, fall between these extremes. Of other portraits we have already +mentioned the two Pellicorne groups in the Wallace Collection; and +another of this earliest period, the very popular _Old Woman_, in the +National Gallery, dated 1634. This is of greater interest as showing, if +anything does, whether it is fair to attribute any of his training to +the influence of Hals. At any rate this picture is a highly important +proof that at the early age of twenty-six, the painter was already in +the full possession of that energy and animation of conception, and of +that decision of the "broad and marrowy touch" which are so +characteristic of him. Of his later period--probably about 1657--a fine +example is _The Jewish Rabbi_, and of his latest the _Old Man_, both in +the National Gallery. + + + + +III + +PAINTERS OF GENRE + + +The painters of _genre_, by the number, quality, and diversity of whose +pictures the Dutch School is specially distinguished, may be roughly +divided into three classes; namely, those who studied the upper, the +middle, and the lower classes respectively. But as Holland was a +republic, and the great stream of its art welled up from the earth and +was not showered upon it from above, it will be found convenient to +reverse the social order in considering them, and begin with the +immediate successors of Frans Hals, whose influence was without doubt a +very considerable factor in the development of Adrian Brouwer and Adrian +and Isaac Ostade. + +ADRIAN BROUWER, now generally classed under the Flemish School, was +born at Oudenarde in 1606. But he went early to Haarlem, and it was not +until about 1630 that he settled at Antwerp, where he died in 1641. He +was a pupil of Frans Hals, and acquired from him not only his spirited +and free touch, but also a similar mode of life. His pictures, which for +the most part represent the lower orders eating and drinking, often in +furious strife, are extraordinary true and life-like in character, and +display a singularly delicate and harmonious colouring, which inclines +to the cool scale, an admirable individuality, and a _sfumato_ of +surface in which he is unrivalled; so that we can well understand the +high esteem in which Rubens held them. Owing to his mode of life, and to +its early close, the number of his works is not large, and they are now +seldom met with. No gallery is so rich in them as Munich, which +possesses nine, six of which are masterpieces. _A Party of Peasants at a +Game of Cards_, affords an example of the brightness and clearness of +those cool tones in which he evidently became the model of Teniers. +_Spanish Soldiers Throwing Dice_, is equally harmonious, in a subdued +brownish tone. _A Surgeon Removing the Plaster from the Arm of a +Peasant_ is not only most masterly and animated in expression, but is a +type of his bright, clear, and golden tone, and is singularly free and +light in touch. _Card-players Fighting_, is in every respect one of his +best pictures. The momentary action in each figure, all of them being +individualized with singular accuracy even as regards the kind of +complexion, is incomparable, the tenderness of the harmony astonishing, +and the execution of extraordinary delicacy. The only example in the +National Gallery is the _Three Boors Drinking_, bequeathed by George +Salting in 1910; and at Hertford House the _Boor Asleep_, though of +this we may without hesitation accept the description in the catalogue, +"our painting is of the highest quality, and in the audacity of its +realism rises almost to grandeur." + +ADRIAN VAN OSTADE, said to have been born at Lubeck, was baptized in +1610 at Haarlem, where he studied under Frans Hals, and he formed a very +good taste in colouring. Nature guided his brush in everything he +undertook; he devoted himself almost entirely to painting peasants and +drunkards, whose gestures and most trifling actions were the subject of +his most serious meditation. The subjects of his little pictures are not +more elevated than those of Brouwer, and considerably less than those of +Teniers--they are nearly always alehouses or kitchens. He is perhaps one +of the Dutch masters who best understood chiaroscuro. His figures are +very lively, and he sometimes put them into the pictures of the best +painters among his countrymen. Nothing can excel his pictures of +stables, in which the light is spread so judiciously that all one could +wish is a lighter touch in his drawing, and a little more height in his +figures. Many of his brother Isaak's pictures are improperly attributed +to him, which, though painted in the same manner, are never of the real +excellence of Adrian's. + +The _Interior with Peasants_ at Hertford House, and _The Alchymist_ at +the National Gallery are a characteristic pair of his pictures, which +were sold in the collection of M. de Jully in 1769 for L164, the former +being purchased by the third Marquess of Hertford and the latter passing +into the Peel Collection. _Buying Fish_, at Hertford House, dated +1669--when the artist was nearly sixty years old, is remarkable for its +breadth of effect and brilliancy of colour. + +JAN STEEN, born at Leyden about the year 1626, died 1679. He first +received instruction under Nicolas Knupler; and afterwards it is said +worked with Jan van Goyen, whose daughter he married. An extraordinary +genius for painting was unfortunately co-existent in Jan Steen with +jovial habits of no moderate kind. The position of tavern-keeper in +which he was placed by his family, gave both the opportunity of +indulging his propensities and also that of depicting the pleasures of +eating and drinking, of song, card-playing and love-making directly from +nature. He must have worked with amazing facility, for in spite of the +time consumed in this mode of life, to which his comparatively early +death may be attributed, the number of his pictures is very great. His +favourite subjects were groups like the _Family Jollification_; the +_Feast of the Bean King_; and that form of diversion illustrating the +proverb, "_So wie die Alten sungen, so pfeifen auch die Jungen_"; fairs, +weddings, etc.; he also treated other scenes, such as the Doctor's +Visit, the Schoolmaster with a generally very unmanageable set of +boys--of which is a charming example at Dublin. The ludicrous ways of +children seem especially to have attracted him; accordingly, he depicts +with great zest the old Dutch custom on St. Nicholas's Day, September +3rd, of rewarding the good, and punishing the naughty child; or shows a +mischievous little urchin teasing the cat, or stealing money from the +pockets of their, alas!--drunken progenitors. + +Jan Steen is the most genial painter of the whole Dutch School. His +humour has made him so popular with the English, that at least +two-thirds of his pictures are in their possession. + +A peculiar cluster of masters, belonging to the Dutch + +[Illustration: PLATE XXVIII.--TERBORCH + +THE CONCERT + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +School, was formed by Gerard Dou. However careful in execution were such +painters as Terburg, Metsu, and Netscher, yet Gerard Dou and his +scholars and imitators surpassed them in the development of that +technical finish with which they rendered the smallest detail with +meticulous exactitude. + +GERARD DOU was born at Leyden on the 7th April 1613, died there 1680. He +entered Rembrandt's school at fifteen years of age, and in three years +had attained the position of an independent artist. He devoted himself +at first to portraiture, and, like his master, made his own face +frequently his subject. Afterwards he treated scenes from the life +chiefly of the middle classes. He took particular pleasure in the +representation of hermits; he also painted scriptural events and +occasionally still life. His lighting is frequently that of lanterns and +candles. Most of his pictures contain only from one to three figures, +and do not exceed about 2 ft. high and 1 ft. 3 in. wide, being often +smaller. His pictures seldom attain even an animated moral import, and +may be said to be limited usually to a certain kindliness of sentiment. +On the other hand, he possessed a trace of his master's feeling for the +picturesque, and for chiaroscuro. Notwithstanding the incalculable +minuteness of his execution, the touch of his brush is free and soft, +and his best pictures look like Nature seen through the camera-obscura. +His works were so highly estimated in his own time, that the President +van Spiring, at the Hague, offered him 1000 florins a year for the right +of pre-emption of his pictures. Considering the time which such finish +required, and the early age at which he died, the number of his +pictures--Smith enumerates about 200--is remarkable. In the Louvre are +the following:--An old woman seated at a window, reading the Bible to +her husband; this is one of the best among the many representations by +Dou of a similar kind, being of warm sunny effect, and marvellous +finish. Also the _Woman with the Dropsy_, which is accounted his +_chef-d'oeuvre_. + +Among the scholars of Gerard Dou, FRANS VAN MIERIS, born at Leyden 1635, +died 1681, takes the first place. In chiaroscuro, and in delicacy of +execution he is not inferior to his master. Although his pictures are +generally very small, yet with their extraordinary minuteness of +execution it is surprising that, in a life extended only to forty-six +years, he should have produced so many. The Munich Gallery has most, +then Dresden, Vienna, Florence, and St. Petersburg. The date, 1656, on a +picture in the Vienna Gallery, _The Doctor_, shows the painter to have +attained the summit of his art at twenty-one years of age. Another dated +1660, in the same gallery, executed for the Archduke Leopold, is one of +his best. The scene is a shop with a young woman showing a gentleman, +who has taken her by the chin, various handkerchiefs and stuffs. In the +Munich Gallery is _A Soldier_, dated 1662, of admirable transparency and +softness. Also _A Lady_ in a yellow satin dress fainting in the presence +of the doctor. In the Hague Gallery is _A Boy Blowing Soap-bubbles_, +dated 1663. This is a charming little picture of great depth of the +brownish tone. Also _The Painter and His Wife_, whose little shock dog +he is teasing; very naive and lively in the heads, and most delicately +treated in a subdued but clear tone. In the Dresden Gallery are Mieris +again and his wife before her portrait. This is one of his most +successful pictures for chiaroscuro, tone, and spirited handling. + +NICOLAS MAES, already mentioned, born at + +[Illustration: PLATE XXIX.--GABRIEL METSU + +THE MUSIC LESSON + +_National Gallery, London_] + +Dordrecht 1632, died 1693, was actually a pupil of Rembrandt. His much +prized and rare _genre_ pictures treat very simple subjects, and consist +seldom of more than two or three figures, generally of women. The +naivete and homeliness of his feeling, with the addition sometimes of a +trait of kindly humour; the admirable lighting, and a touch resembling +Rembrandt in impasto and vigour, render his pictures very attractive. In +the National Gallery, besides _The Card Players_, are _The Cradle_, _The +Dutch Menage_, dated 1655; and _The Idle Servant_: all these are +admirable, and the last-named a _chef-d'oeuvre_. + +PETER DE HOOGH (1629-1677) decidedly belongs to the numerous artistic +posterity of Rembrandt, possibly through Karel Fabritius, and stands +nearer to Vermeer and to Maes, than to any other painter. His biography +can only be gathered from the occasional dates on his pictures, +extending from 1658 to 1670. Although he impresses the eye by the same +effects as Maes, yet he is also very different from him. He has not his +humour, and seldom his kindliness, and his figures, which are either +playing cards, smoking or drinking, or engaged in the transaction of +some household duty,--with faces that say but little--have generally +only the interest of a peaceful or jovial existence. If Maes takes the +lead in warm lighting, Peter de Hoogh may be considered _par excellence_ +the painter of full and clear sunlight. If, again, Maes shows us his +figures almost exclusively in interiors, Peter de Hoogh places them most +frequently in the open air--in courtyards. In the representation of the +poetry of light, and in that marvellous brilliancy and clearness with +which he calls it forth in various distances till the background is +reached, which is generally illumined by a fresh beam, no other master +can compare with him. His prevailing local colour is red, repeated with +greater delicacy in various planes of distance. This colour fixes the +rest of the scale. His touch is of great delicacy; his impasto +admirable. + +GERARD TERBURG, born at Zwol 1608, died 1681, learned painting under his +father, and when still young visited Germany and Italy, painting +numerous portraits on a small scale, and occasionally the size of life. +But his place in the history of art is owing principally to a number of +pictures, seldom representing more than three, and often only one +figure, taken from the wealthier classes, in which great elegance of +costume, and of all accompanying circumstances, is rendered with the +finest keeping, and with a highly delicate but by no means over-smooth +execution. He may be considered as the originator of this class of +pictures, in which, after his example, several other Dutch painters +distinguished themselves. With him the chief mass of light is generally +formed by the white satin dress of a lady, which gives the tone for the +prevailing cool harmony of the picture. Among his pictures we +occasionally find some which, taken successively, represent several +different moments of one scene. Thus in the Dresden Gallery, there are +two good pictures: the one of an officer writing a letter, while a +trumpter waits for it; the other of a girl in white satin washing her +hands in a basin held before her by a maid-servant; while at Munich, is +another fine work, in which the trumpeter is offering the young lady the +letter, who owing to the presence of the maid, who evidently +disapproves, is uncertain whether to take the missive. Finally, in the +Amsterdam Gallery, the celebrated picture known by the title of _Conseil +paternel_, furnishes + +[Illustration: PLATE XXX.--PIETER DE HOOCH + +INTERIOR OF A DUTCH HOUSE + +_National Gallery, London_] + +the closing scene. The maid has betrayed the affair to the father, and +he is delivering a lecture to the young lady, in whom by turning her +back on the spectator, the painter has happily expressed the feeling of +shame; good repetitions are in the Berlin Museum, and in the Bridgewater +Gallery. But Terburg's perfection as regards the clearness and harmony +of his silvery tone is shown in a picture at Cassel, representing a +young lady in white satin sitting playing the lute at a table. + +JAN VERMEER OF DELFT (1632-1675) was certainly a pupil of Fabritius, and +thus "grandson" of Rembrandt. To class him with painters of _genre_ +seems almost a profanation of the exquisite sense of beauty with which, +almost alone among the Dutch painters, he seems to have been endowed. It +is like classing Walter Pater with art critics. But as Vermeer had to +express himself in some form, it is perhaps fortunate that the school +had developed this kind of poetic portraiture, under Terburg, Metsu and +others, to a point where a genius like Vermeer could use it as the +vehicle of his fascinating self-revelations. In landscape we have the +_View of Delft_, at the Hague, which has shown the nineteenth century +painters more than they could ever see in their more famous +predecessors; but it is in the simple compositions like _The Letter +Reader_ at Amsterdam, _The Proposal_, at Dresden, or the _Lady at the +Virginals_, in the National Gallery, that he displays his greatest power +and charm. + + + + +IV + +PAINTERS OF ANIMALS + + +As a link between the painters of _genre_ and the landscapists, we may +here mention some of the numerous artists who either made landscape the +background for groups of figures and animals, or peopled their +landscapes with groups--it matters not which way we put it. Among these +we shall find several of the most famous, or at any rate the most +popular artists of the Dutch School. + +PHILIPS WOUVERMAN (1619-1668), whose reputation during the last century +was greater than that of almost any of the Dutch painters except +Rembrandt and Dou, is said to have studied under Hals, but it is more +certain that the master from whom he learnt most, if not all, was Jan +Wynants at Haarlem, whose whole manner in landscape he quickly succeeded +in acquiring, and surpassed him in his facility with horsemen and other +figures. + +Wouverman's works have all the excellences that may be expected from +high finishing, correctness, agreeable composition and colouring. It +does not appear that he was ever in Italy, or even quitted the city of +Haarlem, though it would seem probable that his more elaborate +compositions owed something to other influences than those of Hals or +Wynants. In his earlier pictures there are no horses, but later in his +career he generally subordinated his landscapes to the groups or +subjects for which he is most famous. In the National Gallery, among +eleven examples, are a _Halt of Officers_, _Interior of a Stable_, _A +Battle_, _The Bohemians_, and _Shoeing a Horse_, all of which contain +numerous figures, mounted and unmounted--and there is nearly always a +white horse. + +With all his success, he died a poor man, and it is related that in his +last hours he burned a box filled with his studies and drawings, saying, +"I have been so ill repaid for all my labours, that I would not have + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXI.--JAN VERMEER + +THE LACE MAKER + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +those designs engage my son to embrace so miserable a profession as +mine." This son followed his advice, and became a Chartreux friar. Peter +and Jan Wouverman were his brothers. The former painted hawking scenes, +and his horses, though well designed, were not equal to those of +Philips. The latter is represented in the National Gallery by a +landscape in which the spirit of Wynant's, rather than that of +Philips's, is discernible. + +At Hertford House, out of seven examples, two are of more than usual +excellence, and well represent his earlier and later manners. _The +Afternoon Landscape with a White Horse_ (No. 226 in Room XIII), which +Smith (in his Catalogue Raisonne), characterizes as possessing unusual +freedom of pencilling, and powerful effect, dates from the transition +from the early to the middle period, and is a very effective picture, as +well as being very characteristic. The _Horse Fair_ (No. 65, in Room +XVI), is not only much larger than the other--it measures 25 x 35 +inches--but is a really important picture. Lord Hertford paid L3200 for +it in 1854. It was engraved by Moyrean, for his series of a hundred +prints after Wouverman, under the title of _Le Grand Marche aux +Chevaux_. It is thus described by Smith:--"This very capital picture +exhibits an open country divided in the middle distance by a river whose +course is lost among the distant mountains. The principal scene of +activity is represented along the front and second grounds, on which may +be numbered about twenty-four horses, exhibiting that noble animal in +every variety of action, and nearly fifty persons. On the right of the +picture is a coach, drawn by four fine grey horses, and in front of this +object are a grey and a bay horse, on the latter of which are mounted a +man and a boy. In advance of them is a group of four horses and several +persons, among whom may be noticed a cavalier and a lady observing the +paces of a horse which a jockey and his master are showing off. A +gentleman on a black horse seems also to be watching the action of the +animal. Near this person is a mare lying down, and a foal standing by it +which a boy is approaching. On the opposite side of the picture is a +gentleman on a cream-coloured horse, near two spirited greys, one of +which is kicking, and a woman, a man and a boy are escaping from its +heels. From thence the eye looks over an open space occupied by men and +horses, receding in succession to the bank of the river, along which are +houses and tents concealed in part by trees. This picture is painted +throughout with great care and delicacy in what is termed the last +manner of the master, remarkable for the prevalent grey or silvery hues +of colouring." + +ALBERT CUYP, born at Dortrecht 1620, died there about 1672. Of the life +of this great painter little more is known with any certainty than that +he was the scholar of his father, Jacob Gerritsz Cuyp. Cattle form a +prominent feature in many of his works, though never so highly finished +as in those of Paul Potter or Adrian van de Velde; indeed, in many of +Cuyp's pictures, they are quite subordinate. His favourite subjects, a +landscape with a river, with cattle lying or standing on its banks, and +landscapes with horsemen in the foreground, were suggested to him no +doubt by the country about Dortrecht and the river Maas: but he also +painted winter landscapes, and especially views of rivers where the +broad extent of water is animated by vessels. Sometimes, too, with great +perfection, fowls as large as life, hens, ducks, etc., and still life. +He also painted portraits, though less successfully. However great the +skill displayed in the composition of his works, their principal charm +lies in the beauty and truthfulness of their peculiar lighting. No other +painter, with the exception of Claude, has so well understood the cool +freshness of morning, the bright but misty light of a hot noon, or the +warm glow of a clear sunset. The effect of his pictures is further +enhanced by the skill with which he avails himself of the aid of +contrasts; as for example, dark, rich colours of the reposing cattle as +seen against the bright sky. In his own country no picture of his, till +the year 1750, ever sold for more than thirty florins. Indeed, Kugler +was informed by a Dutch friend, that in past times, when a picture found +no bidder, the auctioneer would offer to throw in "a little Cuyp" in +order to induce a sale. The merit of having first given him his due rank +belongs to the English, who as early as 1785, gave at the sale of Linden +van Slingelandt's collection at Dortrecht high prices for Cuyp's works; +About nine-tenths of his pictures are consequently to be found in +England. + +One of his finest works is the landscape, in bright, warm, morning +light, with two cows reposing in the foreground, and a woman conversing +with a horseman, in the National Gallery (No. 53). The whole picture +breathes a cheerful and rural tranquillity. In his mature time, these +admirable qualities are seen in higher development. In the Louvre (No. +104), is another fine example--a scene with six cows, a shepherd blowing +the horn, and two children listening to him. This is admirably arranged, +of greater truthfulness as regards the form and colouring of the cattle +than usual, and with the warm lighting of the sky executed with equal +decision and softness. This picture is one of the master's chief +productions, being also about 4 ft. high by 6 ft. wide. Another with +three horsemen, and a servant carrying partridges, and in the centre a +meadow with cattle, is also in the Louvre. This is less attractive in +subject, but ranks equally high as a work of art. In Buckingham Palace +are two pictures, one with three cows reposing, and one standing by a +clear stream, near them a herdsman and a woman; other cows are in water +near the ruins of a castle. In this picture, we see Cuyp in every +respect at his culminating point of excellence. Not less fine, and of +singular force of colour, is the landscape, with a broad river running +through it, and a horseman under a tree in conversation with a +countryman. + +PAUL POTTER, born at Enckhuysen 1625, died at Amsterdam 1654. Although +the scholar of his father, Pieter Potter, who was but a mediocre +painter, he made such astonishing progress as to rank at the age of 15 +as a finished artist. He removed very early to the Hague, where his +talents met with universal recognition, including that of Prince Maurice +of Orange, and where he married. In the year 1652, however, he removed +to Amsterdam at the instance of one of his chief patrons, the +Burgomaster Tulp. Of the masters who have striven pre-eminently after +truth he is, beyond all question, one of the greatest that ever lived. +In order to succeed in this aim, he acquired a correctness of drawing, a +kind of modelling which imparts an almost plastic effect to his animals, +an extraordinary execution of detail in the most solid impasto, and a +truth of colouring which harmonises astonishingly with the time of day. +In his landscapes, which generally consist of a few willows in the +foreground, and of a wide view over meadows, the most delicate +graduation of aerial perspective is seen. With few exceptions, his +animals are small, and his pictures proportionately moderate in size. By +the year 1647 he had attained his full perfection. Of this date is the +celebrated group called _The Young Bull_, in the Hague Gallery. All the +figures in this are as large as life, and so extraordinarily true to +nature as not only to appear real at a certain distance, but even to +keep up the illusion when seen near. + +A picture dated 1649, now in Buckingham Palace, of two cows and a young +bull in a pasture, combines with his customary fidelity to nature a more +than common power of effect, and breadth and freedom of treatment. To +the same year belongs also The _Farmyard_, formerly in the Cassel +Gallery, now in that of S. Petersburg, which, according to Smith, fully +deserves its celebrity both for the clearness and warmth of the sunset +effect, as well as for its masterly execution. To 1650 belongs the +picture of _Orpheus_, charming the animal world by the strains of his +lyre, in the Amsterdam Museum. Here we see that the master had also +studied wild animals. He is most successful in the bear. In the same +gallery is another _chef-d'oeuvre_ of the same year--a hilly landscape +with a shepherdess singing to her child, a shepherd playing on the +bagpipe, and oxen, sheep, and goats around. + +The names of Weenix and Hondecoeter are so inseparably associated in the +popular mind as painters of birds, whose respective works are not +readily distinguishable moreover by the casual observer, that a short +excursion into their family histories is advisable, for the purpose of +showing how it was that this particular branch of the art was so +successfully practised by the two. Moreover, as there were three +Hondecoeters and two Weenixes who were painters, it is necessary to say +something about each of them. + +MELCHIOR HONDECOETER, the best known, was of an ancient and noble +family. He was instructed till the age of seventeen by his father +Gysbert, who was a tolerable painter. Giles Hondecoeter, his +grandfather, painted live birds admirably, but chiefly cocks and hens in +the taste of Savery and Vincaboom. Melchior was born in 1636, and +studied for a time with his father; but meantime his aunt Josina had +married Jan Baptist Weenix, and a son was born to them, Jan Weenix, who +inherited from old Giles Hondecoeter, his grandfather, his talent for +painting poultry, and from his father, Jan Baptist Weenix, he acquired +the benefit of several influences which were not shared by his cousin +Melchior. + +JAN BAPTIST WEENIX, who was nicknamed "Rattle," was born at Amsterdam +about 1621. His father was an architect, who bred his son up to that +profession, but he was afterwards put to study painting under Abraham +Bloemart. Soon after his marriage with Josina he was seized with the +desire to visit Italy, and he set off alone to Rome, promising to return +in four months. In Rome, however, he was so well received that he stayed +there four years, and Italianized himself to an extent that may be seen +in a picture in the Wallace Collection, a _Coast Scene with Classic +Ruins_, which he signs _Gio. Batta. Weenix_. Though he returned to +Holland and settled near Utrecht, his manner was sensibly modified by +his sojourn in Rome. + +JAN WEENIX, who was born at Amsterdam in 1649, though he succeeded in so +far assimilating his father's style that his earlier works are often +confused with those of "Giovanni Battista," did not acquire the energy +or the dramatic force displayed by Melchior Hondecoeter in representing +live birds and animals, though he sometimes surpassed him in the finish +and the harmony of his decorative arrangements of dead game and still +life. Accordingly the one usually painted dead and the latter live +birds. In other respects there is not much to distinguish their works. + +NICHOLAS BERCHEM was the only other pupil of Jan Baptist Weenix of whom +we know anything. Berchem had other masters, beginning with his father, +who was a painter of fish and tables covered with plates, china dishes, +and such like. Having given his son the first rudiments of his art he +found himself unequal to the task of cultivating the excellent +disposition he observed in him, and therefore placed him with Van Goyen, +Nicholas Moyaert, Peter Grebber, Jan Wils, and lastly with Jan Baptist +Weenix, all of whom had the honour of assisting to form so excellent a +painter. Indefatigable at his easel, Berchem acquired a manner both easy +and expeditious; to see him work, painting appeared a mere diversion to +him. + +His wife was the daughter of his instructor, Jan Wils, and was so +avaricious that she allowed him no rest. Busy as he was by nature, she +used to sit under his studio, and when she neither heard him sing nor +stir, she struck upon the ceiling to rouse him. She got from him all the +money he earned by his labour, so that he was obliged to borrow from his +scholars when he wanted money to buy prints that were offered him, which +was the only pleasure he had. _The Musical Shepherdess_ at Hertford +House is a good example of his style, and the description of it in +Smith's catalogue shows in what estimation the artist was held in early +Victorian days:--"This beautiful pastoral scene represents a bold rocky +coast under the appearance of the close of day. The rustics have ended +their labours and are recreating with music and dancing. A group +composed of two peasants and a like number of women occupies the +foreground; one of the latter, attired in a blue mantle, is gaily +striking a tambourine, and dancing to the music; her companion in a +yellow dress sits near her; the shepherds also are seated, and one of +them appears to have just ceased playing a pipe which he holds. The +goats are browsing near them. Painted in the artist's most fascinating +style." + +That Berchem had been to Italy is pretty certain, and though no +authentic account of his visit is recorded, there is a story that when +Jacob Ruisdael went to Rome as a young man, Nicholas Berchem was the +first acquaintance he met, and that their friendship was of long +standing. Their frequent walks round about Rome gave them the +opportunity of working together from Nature, and one day a cardinal +seeing them at work, inquired what they were doing. His eminence was +agreeably impressed with their drawings, and invited them to visit him +in Rome. The painters returned to their work, where they met with a +second _rencontre_ of a very different nature; a gang of thieves robbed +and stripped them of their clothes. They returned in their shirts to the +city, and called on the cardinal, who took pity upon them, ordered them +clothes, and afterwards employed them in several considerable works in +his palace. + +Berchem at one time took up his abode in the Castle of Bentheim, and as +both he and Ruisdael have left several pictures of this castle it may be +inferred that they worked there together, as at Rome. + +Apart from personal friendship there is nothing to connect Berchem with +Ruisdael, the popularity of the former being derived from qualities of a +totally different nature from those which raise Ruisdael far above any +of his contemporaries as a landscape painter. + +JAN VAN HUYSUM was born at Amsterdam in 1682. His father, Justus Van +Huysum, who dealt in pictures, was himself a middling painter in most +kinds of painting. He taught his son to paint screens, figures and vases +on wood, landscape, and sometimes flowers; but the son being arrived at +a reasoning age perceived that to work in every branch of his art was +the way to excel in none, therefore he confined himself to flowers, +fruit, and landscape, and quitting his father's school set up for +himself. + +No one before Van Huysum attained so perfect a manner of representing +the beauty of flowers and the down and bloom of fruit; for he painted +with greater freedom than Velvet Breughel and Mignon, with more +tenderness and nature than Mario di Fiori, Andrea Belvedere, Michel de +Campidoglio or Daniel Seghers; with more mellowness than de Heem, and +with more vigour of colouring than Baptist Monoyer. + +His pictures of flowers and fruit pleasing an English gentleman, he +introduced them into his own country, where they came into vogue and +yielded a high price. To express the motions of the smallest insects +with justice he used to contemplate them through the microscope with +great attention. At the times of the year when the flowers were in +bloom, and the fruit in perfection, he used to design them in his own +garden, and the Sieur Gulet and Voorhelm sent him the most beautiful +productions in those kinds they could pick up. + +His reputation rose to such a height that all the curious in painting +sought his works with great eagerness, which encouraged him to raise his +prices so high that his pictures at last grew out of the reach of any +but princes and men of the greatest fortune. He was the first flower +painter that ever thought of laying them on light grounds, which +requires much greater art than to paint them on dark ones. + +Van Huysum died at Amsterdam in 1749. He never had any pupil but a young +woman named Haverman, and his brother Michael. Two other brothers have +distinguished themselves in painting, one named Justus, who painted +battles, and died at twenty-two years old, the other named James, who +ended his days in England in 1740. He copied the pictures of his brother +John so well as to deceive the connoisseurs: he had usually L20 for each +copy. For the originals, it may be noted, from a thousand to fourteen +hundred florins was paid. + + + + +V + +PAINTERS OF LANDSCAPE + + +Coming now to the landscape painters we find that JAN VAN GOYEN, born at +Leyden in 1596, was destined to exert a really powerful influence, +inasmuch as he was the founder, as is generally acknowledged, of the +Dutch school of homely native landscape. Beginning with figure subjects, +he discovered in their landscape backgrounds his real _metier_, and +seems only to have realized his great gifts when he looked further into +nature than was possible when painting a foreground picture. He appears +to have been by nature or by inclination long-sighted, and he is never +so happy as when painting distance, either along the banks of a river or +looking out to sea. This extended gaze taught him something of +atmosphere that few painters beside himself ever acquired, and helped +him to the mastery of tone which appears to have influenced so many of +his followers, as for example Van de Velde in the painting of +sea-pieces. + +JAN WYNANTS, born at Haarlem about 1620, and still living in 1677, was +the first master who applied all the developed qualities of the Dutch +School to the treatment of landscape painting. In general his prevailing +tone is clear and bright, more especially in the green of his trees and +plants, which in many cases, merges into blue. One of his +characteristics is a fallen tree trunk in the foreground, as may be seen +in three out of the six examples in the National Gallery. The +carefulness of his execution explains how it was that in so long a life +he only produced a moderate number of pictures. Smith's catalogue +contains about 214. These differ much according to their different +periods. In his first manner peasants' cottages or ruins play an +important part, and the view is more or less shut in by trees of a heavy +dark green, the execution solid and careful. In his middle time he +generally paints open views of a rather uneven country, diversified by +wood and water. That Wynants retained his full skill even in advanced +life is proved by a picture dated 1672, in the Munich Gallery, +representing a road leading to a fenced wood and a sandhill, near which +in the foreground are some cows (by Lingelbach) being driven along. In +his last manner a heavy uniformly brown tone is often observable. + +It is his genuine feeling for nature that makes Wynant's pictures so +popular in England, where we meet with a considerable number of his best +works. + +JACOB RUISDAEL (born at Haarlem 1628, died there 1682) is supposed to +have developed under the influence of a school there that was opposing +Van Goyen's tone treatment by local colour. Though not always the most +charming, Ruisdael is certainly the greatest and the most profound of +the Dutch landscape painters. His wide expanses of sky, earth or sea, +with their tender gradations of aerial perspective, diversified here and +there by alternations of sunshine and shadow, attract us as much by the +pathos as by the picturesqueness of their character. His scenes of +mountainous districts with foaming waterfalls; or bare piles of rock and +sombre lakes are imbued with a feeling of melancholy. Ruisdael's work +may be well studied in the six examples at Hertford House, and the +fourteen in the National Gallery. Among his finer works in Continental +collections the following are some of those selected by Kugler for +description. At the Hague is one of his wide expanses--a view of the +country around Haarlem, the town itself looking small on the horizon, +under a lofty expanse of cloudy sky in the foreground a bleaching-ground +and some houses reminding us, by the manner in which they are +introduced, of Hobbema. The prevailing tone is cool, the sky singularly +beautiful, and the execution wonderfully delicate. A flat country with a +road leading to a village, and fields with wheatsheaves, is in the +Dresden Gallery. This is temperate in colouring and beautifully lighted. +Equally fine is an extensive view over a hilly but bare country, through +which a river runs; in the Louvre. The horseman and beggar on a bridge +are by Wouvermans: here the grey-greenish harmony of the tone is in fine +accordance with the poetic grandeur of the subject. A hill covered with +oak woods, with a peasant hastening to a hut to escape the gathering +shower, is in the Munich Gallery. The golden warmth of the trees and +ground, and the contrast between the deep clear chiaroscuro and soft +rain-clouds, and the bright gleam of sunshine, render this picture one +of the finest by this master. + +The peculiar charm which is seen in Holland by the combination of lofty +trees and calm water is fully represented in the following works:--_The +Chase_; in the Dresden Gallery. Here in the still water in the +foreground--through which a stag-hunt (by Adrian van de Velde) is +passing--clouds, warm with morning sunlight, appear reflected. In this +picture, remarkable as it is for size, being 3 ft. 10-1/2 in. high, by 5 +ft. 2 in. wide, the sense even of the fresh morning is not without a +tinge of gentle melancholy. A noble wood of oaks, beeches and elms, +about the size of the last-mentioned picture, is in the Louvre. In the +centre, through an opening in the woods, are seen distant hills. The +cattle and figures upon a flooded road are by Berchem. In power, warmth, +and treatment, this is also nearly allied to the preceding work. Of his +waterfalls, the most remarkable are--A picture at the Hague, which is +particularly striking for its warm lighting, and careful execution. +Another with Bentheim Castle, so often repeated by Ruisdael, is at +Amsterdam. In the same collection is a landscape, with rocks, woods, and +a larger waterfall. This has a grandly poetic character which, with the +broad and solid handling, plainly shows the influence of Everdingen. The +same remark may be applied to the waterfall, No. 328, in the Munich +Gallery. Here the dark, rainy sky, enhances the sublime impression made +by the foaming torrent that rushes down the rocky masses. Another work +worthy to rank with the fore-going is _The Jewish Cemetry_, in the +Dresden Gallery: a pallid sunbeam lights up some of the tombstones, +between which a torrent impetuously flows. + +The _Landscape with Waterfall_ at Hertford House is a good example; the +_Landscape with a Farm_ in the same collection is another, though in +this the figures and cattle are by Adrian Van der Velde. Ostade and +Wouverman are also said to have helped him with his figures, and it is +possible that one or other of them ought to have some of the credit for +the beautiful _View on the Shore at Scheveningen_ in the National +Gallery (No. 1390). The _Landscape with Ruins_ (No. 746) is perhaps the +finest of the others there. + +WILLEM VAN DE VELDE, the younger, born at Amsterdam 1633, died at +Greenwich 1707. His first master was his father, Willem van de Velde the +elder, but his principal instructor was Simon de Vlieger. The earlier +part of his professional life was spent in Holland, where, besides +numerous pictures of the various aspects of marine scenery, he painted +several well-known sea-fights in which the Dutch had obtained the +victory over the English. He afterwards followed his father to England, +where he was greatly patronized by Charles II. and James II. for whom, +in turn, he painted the naval victories of the English over the Dutch. +He was also much employed by amateurs of art among the English nobility +and gentry. There is no question that Willem van de Velde the younger is +the greatest marine painter of the whole Dutch School. His perfect +knowledge of lineal and aerial perspective, and the incomparable +technique which he inherited from his school, enabled him to represent +the sea and the sky with the utmost truth of form, atmosphere and +colour, and to enliven the scene with the purest feeling for the +picturesque, with the most natural incidents of sea-faring life. + +Two of his pictures at Amsterdam are particularly remarkable; +representing the English flagship _The Prince Royal_ striking her +colours in the fight with the Dutch fleet of 1666; and its companion, +four English men-of-war brought in as prizes at the same fight. Here the +painter has represented himself in a small boat, from which he actually +witnessed the battle. This accounts for the extraordinary truth with +which every particular of the scene is rendered in such small pictures, +which, combined with their delicate greyish tone, and the mastery of the +execution, render them two of his finest works. A view of the city of +Amsterdam, dated 1686, taken from the river, is an especially good +specimen of his large pictures. It is about 5 ft. high by 10 ft. wide. +The vessels in the river are arranged with great feeling for the +picturesque, and the treatment of details is admirable. His greatest +successes, however, are in the representation of calm seas, as may be +seen in a small picture at Munich. In the centre of the middle distance +is a frigate, and in the foreground smaller vessels. The fine silvery +tone in which the whole is kept finds a sufficient counter-balance of +colour in the yellowish sun-lit clouds, and in the brownish vessels and +their sails. Nothing can be more exquisite than the tender reflections +of these in the water. Of almost similar beauty is a picture of about +the same size, with four vessels, in the Cassel Gallery, which is signed +and dated 1653. As a contrast to this class of works, may be mentioned +_The Gathering Tempest_, in the Munich Gallery. This is brilliantly +lighted, and of great delicacy of tone in the distance, though the +foreground has somewhat darkened. + +MEINDERT HOBBEMA (1638-1709) was a friend as well as a pupil of Jacob +Ruisdael. The fact that such distinguished painters as Adrian van de +Velde, Wouvermans, Berchem, and Lingelbach, executed the figures and +animals in his pictures proves the esteem in which he was held by his +contemporaries; nevertheless it is evident that the public was slow in +conceding to him the rank which he deserved, for his name is not found +for more than a century after his death in any even of the most +elaborate dictionaries of art, while the catalogues of the most +important picture sales in Holland make no mention of him at all up to +the year 1739; when a picture by him, although much extolled, was sold +for only 71 florins, and even in 1768 one of his masterpieces only +fetched 300 florins. The English were the first to discover his merits. + +The peculiar characteristics of this master, who next to Ruisdael, is +confessedly at the head of landscape painters of the Dutch School, will +be best appreciated by comparing him with his rival. In two most +important qualities--fertility of inventive genius, and poetry of +feeling--he is decidedly inferior: the range of his subjects being far +narrower. His most frequent scenes are villages surrounded by trees, +such as are frequently met with in the districts of Guelderland, with +winding pathways leading from house to house. A water-mill occasionally +forms a prominent feature. Often, too, he represents a slightly uneven +country, diversified by groups or rows of trees, wheat-fields, meadows, +and small pools. Occasionally he gives us a view of part of a town, with +its gates, canals with sluices, and quays with houses; more rarely, the +ruins of an old castle, with an extensive view of a flat country, or +some stately residence. In the composition of all these pictures, +however, we do not find that elevated and picturesque taste which +characterises Ruisdael; on the contrary they have a thoroughly +portrait-like appearance, decidedly prosaic, but always surprizingly +truthful. The greater number of Hobbema's pictures are as much +characterized by a warm and golden tone as those of Ruisdael by the +reverse; his greens being yellowish in the lights and brownish in the +shadows--both of singular transparency. In pictures of this kind the +influence of Rembrandt is perhaps perceptible, and they are superior in +brilliancy to any work by Ruisdael. While these works chiefly present us +with the season of harvest and sunset-light, there are others in a cool, +silvery, morning lighting, and with the bright green of spring, that +surpass Ruisdael's in clearness. His woods also, owing to the various +lights that fall on them, are of greater transparency. + +As almost all the galleries on the Continent were formed at a period +when the works of Hobbema were little prized (Ticcozzi's _Dictionary_, +in 1818, does not include his name), they either possess no specimens, +or some of an inferior class, so that no adequate idea can be formed of +him. The most characteristic example to be met with on the Continent is +a landscape in the Berlin Museum, No. 886, an oak wood, with scattered +lights, a calm piece of water in the foreground, and a sun-lit village +in the distance. Of the eight pictures in the National Gallery from his +hand, most are good, and one world-famous--_The Avenue, Middelharnis_, +which may be called his masterpiece. This was painted in 1689, when he +had reached the age of fifty. His diploma picture, painted in 1663, is +at Hertford House, together with four other interesting examples, all of +which repay careful study. + + + + +GERMAN SCHOOLS + + +The origins of the German Schools of painting are obscure, but it is +fairly certain that Cologne was the first place in which the art was +soonest established to any considerable extent. Here, as in the +Netherlands, we cannot find any traces of immediate Italian influences. +The first painter who can be identified with any certainty is WILHELM +VON HERLE, called MEISTER WILHELM, whose activity is not traceable +earlier than about 1358. Most of the pictures formerly attributed to him +have, however, been assigned to his pupil HERMANN WYNRICH VON WESEL, who +on the death of his master in 1378 married his widow and continued his +practice, until his death somewhere about 1414. His most important works +were six panels of the High Altar of the Cathedral, the so-called +_Madonna of the Pea Blossoms_ and two _Crucifixions_ at Cologne, and the +_S. Veronica_ at Munich, dated 1410. + +More important was STEPHEN LOCHNER, who died at Cologne in 1451. His +influence was widespread and his school apparently numerous, until, in +1450, Roger van der Weyden, returning from Italy, stopped at Cologne and +painted his large triptych, which eclipsed Lochner. From this time +onwards the school of Cologne is represented by painters whose names are +not known, and who are accordingly distinguished by the subjects of +their works; such as _The Master of the Glorification of the Virgin_, +_The Master of S. Bartholomew_, etc., until we come to Bartel Bruyn +(_c._ 1493-1553), a portrait painter who is represented at Berlin, and +by a picture of Dr Fuchsius bequeathed to the National Gallery by George +Salting. + +In other parts of Germany, particularly in Nuremberg, Ulm, Augsburg, and +Basle, various names of painters of the latter half of the fourteenth +century have survived, but their works are of little interest except to +the connoisseur as showing the influence under which the two great +artists of the sixteenth century, Albert Duerer and Hans Holbein, and one +or two lesser lights like Lucas Cranach, Albert Altdorfer, and Adam +Elsheimer, were formed. + +In Germany the taste for the fantastic in art peculiar to the Middle +Ages, though it engendered clever and spirited works such as those of +Quentin Massys and Lucas van Leyden, was still unfavourable to the +cultivation of pure beauty, scenes from the Apocalypse, Dances of Death, +etc., being among the favourite subjects for art. On the other hand, the +pictorial treatment of antique literature, a world so suggestive of +beautiful forms, was so little comprehended by the German mind that they +only sought to express it through the medium of those fantastic ideas +with very childish and even tasteless results. We must also remember +that that average education of the various classes of society which the +fine arts require for their protection stood on a very low footing in +Germany. In Italy the favour with which works of art was regarded was +far more widely extended. This again gave rise to a more elevated +personal position on the part of the artist, which in Italy was not only +one of more consideration, but of incomparably greater independence. In +this latter respect Germany was so + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXII. + +"THE MASTER OF ST BARTHOLOMEW" + +TWO SAINTS + +_National Gallery, London_] + +deficient that the genius of Albert Duerer and Holbein was miserably +cramped and hindered in development by the poverty and littleness of +surrounding circumstances. It is known that of all the German princes no +one but the Elector Frederick the Wise ever gave Albert Duerer a +commission for pictures, while a writing addressed by the great painter +to the magistracy of Nuremberg tells us that his native city never gave +him employment even to the value of 500 florins. At the same time his +pictures were so meanly paid, that for the means of subsistence, as he +says himself, he was compelled to devote himself to engraving. How far +more such a man as Duerer would have been appreciated in Italy or in the +Netherlands is further evidenced in the above-mentioned writing, where +he states that he was offered 200 ducats a year in Venice and 300 +Philips-gulden in Antwerp, if he would settle in either of those cities. +And Holbein fared still worse: there is no evidence whatever that any +German prince ever troubled himself at all about the great painter while +at Basle, and his art was so little cared for that necessity compelled +him to go to England, where a genius fitted for the highest undertakings +of historical painting was limited to the sphere of portraiture. The +crowning impediments finally, which hindered the progress of German art, +and perverted it from its true aim, were the Reformation, which narrowed +the sphere of ecclesiastical works, and the pernicious imitation of the +great Italian masters which ensued. + +LUCAS CRANACH, born in 1472, received his first instructions in art from +his father, his later teaching probably from Matthew Grunewald. In some +instances he attained to the expression of dignity, earnestness and +feeling, but generally his characteristics are a naive and childlike +cheerfulness and a gentle and almost timid grace. The impression +produced by his style of representation reminds one of the "Volksbuecher" +and "Volkslieder." Many of his church pictures have a very peculiar +significance: in these he stands forth properly speaking as the painter +of the Reformation. Intimate both with Luther and Melanchthon, he seizes +on the central aim of their doctrine, viz., the insufficiency of good +works and the sole efficacy of faith. His mythological subjects appeal +directly to the eye like real portraits; and sometimes also by means of +a certain grace and naivete of motive. We may cite as an instance the +Diana seated on a stag in a small picture at Berlin, No. 564. _The +Fountain of Youth_, also at Berlin, No. 593, is a picture of peculiar +character; a large basin surrounded by steps and with a richly adorned +fountain forms the centre. On one side, where the country is stony and +barren, a multitude of old women are dragged forward on horses, waggons +or carriages, and with much trouble are got into the water. On the other +side of the fountain they appear as young maidens splashing about and +amusing themselves with all kinds of playful mischief; close by is a +large pavilion into which a herald courteously invites them to enter and +where they are arrayed in costly apparel. A feast is prepared in a +smiling meadow, which seems to be followed by a dance; the gay crowd +loses itself in a neighbouring grove. The men unfortunately have not +become young, and retain their grey beards. The picture is of the year +1546, the seventy-fourth of Cranach's age. + +ALBERT ALTDORFER was born 1488 at Altdorf, near Landshuth, in Bavaria, +and settled at Ratisbon, where he died 1528. He invested the fantastic +tendency of the time with a poetic feeling--especially in +landscape--and he developed it so as to attain a perfection in this +sort of romantic painting that no other artist had reached. In his later +period he was strongly influenced by Italian art. Altdorfer's principal +work is in the Munich Gallery, and is thus described by Schlegel:-- + +"It represents the Victory of Alexander the Great over Darius; the +costume is that of the artist's own day, as it would be treated in the +chivalrous poems of the middle ages--man and horse are sheathed in plate +and mail, with surcoats of gold or embroidery; the chamfrons upon the +heads of the horses, the glittering lances and stirrups, and the variety +of the weapons, form altogether a scene of indescribable splendour and +richness.... It is, in truth, a little world on a few square feet of +canvas; the hosts of combatants who advance on all sides against each +other are innumerable, and the view into the background appears +interminable. In the distance is the ocean, with high rocks and a rugged +island between them; ships of war appear in the offing and a whole fleet +of vessels--on the left the moon is setting--on the right the sun +rising--both shining through the opening clouds--a clear and striking +image of the events represented. The armies are arranged in rank and +column without the strange attitudes, contrasts, and distortions +generally exhibited in so-called battle-pieces. How indeed would this +have been possible with such a vast multitude of figures? The whole is +in the plain and severe, or it may be the stiff manner of the old style. +At the same time the character and execution of these little figures is +most masterly and profound. And what variety, what expression there is, +not merely in the character of the single warriors and knights, but in +the hosts themselves! Here crowds of black archers rush down troop after +troop from the mountain with the rage of a foaming torrent; on the +other side high upon the rocks in the far distance a scattered crowd of +flying men are turning round in a defile. The point of the greatest +interest stands out brilliantly from the centre of the whole--Alexander +and Darius both in armour of burnished gold; Alexander on Bucephalus +with his lance in rest advances before his men and presses on the flying +Darius, whose charioteer has already fallen on his white horses, and who +looks back upon his conqueror with all the despair of a vanquished +monarch." + +ALBERT DUeRER (1471-1528), by his overpowering genius, may be called the +sole representative of German art of his period. He was gifted with a +power of conception which traced nature through all her finest shades, +and with a lively sense, as well for the solemn and the sublime, as for +simple grace and tenderness; above all, he had an earnest and truthful +feeling in art united with a capacity for the most earnest study. These +qualities were sufficient to place him by the side of the greatest +artists whom the world has ever seen. + +One of the earliest portraits by Albert Duerer known to us is that of his +father, Albert Duerer, the goldsmith, dated 1497, in our National +Gallery. In the year 1644, another version of this picture, which was +engraved by Hollar, was in the collection of the Earl of Arundel, and is +now in that of the Duke of Northumberland, at Syon House. Of about the +same time--that is to say, before 1500--are the portraits of Oswald +Krell, at Munich, of Frederick the Wise, at Berlin, and of himself, at +the Prado. + +Several of Albert Duerer's pictures of the year 1500 are known to us. The +first and most important is his own portrait in the Munich Gallery, +which represents him full face with his hand laid on the fur trimming +of his robe. + +His finest picture of the year 1504 is an _Adoration of the Kings_, +originally painted for Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony, +subsequently presented by the Elector Christian II. to the Emperor +Rudolph II., and finally, on the occasion of an exchange of pictures, +transferred from Vienna to Florence, where it now hangs in the Tribune +of the Uffizi. The heads are of thoroughly realistic treatment; the +Virgin a portrait from some model of no attractive character; the second +King a portrait of the painter himself. The landscape background exactly +resembles that in the well-known engraving of S. Eustace, the period of +which is thus pretty nearly defined. It is carefully painted in a fine +body of colour. + +In 1505 Duerer made a second journey into Upper Italy, and remained a +considerable time at Venice. Of his occupations in this city the letters +written to his friend Wilibald Pirckheimer which have come down to us +give many interesting particulars. He there executed for the German +Company a picture known as _The Feast of Rose Garlands_, which brought +him great fame, and by its brilliant colouring silenced the assertion of +his envious adversaries "that he was a good engraver, but knew not how +to deal with colours." In the centre of a landscape is the Virgin seated +with the Child and crowned by two angels; on her right is a Pope with +priests kneeling; on her left the Emperor Maximilian I. with knights; +various members of the German Company are also kneeling; all are being +crowned with garlands of roses by the Virgin, the Child, S. +Dominick--who stands behind the Virgin--and by angels. The painter and +his friend Pirckheimer are seen standing in the background on the +right; the painter holds a tablet with the inscription, "Albertus Duerer +Germanus, MDVI." This picture, which is one of his largest and finest, +was purchased from the church at a high price by the Emperor Rudolph II. +for his gallery at Prague, where it remained until sold in 1782 by the +Emperor Joseph II. It then became the property of the Praemonstratensian +monastery of Stratow at Prague, where it still exists, though in very +injured condition and greatly over-painted. In the Imperial Gallery at +Vienna may be seen an old copy which conveys a better idea of the +picture than the original. + +With these productions begins the zenith of this master's fame, in which +a great number of works follow one another within a short period. Of +these we first notice a picture of 1508, in the Imperial Gallery at +Vienna, painted for Duke Frederick of Saxony, and which afterwards +adorned the gallery of the Emperor Rudolph II. It represents _The +Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand Saints_. In the centre of the picture +stand the master and his friend Pirckheimer as spectators, both in black +dresses. Duerer has a mantle thrown over his shoulder in the Italian +fashion, and stands in a firm attitude. He folds his hands and holds a +small flag, on which is inscribed, "Iste faciebat anno domini 1508 +Albertus Duerer Alemanus." There are a multitude of single groups +exhibiting every species of martyrdom, but there is a want of general +connection of the whole. The scenes in the background, where the +Christians are led naked up the rocks, and are precipitated down from +the top, are particularly excellent. The whole is very minute and +miniature-like; the colouring is beautifully brilliant, and it is +painted (the accessories particularly) with extraordinary care. + +To 1511 belongs also one of his most celebrated pictures, _The Adoration +of the Trinity_, which is also at Vienna, painted for the chapel of the +Landauer Bruederhaus in Nuremberg. Above in the centre of the picture are +seen the First Person, who holds the Saviour in his arms, while the Holy +Spirit is seen above; some angels spread out the priestly mantle of the +Almighty, whilst others hover near with the instruments of Christ's +passion. On the left hand a little lower down is a choir of females with +the Virgin at their head; on the right are the male saints with St John +the Baptist. Below all these kneel a host of the blessed of all ranks +and nations extending over the whole of this part of the picture. +Underneath the whole is a beautiful landscape, and in a corner of the +picture the artist himself richly clothed in a fur mantle, with a tablet +next him with the words, "Albertus Duerer Noricus faciebat anno a +Virginis partu, 1511." It may be assumed beyond doubt that he held in +particular esteem those pictures into which he introduced his own +portrait. + +In the Vienna Gallery is also a picture of the year 1512, the Virgin +holding the naked Child in her arms. She has a veil over her head and +blue drapery. Her face is of the form usual with Albert Duerer, but of a +soft and maidenly character; the Child is beautiful--the countenance +particularly so. It is painted with exceeding delicacy of finish. + +Two altar-pieces of his earliest period must be mentioned. One is in the +Dresden Gallery, consisting of three pictures painted in tempera on +canvas, representing the Virgin, S. Anthony, and S. Sebastian +respectively. Although this is probably one of his very earliest works, +it is remarkable for the novelty of its treatment and its independence +of tradition. + +The other, a little later, is in the Munich Gallery (Nos. 240-3), +painted at the request of the Paumgartner family, for S. Catherine's +Church at Nuremberg, was brought to Munich in 1612 by Maximilian I. The +subject of the middle picture is the Nativity; the Child is in the +centre, surrounded by little angels, whilst the Virgin and Joseph kneel +at the side. The wings contain portraits of the two donors under the +form of S. George and S. Eustace represented as knights in steel armour, +each with his standard, and the former holding the slain dragon. + +The year 1526 was distinguished by the two pictures of the four +Apostles: John and Peter, Mark and Paul; the figures are the size of +life. These, which are the master's grandest work, and the last of +importance executed by him, are now in the Munich Gallery. We know with +certainty that they were presented by Albert Duerer himself to the +council of his native city in remembrance of his career as an artist, +and at the same time as conveying to his fellow-citizens an earnest and +lasting exhortation suited to that stormy period. In the year 1627, +however, the pictures were allowed to pass into the hands of the Elector +Maximilian I. of Bavaria. The inscriptions selected by the painter +himself might have given offence to a Catholic prince, and were +therefore cut off and joined to the copies by John Fischer, which were +intended to indemnify the city of Nuremberg for the loss of the +originals. These copies are still in the collection of the Landauer +Bruederhaus at Nuremberg. + +These pictures are the fruit of the deepest thought which then stirred +the mind of Albert Duerer, and are executed with overpowering force. +Finished as they are, they form the first complete work of art produced +by Protestantism. As the inscription taken from the Gospels and +Epistles of the Apostles contains pressing warnings not to swerve from +the word of God, nor to believe in the doctrines of false prophets, so +the figures themselves represent the steadfast and faithful guardians of +that holy Scripture which they bear in their hands. There is also an old +tradition, handed down from the master's own times, that these figures +represent the four temperaments. This is confirmed by the pictures +themselves; and though at first sight it may appear to rest on a mere +accidental combination, it serves to carry out more completely the +artist's thought, and gives to the figures greater individuality. It +shows how every quality of the human mind may be called into the service +of the Divine Word. Thus in the first picture, we see the whole force of +the mind absorbed in contemplation, and we are taught that true +watchfulness in behalf of the Scripture must begin by devotion to its +study. + +S. John stands in front, the open book in his hand; his high forehead +and his whole countenance bear the impress of earnest and deep thought. +This is the melancholic temperament, which does not shrink from the most +profound inquiry. Behind him S. Peter bends over the book, and gazes +earnestly at its contents--a hoary head, full of meditative repose. This +figure represents the phlegmatic temperament, which reviews its own +thoughts in tranquil reflection. The second picture shows the outward +operation of the conviction thus attained and its relation to daily +life. S. Mark in the background is the man of sanguine temperament; he +looks boldly round, and appears to speak to his hearers with animation, +earnestly urging them to share those advantages which he has himself +derived from the Holy Scriptures. S. Paul, on the contrary, in the +foreground, holds the book and sword in his hands; he looks angrily and +severely over his shoulder, ready to defend the Word, and to annihilate +the blasphemer with the sword of God's power. He is the representative +of the choleric temperament. + +We know of no important work of a later date than that just described. +His portrait in a woodcut of the year 1527 represents him earnest and +serious in demeanour, as would naturally follow from his advancing age +and the pressure of eventful times. His head is no longer adorned with +those richly flowing locks, on which in his earlier days he had set so +high a value, as we learn from his pictures and from jests still +recorded of him. With the departure of Hans Holbein to England in 1528 +and the death of Albert Duerer in the same year, that excellence to which +they had raised German art passed away, and centuries saw no sign of its +revival. + +Of HANS HOLBEIN, born at Augsburg in 1498, we shall have more to say in +a later chapter, when considering the origins of English portraiture. +But as in the case of Van Dyck, and in fact of every great portrait +painter, his excellence in this particular branch of his art was but one +result of his being a born artist and first exercising his talents in a +much wider field. In Holbein the realistic tendency of the German School +attained its highest development, and he may, next to Duerer, be +pronounced the greatest master in it. While Duerer's art exhibits a close +affinity with the religious ideas of the Middle Ages, Holbein appears to +have been imbued with more modern and more material sentiments, and +accordingly we find him excelling Duerer in closeness and delicacy of +observation in the delineation of nature. A proof of this is afforded by +the evidence of Erasmus, who said that as regards the portraits painted +of him by both these artists, that by Holbein was the most like. In +feeling for beauty of form, also in grace of movement, in colouring, and +in the actual art of painting--in which his father had thoroughly +instructed him--Holbein is to be placed above Duerer. That he did not +rival the great Italians of his time in "historical" painting can only +be ascribed to the circumstances of his life in Germany, where such +subjects were not in fashion. + +Of his pictures executed before he left his native country the greater +number are at Basle and Augsburg, and are therefore less familiar to the +general public than his later works. A notable exception is the famous +_Meyer Madonna_, the original of which is at Darmstadt, but a version +now relegated, somewhat harshly, to the "copyist" is in the Dresden +Gallery, and certainly exhibits as much of the spirit of the master as +will serve for an example of his powers. It represents the Virgin as +Queen of Heaven, standing in a niche, with the Child in her arms, and +with the family of the Burgomaster Jacob Meyer of Basle kneeling on +either side of her. With the utmost life and truth to nature, which +brings these kneeling figures actually into our presence, says Kugler, +there is combined in a most exquisite degree an expression of great +earnestness, as if the mind were fixed on some lofty object. This is +shown not merely by the introduction of divine beings into the circle of +human sympathies, but particularly in the relation so skilfully +indicated between the Holy Virgin and her worshippers, and in her +manifest desire to communicate to those who are around her the sacred +peace and tranquillity expressed in her own countenance and attitude, +and implied in the infantine grace of the Saviour. In the direct union +of the divine with the human, and in their reciprocal harmony, there is +involved a devout and earnest purity of feeling such as only the older +masters were capable of representing. + +Another of his most beautiful pictures painted in Germany is the +portrait of Erasmus, dated 1523. This was sent by Erasmus to Sir Thomas +More, at Chelsea, with a letter recommending Holbein to his care, and as +it is still in this country--in the collection of the Earl of Radnor at +Longford Castle--it is not perhaps too much to hope that it may one of +these days find its way into the National Gallery--perhaps when the +alterations to the front entrance are completed. This picture has for a +very long time been regarded as one of Holbein's very finest portraits. +Mr W. Barclay Squire, in the sumptuous catalogue of the Radnor +collection compiled by him, quotes the opinion of Sir William Musgrave, +written in 1785, "I am not sure whether it is not the finest I have +seen"; and that of Dr Waagen, "Alone worth a pilgrimage to Longford. +Seldom has a painter so fully succeeded in bringing to view the whole +character of so original a mind as in this instance. In the mouth and +small eyes may be seen the unspeakable studies of a long life ... the +face also expresses the sagacity and knowledge of a life gained by long +experience ... the masterly and careful execution extends to every +portion ... yet the face surpasses everything else in delicacy of +modelling." + +Cruel, indeed, was England to have transplanted the one artist who might +have saved Germany from the artistic destitution from which she has +suffered ever since! + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXIII.--HANS HOLBEIN + +PORTRAIT OF CHRISTINA, DUCHESS OF MILAN + +_National Gallery, London_] + + + + +_FRENCH SCHOOL_ + + + + +I + +THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY + + +When we consider the peculiar beauty of the architecture and +ecclesiastical sculpture in France during the Middle Ages and the period +of the renaissance, and of the enamels, ivories, and other small works +of art, it is wrong to regret that painting was not also practised by +the French as assiduously as it was in Italy. For there can be no doubt +that in being confined to one channel the artistic impulses of a people +cut deeper than if dissipated in various directions. We may suppose, +indeed, that if those of the French had found their outlet in painting +alone, we should have pictures of wonderful beauty, of a beauty moreover +of a markedly different kind from that of the Italian or Spanish or +Netherlandish pictures. But on the other hand we should have perhaps +lost the amazing fascination of Chartres, and the delights of Limoges +enamel and ivories. + +As it happens, the earliest mention to be made of painting in France is +the arrival of Leonardo da Vinci at Amboise in 1516, whither he had come +from Milan in the train of the young king Francois I. Unfortunately he +was by this time sixty-four years old, and in less than three years he +died. At about the same time there was a court painter in the employment +of Francois--under the official designation of _varlet de +chambre_--named JEHAN CLOUET, who is supposed to have been of Flemish +extraction. Nothing very definite is known about him or his work, but he +had a son FRANCOIS CLOUET, who seems to have been born at about the time +of Leonardo's arrival, and who succeeded to his father's office. At the +funeral of Francois I. in 1547 he was ordered to make an _effige du dict +feu roy_, and he continued to be the official court painter to Henri II. +(whose posthumous portrait he was also ordered to paint), Francois II., +and Charles IX. He died in 1572. Every portrait of this period is +attributed to him, just as was the case with Holbein in England. Neither +of the two examples at the National Gallery can be safely ascribed to +him. The little head of the Emperor Charles V., king of Spain, at +Hereford House, is identical in style and in dimensions with that of +Francis I., king of France, in the Museum at Lyons, which is attributed +to Jean Clouet. Both may have been painted when Charles V. passed +through Paris in 1539, but whether by Jean or one of his disciples +cannot be said with certainty. + +Not until the very end of the sixteenth century were born Claude Gellee +and Nicholas Poussin, the only two Frenchmen who were painters of +considerable importance before the close of the seventeenth. Nor did +either of these two contribute anything to the glory of their country by +practice or by precept within its confines, both of them passing most of +their lives and painting their best works in Italy and under Italian +influence. + +NICHOLAS POUSSIN was born at Villiers near Les Andelys on the banks of +the Seine, in 1594, where he studied for some time under Quentin Varin +till he was eighteen. After this he was in Paris, but in 1624 he went to +Rome where he lived with Du Quesnoy. His first success was obtained by +the execution of two historical pieces which were commissioned by +Cardinal Barberini on his return from an Embassy to France. These were +_The Death of Germanicus_ and _The Capture of Jerusalem_. His next works +were _The Martyrdom of S. Erasmus_, _The Plague at Ashdod_, of which a +replica is in the National Gallery, and _The Seven Sacraments_ now at +Belvoir Castle. By these he acquired such fame that on his return to +Paris in 1640, Louis XIII. appointed him royal painter, and in order to +keep him at home provided him with apartments in the Tuileries and a +salary of L120 a year. Within two years, however, Poussin was back in +Rome, and after twenty-three years' unbroken success died there in 1665 +in his seventy-second year. + +Poussin was a most conscientious painter, devoting himself seriously in +his earlier years to the study both of the antique and of practical +anatomy. Besides being the intimate friend of Du Quesnoy, he was a +devout pupil of Domenichino, for whom he had the greatest reverence. It +is not surprising therefore to find in his earlier works, such as the +_Plague at Ashdod_, a certain academic dulness and lack of spontaneity. +He was not the forerunner of a new epoch, but one of the last upholders +of the old. He was trying to arrest decay, to infuse a healthier spirit +into a declining art, so that he errs on the side of correctness. The +influence of Titian, however, was too strong for him to remain long +within the narrowest limits, as may be seen in the _Bacchanalian Dance_, +No. 62 in the National Gallery, which was probably one of a series +painted for Cardinal Richelieu during the short time that Poussin was in +Paris in 1641. In this and in No. 42, the _Bacchanalian Festival_ as +well as in _The Shepherds in Arcadia_, in the Louvre, we get a +surprisingly strong reminiscence of Titian, more especially in the +brown tones of the flesh and the deep blue of the sky. + +As the result of conscientious study of the human body the figures in +these pictures are full of life--for correctness of drawing is the first +requisite of lively painting without which all the others are useless. +The fact that over two hundred prints have been engraved after his +pictures is a proof of his popularity at one time or another, and though +at the present time his reputation is not as widely recognised as in +former years, it is certainly as high among those whose judgment is +independent of passing fashions. As evidence of the soundness of his +principles, the following is perhaps worth quoting:-- + +"There are nine things in painting," Poussin wrote in a letter to M. de +Chambrai, the author of a treatise on painting, "which can never be +taught and which are essential to that art. To begin with, the subject +of it should be noble, and receive no quality from the person who treats +it; and to give opportunity to the painter to show his talents and his +industry it must be chosen as capable of receiving the most excellent +form. A painter should begin with disposition (or as we should say, +composition), the ornament should follow, their agreement of the parts, +beauty, grace, spirit, costume, regard to nature and probability; and +above all, judgment. This last must be in the painter himself and cannot +be taught. It is the golden bough of Virgil that no one can either find +or pluck unless his lucky star conducts him to it." + +GASPAR POUSSIN, whose name was really Gaspard Dughet, was brother-in-law +of Nicholas, and acquired his name from being his pupil. He was nineteen +years his junior, and survived him by ten years. He was born in Rome of +French parents, and died there in 1675, and though he travelled a good +deal in Italy he never appears to have visited France. His Italian +landscapes are very beautiful, and we are fortunate in the possession of +one which is considered his best, No. 31 in the National Gallery, +_Landscape with Figures_, _Abraham and Isaac_. Scarcely less fine is the +_Calling of Abraham_, No. 1159, especially in the middle and far +distance. The sacred figures, it may as well be said, are of little +concern in the compositions, though useful for purposes of identifying +the pictures. + +CLAUDE GELLEE, nowadays usually spoken of as Claude, was born at +Chamagne in Lorraine in 1600. Accordingly he has been styled Claude +Lorraine, le Lorraine, de Lorrain, Lorrain, or Claudio Lorrenese with +wonderful persistency through the ages, though there was no mystery +about his surname and it would have served just as well. He was brought +up in his father's profession of pastrycook, and in that capacity he +went to Rome seeking for employment. As it happened he found it in the +house of a landscape painter, Agostino Tassi, who had been a pupil of +Paul Bril, and he not only cooked for him but mixed his colours as well, +and soon became his pupil. Later he was studying under a German painter, +Gottfried Wals, at Naples. A more important influence on him, however, +was that of Joachim Sandrart, one of the best of the later German +painters, whom he met in Rome. + +Claude's earliest pictures of any importance were two which were painted +for Pope Urban VII. in 1639, when he was just upon forty years old. +These are the _Village Dance_ and the _Seaport_, now in the Louvre. The +_Seaport at Sunset_ and _Narcissus and Echo_ in the National Gallery +(Nos. 5 and 19) are dated 1644--the former on the canvas and the latter +on the sketch for it in the _Liber Veritatis_, where it is stated that +it was painted for an English patron. + +The _Liber Veritatis_, it should be observed, is the title given to a +portfolio of over two hundred drawings in pen and bistre, or Indian ink, +which is now in the possession of the Duke of Devonshire. Most of these +were made from pictures which had been painted, not as sketches or +designs preparatory to painting them, and in some instances there are +notes on the back of them giving the date, purchaser, and other +particulars relating to them. So great was the vogue for Claude's +landscapes in England during the eighteenth century that as early as +1730 or 1740 a good many of his drawings, which had been collected by +Jonathan Richardson, Dr. Mead and others, were engraved by Arthur Pond +and John Knapton; and in 1777 a series of about two hundred of the Duke +of Devonshire's drawings was published by Alderman Boydell, which had +been etched and mezzotinted by Richard Earlom, under the title of _Liber +Veritatis_. This was the model on which Turner founded the publication +of his own sketches under the title of _Liber Studiorum_. Thus, if +Claude exerted little influence on the art of his own country, it can +hardly be said that he exerted none elsewhere, for Turner was by no +means the first Englishman to fall under his spell. Richard Wilson, the +first English landscape painter, was undoubtedly influenced by him, both +from an acquaintance with his drawings in English collections and from +the study of his works when in Rome. + +In this connection we may consider the two landscapes, numbered 12 and +14 in the National Gallery Catalogue, as our most important examples by +this master, for Turner bequeathed to the nation his two most important +pictures _The Sun Rising Through a Vapour_ and _Dido Building Carthage_, +on condition that they should be hung between these two by Claude. The +Court of Chancery could annul the condition, but they could not nullify +the effect of Claude's influence on Turner or alter the judgment of +posterity with regard to the relations of the two painters to each other +and to art in general, and the Director has wisely observed the wishes +of Turner in still hanging the four pictures together, the Court of +Chancery notwithstanding. Both of Claude's are inscribed, besides being +signed and dated, as follows: + + No. 12. Mariage d'Isaac avec Rebeca, Claudio Gil. inv. Romae 1648. + + No. 14. La Reine de Saba va trover Salomon. Clavde Gil. inv. faict + pour son altesse le duc de Buillon a Roma 1648. + +Both pictures are familiar in various engravings of them, and though the +present fashion leads many people in other directions, there can be no +doubt that the appreciation of Claude in this country is never likely to +die out, and is only waiting for a turn of the wheel to revive with +increased vigour. + +Meantime, however, France was not entirely destitute of painters, and +though without Claude, Poussin or Dughet, who preferred to exercise +their art in Rome, she anticipated England by over a century in that +most important step, the foundation of an Academy of Painting. Not many +of the names of its original members ever became famous--as may be said +in our own country--but among them was SEBASTIEN BOURDON (1616-1671), +whose work was so much admired by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Bourdon, also, +wandered away from France; within four years after the foundation of +the Academy, namely, in 1652, he went to Stockholm, and was appointed +principal painter to Queen Christina. On her abdication, however, in +1663, he returned to Paris, and enjoyed a great success in painting +landscapes, and historical subjects. _The Return of the Ark from +Captivity_, No. 64 in the National Gallery Catalogue, was presented by +that distinguished patron of the arts, Sir George Beaumont, to whom it +was bequeathed by Sir Joshua Reynolds, as being one of his most +treasured possessions. "I cannot quit this subject," he writes in the +fourteenth Discourse, alluding to poetry in landscape, "without +mentioning two examples, which occur to me at present, in which the +poetical style of landscape may be seen happily executed; the one is +_Jacob's Dream_, by Salvator Rosa, and the other, _The Return of the Ark +from Captivity_, by Sebastian Bourdon. With whatever dignity those +histories are presented to us in the language of scripture, this style +of painting possesses the same power of inspiring sentiments of grandeur +and sublimity, and is able to communicate them to subjects which appear +by no means adapted to receive them. A ladder against the sky has no +very promising appearance of possessing a capacity to excite any heroic +ideas, and the Ark in the hands of a second-rate master would have +little more effect than a common waggon on the highway; yet those +subjects are so poetically treated throughout, the parts have such a +correspondence with each other, and the whole and every part of the +scene is so visionary, that it is impossible to look at them without +feeling in some measure the enthusiasm which seems to have inspired the +painters." + +EUSTACHE LE SUEUR, born in the same year as Sebastien Bourdon (1616), +was another of the original members of the Academy, and was employed by +the King at the Louvre. His most famous work was the decorations of the +cloister at the monastery of La Chartreuse (now in the Louvre) of which +Horace Walpole speaks so ecstatically in the preface to the last volume +of the _Anecdotes of Painting_. "The last scene of S. Bruno expiring" +(he writes) "in which are expressed all the stages of devotion from the +youngest mind impressed with fear to the composed resignation of the +Prior, is perhaps inferior to no single picture of the greatest master. +If Raphael died young, so did Le Sueur; the former had seen the antique, +the latter only prints from Raphael; yet in the Chartreuse, what airs of +heads! What harmony of colouring! What aerial perspective! How Grecian +the simplicity of architecture and drapery! How diversified a single +quadrangle though the life of a hermit be the only subject, and devotion +the only pathetic!" + +PHILIPPE DE CHAMPAIGNE was another of the original members. He was born +at Brussels in 1602, and did not come to Paris till 1621, where he was +soon afterwards employed in the decoration of the Luxembourg Palace. But +he was chiefly a portrait painter, his principal works being the fine +full-length of Cardinal Richelieu, and another of his daughter as a nun +of Port Royal, both of which are in the Louvre. There are four in the +Wallace Collection, but perhaps the most familiar to the English public +is the canvas at the National Gallery (No. 798), painted for the Roman +sculptor Mocchi, to make a bust from, with a full face and two profiles +of Richelieu. As a portrait this is exceedingly interesting, the more so +from having an inscription over one of the heads, "de ces deux profiles +cecy est le meilleur." The full length of the Cardinal presented by Mr. +Charles Butler in 1895 (No. 1449), is a good example, which cannot +however but suffer by juxtaposition with more accomplished works. + +But it was not until the close of the seventeenth century that portrait +painting in France became anything like a fine art, and even then it did +not get beyond being formal and magnificent. The two principal exponents +were HYACINTHE RIGAUD and NICOLAS LARGILLIERE, both of whose works have +a sort of grandeur but little subtlety or charm. + +Rigaud was born in 1659, at Perpignan in the extreme south of France, +and studied at Montpelier in his youth, then at Lyons on his way to +Paris--much as a Scottish artist might have studied first at Glasgow, +then at Birmingham on his way to London. On the advice of Lebrun he +devoted himself specially to portrait painting, which he did with such +success that in 1700 he was elected a member of the Academy. He painted +Louis XIV. more often than Largilliere or any other painter, and in his +later years (he lived till 1743) Louis XV. his great-grandson. He is +said to have shared with Kneller the distinction, such as it may be, of +having painted at least five monarchs. + +Rigaud is best known in these days by the fine prints after his +portraits by the French engravers. Of his brushwork we are only able to +judge by the two doubtful versions at the National Gallery and the +Wallace Collection respectively, of the fine portrait at Versailles of +_Cardinal Fleury_. The group of _Lulli and the Musicians of the French +Court_, which was purchased for the National Gallery in 1906 is not by +him, and it is difficult to understand why the public money should have +been wasted on it, or at least on the inscription attributing it to +him. + +Nicolas de Largilliere was three years older than Rigaud and survived +him by another three. He was born in Paris in 1656 and died six months +before completing his ninetieth year. Early in life he went as a pupil +to Antwerp, under Antoine Goubeau, and he is said to have worked in +England as an assistant to Sir Peter Lely during the later years of that +master. On his return to France he was received into the Royal +Academy--in 1686. + +In the Wallace Collection is an interesting example of his work, the +large group of the French Royal Family, in which four living generations +are portrayed and the bronze effigies of two more. Henri IV. and Louis +XIII., the grandfather and father of the reigning monarch, Louis XIV., +the Dauphin his son, the Duc de Bourgogne his grandson, and the Duc +d'Anjou, his great-grandson--afterwards Louis XV., are all included in +this formal group, which is a useful lesson in history as well as in +painting. + + + + +II + +THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY + + +ANTOINE WATTEAU was born at Valenciennes in 1684, and died near there +about thirty-seven years later of consumption. Valenciennes really +belonged to Flanders, and had only lately been annexed to France, so +that Watteau owed something of his art to Flemish rather than to French +sources. At the same time it cannot be said that his development would +have been the same if he had gone to Brussels or Antwerp instead of to +Paris to study, for though the works of Rubens and Van Dyck were from +his earliest years his chief attraction, the influence of the French +artist Claude Gillot, as well as that of Audran, the keeper of the +Luxembourg Palace, without doubt exerted a very decided help in +determining the future course of his work. + +When living with Audran, Watteau had every opportunity for studying the +works of the older masters, especially those of Rubens, whose +decorations, executed for Marie de Medici, had not at that time been +removed to the Louvre. Besides copying from these older pictures, +Watteau was employed by Audran in the execution of designs for wall +decorations, etc. + +Watteau's two earliest pictures still in existence are supposed to be +the _Depart de Troupe_ and the _Halte d'Armee_, which were the first of +a series of military pictures on a small scale. To an early period also +belong the _Accordee de Village_, at the Soane Museum in Lincoln's Inn +Fields, the _Mariee de Village_ at Potsdam, and the _Wedding +Festivities_ in the Dublin National Gallery. + +In 1712 other influences began to work upon him. In this year he came +into contact with Crozat, the famous collector, in whose house he became +familiar with a fresh batch of the Flemish and Italian masterpieces. It +was at this time that he was approved by the Royal Academy, though he +took five years over his Diploma picture, "_Embarquement pour l'Ile de +Cythere_," which is now in the Louvre. Meantime the influence of Rubens +and the Italian masters--especially the Venetians, had greatly widened +and deepened his art, and these influences, acting on his peculiarly +sensitive temperament and poetical spirit, had a magical effect, +transforming the actual scenes of Paris and Versailles, which he painted +into enchanted places in + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXIV.--ANTOINE WATTEAU + +L'INDIFFERENT + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +fairyland, as he transformed the formal actual painting of the period of +Louis XIV. into the romantic school of the eighteenth century in France. +The setting of the famous pictures in the Wallace Collection, catalogued +as _The Music-Party_ or _Les Charnes de la Vie_ (No. 410), is a view of +the Champs Elysees taken from the gallery of the Tuileries. Who would +have thought it? And what does it matter, except to show how entirely +Watteau revolutionized the pompous and prosaic methods of his time by +investing the actual with poetry and romance. + +Two other pictures at Hertford House, Nos. 389 and 391, were painted in +the Champs Elysees, and the figures are, for the most part, the same in +both, all three of these pictures are fine examples of the artist's +power of broad and spirited treatment, combined with extreme delicacy +and refinement of conception. + +Three other pictures at Hertford House are equally delightful examples +of another class of subject, namely groups of figures dressed in the +parts of actors in Italian comedy. From a note in the Catalogue we learn +that a company of Italian comedians were in Paris in the sixteenth +century, but were banished by Louis Quatorze in 1697 for a supposed +affront to Madame de Maintenon. In 1716, however, they were recalled by +the Regent, the Duc d'Orleans, and became once more the delight of +Paris. Several of the figures in the Italian comedy had already passed +into French popular drama, and in Watteau's time there seems to have +been a fluctuating company, according as one actor or actress or another +developed a part, and to Pantalone, Arlecchino, Dottore and Columbina +were now added Pierrot--or Gilles--Mezetin, a sort of double of Pierrot, +Scaramouche and Scapin. The vague web of courtship, dalliance, intrigue +and jealousy called up by these characters attracted Watteau to employ +them in his compositions, and to make them also the medium of the more +sincere sentiments of conjugal love and friendship,--as in _The Music +Lesson_, _Gilles and his Family_ and _Harlequin and Columbine_, at +Hertford House. All of these three were engraved in Watteau's life-time +or shortly after his death, and the verses sub-joined to the engravings +are a charming rendering of the sentiment underlying the pictures. + +In _The Music Lesson_ we see the half length figures of a lady, seated, +reading a music book, and of a man playing a lute opposite to her. +Another man looks at the book over the lady's shoulder, and two little +children's faces appear at her knee. The verses are as follows:-- + + Pour nous prouver que cette belle + Trouve l'hymen un noeud fort doux + Le peintre nous la peint fidelle + A suivre le ton d'un Epoux. + + Les enfants qui sont autour d'elle + Sont les fruits de son tendre amour + Dont ce beau joueur de prunelle + Pouvait bien gouter quelque jour. + +In _Gilles and his Family_ we have a three-quarter length full-face +portrait of le Sieur de Sirois, a friend of Watteau, with these verses +under the engraving:-- + + Sous un habit de mezzetin + Ce gros brun au riant visage + Sur la guitarre avec sa main + Fait un aimable badinage. + + Par les doux accords de sa voix + Enfants d'une bouche vermeille + Du beau sexe tant a la fois + Il charme les yeux et l'oreille. + +In the little _Lady at her Toilet_ (No. 439) we see the influence of +Paul Veronese, though it is probable that this was not painted until he +visited London in the later part of his short life. For there is a +similar piece called _La Toilette du Matin_ which was engraved by a +French artist who had settled in England, Philip Mercier, and on whose +work the influence of Watteau is very noticeable. + +_Le Rendez-vous de Chasse_ (No. 416), which is of the same size, and in +character similar to _Les Amusements Champetres_ (No. 391), is the last +by Watteau of which we have any certain knowledge. It was painted in +1720, the year before his death, when his health prevented him from +making any sustained effort. It is said to have been a commission from +his friends M. and Mme. de Julienne, in whose shooting-box at Saint +Maur, between the woods of Vincennes and the river, he went to repose +from time to time. + +NICHOLAS LANCRET was only by six years Watteau's junior, so that he can +hardly be considered as a pupil or even a disciple, but only as an +imitator of Watteau. He was the pupil of Claude Gillot, and afterwards +his assistant, and it was not unnatural that a close friendship should +have been formed between Lancret and Watteau, or that it should have +been dissolved by the deliberate imitation by the former of the latter's +style--seeing how successful the imitation was. Two of the pictures by +Lancret at Hertford House, Nos. 422, _Conversation Galante_ and 440, +_Fete in a Wood_, are fair examples of how close, at one period of his +career, the imitation became. The latter is the _Bal dans un Bois_ which +was exhibited at the Place Dauphine, and was complained of by Watteau on +account of its close resemblance to his own work. + +Another in the Wallace Collection belongs to the same early period of +Watteau's influence. The _Italian Comedians by a Fountain_ (No. 465), +being attributed to Watteau in the sale, in 1853, at which it was bought +for Lord Hertford. His lordship was particularly anxious to secure this +picture, "Between _you_ and _I_," he writes, with the quaint +regardlessness of grammar peculiar to the Victorian nobility, "(and to +no other person but you should I make this _confidence_), I must have +the Lancret called Watteau in the Standish Collection. So I depend upon +you for _getting it for me_. I need not beg you not to mention a word +about this to _anybody_, either _before_ or _after_ the sale." And +again, "I _depend_ upon your getting the Lancret (Watteau in the +Catalogue) for me. I have no doubt it will sell for a good sum, most +likely more than it is worth, but we _must_ have it ... I leave it to +you, but I must have it, unless by some unheard of chance it was to go +beyond 3000 guineas." He was fortunate indeed in getting it for L735. + +_Mademoiselle Camargo Dancing_ (No. 393), and _La Belle Grecque_ (No. +450), in the Wallace Collection, are good examples of the Comedian +motive treated with more actuality, yet with no less grace. The four +little allegorical pieces in the National Gallery, _The Four Ages of +Man_, are more lively if less romantic, being composed more for the +characters illustrating the subject than for poetical setting. + +JEAN BAPTISE JOSEPH PATER was actually a pupil of Watteau. He was ten +years his junior, but was equally unhappy on account of his health, and +died at forty. Like Lancret, he incurred Watteau's displeasure for a +similar reason, though in his case it was rather the fear of what he +would do than what he did that was the cause of Watteau's displeasure. +At the same time, the names of both Lancret and Pater are inseparable +from that of Watteau in the history of painting, and, both in their +choice of subject and their treatment of it, they are hardly +distinguishable to the casual observer. Watteau, it need hardly be said, +was far above the other two, but it was fortunate indeed that his +romantic genius had two such gifted imitators as Lancret and Pater--or +to put it the other way, that they had such a master to imitate, without +whom neither their work nor their influence would have been nearly as +great as it was. + +FRANCOIS BOUCHER, though doubtless influenced by Watteau, more +especially at the outset of his brilliant career, was nevertheless +independent of him in carrying forward the art painting in his country, +choosing rather to revert to the patronage of the Court like his +predecessors Le Brun, Rigaud, and Largilliere than to devote himself to +the expression of his own ideas and feelings. Being a pupil of Francois +Le Moine, whose principal work was the decoration of Versailles, it is +not unnatural that Boucher should have succumbed to the influence of +Royalty, especially when exerted in his favour by as charming and as +powerful an agent as Madame de Pompadour. Another early influence which +shaped his artistic tendencies as well as his fortunes was that of Carle +van Loo, in whose honour his countrymen coined the verb _vanlotiser_--to +frivol agreeably--- on account of the popularity which he achieved as a +painter of elegant trifles. There is a picture by Carle van Loo in the +Wallace Collection entitled _The Grand Turk giving a Concert to his +Mistress_ (No. 451), painted in 1737, which is a fair example of his +proficiency in this direction, and there are one or two portraits +scattered about the country which he painted when over here for a few +months towards the end of his life. He died in Paris on the 15th July +1765, and Boucher was immediately appointed his successor as principal +painter to Louis XV. + +Madame de Pompadour was more than a patron to him, she was a matron! She +made an intimate friend and adviser of him, and it is to her that he +owed most of his advancement at Court, which continued after her death. +The full-length portrait of her at Hertford House (No. 418) was +commissioned by her in 1759, and remained in her possession till her +death in 1764. It was purchased by Lord Hertford in 1868 for 28,000 +francs. In the Jones Collection at the South Kensington Museum is +another portrait of her, and a third in the National Gallery at +Edinburgh, not to mention those in private collections. The two +magnificent cartoons on the staircase at Hertford House, called the +_Rising and Setting of the Sun_, she begged from the king. These were +ordered in 1748 as designs to be executed in tapestry at the Manufacture +Royale des Gobelins, by Cozette and Audran, according to the catalogue +of the Salon in 1753 when they were exhibited. They are characterised by +the brothers de Goncourt as _le plus grand effort du peintre, les deux +grandes machines de son oeuvre_; and the writer of the catalogue of +Madame de Pompadour's pictures when they were sold in 1766 testifies +thus to the artist's own opinion of them: "J'ai entendu plusieurs fois +dire par l'auteur qu'ils etaient du nombre de ceux dont il etait le plus +satisfait." They were then sold for 9800 livres, and Lord Hertford paid +20,200 francs for them in 1855. + +Even without these _chefs d'oeuvre_ the Wallace Collection is richer +than any other gallery in the works of Boucher, with twenty-four +examples (in all), of which few if any are of inferior quality. But it +must be confessed that the abundance of Boucher's work does not enhance +its artistic value, and we have to think of him, in comparison with +Watteau and his school, rather as a great decorator than a great +painter. With all his skill and charm, that is to say, there is not one +of his canvases that we could place beside a picture by Watteau on +anything like equal terms. Superficially it may be equally or possibly +more attractive, but inwardly there is no comparison. Let us hear what +Sir Joshua Reynolds has to say of him:-- + +"Our neighbours, the French, are much in this practice of extempore +invention, and their dexterity is such as even to excite admiration, if +not envy; but how rarely can this praise be given to their finished +pictures! The late Director of their Academy, Boucher, was eminent in +this way. When I visited him some years since in France, I found him at +work on a very large picture without drawings or models of any kind. On +my remarking this particular circumstance, he said, when he was young, +studying his art, he found it necessary to use models, but he had left +them off for many years.... However, in justice, I cannot quit this +painter without adding that in the former part of his life, when he was +in the habit of having recourse to nature, he was not without a +considerable degree of merit--enough to make half the painters of his +country his imitators: he had often grace and beauty, and good skill in +composition, but I think all under the influence of a bad taste; his +imitators are, indeed, abominable." + +Twenty-one years elapsed between the birth of Boucher and the next +painter of anything like his ability, namely, JEAN BAPTISTE GREUZE. He +was a native of Tournous, near Macon, and lived to see the century out, +dying in 1805, at the age of seventy-eight. His popularity is nowadays +due chiefly to his heads of young girls, which he painted in his later +life with admirable skill, but with a sentimentality that almost repels. +The famous example in the National Gallery is more free from the sickly +sweetness that spoils most of them, and reminds us that he could paint +more serious works, and paint them exceedingly well. He first came into +notice by pictures like _La Lecture du Bible_, _La Malediction +Paternelle_, or _Le Fils Puni_, which are now to be seen--though +generally passed by--at the Louvre, and his style was imitated in later +years in England by Wheatley and others of that school with more or less +success. It was a great blow to him, and one which seriously affected +his career when the Academy censured his Diploma picture, _The Emperor +Severus reproaching Caracalla_. But for this we might have had more than +these sentimental young ladies from a hand that was undoubtedly worthy +of better things. However, as Lord Hertford admired them sufficiently to +include no less than twenty-one of them in his collection, we ought not +to be severe in criticising them, and we may quote the description of +_The Souvenir_ (No. 398) given by John Smith, in his Catalogue Raisonne +in 1837, as showing the esteem in which it was held. + +"_The Souvenir._ An interesting female, about fifteen years of age, +pressing fondly to her bosom a little red and white spaniel dog; the pet +animal appears to remind her of some favourite object, for whose safety +and return she is breathing an earnest wish; her fair oval countenance +and melting eyes are directed upwards, and her ruby lips are slightly +open; her light hair falls negligently on her shoulder, and is +tastefully braided + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXV.--JEAN-BAPTISTE GREUZE + +THE BROKEN PITCHER + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +with a crimson riband and pearls. She is attired in a morning dress, +consisting of a loose gown and a brownish scarf, the latter of which +hangs across her arm. Upon a tree behind her is inscribed the name of +the painter. This beautiful production of art abounds in every +attractive charm which gives interest to the master's works." + +Very different, and far superior to Greuze, was JEAN HONORE FRAGONARD, +born at Grasse, in the Alpes Maritimes, in 1732. In England his name was +almost unknown until within quite recent years, and the National Gallery +has only one picture by him, which was bequeathed by George Salting in +1910. Fortunately he is well represented in the Wallace Collection, +three at least of the nine examples being in his most brilliant manner. + +Fragonard's father was a glover. In 1750 the family moved to Paris, and +the boy was put into a notary's office. The usual signs of +disinclination for office work and a passion for art having duly +appeared, he was sent to Boucher, who advised him to go and study under +Chardin. This he did for a short time, but finding it dull--for Chardin +was not as great a teacher as he was a painter--he went back to Boucher +as an assistant. In 1752 he won the Prix de Rome, although he had never +attended the Academy Schools, and in 1756 started for Italy. + +Reynolds had just returned from Rome at the date of Fragonard's capture +of the opportunity of going there, and we know from the _Discourses_ how +he spent his time there and what direction his studies took. Fragonard +pursued an exactly opposite course, being advised thereto by Boucher, +who said to him, "If you take Michelangelo and Raphael seriously, you +are lost." Feeling that the advice was suitable to himself, if not +sound on general principles, Fragonard devoted himself to the lighter +and more sparkling works of Tiepolo and others of the seventeenth and +eighteenth centuries. He also made a tour in South Italy and Sicily with +Hubert Robert, the landscape painter, and the Abbe Saint Non, the latter +of whom published a number of etchings he made after Fragonard's +drawings, under the title of _Voyages de Naples et de Sicile_. + +On returning to Paris in 1761 his first success was the large +composition of _Callirhoe and Coresus_, which was exhibited at the Salon +in 1765, and is now in the Louvre. But he soon abandoned the grand +style, chiefly, it is probable, owing to the patronage of the idle or +industrious rich who showered commissions upon him, for smaller and more +sociable pictures with which to adorn and enliven their houses. The +beautiful, but exceedingly improper picture at Hertford House, called +_The Swing_--or in French, _Les Hazards heureux de l'Escarpolette_, +appears to have been commissioned by the Baron de St. Julien, within the +next year or two, for in the memoirs of Cotte a conversation is recorded +which shows that the Baron had asked another painter, Doyen, to paint +it. "Who would have believed," says the indignant Doyen, "that within a +few days of my picture of Ste. Genevieve being exhibited at the Salon, a +nobleman would have sent for me to order a picture on a subject like +this." He then goes on to relate how the Baron explained to him exactly +what he required. We cannot entirely acquit Fragonard of all blame in +accepting such a commission, but he was a young man, just starting as a +professional artist, with the example of Boucher before him, and it +would hardly have seemed wise to begin his career by offending a noble +patron. The whole incident throws a glaring light on the conditions +under which the art of France flourished in the Louis Quinze period, +when Boucher was everybody and Chardin nobody. + +For the real Fragonard we may turn to _Le Chiffre d'Amour_, or the "Lady +carving an initial," as the prosaic diction of the Wallace Collection +has it (No. 382). In this the equal delicacy of the sentiment and of the +painting combine to effect a little masterpiece of Louis Quinze art. It +is simple and natural, and entirely free from the besetting sins of so +slight a picture triviality, affectation, empty prettiness, or simply +silliness. In its way it is perfect, and for that perfection is for ever +reserved the popularity which we find temporarily accorded to pictures +like Frith's _Dolly Varden_ or Millais' _Bubbles_. + +Another of the Hertford House examples, the portrait of a Boy as +Pierrot, is equally entitled to be popular for all time, and like +Reynolds's _Strawberry Girl_, might well be called "one of the +half-dozen original things" which no artist ever exceeded in his life's +work. A comparison between the two pictures, which were probably painted +within a few years of each other, will serve to show the difference +between the English and French Schools at this period. On the one +hand--to put it very shortly indeed--we see Fragonard influenced by +Tiepolo, France, and Louis XV.; on the other, Sir Joshua, influenced by +Michelangelo and Raphael, England, and George III. + +The mention of JEAN BAPTISTE SIMEON CHARDIN among this brilliant and +frivolous galaxy seems almost out of place. "He is not so much an +eighteenth-century French artist," Lady Dilke says of him, "as a French +artist of pure race and type. Though he treated subjects of the +humblest and most unpretentious class, he brought to their rendering not +only deep feeling and a penetration which divined the innermost truths +of the simplest forms of life, but a perfection of workmanship by which +everything he handled was clothed with beauty." That the Wallace +Collection includes no work from his hand is perhaps regrettable, but +truly Chardin was someone apart from all the magnificence that dazzles +us there. His was the treasure of the humble. + +The effects of the Revolution upon French painting were as surprising as +they were great. That the gay and frivolous art of Boucher and Fragonard +should have suddenly ceased might have been considered inevitable; but +whereas in Holland, when the Spanish yoke had been thrown off, and a +Republic proclaimed, a vigorous democratic school arose under Frans +Hals; and in England during the Commonwealth the artistic influence +which was beginning to be spread by Charles I. and Buckingham utterly +ceased; in France an artistic Dictator arose, as we may well call him, +in the person of JACQUES LOUIS DAVID, who not only made painting a part +of the revolutionary propaganda, but succeeded under the Emperor +Napoleon also in maintaining his position as painter to the Government, +and thereby imposing on his country a style of art which had a great +influence on the whole course of French painting for many years to come. +But the most remarkable thing was that it was to the classics that this +revolutioniser went for inspiration. The explanation is to be found in +the fact that he was bitterly aggrieved by the attitude of the Academy +to him as a young man, and in the accident of his famous picture of +Brutus synchronising with the events of 1789. He was at once hailed as a +deliverer, and made, as it were, painter to the Revolution. + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXVI.--FRAGONARD + +L'ETUDE + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +But what was even more important in the influence he exerted at this +time was his actual appointment as President of the Convention, which +gave him the power to revenge himself upon the Academy, which he did by +extinguishing it in 1793, and to remove any inconvenient rivals by +indicting them as aristocrats. Of the older painters, Fragonard and +Greuze were the only important ones left, and as they could not under +the altered circumstances be considered as rivals to the classical +David, they both saw the century out. Fragonard simply ceased painting +for want of patrons, and David was good enough to procure him a post in +the Museum des Arts, or he would have starved. Unfortunately he +attempted to adapt himself to the new style, and was promptly ejected +from his post--ostensibly on his previous connection with royalty--and +was wise enough to fly to his native town in the south. + +During the first quarter of the nineteenth century the dictatorship of +David was supreme. How it was finally overthrown we shall see in another +chapter. + + + + +_THE ENGLISH SCHOOL_ + + + + +I + +THE EARLY PORTRAIT PAINTERS + + +In the preface to the _Anecdotes of Painting_ written in 1762, Horace +Walpole observes that this country had not a single volume to show on +the works of its painters. "In truth," he continues, "it has very rarely +given birth to a genius in that profession. Flanders and Holland have +sent us the greatest men that we can boast. This very circumstance may +with reason prejudice the reader against a work, the chief business of +which must be to celebrate the art of a country which has produced so +few good artists. This objection is so striking, that instead of calling +it _The Lives of English Painters_, I have simply given it the title of +_Anecdotes of Painting in England_." + +As Walpole's work was merely a compilation from the voluminous notes of +George Vertue, a painstaking antiquary who had collected every scrap of +information he could acquire in the early years of the eighteenth +century, his conclusions can hardly be questioned, and the foundation of +the English school of painting is therefore generally assumed to have +been effected by Reynolds. But as Wren's Cathedral replaced an older one +which was destroyed by the fire of London, and as that was reared on +the foundation of a Roman temple, so we find that the art of painting in +England was certainly practised in earlier times, and but for certain +circumstances much more of it would have survived than is now to be +found. + +In other countries, as we have seen, the Church was in earlier times the +greatest if not the only patron of the arts, and there is plenty of +evidence to show that in England, too, from the reign of Henry III. +onwards till the Reformation, our churches were decorated with frescoes. +This evidence is of two kinds; first, entries in royal and other +accounts, directing payment for specified work; and secondly, the +remains of fresco painting in our cathedrals and churches. The former is +of little interest except to the antiquary. The latter has suffered so +much from neglect or actual destruction as to be considered unworthy of +the attention of either the artist in search of inspiration or the +critic in pursuit of anything to criticise; but when every +inconsiderable production in the little world of English art has had its +bulky quarto written upon it, it is curious that no one has yet +discovered what a splendid harvest awaits the investigation of these old +frescoes all over the country. + +As it is, we have only to note that as religion was so important an +influence on painting in other countries so was it in England, only +unfortunately as a destroying and not a cherishing influence. Granting +the probability that there were few, if any, of our English frescoes +which would be comparable in artistic interest with those in Italy, +where the art was so sedulously cultivated, it must nevertheless be +remembered that only a fragment remains here and there out of all the +work which must have been produced, and that after the Reformation even +those works which did survive were treated with positive as well as +negative obloquy, so that where they have been preserved at all it is +only by having been whitewashed over or otherwise hidden and damaged. + +Even worse than the Reformation in 1530, was the Puritan outburst a +century later, which not only destroyed works of art, but extinguished +all hope of their being created. Is it to be wondered at, then, that the +foundation of the English School of painting should have been postponed +for a century more? + +At the same time it is interesting to note that the little painting +which did creep into England in the sixteenth century, was of the very +kind that formed the chief feature of the English School when it was +finally established, namely portraiture. Here again we see the influence +of religion; for to the reformed church, at least as interpreted by the +English temperament, the second commandment was and is still second only +in number, not in importance. To Protestant or Puritan the idea of a +picture in a church was anathema. As late as 1766, when Benjamin West +offered to decorate St. Paul's Cathedral with a painting of Moses +receiving the tables of the law on Mount Sinai, the Bishop exclaimed, "I +have heard of the proposition, and as I am head of the Cathedral of the +Metropolis, I will not suffer the doors to be opened to introduce +popery." + +The painting of a portrait, however, was a very different matter, and +from the earliest times appears to have appealed with peculiar strength +to the vanity of Britons. Loudly as they protested against the iniquity +of bowing down to and worshipping the likeness of anything in heaven +above or in the earth beneath or in the waters under the earth, they +were never averse to giving others an opportunity of bowing down to and +worshipping the likenesses of themselves; and while religion fostered +the arts in other countries, self-importance kept them alive in this. +The portrait of Richard II. in Westminster Abbey, if not actually an +instance of this, certainly happens to seem like one. + +With the exception of Jan de Mabuse, who is said to have been in England +for a short time during the reign of Henry VII., the first painter of +any importance in this country was Hans Holbein. Hearing that money was +to be made by painting portraits at the English Court, he forsook his +native town, his religious art, and his wife, and came to stay with Sir +Thomas More at Chelsea, with an introduction from Erasmus. Arriving in +1527, he started business by making a sketch in pen and ink of More's +entire family, with which marvellous work, still preserved in the Museum +at Basle, the history of modern English painting may fairly be said to +have begun; for though it was long before a native of England was +forthcoming who was of sufficient force to carry on the tradition, the +seed was sown, and in due course the plant appeared, and after many +vicissitudes, at last flourished. + +The immediate effect may be noted by mentioning here the names of +GUILLIM STREETES, who was possibly English born, and JOHN BETTES who +certainly was. To the former is attributed the large whole-length +portrait at Hampton Court of Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey, in a suit of +bright red. Another portrait of Howard belongs to the Duke of Norfolk, +having been presented to his ancestor by Sir Robert Walpole. Both were +exhibited at the Tudor Exhibition in 1892. Streetes was painter to King +Edward VI., and according to Stype he was paid fifty marks, in 1551, +"for recompense of three great tables whereof two were the pictures of +his Highness sent to Sir Thomas Hoby and Sir John Mason (ambassadors +abroad), the third a picture of the late Earl of Surrey attainted, and +by the Councils' commandment fetched from the said Guillim's house." +Horace Walpole was under the impression that this was the Duke of +Norfolk's picture, but the Hampton Court Catalogue claims the other one +as the work of Streetes. + +In the National Gallery is a bust portrait of Edmund Butts, physician to +Henry VIII., which is inscribed _faict par Johan Bettes Anglois_, and +with the date 1545. In this the influence of Holbein is certainly +discernible, though not all pervading. There were two brothers, THOMAS +and JOHN BETTES who are mentioned by Meres with several other English +painters in _Palladis Tamia_, published in 1598--"As Greece had moreover +their painters, so in England we have also these, William and Francis +Segar, brethren, Thomas and John Bettes, Lockie, Lyne, Peake, Peter +Cole, Arnolde, Marcus (Mark Garrard)," etc. Walpole, quoting this, adds, +"I quote this passage to prove to those who learn one or two names by +rote that every old picture you see is not by Holbein." At the same time +it must be admitted that until some considerable fund of information +concerning these early days of painting is brought to light, there is +very little to be said about any one except Holbein till almost the end +of the sixteenth century. + +That Holbein was "a wonderful artist," as More wrote to Erasmus, is not +to be denied. But in placing him among the very greatest, we must not +forget that his range was somewhat limited. We might nowadays call him a +specialist, for in England he painted nothing but portraits, and very +few of his pictures contained anything besides the single figure, or +head, of the subject. The famous exception is the large picture called +_The Ambassadors_, which was purchased at an enormous price from the +Longford Castle collection, and is now in the National Gallery. +Important and interesting as this is as showing us how Holbein could +fill a large canvas, there is no doubt that he is far happier in simple +portraiture, and that the L60,000 expended on _Christina Duchess of +Milan_ was, relatively, a better investment for the nation. In the +famous half-lengths like the _George Gisze_ at Berlin (which was painted +in London) and the _Man with the Hawk_, where the portrait is surrounded +by accessories, Holbein is perhaps at his very best; but it is as a +painter of heads, simply, that he influenced the English School, and set +an example which, alas! has never been attainable since. + +For one thing, which is apart altogether from talent or genius, +Holbein's method was never followed in later times, namely, the practice +of making carefully finished drawings in crayon before painting a +portrait in oils. He was a wonderful draughtsman, and in the series of +over eighty drawings at Windsor we have even more life-like images of +the persons represented than their finished portraits. I am not aware +that any portrait drawings exists of Holbein's contemporaries or +successors in England earlier than one or two by Van Dyck. There are a +good many belonging to the seventeenth century, but with one or two +exceptions they are little more than sketches. And though sketches have +only survived by accident, as it were, not being intended for anything +more than the artist's own purposes, finished drawings would have been +kept, like Holbein's, with much greater care. + +In a word, then, Holbein's first and chief business was in rendering the +likeness of the sitter. Being a + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXVII.--HANS HOLBEIN + +ANNE OF CLEVES + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +born genius, he accomplished far more than this; but it is important in +tracing the development of the English School of painting to remember +that its origin was not in the idealization of religious sentiment, but +in the realization of the human features. From the time of the first +great genius to that of the next, exactly a century later, there is +hardly a portrait in existence that is valued for anything but its +historic or personal interest. Between Holbein and Van Dyck is a great +gap, in which the only names of Englishmen are those of the +miniaturists, Hilliard and Oliver, who were veritably of the seed of +Holbein, but only in little. + +Van Dyck struck deeper into the English soil, and loosened it +sufficiently for the growth of larger stuff, if still somewhat coarse, +like the work of William Dobson and Robert Walker. To Van Dyck succeeded +Peter Lely, who boldly and worthily assumed the mantle of Van Dyck, and +kept English portraiture alive throughout the dismal period of the +Commonwealth. After the Restoration he was still in power, and under him +flourished one or two painters of English birth, like Greenhill and +Riley, who in turn gave way to others under Kneller without ceding the +monopoly to foreigners. From these came Jervas, Richardson, and, most +important, Hudson, who was Reynolds's master, and so we arrive at the +beginning of what is now generally known as the English School. + +Another source, however, must here be mentioned as joining the main +stream, and contributing a solid body of water to it, chiefly below the +surface, namely the art of WILLIAM HOGARTH. Being essentially English, +and without any artistic forefathers, it is not surprising that he left +less perceptible impressions on his immediate successors than the more +accomplished and educated Reynolds; but the solid force of his +character, as exemplified in his career and his works, is hardly a less +important factor in the development of the English School, while from +his outspoken opinions on the state of the arts in his time he is one of +the most valuable sources of its history. + + + + +II + +WILLIAM HOGARTH + + +WILLIAM HOGARTH occupies a curious position in the history of English +painting. There was nothing ever quite like him in any country--except +Greuze in France; for though a comparison between two such opposites, +seems at first sight absurd, it must be remembered that French and +English painting in the middle of the eighteenth century were no less +far apart. Both Greuze and Hogarth, in their own fashion, tried to +preach moral lessons in paint, the one in the over-refined atmosphere of +French surroundings, the other in the coarse language of England in his +time. + +Hogarth's chief characteristic was his blunt, honest, bull-dog +Englishness, which at the particular moment of his appearance on the +artistic stage was a quality which was eminently serviceable to English +painting. Though of humble parents, his honest and forceful character +won for him the daughter of Sir James Thornhill in marriage (by +elopement) and his sturdy talent in painting secured for him his +father-in-law's forgiveness and encouragement. Thornhill came of a good, +old Wiltshire family, and had been knighted by George I. for his +sterling merits as much as for his skill in painting and decorating the +royal palaces and the houses of noblemen. His place among English +artists is not a very high one, but he deserves the credit of having +stood out against the monopoly that was being established by foreigners +in this country in every department of artistic work, and in this sense +he is a still earlier forerunner of the great English painters, than his +more forcible son-in-law. + +If Hogarth had been content to follow the beaten track of portraiture as +his main pursuit, and let the country's morals take care of themselves, +he would in all probability have attained much greater heights as a +painter. But his nature would not allow him to do this. His character +was too strong and his originality too uncontrollable. There is enough +evidence among the works which have survived him, especially in those +which were never finished, to show that his accomplishments in oil +painting were of a very high order indeed. I need only refer to the +famous head in the National Gallery known as _The Shrimp Girl_ to +explain what I mean. In this surprisingly vivacious and charming sketch +we see something that is not inferior to Hals, in its broad truth and +its quick seizure of the essentials of what had to be rendered. In +another unfinished piece, which is now in the South London Art Gallery +at Camberwell, we see the same powerful qualities differently exhibited, +for it is not a single head this time, but a sketch of a ballroom where +everybody is dancing, except one gentleman who is even more vivid than +the rest, in the act of mopping his head at the open window. There is +nothing grotesque in this picture, but it is all perfectly life-like and +wonderfully sketched in. + +In his finished pictures Hogarth does not appear to such great +advantage--I mean as a painter; but it must be remembered that in his +day there was little example for him to follow in the higher departments +of his art. Nor had he ever been out of England to see fine pictures on +the Continent. Not only this, but as his work was intended especially to +appeal to ordinary people, it is hardly to be expected that he would +express himself in terms other than might most quickly appeal to them. +His most famous works, indeed, were executed as well as designed for the +engraver, namely _The Harlot's Progress_, _The Rake's Progress_, +_Marriage a la Mode_, and _The Election_, each of which consisted of a +series of several minutely finished pictures. In portraiture he showed +finer qualities, it is true; but even in these he was thinking more of +getting the most out of his model, according to his forcible character, +than of any technical refinements for which he might be handed down to +posterity as a great painter. + +It was easy enough for Reynolds to sneer at Hogarth for his vulgarity, +when he was trying to impress upon his pupils the importance of painting +in the grand style. "As for the various departments of painting," he +says in his third Discourse, "which do not presume to make such high +pretensions, they are many. None of them are without their merit, though +none enter into competition with this universal presiding idea of the +art. The painters who have applied themselves more particularly to low +and vulgar characters, and who express with precision the various shades +of passion as they are exhibited by vulgar minds (such as we see in the +works of Hogarth), deserve great praise; but as their genius has been +employed on low and confined subjects, the praise which we must give +must be as limited as its object." And yet it was in following an +example set by Hogarth in portrait painting that Reynolds gained his + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXVIII.--WILLIAM HOGARTH + +THE SHRIMP GIRL + +_National Gallery, London_] + +first success in that art. I mean the full-length portrait of Captain +Keppel, painted in 1752. This originality and boldness in disregarding +the tame but universal convention in posing the sitter was peculiarly +Hogarth's own. With him it amounted almost to perverseness. He would not +let anybody "sit" to him, if he could help it. When he did, as in the +portraits of Quinn, the actor, and Hoadly, Bishop of Winchester, in the +National Gallery, the result is not the happiest; for, with all their +force, these portraits lack the grace that a conventional pose requires +to render it acceptable in the terms of its convention. If a man must +put on the accepted evening dress of his time, he must see that it +conforms in the spirit as well as in the letter of the fashion, or he +will only look like a dressed-up greengrocer. Hogarth was too sturdy and +too wilful to put on court clothes. If he had to, he struggled with +them. + +Hogarth's father was a man of literary tastes, and a scholar. He had +written a supplement to Littleton's Latin Dictionary, but was unable to +get it published. "I saw the difficulties," writes the artist, "under +which my father laboured; the many inconveniences he endured from his +dependence, living chiefly on his pen, and the cruel treatment he met +with from booksellers and printers. I had before my eyes the precarious +situation of men of classical education; it was therefore conformable to +my wishes that I was taken from school and served a long apprenticeship +to a silver-plate engraver." This is printed in Allan Cunningham's _Life +of Hogarth_, together with many more extracts from autobiographical +memoranda, from which we may learn at first hand a great deal of +information bearing on the state of painting at this period, and the +circumstances under which it received such a stimulus from Hogarth, +before the sun had fully risen (in the person of Reynolds) to illumine +the whole period of British art. + +"As I had naturally a good eye and fondness for drawing," Hogarth +continues, "_shows_ of all sorts gave me uncommon pleasure when young, +and mimicry, common to all children, was remarkable in me. An early +access to a neighbouring painter drew my attention from play, and I was +at every possible opportunity engaged in making drawings.... My +exercises at school were more remarkable for the ornaments which adorned +them than for the exercise itself. In the former I soon found that +blockheads with better memories would soon surpass me, but for the +latter I was particularly distinguished. + +"The painting of St. Paul's and Greenwich Hospital, which were at that +time going on, ran in my head, and I determined that silver-plate +engraving should be followed no longer than necessity obliged me to it. +Engraving on copper was, at twenty years of age, my utmost ambition. To +attain that it was necessary that I should learn to draw objects +something like nature, instead of the monsters of heraldry, and the +common methods of study were much too tedious for one who loved his +pleasure and came so late to it.... This led me to consider whether a +shorter road than that usually travelled was not to be found.... I had +learned by practice to copy with tolerable correctness in the ordinary +way, but it occurred to me that there were many disadvantages attending +this method of study, as having faulty originals, etc.; and even when +the prints or pictures to be imitated were by the best masters, it was +little more than pouring water out of one vessel into another. Many +reasons led me to wish that I could find a shorter path--fix forms and +characters in my mind--and, instead of copying the lines, try to read +the language, and if possible find the grammar of the art, by bringing +into one focus the various observations I had made, and then trying by +my power on the canvas how far my plan enabled me to combine and apply +them to practice.... + +"I had one material advantage over my competitors, viz., the early habit +I acquired of retaining in my mind's eye, without coldly copying on the +spot, whatever I intended to imitate.... Instead of burdening the memory +with musty rules, or tiring the eye with copying dry or damaged +pictures, I have ever found studying from nature the shortest and safest +way of obtaining knowledge in my art...." + +"I entertained some thoughts," he writes again, "of succeeding in what +the puffers in books call the great style of history painting, so that, +without having had a stroke of this grand business before, I quitted +small portraits and familiar conversations, and with a smile at my own +temerity commenced history painter, and on a great staircase at St. +Bartholomew's Hospital painted two Scripture stories, _The Pool of +Bethesda_ and _The Good Samaritan_, with figures seven feet high. These +I presented to the charity, and thought that they might serve as a +specimen to show that, were there an inclination in England for +encouraging historical pictures, such a first essay might prove the +painting them more easily attainable than is generally imagined. But as +Religion, the great promoter of this style in other countries, rejected +it in England, and I was unwilling to sink into a +portrait-manufacturer--and still ambitious of being singular, I soon +dropped all expectations of advantage from that source, and returned to +the pursuit of my former dealings with the public at large." + +Few seemed disposed to recognise, in any of Hogarth's works, a higher +aim than that of raising a laugh. Somerville, the poet, dedicated his +_Rural Games_ to Hogarth in these words--"Permit me, Sir, to make choice +of you for my patron, being the greatest master in the burlesque way. +Your province is the town--leave me a small outride in the country, and +I shall be content." Fielding had a different opinion of his merits: "He +who would call the ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter would in my +opinion do him very little honour, for sure it is much easier, much less +the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a nose, or any other +feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in some absurd or +monstrous attitude, than to express the affections of man on canvas. It +hath been thought a vast commendation of a painter to say his figures +seem to breathe, but surely it is a much greater and nobler applause +that they appear to think." + +In answer to criticism of his _Analysis of Beauty_, Hogarth writes: +"Among other crimes of which I am accused, it is asserted that I have +abused the 'Great Masters'; this is far from being just. So far from +attempting to lower the ancients, I have always thought, and it is +universally admitted, that they knew some fundamental principles in +nature which enabled them to produce works that have been the admiration +of succeeding ages; but I have not allowed this merit to those +leaden-headed imitators, who, having no consciousness of either symmetry +or propriety, have attempted to mend nature, and in their truly ideal +figures, gave similar proportions to a Mercury and a Hercules." + +Another and a better spirit influenced him in the following passage--he +is proposing to seek the principles of beauty in nature instead of +looking for them in mere learning. His words are plain, direct, and +convincing. "Nature is simple, plain, and true in all her works, and +those who strictly adhere to her laws, and closely attend to her +appearances in their infinite varieties are guarded against any +prejudicial bias from truth; while those who have seen many things that +they cannot well understand, and read many books which they do not fully +comprehend, notwithstanding all their parade of knowledge, are apt to +wander about it and about it; perplexing themselves and their readers +with the various opinions of other men. As to those painters who have +written treatises on painting, they were in general too much taken up +with giving rules for the operative part of the art, to enter into +physical disquisitions on the nature of the objects." + +After this it would be unfair to withhold the praise of Benjamin West +(who succeeded Reynolds as President of the Royal Academy)--a painter, +prudent in speech, and frugal in commendation. "I remember, when I was a +lad," says Smith, in his account of Nollekens, "asking the late +venerable President West what he thought of Hogarth's _Analysis of +Beauty_, and his answer was, 'It is a work of the highest value to +everyone studying the art. Hogarth was a strutting consequential little +man, and made himself many enemies by that book; but now that most of +them are dead, it is examined by disinterested readers, unbiassed by +personal animosities, and will be more and more read, studied and +understood.'" + +In his memoranda respecting the establishment of an Academy of Art in +England, Hogarth writes well and wisely. Voltaire asserts that after +the establishment of the French Academy not one work of genius appeared, +for all the painters became mannerists and imitators. Hogarth agrees +with him, declaring that "the institution will serve to raise and +pension a few bustling and busy men, whose whole employment will be to +tell a few simple students when a leg is too long, or an arm too short. +More will flock to the study of art than genius sends; the hope of +profit, or the thirst of distinction, will induce parents to push their +offspring into the lecture-room, and many will appear and but few be +worthy. The paintings of Italy form a sort of ornamental fringe to their +gaudy religion, and Rome is the general storeshop of Europe. The arts +owe much to Popery, and Popery owes much of its universality to the +arts. The French have attained to a sort of foppish magnificence in art; +in Holland, selfishness is the ruling passion, and in England vanity is +united with selfishness. Portrait-painting, therefore, has succeeded, +and ever will succeed better in England than in any other country, and +the demand will continue as new faces come into the market. + +"Portrait painting is one of the ministers of vanity, and vanity is a +munificent patroness; historical painting seeks to revive the memory of +the dead, and the dead are very indifferent paymasters. Paintings are +plentiful enough in England to keep us from the study of nature; but +students who confine their studies to the works of the dead, need never +hope to live themselves; they will learn little more than the names of +the painters: true painting can only be learnt in one school, and that +is kept by Nature." + +Hogarth disliked a formal school, says Cunningham, because he was the +pupil of nature, and foresaw that students would flock to it from the +feeling of trade rather than the impulse of genius, and that it become a +manufactory for conventional forms and hereditary graces. Opulent +collectors were filling their galleries with the religious paintings of +the Romish Church, and vindicating their purchases by representing these +works as the only patterns of all that is noble in art and worthy of +imitation. Hogarth perceived that all this was not according to the +natural spirit of the nation; he well knew that our island had not yet +poured out its own original mind in art, as it had done in poetry; and +he felt assured that such a time would come, if native genius were not +overlaid systematically by mock patrons and false instructors. + +"As a painter," says Walpole, "Hogarth has slender merit." "What is the +merit of a painter?" Cunningham concludes. "If it be to represent +life--to give us an image of man--to exhibit the workings of his +heart--to record the good and evil of his nature--to set in motion +before us the very beings with whom earth is peopled--to shake us with +mirth--to sadden us with woeful reflection--to please us with natural +grouping, vivid action, and vigorous colouring--Hogarth has done all +this--and if he that has done so be not a painter, who will show us +one?" + + + + +III + +SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS AND THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH + + +Whether or not SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS is entitled to be ranked among the +very greatest painters, there can be no question that he has a place +among the most famous, not only on account of his actual painting, but +also because of the influence exerted by his whole-hearted devotion to +his art, and his strong character in forming, out of such unpromising +elements, a really vigorous school of painting in this country. The +example he set in the strenuous exercise of his profession, the precepts +he laid down for the guidance of students, and the dignity with which he +invested the whole practice of painting which, until he came, had +degenerated into a mere business, were of incalculable benefit to his +own and succeeding ages, and Edmund Burke was paying him no empty +compliment but only stating the bare truth when he said that Sir Joshua +Reynolds was the first Englishman who added the praise of the elegant +arts to the other glories of his country. + +Joshua Reynolds was born at Plympton in Devonshire on the 16th July +1723; the son of the Rev. Samuel Reynolds and his wife Theophila Potter. +He was on every side connected with the Church, for both his father and +his grandfather were in holy orders, his mother was the daughter of a +clergyman, and his maternal grandmother also. His father's elder +brother, too, was a clergyman, a fellow of Eton College and Canon of St. +Peter's, Exeter. So that here, as in Italy, we start with a basis of +religion. + +The young artist's first essays were made in copying several little +things done by his elder sisters, and he afterwards took great delight +in copying such prints as he met with in his father's books, +particularly those in Plutarch's _Lives_, and in Jacob Cats's _Book of +Emblems_, which his great-grandmother by his father's side, a Dutch +woman, had brought from Holland. When he was only eight years old he +read with great avidity a book called _The Jesuits Perspective_, an +architectural, not a religious work, and made himself so completely +master of it that he never afterwards had occasion to study any other +treatise on the subject. In fact, a drawing which he then made of +Plympton School so filled his father with wonder that he said to him, +"Now this exemplifies what the author of the _Perspective_ says in his +preface--that by observing the rules laid down in his book a man may do +wonders, for this is wonderful!" + +From these attempts he proceeded to draw likenesses of his friends and +relations with tolerable success. But what most strongly confirmed him +in his love of the art was Richardson's _Treatise on Painting_, the +perusal of which so delighted and inflamed his mind, that Raphael +appeared to him superior to the most illustrious names of ancient or +modern times--a notion which he loved to indulge all the rest of his +life. + +Before he was eighteen years old his father placed him as a pupil with +Thomas Hudson, who was then the most distinguished portrait-painter in +England; but having some disagreement with his master, the young man +returned to Devonshire, where he practised portrait painting with more +or less success until in 1749 he accompanied Admiral Keppel to the +Mediterranean, and remained for two or three years studying the old +masters in Italy. + +As this period of Reynold's career had so determining an influence not +only on himself but on the whole course of the history of painting in +England--inasmuch as it formed the greater part of the groundwork of his +discourses when President of the Royal Academy, it is worth having an +account of it at first hand from the painter himself. "It has frequently +happened," he says, "as I was informed by the Keeper of the Vatican, +that many of those whom he had conducted through the various apartments +of that edifice when about to be dismissed, have asked for the works of +Raphael, and would not believe that they had already passed through the +room where they are preserved, so little impression had those +performances made on them. One of the first painters now in France once +told me that this circumstance happened to himself, though he now looks +on Raphael with that veneration which he deserves from all painters and +lovers of the art. I remember very well my own disappointment when I +first visited the the Vatican: but on confessing my feelings to a +brother student, of whose ingenuousness I had a high opinion, he +acknowledged that the works of Raphael had the same effect on him, or +rather that they did not produce the effect which he expected. This was +a great relief to my mind, and on inquiry further of other students I +found that those persons only who from natural imbecility appeared to be +incapable of ever relishing those divine performances, made pretensions +to instantaneous raptures on first beholding them. + +"In justice to myself, however, I must add that though disappointed and +mortified at not finding myself enraptured with the works of this great +master, I did not for a moment conceive or suppose that the name of +Raphael, and those admirable paintings in particular, owed their +reputation to the ignorance and prejudice of mankind; on the contrary, +my not relishing them as I was conscious I ought to have done was one of +the most humiliating circumstances that ever happened to me. I found +myself in the midst of works executed upon principles with which I was +unacquainted: I felt my ignorance, and stood abashed. All the indigested +notions of painting which I had brought with me from England where the +art was in the lowest state it had ever been in (it could not indeed be +lower) were to be totally done away and eradicated from my mind. It was +necessary, as it is expressed on a very solemn occasion, that I should +become _as a little child_. + +"Notwithstanding my disappointment, I proceeded to copy some of those +excellent works. I viewed them again and again; I even affected to feel +their merit and to admire them more than I really did. In a short time a +new taste and new perceptions began to dawn upon me, and I was convinced +that I had originally formed a false opinion of the perfection of art, +and that this great painter was well entitled to the high rank which he +holds in the estimation of the world." + +"When I was at Venice," he writes in a note on Du Fresnoy's _Art of +Painting_ about the chiaroscuro of Titian, Paul Veronese and Tintoretto, +"the method I took to avail myself of their principles was this. When I +observed an extraordinary effect of light and shade in any picture, I +took a leaf of my pocket-book and darkened every part of it in the same +gradation of light and shade as the picture, leaving the white paper +untouched to represent the light, and this without any attention to the +subject or to the drawing of the figures. After a few experiments I +found the paper blotted nearly alike; their general practice appeared to +be to allow not above a quarter of the picture for the light, including +in this portion both the principal and secondary lights; another quarter +to be as dark as possible, and the remaining half kept in mezzotint or +half shadow. + +"Rubens appears to have admitted rather more light than a quarter, and +Rembrandt much less, scarce an eighth; by this conduct Rembrandt's light +is extremely brilliant, but it costs too much, the rest of the picture +is sacrificed to this one object." + +The results of these studies in Rome and Venice were at once observable +on his return to England in the beautiful portrait of _Giuseppe Marchi_, +one of the treasures belonging to the Royal Academy. It was altogether +too much for the ignorant British artists, and it excited lively +comment. What chiefly attracted the public notice, however, was the +whole-length portrait which he painted of his friend and patron Admiral +Keppel. On the appearance of this Reynolds was not only universally +acknowledged to be at the head of his profession, but to be the greatest +painter that England had seen since Van Dyck. The whole interval, as +Malone observes, between the time of Charles I. and the conclusion of +the reign of George II. seemed to be annihilated, and the only question +was whether the new painter or Van Dyck were the more excellent. +Reynolds very soon saw how much animation might be obtained by deviating +from the insipid manner of his immediate predecessors, and instead of +confining himself to mere likeness he dived, as it were, into the minds +and habits and manners of those who sat to him, and accordingly the +majority of his portraits are so appropriate and characteristic that the +many illustrious persons whom he has delineated are almost as well known +to us as if we had seen and conversed with them. + +Very soon after his return from Italy his acquaintance with Dr Johnson +commenced, and their intimacy continued uninterrupted to the time of +Johnson's death. How much he profited thereby, especially in the +practice of art, he has recorded in a paper which was intended to form a +part of one of his discourses. "I remember," he writes, "Mr Burke +speaking of the _Essays_ of Sir Francis Bacon, said he thought them the +best of his works. Dr Johnson was of opinion 'that their excellence and +their value consisted in being the observations of a strong mind +operating upon life; and in consequence you find there what you seldom +find in other books,' It is this kind of excellence which gives a value +to the performances of artists also.... The observations which he made +on poetry, on life, and on everything about us, I applied to our art; +with what success others must judge. Perhaps an artist in his studies +should pursue the same conduct, and instead of patching up a particular +work on the narrow plan of imitation, rather endeavour to acquire the +art and power of thinking." + +In another passage from his memoranda, quoted by Malone, Sir Joshua lets +us into some more of the secrets of his pre-eminence in his art, both of +painter and preceptor: for we are to remember that the British School of +painting owes more to the influence of Reynolds than perhaps any other +school to the example of one man:-- + +"I considered myself as playing a great game," he writes, "and instead +of beginning to save money, I laid it out faster than I got it in, +purchasing the best examples of art that could be procured; for I even +borrowed money for this purpose. The possessing portraits by Titian, Van +Dyck, Rembrandt, etc., I considered as the best kind of wealth. By +studying carefully the works of great masters, this advantage is +obtained--we find that certain niceties of expression are capable of +being executed, which otherwise we might suppose beyond the reach of +art. This gives us a confidence in ourselves, and we are thus incited to +endeavour at not only the same happiness of execution but also at other +congenial excellencies. Study indeed consists in learning to see nature, +and may be called the art of using other men's minds. By this kind of +contemplation and exercise we are taught to think in their way, and +sometimes to attain their excellence. Thus, for instance, if I had never +seen any of the works of Correggio, I should never perhaps have remarked +in nature the expression which I find in one of his pieces; or if I had +remarked it I might have thought it too difficult, or perhaps impossible +to be executed. + +"My success and continual improvement in my art (if I may be allowed +that expression), may be ascribed in a good measure to a principle which +I will boldly recommend to imitation; I mean the principle of honesty; +which in this as in all other instances is according to the vulgar +proverb certainly the best policy: I always endeavoured to do my best. + +"My principal labour was employed on the whole together, and I was never +weary of changing and trying different modes and different effects. I +had always some scheme in my mind, and a perpetual desire to advance. By +constantly endeavouring to do my best, I acquired a power of doing that +with spontaneous facility that which at first was the effort of my whole +mind." + +"I had not an opportunity of being early initiated in the principles of +colouring"; he continues, "no man indeed could teach me. If I have never +been settled with respect to colouring, let it at the same time be +remembered that my unsteadiness in this respect proceeded from an +inordinate desire to possess every kind of excellence that I ever saw in +the works of others, without considering that there are in colouring, as +in style, excellencies which are incompatible with each other.... I +tried every effect of colour, and by leaving out every colour in its +turn, showed every colour that I could do without it. As I alternately +left out every + +[Illustration: PLATE XXXIX.--SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS + +LADY COCKBURN AND HER CHILDREN + +_National Gallery, London_] + +colour, I tried every new colour; and often, as is well known, +failed.... My fickleness in the mode of colouring arose from an eager +desire to attain the highest excellence." + +In the year 1759 Reynolds began to write, and three of his essays were +printed in the _Idler_, which was conducted by Dr. Johnson. Northcote +records that at the same time he committed to paper a variety of remarks +which afterwards served him as hints for his discourses. One or two of +these will give us as good an idea as we are likely to get from +elsewhere of what are the first requisites of a successful painter. + +"It is absolutely necessary that a painter, as the first requisite, +should endeavour as much as possible to form to himself an idea of +perfection not only of beauty, but of what is perfection in a picture. +This conception he should always have fixed in his view, and unless he +has this view we shall never see any approaches towards perfection in +his works; for it will not come by chance. + +"If a man has nothing of that which is called genius, that is, if he is +not carried away, if I may so say, by the animation, the fire of +enthusiasm, all the rules in the world will never make him a painter. + +"He who possesses genius is enabled to see a real value in those things +which others disregard and overlook. He perceives a difference in cases +where inferior capacities see none; as the fine ear for music can +distinguish an evident variation in sounds which to another ear more +dull seem to be the same. This example will also apply to the eye in +respect to colouring." + +In the beginning of the year 1760, Reynolds moved into the house on the +west side of Leicester Square which he occupied for the rest of his +life. It is now tenanted by Messrs. Puttick & Simpson, the Auctioneers. +Northcote has usefully recorded the following details his studio. His +painting-room was of an octagonal form, about twenty feet long and about +sixteen in breath. The window which gave the light to this room was +square, and not much larger than one half the size of a common window in +a private house, whilst the lower part of this window was nine feet four +inches from the floor. The chair for his sitters was raised eighteen +inches from the floor, and turned round on castors. His palettes were +those which are held by a handle, not those held on the thumb. The +sticks of his pencils (brushes) were long, measuring about nineteen +inches. He painted in that part of the room nearest the window, and +never sat down when he worked. As the actual methods of a great artist +are possibly of more value in a history of painting than the subjects, +or even the prices, of his pictures, I venture to quote the following +extracts from various parts of Sir Joshua's own memoranda:-- + +Never give the least touch with your pencil (_i.e._ brush) till you have +present in your mind a perfect idea of your future work. + +Paint at the greatest possible distance from your sitter, and place the +picture ... near to the sitter, or sometimes under him, so as to see +both together. + +In beautiful faces keep the whole circumference about the eye in a +mezzotinto, as seen in the works of Guido and the best of Carlo Maratti. + +Endeavour to look at the subject or sitter from which you are painting, +as if it was a picture. This will in some degree render it more easy to +be copied. + +In painting consider the object before you, whatever it may be, as more +made out by light and shadow than by lines. + +A student should begin his career by a careful finishing and making out +the parts; as practice will give him freedom and facility of hand: a +bold and unfinished manner is commonly the habit of old age. + +On painting a head-- + +Let those parts which turn or retire from the eye be of broken or mixed +colours, as being less distinguished and nearer the borders. + +Let all your shadows be of one colour: glaze them till they are so. + +Use red colours in the shadows of the most delicate complexions, but +with discretion. + +Contrive to have a screen with red or yellow colour on it, to reflect +the light on the shaded part of the sitter's face. + +Avoid the chalk, the brick dust, and the charcoal, and think on a pearl +and a ripe peach. + +Avoid long continued lines in the eyes, and too many sharp ones. + +Take care to give your figure a sweep or sway. + +Outlines in waves, soft, and almost imperceptible against the +background. + +Never make the contour too coarse. + +Avoid also those outlines and lines which are equal, which make +parallels, triangles, etc. + +The parts which are nearest to the eye appear most enlightened, deeper +shadowed, and better seen. + +Keep broad lights and shadows, and also principal lights and shadows. + +Where there is the deepest shadow it is accompanied by the brightest +light. + +Let nothing start out or be too strong for its place. + +Squareness has grandeur; it gives firmness to the forms; a serpentine +line in comparison appears feeble and tottering. + + * * * * * + +One is apt to forget in these enlightened days how greatly the art of +painting benefited by the establishment of public exhibitions. +Farington's observations on this point, occasioned by the inauguration +of the exhibitions at the Society of Arts from 1760, until the +foundation of the Royal Academy in 1768, are both instructive and +amusing. + +"The history of our exhibitions," he says "affords the strongest +evidence of their impressive effect upon public taste. At their +commencement, though men of enlightened minds could distinguish and +appreciate what was excellent, the admiration of the _many_ was confined +to subjects either gross or puerile, and commonly to the meanest efforts +of intellect; whereas at this time (1819) the whole train of subjects +most popular in the earlier exhibitions have disappeared. The loaf and +cheese that could provoke hunger, the cat and canary bird, and the dead +mackerel on a deal board, have long ceased to produce astonishment and +delight; while truth of imitation now finds innumerable admirers though +combined with the highest qualities of beauty, grandeur and taste. + +"To our public exhibitions, and to arrangements that followed in +consequence of their introduction this change must be chiefly +attributed. The present generation appears to be composed of a new and, +at least with respect to the arts, a superior order of beings. Generally +speaking, their thoughts, their feelings and language, differ entirely +from what they were sixty years ago. The state of the public mind, +incapable of discriminating excellence from inferiority proved +incontrovertibly that a right sense of art in the spectator can only be +acquired by long and frequent observation, and that without proper +opportunities to improve the mind and the eye, a nation would continue +insensible of the true value of the fine arts." + +In view of these very pertinent observations it is worth inquiring a +little as to the origin of exhibitions in England, and the stimulus +given by them to British art before the institution of the Royal +Academy. From the introduction to book written by Edward Edwards, in +continuation of Walpole's "Anecdotes of Painters," and published in +1808, I extract the following account of them, as far as possible using +his own quaint phraseology. + +Although the study of the human form had long been cultivated and +encouraged in Italy and France by national schools or academies, yet in +England until the eighteenth century such seminaries were unknown; and +it is therefore difficult to trace the origin or ascertain the precise +period when those nurseries of art were first attempted in this country, +especially as every establishment of that kind was, at first, of a +private and temporary nature, depending chiefly upon the protection of +some artist of rank and reputation in his day. The first attempt towards +the establishment of an academy is mentioned by Walpole as having been +formed by several artists under Sir Godfrey Kneller in 1711. Afterwards +we find, by other accounts in the same author, which are corroborated by +authentic information, that Sir James Thornhill formed an academy in his +own house, in the Piazza, Covent Garden. But this was not of long +duration, for it commenced in 1724 and died in 1734; which reduced the +artists again to seek some new seminary; for the public of that day were +so little acquainted with the use of such schools, that they were even +suspected of being held for immoral purposes. + +After the death of Thornhill a few of the artists (chiefly foreigners), +finding themselves without the necessary example of the living model, +formed a small society and established their regular meetings of study +in a convenient apartment in Greyhound Court, Arundel Street. The +principal conductor of this school was Michael Moser, who when the Royal +Academy was established was appointed keeper. Here they were visited by +artists such as Hogarth, Wills, and Ellis, who were so well pleased with +the propriety of their conduct, and so thoroughly convinced of the +utility of the institution, that a general union took place, and the +members thereby becoming numerous, they required and sought for a more +convenient situation and accommodation for their school. By the year +1739 they were settled in Peter's Court, St Martin's Lane, where the +study of the human figure was carried on till 1767, when they removed to +Pall Mall. + +But a permanent and conspicuous establishment was still wanting, and on +this account the principal artists had several meetings with a view to +forming a public academy. This they did not succeed in doing; but they +were so far from being discouraged that they continued their meetings +and their studies, and the next effort they made towards acquiring the +attention of the public was connected with the Foundling Hospital. This +institution was incorporated in 1739, and a few years later the present +building was erected; but as the income of the charity could not, with +propriety, be expended upon decorations, many of the principal artists +of that day voluntarily exerted their talents for the purpose of +ornamenting several apartments of the Hospital which otherwise must +have remained without decoration. The pictures thus produced, and +generously given, were permitted to be seen by any visitor upon proper +application. The spectacle was so new that it made a considerable +impression upon the public, and the favourable reception these works +experienced impressed the artists with an idea of forming a public +exhibition, which scheme was carried into full effect with the help of +the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, +who lent their great room for the purpose. + +The success of this, the first, public display of art was more than +equal to the general expectation. Yet there were some circumstances, +consequent to the arrangement of the pictures, with which the artists +were very justly dissatisfied; they were occasioned by the following +improprieties. The Society in the same year had offered premiums for the +best painting of history and landscape, and it was one of the conditions +that the pictures produced by the candidates should remain in their +great room for a certain time; consequently they were blended with the +rest, and formed part of the exhibition. As soon as it was known which +performances had obtained the premiums, it was naturally supposed, by +such persons who were deficient in judgment, that those pictures were +the best in the room, and consequently deserved the chief attention. +This partial, though unmerited, selection gave displeasure to the +artists in general. Nor were they pleased with the mode of admitting the +spectators, for every member of the Society had the discretionary +privilege of introducing as many persons as he chose, by means of +gratuitous tickets; and consequently the company was far from being +select, or suited to the wishes of the exhibition. These circumstances, +together with the interference of the Society in the concern of the +exhibition, determined the principal artists to withdraw themselves, +which they did in the next year. + +Encouraged by the success of their first attempt, they engaged the great +room in Spring Garden, and their first exhibition at that place opened +on the 9th May 1761. Here they found it necessary to change their mode +of admission, which they did by making the catalogue the ticket of +admission; consequently one catalogue would admit a whole family in +succession, for a shilling, which was its price; but this mode of +admittance was still productive of crowd and disorder, and it was +therefore altered the next year. This exhibition, which was the second +in this country, contained several works of the best English artists, +among which many of the pictures were equal to any masters then living +in Europe; and so strikingly conspicuous were their merits, and so +forcible was the effect of this display of art, that it drew from the +pen of Roubilliac, the sculptor, the following lines, which were stuck +up in the exhibition room, and were also printed in the _St James's +Chronicle_:-- + + Pretendu Connoiseur qui sur l'Antique glose, + Idolatrant le hom, sans connoitre la Chose, + Vrai Peste des beaux Arts, sans Gout sans Equite, + Quitez ce ton pedant, ce mepris affecte, + Pour tout ce que le Tems n'a pas encore gate. + + Ne peus tu pas, en admirant + Les Maitres de la Grece, ceux d l'Italie + Rendre justice egalement + A ceux qu'a nourris ta Patrie? + + Vois ce Salon, et tu perdras + Cette prevention injuste, + Et bien etonne conviendras + Qu'il ne faut pas qu'un Mecenas + Pour revoir le Siecle d'Auguste. + +"In the following season," says Edwards, "they ventured to fix the price +of _admission_ at one shilling each person, but had the precaution to +affix a conciliatory preface to their catalogue, which was given +gratis," As it is becoming more and more usual of late years to preface +a catalogue with a signed article, or, as in a recent instance, a +facsimile letter, it is interesting to know that this "conciliatory +preface" was written by Dr Johnson. As a document its value in the +history of the British School of Painting demands its reproduction here +in full:-- + +"The public may justly require to be informed of the nature and extent +of every design for which the favour of the public is openly solicited. +The artists who were themselves the first promoters of an exhibition in +this nation, and who have now contributed to the following catalogue, +think it therefore necessary to explain their purpose, and justify their +conduct. An exhibition of the works of art being a spectacle new in this +kingdom, has raised various opinions and conjectures among those who are +unacquainted with the practice in foreign nations. Those who set their +performances to general view, have been too often considered as the +rivals of each other; as men actuated, if not by avarice, at least by +vanity, and contending for superiority of fame, though not for a +pecuniary prize. It cannot be denied or doubted, that all who offer +themselves to criticism are desirous of praise; this desire is not only +innocent but virtuous, while it is undebased by artifice, and unpolluted +by envy; and of envy or artifice those men can never be accused, who +already enjoying all the honours and profits of their profession are +content to stand candidates for public notice, with genius yet +unexperienced, and diligence yet unrewarded; who without any hope of +increasing their own reputation or interest, expose their names and +their works, only that they may furnish an opportunity of appearance to +the young, the diffident, and the neglected. The purpose of this +exhibition is not to enrich the artist, but to advance the art; the +eminent are not flattered with preference, nor the obscure insulted with +contempt; whoever hopes to deserve public favour, is here invited to +display his merit. Of the price put upon this exhibition some account +may be demanded. Whoever sets his work to be shewn, naturally desires a +multitude of spectators; but his desire defeats its own end, when +spectators assemble in such numbers as to obstruct one another. + +"Though we are far from wishing to diminish the pleasures, or to +depreciate the sentiments of any class of the community, we know, +however, what every one knows, that all cannot be judges or purchasers +of works of art. Yet we have already found by experience, that all are +desirous to see an exhibition. When the terms of admission were low, our +room was throng'd with such multitudes, as made access dangerous, and +frightened away those, whose approbation was most desired. + +"Yet because it is seldom believed that money is got but for the love of +money, we shall tell the use which we intend to make of our expected +profits. Many artists of great abilities are unable to sell their works +for their due price; to remove this inconvenience, an annual sale will +be appointed, to which every man may send his works, and send them, if +he will, without his name. These works will be reviewed by the committee +that conduct the exhibition; a price will be secretly set on every +piece, and registered by the secretary; if the piece exposed for sale is +sold for more, the whole price shall be the artist's; but if the +purchasers value it at less than + +[Illustration: PLATE XL.--SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS + +THE AGE OF INNOCENCE + +_National Gallery, London_] + +the committee, the artist shall be paid the deficiency from the profits +of the exhibition." + + * * * * * + +This mode of admission was found to answer all the wished-for purposes, +and the visitors, who were highly respectable, were also perfectly +gratified with the display of art, which, for the first time, they +beheld with ease and pleasure to themselves. + +The exhibition, thus established, continued at Spring Garden Room, under +the direction and management of the principal artists by whom it was +first promoted, and they were soon also joined by many of those who had +continued to exhibit in the Strand (_i.e._ at the Society of Arts, +etc.), which party being mostly composed of young men, and others who +chose to become candidates for the premiums given by the Society, +thought it prudent to remain under their protection. But the Society +finding that those who continued with them began to diminish in their +numbers, and that the exhibition interfered with their own concerns, no +longer indulged them with the use of their room, and the exhibitions at +that place terminated in 1764. These artists, who were mostly the +younger part of the profession at that time, thereupon engaged a large +room in Maiden Lane, where they exhibited in 1765 and 1766. But this +situation not being favourable, they engaged with Mr Christie, in +building his room near Pall Mall, and the agreement was that they should +have it for their use during one month every year, in the spring. Here +they contrived to support a feeble exhibition for eight years, when +their engagements interfering with Mr Christie's auctions, he purchased +their share of the premises, and they made their last removal to a room +in S. Alban's Street, where they exhibited the next season, but never +after attempted to attract public notice. It may be observed that while +this Society continued there were annually three exhibitions of the +works of English artists, namely, the Royal Academy, the Chartered +Society, and that last mentioned, the members of which styled themselves +the Free Society of Artists. Their exhibition was considerably inferior +to those of their rivals. By the Chartered Society, Edwards means the +artists who formed the exhibition at the Spring Garden Room, who in 1765 +obtained a Charter from the king. Owing partly to internal +disagreements, but more no doubt to the foundation of the Royal Academy +in 1768, this Society gradually diminished in importance, until Edwards +could write of their exhibition in 1791 that "the articles they had then +collected were very insignificant, most of which could not be considered +as works of art; such as pieces of needlework, subjects in human hair, +cut paper, and such similar productions as deserve not the +recommendation of a public exhibition," + + * * * * * + +To the first exhibition of the Royal Academy, which was opened on the +2nd of January 1769, Reynolds sent three pictures:-- + +_The Duchess of Manchester and her son, as Diana disarming Cupid._ + +_Lady Blake, as Juno receiving the Cestus of Venus._ + +_Miss Morris as Hope nursing Love._ + +That all of them were, so to speak, "fancy portraits" is not entirely +without significance. Portraiture, the painters bread and butter, was +apparently deemed hardly suitable for the occasion, and among a list of +the pictures which attracted most attention Northcote only includes the +portraits of the _King and Queen_ by Nathaniel Dance, _Lady Molyneux_ by +Gainsborough, and the _Duke of Gloucester_ by Cotes. The rest are as +follows:--_The Departure of Regulus from Rome_, and _Venus lamenting the +Death of Adonis_, by Benjamin West; _Hector and Andromache_, and _Venus +directing Aeneas and Achates_, by Angelica Kauffmann; _A Piping Boy_, +and _A Candlelight Piece_, by Nathaniel Hone; _An Altar-Piece_ of the +Annunciation by Cipriani; _Hebe_, and _A Boy Playing Cricket_, by Cotes; +A landscape by Barrett, and _Shakespeare's Black-smith_, by Penny. + +In all, Reynolds exhibited two hundred and fifty-two pictures during the +thirty-two years of his life in which exhibitions existed, namely from +1760 to 1791; of which two hundred and twenty-eight went to the Royal +Academy. + +Of these, or most of them, ample records and criticisms may be found in +the copious literature which has grown up around his name. For our +present purpose a glance at his influence, his methods, and his +circumstances has seemed to me to be more in point, and as a succinct +estimate of the man and his work from one of his most illustrious +contemporaries, the following passage may be added by way of +conclusion:-- + +"Sir Joshua Reynolds," wrote Edmund Burke six years after the painter's +death, "was on very many accounts one of the most memorable men of his +time. He was the first Englishman who added the praise of the elegant +arts to the other glories of his country. In taste, in grace, in +facility, in happy invention, and in the richness and harmony of +colouring, he was equal to the great masters of the renowned ages. In +portraiture he went beyond them, for he communicated to that description +of the art, in which English artists are the most engaged, a fancy and a +dignity derived from the higher branches, which even those who +professed, them in a superior manner, did not always preserve when they +delineated individual nature. His portraits remind the spectator of the +invention of history and the amenity of landscape. In painting portraits +he appeared not to be raised upon that platform, but to descend to it +from a higher sphere. His paintings illustrate his lessons, and his +lessons seem to be derived from his paintings. He possessed the theory +as perfectly as the practice of his art. To be such a painter, he was a +profound and penetrating philosopher." + + * * * * * + +THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH (1727-1788), whose name we can seldom help thinking +of whenever we hear that of Reynolds, was in many ways the very +antithesis of his more illustrious rival. In his private life he most +certainly was, and so far as his practical influence on his +contemporaries is concerned, he is altogether overshadowed by the first +President of the Royal Academy. With respect to their works there is a +diversity of opinion, and it is largely a matter of personal feeling +whether we prefer those of the one or of the other. Both were great +artists, and on the common ground of portraiture they contended so +equally, and in some cases with such similarity of method, that it is +impossible to say impartially which was the greater. How is it possible +to decide except on the ground of individual taste, as to whether we +would rather lose Gainsborough or Reynolds as a portrait painter, +without considering for a moment that the former was a great landscape +painter as well? And, putting aside Wilson, whose landscape was +essentially Italian, whether executed in Italy or not, the first +landscape painter in England was Gainsborough. We are so accustomed to +bracket him with Reynolds as a great portrait painter, so thrilled over +the sale of a Gainsborough portrait for many thousands of pounds, that +we are apt to forget him altogether as a landscape painter. And yet two +or three of his best works in the National Gallery are landscapes, and +two of them at least famous ones--_The Market Cart_ and _The Watering +Place_. How many more beautiful landscapes by him there must be in +existence it is impossible to say, but there can be no doubt that there +are not a few which are only waiting their turn for a fashionable +market, but are now reposing unappreciated in private hands. In the +Metropolitan Museum at New York is a splendid example, the like of which +I have never seen in this country, but which is so much closer in +feeling to his numerous drawings and sketches in chalk or pencil that it +is impossible to believe that no similar examples exist. If we could +only bring them to light! + +The fact is that the state of society in the middle of the eighteenth +century was, with all its brilliance and intellect, the cause of +hampering the natural development of the three great painters of that +period. Reynolds came back from his stay in Italy an ardent disciple of +the grand style, burning to follow the example of Raphael and +Michelangelo. Romney, too, was all for Italian art, but looked further +back, and worshipped the classics. Gainsborough was a born landscape +painter, and his whole time was devoted, when he was not executing +commissions for portraits, to making sketches and studies of woods and +valleys and trees. But so bent on having their likenesses handed about +were the brilliant personages of their time, that Reynolds, Gainsborough +and Romney were compelled in spite of themselves to turn their +attention to portraiture, to the exclusion of every other branch of +their art, and as portrait painters they have made themselves and their +country famous. + +In the numerous sketches and studies that Gainsborough has left us, we +can see how much we have lost in gaining his wonderful portraits. He +loved landscape, from his earliest youth to his dying day. Loved it for +itself. For among all the drawings of his which I have ever seen, I do +not remember one which can be identified as any particular place. In the +eighteenth century there was a perfect mania among the smaller fry for +making topographical drawings, in pencil or water-colour, views of some +town or mountain or castle. But with Gainsborough the place was +nothing--it was the spirit of it that charmed him. A cottage in a wood, +a glade, a country road, a valley, was to him a beautiful scene, +whatever it was called or wherever it happened to be, and out of it +accordingly he made a beautiful picture, or at least a drawing. That his +pictures of landscape are so extraordinarily few while his drawings are +so numerous, may be accounted for in a great measure by the exigences of +portrait painting, but not entirely; and the probability is that there +are many more which are now forgotten. + +For an estimate of Thomas Gainsborough both in regard to his place in +the story of the English School and to the abilities and methods by +which he attained it, it is needless to look elsewhere than to that of +Sir Joshua Reynolds, contained in the discourse delivered shortly after +Gainsborough's death:-- + +"When such a man as Gainsborough rises to great fame without the +assistance of an academical education, without travelling to Italy, or +any of those preparatory studies which have been so often recommended, +he is produced + +[Illustration: PLATE XLI.--THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH + +THE MARKET CART + +_National Gallery, London_] + +as an instance how little such studies are necessary, since so great +excellence may be acquired without them. This is an inference not +warranted by the success of any individual, and I trust that it will not +be thought that I wish to make this use of it. + +"It must be remembered that the style and department of art which +Gainsborough chose, and in which he so much excelled, did not require +that he should go out of his own country for the objects of his study; +they were everywhere about him; he found them in the streets, and in the +fields; and from the models thus accidentally found he selected with +great judgment such as suited his purpose. As his studies were directed +to the living world principally, he did not pay a general attention to +the works of the various masters, though they are, in my opinion, always +of great use even when the character of our subject requires us to +depart from some of their principles. It cannot be denied that +excellence in the department of the art which he professed may exist +without them, that in such subjects and in the manner that belongs to +them the want of them is supplied, and more than supplied, by natural +sagacity and a minute observation of particular nature. If Gainsborough +did not look at nature with a poet's eye, it must be acknowledged that +he saw her with the eye of a painter; and gave a faithful, if not a +poetical, representation of what he had before him. + +"Though he did not much attend to the works of the great historical +painters of former ages, yet he was well aware that the language of the +art--the art of imitation--must be learned somewhere; and as he knew he +could not learn it in an equal degree from his contemporaries, he very +judiciously applied himself to the Flemish school, who are undoubtedly +the greatest masters of one necessary branch of art, and he did not +need to go out of his country for examples of that school; from _that_ +he learned the harmony of colouring, the management and disposition of +light and shadow, and every means of it which the masters practised to +ornament and give splendour to their works. And to satisfy himself, as +well as others, how well he knew the mechanism and artifice which they +employed to bring out that tone of colour which we so much admire in +their works, he occasionally made copies from Rubens, Teniers and Van +Dyck, which it would be no disgrace to the most accurate connoisseur to +mistake at the first sight for the works of those masters. What he thus +learned he applied to the originals of nature, which he saw with his own +eyes, and imitated not in the manner of those masters but in his own. + +"Whether he most excelled in portraits, landscapes, or fancy pictures, +it is difficult to determine; whether his portraits were most admirable +for exact truth of resemblance, or his landscapes for a portrait-like +representation of nature, such as we see in the works of Rubens, +Ruisdael, or others of those schools. In his fancy pictures, when he had +fixed on his object of imitation, whether it was the mean and vulgar +form of the woodcutter, or a child of an interesting character, as he +did not attempt to raise the one, so neither did he lose any of the +natural grace and elegance of the other; such a grace and such an +elegance as are more frequently found in cottages than in courts. This +excellence was his own, the result of his particular observation and +taste; for this he was certainly not indebted to the Flemish school, nor +indeed to any school; for his grace was not academic, or antique, but +selected by himself from the great school of nature.... + +"Upon the whole we may justly say that whatever he attempted he carried +to a high degree of excellence. It is to the credit of his good sense +and judgment that he never did attempt that style of historical painting +for which his previous studies had made no preparation. + +"The peculiarity of his manner or style," Reynolds continues a little +later, "or we may call it the language in which he expressed his ideas, +has been considered by many as his greatest defect.... A novelty and +peculiarity of manner, as it is often a cause of our approbation, so +likewise it is often a ground of censure, as being contrary to the +practice of other painters, in whose manner we have been initiated, and +in whose favour we have perhaps been prepossessed from our infancy: for +fond as we are of novelty, we are upon the whole creatures of habit. +However, it is certain that all those odd scratches and marks which on a +close examination are so observable in Gainsborough's pictures, and +which even to experienced painters appear rather the effect of accident +than design; this chaos, this uncouth and shapeless appearance, by a +kind of magic, at a certain distance assumes form, and all the parts +seem to drop into their proper places; so that we can hardly refuse +acknowledging the full effect of diligence under the appearance of +chance and hasty negligence. + +"That Gainsborough himself considered this peculiarity in his manner, +and the power it possesses of exciting surprise, as a beauty in his +works, I think may be inferred from the eager desire which we know he +always expressed, that his pictures at the exhibition should be seen +near as well as at a distance. + +"The slightness which we see in his best works cannot always be imputed +to negligence. However they may appear to superficial observers, +painters know very well that a steady attention to the general effect +takes up more time and is much more laborious to the mind than any mode +of high finishing or smoothness without such attention. His handling, +the manner of leaving the colours, or, in other words, the methods he +used for producing the effect, had very much the appearance of the work +of an artist who had never learnt from others the usual and regular +practice belonging to the art; but still, like a man of strong intuitive +perception of what was required, he found a way of his own to accomplish +his purpose." + +To Reynolds's opinion of this technique as applied to portraits, we may +listen with even more attention. "It must be allowed," he continues, +"that this hatching manner of Gainsborough did very much contribute to +the lightness of effect which is so eminent a beauty in his pictures; +as, on the contrary, much smoothness and uniting the colours is apt to +produce heaviness. Every artist must have remarked how often that +lightness of hand which was in his dead-colour (or first painting) +escaped in the finishing when he had determined the parts with more +precision; and another loss which he often experiences, which is of +greater consequence: while he is employed in the detail, the effect of +the whole together is either forgotten or neglected. The likeness of a +portrait, as I have formerly observed, consists more in preserving the +general effect of the countenance than in the most minute finishing of +the features or any of the particular parts. Now, Gainsborough's +portraits were often little more in regard to finishing or determining +the form of the features, than what generally attends a first painting; +but as he was always attentive to the general effect, or whole +together, I have often imagined that this unfinished manner contributed +even to that striking resemblance for which his portraits are so +remarkable." + + + + +IV + +THE CLOSE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY + + +Not until the year of Gainsborough's death, 1788, was there born another +landscape painter. This was JOHN CROME, and he too came from the east of +England, nearest to Holland, being born in Norfolk, the neighbouring +county to Gainsborough's native Suffolk. Within ten years more, two +still greater landscapists were born, also in the east, Constable in +Essex, still closer to Sudbury, and Turner in London. + +John Crome--Old Crome, as he is usually called to distinguish him from +his less distinguished son, John Bernay Crome--was born at Norwich, and +had to support himself most of his life by teaching drawing, not to +professional pupils unfortunately; but incidentally he founded "The +Norwich School" of landscape painters, who loyally carried forward the +traditions he had inculcated. But having to spend his time as a +drawing-master, he was not free like the old Dutch painters to put out +pictures when and as often as he would, and his work in oils is +therefore comparatively scarce. The three examples at the National +Gallery are typical of his varied powers, _The Slate Quarries_, +_Household Heath_, and _Porringland Oak_ are all of them masterpieces. + +JOHN SELL COTMAN, born in 1782, was, after Crome, the most considerable +of the Norwich School. He, too, was compelled to earn a livelihood by +being a drawing-master, for there was not as yet a sufficient market, +nor for some time later, for landscape pictures, to support existence, +however humble. Cotman devoted much of his energies to water-colours, +and he is better known in this branch of the art than in painting; that +is the only excuse for the National Gallery in having purchased as his +the very inferior picture called _A Galliot in a Gale_. The other +example, _Wherries on the Yare_, is more worthy of him, though it by no +means exhibits all his wonderful power and fascination. + +In GEORGE MORLAND (1763-1804) we have something more and something less +than a landscape painter. Landscape to him was not what it was to +Wilson, Gainsborough or Crome,--the only end in view; nor was it merely +a background for his subjects. But, as it generally happened, it was +both. To Morland, the landscape and the figures were one and the same +thing. Out of the fulness of his heart he painted pictures of _Boys +Robbing an Orchard_, _Horses in a Stable_, or a _Farmer on Horseback_ +staying to talk to a group of gypsies beside a wood, and whether or not +the picture might be classed as a landscape depended entirely on the +nature of the scene itself. Whatever he saw or chose to see he painted +with equal skill and with equal charm; and as his choice of vision lay +in the simple everyday life that surrounded him, his variety is not the +least of his attractions. + +The fact that his mother was a Frenchwoman (his father was Henry +Morland, the painter of the delightful pair of half-lengths, _The +Laundry Maids_) suggests to my mind the wild surmise that she may have +been the daughter of Chardin. For in the technique as well as in the +temperament of Morland,--making allowance for difference of +circumstances,--there is something remarkably akin to those of the great +Frenchman. Both eschewed the temptation to become fashionable, both +painted the humble realities of middle-class life with a zest that could +not possibly have been affected, and both painted them with much the +same extraordinary charm. At his best, Morland is not much inferior to +Chardin, and but for his unfortunate wildness and his susceptibility to +the temptations of strong drink, he might easily have excelled the +other. The feeling exhibited in two such different subjects as Lord +Glenconner's _Boys Robbing an Orchard_, and _The Interior of a Stable_, +in the National Gallery, certainly equals that of Chardin's most famous +pieces, I mean the feeling for the particular scene he is depicting. The +nearest, in fact the only, approach that Morland made to portrait +painting was in such pieces as _The Fortune Teller_ in the National +Gallery, which brings to mind the "Conversation Pieces," introduced by +Hogarth and Highmore into English painting, but which were never widely +attempted. In the Portfolio monograph "English Society in the Eighteenth +Century" I tried to collect as many examples as I could of this form of +art, but found it difficult to fill even a small volume, so entirely was +the single figure portrait the vogue. A few notable instances are worth +mentioning, if only as exceptions to the general rule. Gainsborough's +_Ladies Walking in the Mall_, belonging to Sir Audley Neeld; Reynolds's +large group of _The Marlborough Family_ at Blenheim, and a very early +group of _The Elliott Family_, consisting of eleven figures, belonging +to Lord St Germans; John Singleton Copley's _Children of Francis +Sitwell, Esq._, at Renishaw; and lastly Zoffany's _Family Party_, at +Panshanger. + +For life-like representation of the English people we look to Hogarth +and Morland, and yet nothing could be more different than the motives +which inspired the two, and the way they went to work upon their +subject. Hogarth was above all things theatrical, Morland natural. +Hogarth first conceived his idea, then laid his scene, and lastly +peopled it with actual characters as they appeared--individually--before +him. Morland simply looked about him and painted what he happened to see +at the precise moment when what he saw coincided with his natural +inclination, or we may even say inspiration, to paint it. It was much +the same difference as between the work of Zola and that of Thomas +Hardy. The one had a moral to preach, the other a story to tell. + + * * * * * + +When the most we hear of GEORGE ROMNEY nowadays is the price that has +been paid for one of his portraits at Christie's, it is refreshing as +well as informative to turn to the criticism of one of his greatest +though not in these times so highly priced contemporaries, I mean John +Flaxman. "When Romney first began to paint," he writes, "he had seen no +gallery of pictures nor the fine productions of ancient sculpture; but +then women and children were his statues, and all objects under the +canopy of heaven formed his school of painting. The rainbow, the purple +distance, or the silver lake, taught him colouring; the various actions +and passions of the human figure, with the forms of clouds, woods, and +mountains or valleys, afforded him studies of composition. Indeed, his +genius bore a strong resemblance to the scenes he was born in; like +them, it partook of the grand and beautiful; and like them also, the +bright sunshine and enchanting prospects of his fancy were occasionally +overspread with mist and gloom. On his arrival in Italy he was witness +to new scenes of art and sources of study of which he could only have +supposed previously that something + +[Illustration: PLATE XLII.--GEORGE ROMNEY + +THE PARSON'S DAUGHTER + +_National Gallery, London_] + +of the kind might exist; for he there contemplated the purity and +perfection of ancient sculpture, the sublimity of Michelangelo's Sistine +Chapel, and the simplicity of Cimabue and Giotto's schools. He perceived +those qualities distinctly, and judiciously used them in viewing and +imitating nature; and thus his quick perception and unwearied +application enabled him, by a two years' residence abroad, to acquire as +great a proficiency in art as is usually attained by foreign studies of +a much longer duration. + +"After his return, the novelty and sentiment of his original subjects +were universally admired. Most of these were of the delicate class, and +each had its peculiar character. Titania with her Indian votaries was +arch and sprightly; Milton dictating to his daughters, solemn and +interesting. Several pictures of Wood Nymphs and Bacchantes charmed by +their rural beauty, innocence, and simplicity. The most pathetic, +perhaps, of all his works was never finished--Ophelia with the flowers +she had gathered in her hand, sitting on the branch of a tree, which was +breaking under her, whilst the moody distraction in her lovely +countenance accounts for the insensibility to danger. Few painters have +left so many examples in their works of the tender and delicate +affections; and several of his pictures breathe a kindred spirit with +the _Sigismonda_ of Correggio. His cartoons, some of which have +unfortunately perished, were examples of the sublime and terrible, at +that time perfectly new in English art. As Romney was gifted with +peculiar powers for historical and ideal painting, so his heart and soul +were engaged in the pursuit of it whenever he could extricate himself +from the importunate business of portrait painting. It was his delight +by day and study by night, and for this his food and rest were often +neglected. His compositions, like those of the ancient pictures and +basso-relievos, told their story by a single group of figures in the +front, whilst the background is made the simplest possible, rejecting +all unnecessary episode and trivial ornament, either of secondary groups +or architectural subdivision. In his compositions the beholder was +forcibly struck by the sentiment at the first glance: the gradations and +varieties of which he traced through several characters, all conceived +in an elevated spirit of dignity and beauty, with a lively expression of +nature in all the parts. His heads were various--the male were decided +and grand, the female lovely. His figures resembled the antique--the +limbs were elegant and finely formed. His drapery was well understood, +either forming the figure into a mass with one or two deep folds only, +or by its adhesion and transparency discovering the form of the figure, +the lines of which were finely varied with the union or expansion of +spiral or cascade folds, composing with or contrasting the outline and +chiaroscuro. Few artists since the fifteenth century have been able to +do so much in so many different branches; for besides his beautiful +compositions and pictures, which have added to the knowledge and +celebrity of the English School, he modelled like a sculptor, carved +ornaments in wood with great delicacy, and could make an architectural +design in a fine taste, as well as construct every part of the +building." + +After the death of Reynolds and the retirement of Romney, in the last +decade of the eighteenth century, the field of portraiture was left +vacant--in London at least--for JOHN HOPPNER, whose name is now +generally included with those of Lawrence and Raeburn among the first +six portrait painters of the British + +[Illustration: PLATE XLIII.--GEORGE ROMNEY + +MRS ROBINSON--"PERDITA" + +_Hertford House, London_] + +School. His fame in recent years has certainly exceeded his merits, but +it is due to him to say that he was a conscientious artist, and a firm +upholder of the tradition of Reynolds, so far as in him lay. The old +King had always disliked Reynolds, and Hoppner was not well enough +advised to hold his tongue on the subject of the master: worse than +this, he openly accepted the patronage of the Prince of Wales, and by so +doing opened the door for the admission of Lawrence as royal painter +much sooner than was at all necessary. The story of their rivalry is +thus--in substance--sketched by Allan Cunningham, their +contemporary:--The light of the Prince of Wales's countenance was of +itself sufficient to guide the courtly and beautiful to Hoppner's easel. +Suffice it to say that before he was forty years of age (he was born in +1759), he had been enabled to exhibit no less than fifteen ladies of +quality--for so are they named in the catalogues--a score of ladies of +lower degree, and noblemen unnumbered. But by this time another star had +arisen, destined to outshine that of Hoppner; though some at that +period, willing to flatter the older practitioner, called it a meteor +that would but flash and disappear--we allude to Lawrence. Urged upon +the Academy by the King and Queen, and handed up to public notice by +royal favour, this new aspirant rose rapidly in the estimation of the +public; and by the most delicate flattery, both with tongue and pencil, +became a formidable rival to the painter whom it was the Prince's +pleasure to befriend. The factions of Reynolds and Romney seemed revived +in those of Hoppner and Lawrence. If Hoppner resided in Charles Street, +at the gates of Carlton House, and wrote himself "portrait painter to +the Prince of Wales," Lawrence likewise had his residence in the Court +end of the town, and proudly styled himself--and that when only +twenty-three years old--"portrait painter in ordinary to His Majesty." +In other respects, too, were honours equally balanced between them; they +were both made Royal Academicians, but in this, youth had the start of +age--Lawrence obtained that distinction first. Nature, too, had been +kind--some have said prodigal--to both; they were men of fine address, +and polished by early intercourse with the world and by their trade of +portrait painting could practise all the delicate courtesies of +drawing-room and boudoir; but in that most fascinating of all flattery, +the art of persuading, with brushes and fine colours, very ordinary +mortals that beauty and fine expression were their portions, Lawrence +was soon without a rival. + +The preference of the King and Queen for Lawrence was for a time +balanced by the affection of the Prince of Wales for Hoppner; the Prince +was supposed to have the best taste, and as he kept a court of his own +filled with the young nobility, and all the wits of that great faction +known by the name of Whig, Hoppner had the youth and beauty of the land +for a time; and it cannot be denied that he was a rival in every way +worthy of contending with any portrait-painter of his day. The bare list +of his exhibited portraits will show how and by whom he was supported. +It is well said by Williams, in his _Life of Lawrence_, that "the more +sober and homely ideas of the King were not likely to be a passport for +any portrait-painter to the variety of ladies, and hence Mr. Hoppner for +a long time almost monopolised the female beauty and young fashion of +the country." + +This rivalry continued for a time in the spirit of moderation--but only +for a time. Lawrence, the gentler and the smoother of the two, kept +silence longest; the warm nature of Hoppner broke out at last. "The +ladies of Lawrence," he said, "show a gaudy dissoluteness of taste, and +sometimes trespass on moral as well as professional decorum." For his +own he claimed, by implication, purity of look as well as purity of +style. This sarcastic remark found wings in a moment, and flew through +all the coteries and through both courts; it did most harm to him who +uttered it; all men laughed, and then began to wonder how Lawrence, +limner to perhaps the purest court in Europe, came to bestow indecorous +looks on the meek and sedate ladies of quality of St. James's and +Windsor, while Hoppner, limner to the court of a gallant young prince, +who loved mirth and wine, the sound of the lute and the music of ladies' +feet in the dance, should to some of its gayest and giddiest ornaments +give the simplicity of manner and purity of style which pertained to the +Quaker like sobriety of the other. Nor is it the least curious part of +the story that the ladies, from the moment of the sarcasm of Hoppner, +instead of crowding to the easel of him who dealt in the loveliness of +virtue, showed a growing preference for the rival who "trespassed on +moral as well as on professional decorum." After this, Lawrence had +plenty of the fairest sitters. + + + + +_THE NINETEENTH CENTURY_ + + + + +I + +THE SPIRIT OF REVOLT + + +In the preceding chapters we have traced the development of painting for +five centuries--from the beginning of the fourteenth, that is to say, to +the end of the eighteenth--in Italy, in the Netherlands, in Germany, in +Spain, and lastly in France and England. In the nineteenth the story is +confined to the last two alone, as with one or two minute exceptions the +art of painting had by this time entirely ceased to be worth +consideration in any of the others. Only in France and England, where it +had been most recently established, was it to continue; and besides +continuing, reach out with the most astonishing vigour to snatch at and +grasp fruits that no one before would have dreamt of being within its +reach. + +Between France and England--if by the latter we may be taken to mean +Great Britain, and include within its artists those who have +acclimatised themselves within her shores--the honours of the +achievement are pretty equally divided, though it will have to be left +to individual choice to decide exactly on which side the balance of +credit is due. A mere list of the greatest names is not sufficient to +apportion the praise, though as a preliminary step it may be of value in +clearing the issue. Let us take a dozen on either side, and see how they +look. + +_England._ + +Lawrence. +Constable. +Turner. +De Wint. +Nasmyth. +Stevens. +Whistler. +Cotman. +Cox. +Watts. +Rossetti. +Hunt. + +_France._ + +David. +Gericault. +Ingres. +Delacroix. +Corot. +Millet. +Daubigny. +Courbet. +Daumier. +Decamps. +Manet. +Degas. + +Among these Turner stands out conspicuously from the rest, and he would +be included by anyone in a list of twenty, or perhaps a dozen, of the +greatest painters in the world. But oddly enough his influence on the +art in general has been comparatively small, if we are to judge by its +effects on other painters up to the present, while that of Constable has +been considerably greater. Manet, again, and Delacroix, have +accomplished far more for the history of painting than any other two in +our lists--and yet their names are scarcely known outside the circle of +those who know anything at all about painting. + +For the English public at large an entirely different list would +probably prove the superiority of their own race to their complete +satisfaction--in spite of Meissonier, Dore, and Bouguereau on the other +side. But that is only because the British public, owing to the +monopoly + +[Illustration: PLATE XLIV.--JACQUES LOUIS DAVID + +PORTRAIT OF MME. RECAMIER + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +enjoyed by the Royal Academy, have never had a chance of judging for +themselves what they approve of and what they do not, and their taste +has been vitiated for generations by the exhibition of what this +self-constituted authority, no doubt unconsciously, conceives to be best +for them--and which, as might be expected, is usually found to coincide +pretty nearly with the sort of thing they are capable of producing +themselves. Hogarth's predictions at the time the Academy was instituted +have in a great measure come perfectly true, and the only benefit that +it has been to the English School of painting is that it has kept it +going. How far this may be called a benefit is at least arguable, but in +the main it is probable that if so many bad pictures had not been +painted, there would not have been so many good ones. On the other hand, +the removal of a man like Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema from his native +sphere of influence is quite enough to account for the unlooked-for +flowering of blossoms like the brothers Maris, Bosboom, Israels, and +Mauve in the Dutch garden, and if that is so, one need not grudge him +his interment amongst Nelson, Wellington, and other heroes of our own. + +In a word, the history of painting in the nineteenth century is Revolt. +What it is going to be in the twentieth I am fortunately not called upon +to say; but if I may throw out an opinion based upon what is already +happening, I should say that no word has yet been coined which will +adequately express it. + +In the last century the issues were simple, and can be easily expressed. +On the one side was the complacent body of practitioners following to +the best of their ability the practice of painting as handed down to +them in a variety of different forms, just as the Byzantine craftsmen +earned their living when they were so rudely disturbed by Cimabue and +his school. On the other was a small but ever-increasing number of +individuals who, like Cimabue, began to think things out for themselves, +but, unlike him, did not succeed in effecting a popular triumph +without--if at all--first raising both the painters and the public to a +pitch of fury. It is indeed curious to read Vasari and modern historians +side by side, and to wonder if, after all, Vasari knew or told +everything, in his desire to glorify the art, or whether Giotto and +other innovators were not in fact burnt at the stake. Probably not. +Gallileo, as we know, and Savonarola suffered for their crimes. But they +were working against the Church, and the artists were working for it. + +In the nineteenth century, painting had altogether broken away from the +Church, and so it had to fight its own battles out in the street, or in +the law courts. That is what has given it such a swagger and strength. +It no longer looks to its protector, it will hit you in the face before +you know where you are. The feeble kind, only, looks to Academies for +support, and thereby becomes feebler still. + +In the present chapter, accordingly, we shall hear no more of the +Madonnas, the Holy Families, and all the sacred and profane subjects on +which the old masters exercised their genius. Five centuries of painting +had established the art in a position of independence; and in a +sixth--that is to say, the nineteenth--it began to assert itself, and to +prove that its education was not in itself an end, but only a means to +various ends. Instead of following out the fortunes of each painter, +therefore, and attempting to set in any sort of order the reputations of +artists before sufficient time has elapsed for them to cool, I propose +to confine myself in the remaining pages to the broad issues raised +during this period between the painters, the critics, and the public. + + + + +II + +EUGENE DELACROIX + + +The man who began all this street fighting was a Frenchman--Eugene +Delacroix. While still a youth he was bullied, and the bully was such a +redoubtable giant that it took somebody with the grit and genius of +Delacroix to tackle him, but tackle him he did. The story of the fight, +which is a long and glorious one, is so admirably told in Madame Bussy's +life of Delacroix, that I have obtained permission to give the essence +of it in her own words. + +In the Salon of 1822 was exhibited Delacroix's picture of _Dante and +Virgil_, which is now in the Louvre, and evoked the first of those +clamours of abuse which were barely stilled before the artist's death. +For nearly thirty years all French painters, with the exception of Gros +and Prudhon; had shown themselves unquestioning disciples of the school +founded by Jacques Louis David, whose masterful character and potent +personality had reduced all art to a system; and Delacroix himself spoke +of him with sympathy and admiration. The chief dogma of David's school +was that the nearest approach to the _beau ideal_ permitted to the human +race had been attained by the Greeks, and that all art must conform as +closely as possible to theirs. Unfortunately, the chief specimens of +Greek art known at that time were those belonging to a decadent +period--neither the Elgin marbles nor the Venus of Milo were accessible +before 1816--so that the works from which they drew their inspiration +were without character in themselves, or merely the feeble and +attenuated copies of ancient Rome. In the pictures of this school, +accordingly, we find only the monotonous perfection of rounded and +well-modelled limbs, classical features and straight noses. Colour, to +the sincere Davidian, was a vain and frivolous accessory, serving only +to distract attention from the real purpose of the work, which was to +aim at moral elevation as well as at ideal beauty. Everything in the +picture was to be equally dwelt upon; there was no sacrifice, no +mystery. "These pictures," says Delacroix, "have no epidermis ...they +lack the atmosphere, the lights, the reflections which blend into an +harmonious whole, objects the most dissimilar in colour." + +By the untimely death of Gericault, whose _Raft of the Medusa_ had +already caused a flutter in 1819, Delacroix was left at the head of the +revolt against this pseudo-classicism; and amid the storm that greeted +the _Dante and Virgil_ it is interesting to find Thiers writing of him +in the following strain:--"It seems to me that no picture [in the Salon] +reveals the future of a great painter better than M. Delacroix's, in +which we see an outbreak of talent, a burst of rising superiority which +revives the hopes that had been slightly discouraged by the too moderate +merits of all the rest.... I think I am not mistaken; M. Delacroix has +genius; let him go on with confidence, and devote himself to immense +labour, the indispensable condition of talent." Delecluze, by the by, +the critic-in-chief of the Davidian School, had characterised the +picture as _une veritable tartouillade_. + +In 1824 the Salon included two pictures which may be regarded as +important documents in the history of painting. One of these was +Constable's _Hay Wain_--now + +[Illustration: PLATE XLV.--EUGENE DELACROIX + +DANTE AND VIRGIL + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +in our National Gallery--which had been purchased by a Frenchman; the +other was Delacroix's _Massacre of Scio_, the first to receive the +enlightenment afforded by the Englishman's methods, which spread so +widely over the French School. It was said that Delacroix entirely +repainted his picture on seeing Constable's; but his pupil, Lassalle +Bordes, is probably nearer the truth in saying that the master being +dissatisfied with its general tone, which was too chalky, transformed it +by means of violent glazings. The critics were no less noisy over this +picture than the last. "A painter has been revealed to us," said one, +"but he is a man who runs along the housetops." "Yes," answered +Baudelaire, "but for that one must have a sure foot, and an eye guided +by an inward light." + +When the Salon opened again in 1827, after an interval of three years, +the public were astonished to find how large a number of painters had +abandoned Davidism and openly joined the ranks of the enemy. Delacroix +himself exhibited the _Marino Faliero_ (now at Hertford House) and +eleven others. The gauntlet was flung down, and war began in deadly +earnest between the opposing parties. It was at this time that the terms +Romanticism and Romantic came into common use. Delacroix always resented +being labelled as a Romantic, and would only acknowledge that the term +might be justly applied to him when used in its widest signification. +"If by my Romanticism," he wrote, "is meant the free expression of my +personal impressions, my aversion from the stereotypes invariably +produced in the schools, and my repugnance to academic receipts, then I +must admit I am Romantic." + +Here we have the plain truth about the painting of the nineteenth +century--and after! The critics were unanimous in their violent +condemnation of Delacroix's works: "the compositions of a sick man in +delirium," "the fanaticism of ugliness," "barbarous execution," "an +intoxicated broom"--such are some of the terms of abuse showered upon +him. The gentlest among them commiserate the talent which here and there +can be seen "struggling with the systematic _bizarrerie_ and the +disordered technique of the artist, just as gleams of reason and +sometimes flashes of genius may be seen pitiably shining through the +speech of a madman." The final touch to Delacroix's disgrace was given +by the Directeur des Beaux Arts sending for him and recommending him to +study drawing from casts, warning him at the same time that unless he +could change his style he must expect neither commissions nor +recognition from the State! + +The year 1830 has given its name to that brilliant generation of poets, +novelists, painters and philosophers which, as Theophile Gautier says +with just pride, "will make its mark on the future and be spoken of as +one of the climacteric epochs of the human mind." The revolution of July +inspired Delacroix with one of his most interesting pictures. _Le 28 +Juillet_ is the only one of his works in which he depicts modern life, +and was a striking refutation to those who complained that modern +costume is too ugly or prosaic to be treated in painting. "Every old +master," Baudelaire usefully pointed out, "has been modern in his day. +The greater number of fine portraits of former times are dressed in the +costume of their period. They are perfectly harmonious because the +costumes, the hair, and even the attitude and expression (each period +has its own), form a whole of complete vitality." _Le 28 Juillet_ gives +us the very breath and spirit of modern street fighting. Though the +public + +[Illustration: PLATE XLVI.--JOHN CONSTABLE + +THE HAY WAIN + +_National Gallery, London_] + +remained hostile and the jury bestowed none of its prizes, as before, +the Government acknowledged the artist's talent and politics by making +him a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. Further, from 1833 to 1853 he +was intermittently employed in decorating the Chamber of Deputies, the +Senate, and other public buildings. In 1855 he showed at the Great +Exhibition a series of thirty-five of his most important pictures, the +effect of which was immense. For the first and only time in his life he +enjoyed a triumph, none the less great because his life-long rival +Ingres also took the opportunity of exhibiting a selection of his works +in the same building. But in spite of this success, and in spite of his +being elected an Academician in 1857, the critics remained incorrigible. +His pictures in the Salon of 1859 once more called forth one of those +storms of abuse that Delacroix had the gift of arousing. Weary and +disheartened--"All my life long I have been livre aux betes," was his +bitter exclamation--he vowed to exhibit no more, and kept his word. + + + + +III + +RUSKIN AGAINST THE PHILISTINES + + +IN England, meantime, great things were being accomplished amid peaceful +surroundings. In portraiture Lawrence soon became supreme, and what +excellence he possessed was accentuated on his death in 1830 by the +appointment of Sir Martin Archer Shee as his successor in the Presidency +of the Royal Academy. That was the end of portraiture in England until a +new school arose. But it was in landscape that our country occupied the +field in the first half of the nineteenth century, and tilled it with +the astonishing results that are usually the effect of doing much and +saying little. The work accomplished by Turner, Constable, and Cotman, +in the first half of the century, to say nothing of Crome and one or two +of the older men who were still alive, has never been equalled in any +country, and yet less was heard about the execution of it than would +keep a modern journalist in bread and cheese for a week. Turner, who +wouldn't sell his pictures, and Constable, who couldn't, between them +filled up the measure of English art without any other aid than that of +the materials with which they recorded their gorgeous communion with +nature. When Ruskin stepped in with the "Modern Painters," originally +designed as a vindication of Turner against certain later-day critics, +Turner's comment was, "He knows a great deal more about my pictures than +I do. He puts things into my head and points out meanings in them that I +never intended." That was in 1843, when Turner was well on in his third +manner--within eight years of his death. But let us go back to the +beginning. + +Until he developed his latest manner, Turner was about the most popular +artist that ever lived. His pictures were not above the comprehension of +the public, educated or otherwise, and no effort was either needed or +demanded to understand them. In the diary of a provincial amateur, +Thomas Greene, are recorded an impression of Turner's work as early as +1797:--"Visited the Royal Exhibition. Particularly struck with a +sea-view by Turner ...the whole composition bold in design and masterly +in execution. I am entirely unacquainted with the artist, but if he +proceeds as he has begun, he cannot fail to become the first in his +department." And again in 1799:--"Was again struck and delighted with +Turner's landscapes.... Turner's views are not mere ordinary transcripts +of nature,--he always throws some peculiar and striking _character_ into +the scene he represents." + +Brought up as a topographical draughtsman, he made no departure till +quite late in life from the conventional method of depicting scenery; +but being a supremely gifted artist, he was capable of utilising this +method as no other before or since has ever succeeded in doing. The +accepted method was good enough for him, and he laid his paint upon the +canvas as anybody else had done before him, and as many of our +present-day painters would do well to do after him--if only they had the +genius in them to "make the instrument speak." The impressions created +on our mind by Turner's earlier pictures are not conveyed by dots, +cubes, streaks, or any device save that of pigment laid upon the canvas +in such a manner as seemed to the artist to reproduce what he saw in +nature. That he did this with surprising and altogether exceptional +skill is the proof of his genius. Unflagging energy and devotion to his +art enabled him to realise, not all, but a wonderful number of the +beauties he saw in the world, with an experience that few beside him +have ever taken the trouble to acquire. When barely thirty years old--in +1805--he was already considered as the first of living landscape +painters, and was thus noticed by Edward Dayes (the teacher of +Girtin):--"Turner may be considered as a striking instance of how much +may be gained by industry, if accompanied with perseverance, even +without the assistance of a master. The way he acquired his professional +powers was by borrowing when he could a drawing or picture to copy; or +by making a sketch of any one in the exhibition early in the morning and +finishing it up at home. By such practice, and a patient perseverance, +he has overcome all the difficulties of the art." Turner himself used to +say that his best academy was "the fields and Dr Monro's parlour"--where +Girtin and other young artists met and sketched and copied the drawings +in the doctor's collection. Burnet, in his notice of "Turner and his +Works," suggests that John Robert Cozens had paved the way for both +Girtin and Turner in striking out a broad effect of light and shade. +"The early pictures of Turner," he observes, "possess the breadth, but +are destitute of the brilliant power of light and colour afterwards +pervading his works, and ultimately carried to the greatest extreme in +his last pictures. Breadth of light seems to have been latterly his +chief aim, supported by the contrast of hot and cold colour; two of his +unfinished pictures exemplified the principle; they were divided into +large masses of blue where the water or sky was to come and the other +portions laid out in broad orange yellow, falling into delicate brown +where the trees and landscapes were to be placed. This preparation, +while it secured the greatest breadth, would have shone through the +other colours when finished, giving the luminous quality observable in +his pictures. In many instances his works sent for exhibition to the +British Institution had little more than this brilliant foundation, +which was worked into detail and completed in the varnishing days, +Turner being the first in the morning and the last to leave; his +certainty in the command over his colour, and the dexterity in his +handling, seemed to convert in a few hours 'an unsubstantial pageant' +into a finished landscape. These _ad captandum_ effects, however, are +not what his fame will depend on for perpetuity; his finest pictures are +the production of great study in their composition, careful and repeated +painting in the detail, and + +[Illustration: PLATE XLVII.--J. M. W. TURNER + +CROSSING THE BROOK + +_National Gallery of British Art, London_] + +a natural arrangement of the colour and breadth of the chiaroscuro." + +Whether or not we agree with all of Burnet's opinions, we shall be more +likely to learn the truth about Turner from prosaic contemporaries of +his earlier years than from all the rhapsodies of later days. How +significant, when stripped of its amusing circumstances, is the simple +fact related thus by Leslie:--"In 1839, when Constable exhibited his +_Opening of Waterloo Bridge_, it was placed in one of the small rooms +next to a sea-piece by Turner--a grey picture, beautiful and true, but +with no positive colour in any part of it. Constable's picture seemed as +if painted with liquid gold and silver, and Turner came several times +while he was heightening with vermilion and lake the decorations and +flags of the city barges. Turner stood behind him looking from the +_Waterloo Bridge_ to his own picture, and at last brought his palette +from the great room where he was touching another picture, and putting a +round daub of red lead, somewhat bigger than a shilling, on his grey +sea, went away without saying a word. The intensity of this red lead, +made more vivid by the coolness of his picture, caused even the +vermilion and lake of Constable to look weak. I came into the room just +after Turner had left it. "He has been here," said Constable, "and fired +a gun." On the opposite wall was a picture by Jones of Shadrach Meshach +and Abednego in the Furnace. "A coal," said Cooper, "has bounced across +the room from Jones's picture and set fire to Turner's sea." Turner did +not come in again for a day and a half, and then in the last moment +allowed for painting, he glazed the scarlet seal he had put on his +picture, and shaped it into a buoy." + +It was in 1835, after an unbroken popular triumph lasting over thirty +years, that the critics openly rounded on him. The occasion seized by +_Blackwood's Magazine_ was the exhibition of his first Venetian picture +exhibited in that year--it is now in the Metropolitan Museum in New +York. "What is Venice in this picture?" wrote Blackwood's critic. "A +flimsy, whitewashed, meagre assemblage of architecture, starting off +ghost-like into unnatural perspective, as if frightened at the affected +blaze of some dogger vessels (the only attempt at richness in the +picture). The greater part of the picture is white, disagreeable white, +without light or transparency, and the boats with their red worsted +masts are as gewgaw as a child's toy which he may have cracked to see +what it is made of. As to Venice, nothing can be more unlike its +character." + +Ruskin was then only sixteen years old, but eight years later appeared +in print the first volume of "Modern Painters," "by an undergraduate of +Oxford," as the result of his growing indignation at this and subsequent +attacks on Turner. Without following Ruskin into the dubious regions +whither the pursuit of his romantic fancies ultimately led him, we may +in fairness quote the opening sentence of his second chapter, "Of Truth +of Colour," which will help us, moreover, in understanding the +conditions under which painting was being conducted at this period. +"There is nothing so high in art," he says, "but that a scurrile jest +can reach at, and often the greater the work the easier it is to turn it +into ridicule. To appreciate the science of Turner's colour would +require the study of a life; but to laugh at it requires little more +than the knowledge that the yolk of egg is yellow and spinage green; a +fund of critical information on which the remarks of most of our +leading periodicals have been of late years exclusively based. We +shall, however, in spite of the sulphur and treacle criticisms of our +Scotch connoisseurs, and the eggs and spinage of our English ones, +endeavour to test the works of this great colourist by a knowledge of +nature somewhat more extensive than is to be gained by an acquaintance, +however formed, with the apothecary's shop or the dinner table." + +So much for the critics. For the artist, if Ruskin said more than Turner +himself could understand, he has summed up his achievement in a few +passages which may possibly outlast the works themselves. "There has +been marked and constant progress in his mind; he has not, like some few +artists, been without childhood; his course of study has been as +evidently as it has been swiftly progressive; and in different stages of +the struggle, sometimes one order of truth, sometimes another, has been +aimed at or omitted. But from the beginning to the present height of his +career he has never sacrificed a greater truth to a less. As he +advanced, the previous knowledge or attainment was absorbed in what +succeeded, or abandoned only if incompatible, and never abandoned +without a gain: and his present works present the sum and perfection of +his accumulated knowledge, delivered with the impatience and passion of +one who feels too much, and has too little time to say it in, to pause +for expression or ponder over his syllables." And again of his latest +works--"There is in them the obscurity, but the truth, of prophecy; the +instinctive and burning language, which would express less if it uttered +more; which is indistinct only by its fulness, and dark with its +abundant meaning. He feels now, with long-trained vividness and keenness +of sense, too bitterly, the impotence of the hand and the vainness of +the colour to catch one shadow or one image of the glory which God has +revealed to him. He has dwelt and communed with Nature all the days of +his life: he knows her now too well, he cannot falter over the material +littlenesses of her outward form: he must give her soul, or he has done +nothing, and he cannot do this with the flax, the earth, and the oil. 'I +cannot gather the beams out of the east, or I would make _them_ tell you +what I have seen; but read this, and interpret this, and let us remember +together. I cannot gather the gloom out of the night sky, or I would +make that teach you what I have seen; but read this, interpret this, and +let us feel together. And if you have not that within you which I can +summon to my aid, if you have not the sun in your spirit, and the +passion in your heart, which my words may awaken, though they be +indistinct and swift, leave me; for I will give you no patient mockery, +no laborious insult of that glorious Nature, whose I am and whom I +serve. Let other servants imitate the voice and the gesture of their +master, while they forget his message. Hear that message from me; but +remember that the teaching of Divine truth must still be a mystery.'" + +Within a very few years Ruskin was performing a more useful service for +the English School of painting than that of gilding the fine gold of its +greatest genius. Whether or not he was aware of the fact, young Holman +Hunt had borrowed a copy of "Modern Painters," which, he says, entirely +changed his opinions as to the views held by society at large concerning +art, and in 1849 there were exhibited Hunt's _Rienzi_, Rossetti's +_Girlhood of Mary Virgin_, and Millais' _Lorenzo and Isabella_, each +inscribed with the mystic letters "P.R.B.," meaning "Pre-Raphaelite +Brotherhood." It is interesting to note that this alliance was formed +when the three young artists were looking over a book of engravings of +the frescoes in the Campo Santo at Pisa. + +In the following year Hunt exhibited the _British Family_, Millais, _The +Carpenter's Shop_, and Rossetti the _Ecce Ancilla Domini_, and in 1851 +were Hunt's _Two Gentlemen of Verona_ and three by Millais. The fury of +the critics had now reached a point at which some notice had to be taken +of it--as of a man in an apopleptic fit. That of the Times in +particular:--"These young artists have unfortunately become notorious by +addicting themselves to an antiquated style, false perspective, and +crude colour of remote antiquity. We want not to see what Fuseli termed +drapery "snapped instead of folded," faces bloated into apoplexy, or +extenuated into skeletons; colour borrowed from the jars in a druggist's +shop, and expression forced into caricature. That morbid infatuation +which sacrifices truth, beauty, and genuine feeling to mere eccentricity +deserves no quarter at the hands of the public." It was in disapproval +of the tone of this outburst that the author of "Modern Painters" +addressed his famous and useful letter to the _Times_, vindicating the +artists, and following it up with another in which he wishes them all +"heartily good speed, believing in sincerity that if they temper the +courage and energy which they have shown in the adoption of their +systems with patience and discretion in framing it, and if they do not +suffer themselves to be driven by harsh and careless criticism into +rejection of the ordinary means of obtaining influence over the minds of +others, they may, as they gain experience, lay in our England the +foundation of a school of art nobler than the world has seen for three +hundred years." + +If any one of this strenuous young band had been a painter of the first +rank, this prediction might have been abundantly verified. But it must +be owned that none of them was. Holman Hunt came nearest to being, and +Millais probably thought he was, when he had abandoned his early +principles and shaped for the Presidency of the Academy. Rossetti had +more genius in him than the others, but it came out in poetry as well as +in painting, and perhaps in more lasting form. As it was, the effects of +the revolution were widespread and entirely beneficial; but those +effects must not be looked for in the works of any one particular +artist, but rather in the general aspect of English art in the +succeeding half century, and perhaps to-day. It broke up the soil. The +flowers that came up were neither rare nor great, but they were many, +varied, and pleasing, and in every respect an improvement on the +evergreens and hardy annuals with which the English garden had become +more and more encumbered from want of intelligent cultivation. More than +this, the freedom engendered of revolt had now encouraged the young +artist to feel that he was no longer bound to paint in any particular +fashion. People's eyes were opened to possibilities as well as to +actualities; and though they were prone to close again under the +soporific influence of what was regular and conventional, they were +capable of opening again, perhaps with a start, but without the +necessity for a surgical operation. In 1847, for example, George +Frederick Watts had offered to adorn, free of charge, the booking-hall +of Euston Station, and had been refused--Watts, by the by, was quite +independent of the Pre-Raphaelites--whereas in 1860 the Benchers of +Lincoln's Inn accepted his _School of Legislature_, and in 1867 he was +elected an academician. + +Two somewhat remarkable effects of the movement are attributed to it by +Mr Edmund Gosse (in a note on the work of Alfred Hunt, written in +1884), which are probably typical of many more. The Liverpool Academy, +founded in 1810, had an annual grant of L200 from the Corporation. In +1857 it gave a prize to Millais' _Blind Girl_ in preference to the most +popular picture of the year (Abraham Solomon's _Waiting for the +Verdict_), and so great was the public indignation that pressure was +brought to bear on the Corporation, the grant was withdrawn, and the +Academy ruined. + +In the other instance we may not go the whole way with Mr Gosse, when in +speaking of the Pre-Raphaelite principle he says that "the school of +Turnerian landscape was fatally affected by them," or that all the +landscape painters, except Alfred Hunt, "accepted the veto which the +Pre-Raphaelites had tacitly laid upon composition or a striving after an +artificial harmony of forms in landscape." But to a certain extent their +influence undoubtedly was prejudicial in that respect. In suggesting +another reason for the cessation of Turner s influence he is quite as +near the mark, namely, the action of the Royal Academy in admitting no +landscape painters to membership. At Turner's death in 1851 there were +only three, among whom was Creswick. "This popular artist," says Mr +Gosse, "was the Upas tree under whose shadow the Academical patronage of +landscape died in England. From his election as an associate in 1842 to +that of Vicat Cole in 1869, no landscape painter entered the doors of +the Royal Academy." Of this august body we shall have something to say +later on. + + + + +IV + +MANET AND WHISTLER AGAINST THE WORLD + + +Let us now cross the channel again, and see what is going on there, in +1863. Evidently there is something on, or there would not be so much +excitement. As we approach the Capital we are aware of one name being +prominent in the general uproar--that of EDOUARD MANET. + +Manet's revolt against tradition began before he became an artist, as +was in fact necessary, or he would never have been allowed to become +one. The traditions of the Bourgoisie were sacred, and their power and +importance since the revolution of 1848 not to be lightly set aside. But +young Manet was so determined that he was at last allowed by his +bourgeois parents to have his way, and was sent to study under that very +rough diamond Couture. Now again his "revolting" qualities showed +themselves, this time in the life class. Theodore Duret, his friend and +biographer, puts it so amusingly that a quotation, untranslated, is +imperative:--"Cette repulsion qui se developpe chez Manet pour l'art de +la tradition," he says, "se manifeste surtout par le mepris qu'il +temoigne aux modeles posant dans l'atelier et a l'etude du nu telle +qu'elle etait alors conduite. Le culte de l'antique comme on le +comprenait dans la premiere moitie du XIXe siecle parmi les peintres +avait amene la recherche de modeles speciaux. On leur demandait des +formes pleines. Les hommes en particulier devaient avoir une poitrine +large et bombee, un torse puissant, des membres muscles. Les individus +doues des qualites requises qui posaient alors dans les ateliers, +s'etaient habitues a prendre des attitudes pretendues expressive et +heroiques, mais toujours tendues et conventionelles, d'ou l'imprevu +etait banni. Manet, porte vers le naturel et epris de recherches, +s'irritait de ces poses d'un type fixe et toujours les memes. Aussi +faisait-il tres mauvais menage avec les modeles. Il cherchait a en +obtenir des poses contraires a leurs habitudes, auxquelles ils se +refusaient. Les modeles connus qui avaient vu les morceaux faits d'apres +leurs torses conduire certains eleves a l'ecole de Rome, alors la +supreme recompense, et qui dans leur orgueil s'attribuaient presqu'une +part du succes, se revoltaient de voir un tout jeune homme ne leur +temoigner aucun respect. Il parait que fatigue de l'eternelle etude du +nu, Manet aurait essaye de draper et meme d'habiller les modeles, ce qui +aurait cause parmi eux une veritable indignation." + +It was in 1863 that the storm of popular fury burst over Manet's head, +on the exhibition of his first important picture, painted three years +before, generally known as _Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe_. This wonderful +canvas was something so new and so surprising that it was rejected by +the jury of the Salon. But in company with less conspicuous though +equally unacceptable pieces by such men as Bracquemond, Cazin, +Fantin-Latour, Harpignies, Jongkind, J. P. Laurens, Le Gros, Pissarro, +Vollon, and Whistler, it was accorded an exhibition, alongside the +official Salon, which was called _le Salon des refuses_. Being the +largest and most conspicuous work shown, it attracted no less attention +than if it had been officially hung, and probably much more. "Ainsi ce +Dejeuner sur l'herbe," says M. Duret, "venait-il faire comme une enorme +tache. Il donnait la sensation de quelquechose outre. Il heurtait la +vision. Il produisait, sur les yeux du public de ce temps, l'effet de la +pleine lumiere sur les yeux du hibou." + +There was more than one reason for this remarkable picture surprising +and shocking the sensibilities of the public. It represents a couple of +men in everyday bourgeois costume, one sitting and the other reclining +on the grass under trees, while next to one of them is seated a young +woman, her head turned to the spectator, in no costume at all. A +profusion of _articles de dejeuner_ is beside her, and it is evident +that they are only waiting to arrange the meal till a second young +woman, who is seen bathing in the near background, is ready to join +them. The subject and composition are reminiscent of Giorgione's +beautiful and famous _Fete Champetre_, in the Louvre, and Manet quite +frankly and in quite good faith pleaded Giorgione as his precedent when +assailed on grounds of good taste. But unfortunately he had not put his +male figures in "fancy dress," and the public could hardly be expected +to realise that Giorgione had not, either. As for the painting, it was a +revelation. He had broken every canon of tradition--and yet it was a +marvellous success! + +Another outburst greeted the appearance of the wonderful _Olympia_ in +1865, this time in the official catalogue. This is now enshrined in the +Louvre. It was painted in 1863, but fortunately, perhaps, Manet had not +the courage to exhibit it then--for who can tell to what length the fury +of the Philistines might not have been goaded by two such shocks? As it +was, this second violation of the sacred traditions of the nude, which +had been exclusively reserved for allegorical subjects, was considered +an outrage; and the innocent, natural model, of by no means voluptuous +appearance, was regarded as a disgraceful intrusion into the chaste +category of nymphs and goddesses. As a painter, however, Manet had shown +himself unmistakably as the great figure of + +[Illustration: PLATE XLVIII.--EDOUARD MANET + +OLYMPIA + +_Louvre, Paris_] + +the age, and if we have to go to Paris or to New York to catch a glimpse +of any of his work, it is partly because we are too backward in seizing +opportunities so eagerly snapped up by others. + +The next great storm in the artistic world followed in the wake of one +of Manet's companions in adversity at the _Salon des Refuses_--JAMES +M'NEILL WHISTLER, who left Paris and settled with his mother in Chelsea +in the late 'sixties. That he should have existed for fifteen whole +years without breaking forth into strife is so extraordinary that we are +almost tempted to attribute it to the influence of his mother, who used +to bring him to the old church on Sundays, as the present writer dimly +remembers. In this case it was not the public, but the critic, John +Ruskin, who so deftly dropped the fat into the fire. Having, as we saw, +taken up the cudgels for poor Turner against the public in 1843, and for +the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1850, he now, in 1877, ranged himself +on the other side, and accused Whistler of impertinence in "flinging a +pot of paint in the face of the public." The action for libel which +Whistler commenced in the following year resulted in strict fact in a +verdict of one farthing damages for the libelled one; but in reality the +results were much farther reaching. The artist had vindicated not only +himself, but his art, from the attacks of the ignorant and bumptious. +"Poor art!" Whistler wrote, "What a sad state the slut is in, an these +gentlemen shall help her. The artist alone, by the way, is to no purpose +and remains unconsulted; his work is explained and rectified without +him, by the one who was never in it--but upon whom God, always good +though sometimes careless, has thrown away the knowledge refused to the +author, poor devil!" This recalls Turner's comment on Ruskin's +eulogies--which Whistler had probably never heard of--and making every +allowance for Whistler's fiery, combative nature, and sharp pen, there +is much truth, and truth that needed telling, in his contention. "Art," +he continues, "that for ages has hewn its own history in marble, and +written its own comments on canvas, shall it suddenly stand still, and +stammer, and wait for wisdom from the passer-by? For guidance from the +hand that holds neither brush nor chisel? Out upon the shallow conceit!" + +Of the hopeless banality of the critics during this period there are +plenty of examples to be found without looking very far. Several of the +most amusing have been embodied in a little volume of "Whistler +Stories," lately compiled by Mr Don C. Seitz of New York. Here we find +_The Standard's_ little joke about Whistler paying his costs in the +action--apart from those allowed on taxation, that is to say--"But he +has only to paint, or, as we believe he expresses it 'knock off' three +or four 'symphonies' or 'harmonies'--or perhaps he might try his hand at +a Set of Quadrilles in Peacock Blue?--and a week's labour will set all +square." Then there is this priceless revelation of his art when +questioning his class in Paris. "Do you know what I mean when I say +tone, value, light, shade, quality, movement, construction, etc.?" +_Chorus_, "Oh, yes, Mr Whistler!" "I'm glad, for it's more than I do +myself." More serious was the verdict of Sir George Scharf, keeper of +the National Gallery, when (in 1874) there was a proposal to purchase +the portrait of Carlyle. "Well," he said, icily, on looking at the +picture, "and has painting come to this!" + +High place, it would seem, did not always conduce to an appreciation of +high art. Here is the opinion of Sir Charles Eastlake, F.R.I.B.A., also +keeper of the + +[Illustration: PLATE XLIX.--J. M. WHISTLER + +LILLIE IN OUR ALLEY + +_In the possession of John J. Cowan, Esq._] + +National Gallery, published in 1883, on one of Rembrandt's pictures in +the Louvre:-- + +"_The Bath_, a very ugly and offensive picture, in which the principal +object is the ill-proportioned figure of a naked woman, distinguished by +flesh tones whose colour suggests the need of a bath rather than the +fact that it has been taken. The position of the old servant wiping the +woman's feet is not very intelligible, and the drawing of the bather's +legs is distinctly defective. The light and shade of the picture, though +obviously untrue to natural effect, are managed with the painter's usual +dexterity." + + + + +V + +THE ROYAL ACADEMY + + +The last revolt of the nineteenth century was effected in a peaceable +and business-like, but none the less successful manner, by the +establishment, in 1886, of the New English Art Club as a means of +defence against the mighty _vis inertiae_ of the Royal Academy. As an +example of the disadvantage under which any artist laboured who did not +bow down to the great Idol, I venture to quote a few sentences from the +report of the Select Committee of the House of Lords appointed to +inquire into the administration of the Chantrey Trust, in 1904:---- + +"With five exceptions, all the works in the collection have been bought +from summer exhibitions of the Royal Academy." + +"It is admitted by those most friendly to the present system that the +Chantrey collection regarded as a national gallery of modern British art +is incomplete, and in a large degree unrepresentative. The works of +many of the most brilliant and capable artists who worked in the last +quarter of the nineteenth century are missing from the gallery, and the +endeavour to account for these omissions has formed one main branch of +the inquiry." + +"It has been stated that while containing some fine works of art, it is +lacking in variety and interest, and while failing to give expression to +much of the finest artistic feeling of its period, it includes not a few +works of minor importance. Full consideration of the evidence has led +the Committee to regard this view as approximately correct." + +Up to 1897, when the collection was handed over to the nation, little +short of L50,000 had been spent upon it. And with five exceptions, +amounting to less than L5000, the whole of that money had been expended +on such works alone as were permitted by the Academy to be exhibited on +their walls. + +Of the L5000, it may be noted, L2200 was well laid out on Watts's +_Psyche_; but with regard to the very first purchase made, in 1877, for +L1000,--Hilton's _Christ Mocked_, which had been painted as an +altar-piece for S. Peter's, Eaton Square, in 1839, the following +question and answer are full of bitter significance for the poor artist +of the time:---- + + Lord Ribblesdale.--Was Mr Hilton's picture offered by the Vicar and + Churchwardens? + + The Secretary to the Royal Academy.--Yes, it was offered by + them--one of the Churchwardens was the late Lord Maghermorne--he + was then Sir James M'Garrell Hogg--he was a great friend of Sir + Francis Grant who was the President, and he offered it to him for + the Chantrey Collection. + +When repeatedly pressed by the Committee for the reasons why so few +purchases were made outside the Academy exhibitions, the President, Sir +Edward Poynter, repeatedly pleaded the impossibility of a Council of +Ten, all of whom must see pictures before they are bought, travelling +about in search of them. In view of this apparent--but obviously +unreal--difficulty, the following questions were then put by the Earl of +Lytton:---- + +420. Without actually changing the terms of the will, has the question +of employing an agent for the purpose of finding out what pictures were +available and giving advice upon them ever been suggested?--No. + +421. That would come within the term of the will, would it not, the +final voting being, as it is now, in the hands of the Academy; it would +be open to the Council to appoint an agent, as was suggested just now, +of going to Scotland, and going about the country making suggestions as +to pictures which in his opinion might be bought?--The question has +never arisen. + +422. But that could be done, could it not?--I suppose that could be done +under the terms of the will, but I do not suppose that the Academy would +ever do it. + +As a comment on this let us turn to the "Autobiography of W. P. Frith R. +A." (Chapter xl.):--"A portion of the year ... was spent in the service +of the winter Exhibition of Old Masters. My duties took me into strange +places.... One of my first visits was paid to a huge mansion in the +North.... I visited thirty-eight different collections of old masters +and named for selection over three hundred pictures.... The pictures of +Reynolds are so much desired for the winter Exhibition that neither +trouble nor expense are spared in searching for them; so hearing of one +described to me as of unusual splendour, I made a journey into Wales +with the solitary Reynolds for its object." + +Here, where it is not a question of a Trust for the benefit of the +public and for the encouragement of artists, there appears to have been +no trouble or expense spared. But the real reason for the Academic +selection leapt naively from the mouth of the President a little later, +in reply to question 545.--"The best artists come into the Academy +ultimately. I do not say that there have been no exceptions, but as a +general rule all the best artists ultimately become Academicians. It is +natural, if we want the best pictures that we should go to the best +artists." + +On this point the answer to a question put by Lord Lytton to one of the +forty, Sir William Richmond, K.C.B., is of value, as showing that the +grievances of "the outsiders" were not imaginary:-- + +767. I just want to ask you one more question. When you said that in +your opinion the walls of the Academy have had priority of claim in the +past, have you any particular reason for that statement?--Yes. I may +mention this to show that I am consistent. Before I was an Associate of +the Royal Academy, I fought hard for what are called, in rather +undignified language, the outsiders, and I was anxious that men should +be elected Associates of the Royal Academy not necessarily because they +exhibit on the Royal Academy walls, but because they are competent +painters. That was my fight upon which I stood; and I refused to send a +picture to the Royal Academy on the understanding that if I did I should +probably be elected Associate that year, and also that my picture would +be bought by the Chantrey Fund. My answer to that was, "If my picture is +good enough to be purchased for the Chantrey Bequest my picture can be +purchased from the walls of the Grosvenor Gallery as well as from the +walls of the Royal Academy. That seems to me to be justice." + +The "New English," then, had some justification for their establishment; +and although they did not make very much headway before the close of the +nineteenth century, they find themselves at the opening of the twentieth +in a position to determine to a very considerable extent what the future +of English painting is to be, just as the Academy succeeded in +determining it before they came into existence. + +For the Academy everything that was vital in English art in the last +half century had no existence--was simply ignored. For the New English, +it was the seed that flowered, under their gentle influence, into the +many varieties of blossoms with which our garden is already filled. To +the Academy there was no such thing as change or development--their ears +were deaf to any innovation, their eyes were blind to any fresh beauty. +To others, every new movement foretold its significance, and the century +closed with the recognition of the fact that art must live and develop +if it is to be anything but a comfortable means of subsistence for a +self-constituted authority of forty and their friends. + +Let me be allowed to conclude this chapter, and my imperfect efforts to +indicate the energies of six centuries of art in so small a space, with +a passage from a lecture delivered in 1882 by Mr Selwyn Image, now Slade +Professor at Oxford, which embodies the spirit in the air at that time, +and foreshadows what was to come. "I do not feel that we have come here +to sing a requiem for art this afternoon," he said. "As a giant it will +renew its strength and rejoice to run its course. I am not a prophet, I +cannot tell you just what that course is going to be. Nor is it possible +to estimate what is around us with the same security, with the same +value, that we estimate what has passed--you must be at a certain +distance to take things in. But in contemporary art we can notice some +characteristics, which are quite at one with what we call the modern +spirit; and extremely suggestive--for they seem to indicate movement, +and therefore life, in this imaginative sphere, just as there is +movement and life in the sphere of science or of social interests. For +instance, in modern representative work ... I think anyone comparing it +as a whole with the work of the old masters, will be struck as against +their distinctness, containedness, simplicity and serenity; with its +complexity, restlessness, and vagueness, and emotion, and suggestiveness +in place of delineation, and impressionism in place of literal +transcription--and this alike in execution and motive. I do not mean to +say that these qualities are better than the qualities that preceded +them, or worse--but only that they are different, only that they are of +the modern spirit--only that they indicate movement and life; and so far +that is hopeful--is it not?" + + +THE END + + + + +_INDEX_ + + +Academy of Painting, the French, 231 + +---- the Royal, 279, 286, 329-333 + +Alamanus, Giovanni or Johannes, 60, 61 + +Allegri, Antonio, or Correggio, 58 + +Alma-Tadema, Sir Lawrence, 307 + +Altdorfer, Albert, 212, 214-216 + +Angelico, Fra, 19 + +Animal Painters, 154, 191-202 + +Aretino, Spinello, 17 + +Arnolde, 255 + + +Backer, 174 + +Balen, Henry van, 159, 162 + +Barret, 287 + +Basaiti, Marco, 63, 74 + +Bassano, Jacopo da, 98-99 + +Bastiani, Lazzaro di, 75-76 + +Baudelaire, 311, 312 + +Bazzi, Giovanni Antonio (Sodoma), 57 + +Bellini, Gentile, 70, 72-73, 76, 81 + +---- Giovanni, 62, 63, 66, 70-72, 76, 81, 82, 83, 94 + +---- Jacopo, 66, 69, 70, 75 + +Belvedere, Andrea, 201 + +Berchem, Nicholas, 199-201, 205, 208 + +Beruete, Senor, quoted, 113, 115, 116, 118, 177 + +Bettes, John, 254, 255 + +---- Thomas, 255 + +Bol, 165 + +Boltraffio, Giovanni Antonio, 57 + +Bonifazio Veronese or Veneziano, 97-98 + +Bordes, Lassalle, 311 + +Bosboom, 307 + +Botticelli, Sandro, 26, 28-32, 33 + +Botticini, Francesco, 32 + +Boucher, Francois, 241-243, 245, 246, 247, 248 + +Bouguereau, 306 + +Bourdon, Sebastien, 231-232 + +Bouts, Dirk, 132 + +Bracquemond, 325 + +Bril, Paul, 229 + +Broederlam, Melchior, 121, 122, 124 + +Brouwer, Adrian, 157, 158, 173, 183-185 + +Brueghel, Jan, or Velvet Brueghel, 141, 201 + +----- Pieter (or Peasant), 141 + +---- ---- his son, 141 + +Brun, Le, 234-241 + +Bruyn, Bartel, 212 + +Buonarroti. _See_ Michelangelo + +Burnet, on Turner, 315 + +Byzantine Art, 59, 124 + + +Caliari, Paolo, 102-103 + +Campidoglio, Michel de, 201 + +Canale, Antonio, 108 + +Caro-Delvaille, quoted, 79, 87, 91, 92 + +Carpaccio, Vittore, 75, 76-78 + +Carracci, the, 106, 182 + +---- Agostino, 106, 107, 108 + +---- Annibale, 106, 107 + +---- Lodovico, 106, 107 + +Catalonia, School of, 109 + +Catena, Vincenzo, 72, 73 + +Cazin, 325 + +Champaigne, Philippe de, 233-234 + +Chantrey Trust, the, 329 + +Chardin, 245, 247, 296, 297 + +Chartered Society, the, 286 + +Cimabue, Giovanni, 1-9, 10, 11, 124, 125, 308 + +Claude (or Claude Lorraine, or Gellee), 226, 229-231 + +Cleef, Joos van, 142 + +Clouet, Francois, 226 + +---- Jehan or Jean, 226 + +Cole, Peter, 255 + +---- Vicat, 323 + +Conegliano, Cima da, 72, 73-74 + +Constable, 295, 306, 310, 314, 317 + +Cook, Herbert, quoted, 80, 83, 87 + +Copley, John Singleton, 297 + +Corot, 306 + +Correggio, 58 + +Cotes, 287 + +Cotman, John Sell, 295-296, 306, 314 + +Courbet, 306 + +Couture, 324 + +Cox, 306 + +Cozens, John Robert, 316 + +Cranach, Lucas, 212, 213-214 + +Credi, Lorenzo di, 49 + +Creswick, 323 + +Crivelli, Carlo, 63, 64 + +Crome, John, or Old Crome, 295, 314 + +---- John Bernay, his son, 295 + +Crowe and Cavalcaselle, quoted, 122 + +Cunningham, Allan, "Life of Hogarth," 261, 266, 267, 301 + +Cuyp, Albert, 194-196 + +---- Jacob Gerritz, 194 + + +Dance, Nathaniel, 286 + +Daubigny, 306 + +Daumier, 306 + +David, Jacques Louis, 248, 249, 306, 309 + +Dayes, Edward, quoted, on Turner, 315 + +Decamps, 306 + +Degas, 306 + +Delacroix, Eugene, 306, 309-313 + +Diana, Benedetto, 75 + +Dilke, Lady, quoted, 247 + +Dobson, William, 257 + +Dolce, Carlo, 108 + +---- Ludovico, on Titian, 80, 81 + +Domenichino, 107-108, 227 + +Donatello, 23, 70 + +Dore, 306 + +Dou, Gerard, 187, 188, 192 + +Doyen, 246 + +Duccio of Siena, 5, 6, 59, 124, 125 + +Duerer, Albert, 70, 140, 175, 181, 212, 213, 215-222, 223 + +Duret, Theodore, quoted, on Manet, 324-325 + +Dyck, Anthony van, 156, 157, 160-163, 165, 166, 178, 236, 272 + +---- ---- in England, 256-257 + +Dutch School, 165-210 + + +Eclectics, the, 105 + +Edwards, Edward, quoted, on Art Exhibitions, 279 + +Elsheimer, Adam, 158, 212 + +Emilia, Schools of, 57 + +English School, early Portrait Painters of, 251-258 + +---- in Eighteenth Century, 295-298 + +---- spirit of revolt in Nineteenth Century, 305 _et seq._ + +Everdingen, 157, 205 + +Exhibitions of Painting, 278 + +Eyck, Hubert van, 121, 125, 126, 127, 143, 150 + +---- Jan van, 121, 125, 129-131, 133, 134, 150 + + +Fabriano, Gentile da, 65, 70 + +Fabritius, Karel, 189 + +Fantin-Latour, 325 + +Fiori, Mario di, 201 + +Flaxman, John, on Romney, 298-300 + +Flemish School, 121-163 + +Floris, Franz, 144 + +Foppa, Vincenzo, 57 + +Fragonard, Jean Honore, 245, 248, 249 + +Francesco, Piero della, 49 + +Franciabigio, 45 + +Free Society of Artists, 286 + +French Academy of Painting, 231 + +French School in Seventeenth Century, 225-235 + +---- in Eighteenth Century, 235-249 + +---- in Nineteenth Century, 305 + +Frith, W. P., quoted, 331 + +Fyt, Jan, 154, 157 + + +Gaddi, Taddeo, 18 + +Gainsborough, Thomas, 286, 288-295, 297 + +Garrard, Mark, 255 + +Gellee, Claude, or Claude, 226, 229-231 + +Genre Painters of Dutch School, 183-191 + +Gericault, 306, 310 + +German Schools, 211-224 + +Ghirlandaio, Domenico, 43, 310 + +Giambono, Michele, 60, 61 + +Gillot, Claude, 236, 239 + +Giorgione, 76, 79, 81, 82, 83, 86, 97 + +Giotto di Bondone, 10-18, 24, 66, 124, 308 + +Girtin, 315, 316 + +Gossaert, Jan, or Mabuse, 136, 138, 139, 143, 254 + +Gosse, Edmund, quoted, 322, 323 + +Goubeau, Antoine, 235 + +Goya, Francisco, 119-120 + +Goyen, Jan van, 186, 199, 202-203, 204 + +Grebber, Peter, 199 + +Greco, El, 110 + +Greene, Thomas, quoted, on Turner, 314 + +Greenhill, 257 + +Gros, Le, 309, 325 + +Greuze, Jean Baptiste, 243-245, 249, 258 + +Gruenewald, Matthew, 213 + +Guardi, Francesco, 108 + +Guercino, 108 + + +Hals, Frans, 165-169, 173, 178, 179, 181, 183, 184, 192, 248 + +Harpignies, 325 + +Heem, de, 201 + +Heemskirk, Martin, 144 + +Helst, Bartholomew van der, 165, 170-171, 174 + +Herle, Wilhelm van, or Meister Wilhelm, 211 + +Herrera, Francisco de, 111 + +Highmore, 297 + +Hilliard, 257 + +Hobbema, Meindert, 208-210 + +Hogarth, William, 257, 258-267, 280, 297, 298, 307 + +Holbein, Hans, 175, 212, 213, 222-224 + +---- in England, 254 + +Hondecoeter, Giles, 197, 198 + +---- Gysbert, 198 + +---- Melchior, 154, 198, 199 + +Hone, Nathaniel, 287 + +Honthorst, Gerard, 169-170 + +Hoogh, Peter de, 189, 190 + +Hudson, Thomas, 257, 269 + +Hunt, Alfred, 323 + +---- Holman, 134, 306, 320, 321, 322 + +Huysum, James van, 202 + +---- Jan van, 201-202 + +---- Justus van, 202 + +---- Michael van, 203 + + +Image, Mr Selwyn, quoted, 333 + +Ingres, 306 + +Israels, 307 + + +Jervas, 257 + +John of Bruges, 125, 126 + +Jongkind, 325 + +Jordaens, Jacob, 156, 157, 160, 163 + + +Kauffmann, Angelica, 287 + +Kneller, Sir Godfrey, 234, 257, 279 + +Knupler, Nicolas, 186 + +Kugler, quoted, 13, 61, 67, 75, 77, 95, +97, 99, 101, 103, 107, 181, 182, 195, 204, 223 + + +Lancret, Nicholas, 239-240, 241 + +Landscape, painters of, 202-210 + +Largilliere, Nicholas, 234, 235, 241 + +Lastman, Peter, 180 + +Laurens, J. P., 325 + +Lawrence, 300, 301-303, 306, 313 + +Le Brun, 234, 241 + +Le Gros, 309, 325 + +Le Moine, Francois, 241 + +Le Sueur, Eustache, 232-233 + +Lefort, quoted, on Velasquez, 115 + +Lely, Sir Peter, 165, 235, 257 + +Leyden, Lucas van, 138, 212 + +Lingelbach, 203, 208 + +Lippi, Fra Filippo, 21, 26, 29 + +---- Filippino, 22 + +Lochner, Stephen, 211 + +Lockie, 255 + +Lombardy, Schools of, 57 + +Longhi, Pietro, 108 + +Loo, Carle van, 241 + +Lorenzetti, Pietro, 17 + +Lorraine, Claude, 226, 229-231 + +Lotto, Lorenzo, 63, 72, 96-97 + +Luini, Bernardino, 57 + +Lyne, 255 + + +Mabuse, Jan van, 136, 138, 139, 143, 254 + +Maes, Nicolas, 180, 188-189 + +Manet, Edouard, 306, 324-327 + +Mansueti, Giovanni, 75 + +Mantegna, Andrea, 67-70, 71, 72, 146, 151 + +Maratti, Carlo, 108 + +Maris, the Brothers, 307 + +Masaccio, 18, 21, 24-26 + +Masolino, 26 + +Massys, Jan, 141 + +---- Quentin, 136-138, 141, 212 + +Mauve, 307 + +Meissonier, 306 + +Memling, Hans, 132, 133-136, 150 + +Mengs, Raphael, 85 + +Messina, Antonello da, 71, 72, 126, 129 + +Metsu, 191 + +Michelangelo, 26, 40-46, 66, 95, 100 + +Mieris, Frans van, 188 + +Millais, 320, 321, 322, 323 + +Millet, 306 + +Moine, Francois le, 241 + +Monoyer, Baptiste, 201 + +Montagna, Bartolommeo, 63 + +Mor, Sir Antonio, 142 + +Morland, George, 296-298 + +---- Henry, his father, 296 + +Moroni, 75 + +Moser, Michael, 280 + +Moyaert, Nicholas, 199 + +Murano, Antonio da, 60 + +Murillo, Bartolome Esteban, 118-119 + +Muther, Dr, quoted, 32, 177, 178 + + +Nasmyth, 306 + +New English Art Club, 329, 333 + +Norwich School, 295 + + +Oil Painting, introduction of, 126 + +Oliver, 257 + +Oort, Adam van, 145 + +Orcagna, Andrea, 16 + +Orley, Bernard van, 140, 143 + +Ostade, Adrian van, 173, 183, 185, 206 + +---- Isaac van, 183, 185 + +Ouwater, 13 + + +Pacheco, 110-111 + +Padua, School of, 66 + +Palma, Giovane, 78 + +---- Vecchio, 78, 96, 98 + +Parma, School of, 58 + +Pater, Jean Baptiste Joseph, 240-241 + +Peake, 255 + +Penny, 287 + +Perugian or Umbrian School, 48, 49, 51 + +Perugino, Pietro, 48, 49 + +Pinas, 180 + +Piombo, Sebastiano del, 94-96 + +Pisanello, Vittore, 64, 65 + +Pissarro, 325 + +Pollaiuolo, Antonio, 26-28, 30 + +Pontormo, 45 + +Pot, Hendrik Gerritz, 169 + +Potter, Paul, 196 + +---- Pieter, 196 + +Poussin, Gaspard (Gaspard Dughet), 228-229, 231 + +---- Nicholas, 226-228 + +Poynter, Sir Edward, 331 + +Predis, Ambrogio di, 36, 57 + +Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, 134, 320, 323, 327 + +Previtali, Andrea, 74 + +Prudhon, 309 + + +Quattrocentists, the Earlier, 18-26 + +---- the Later, 26 _et seq._ + + +Raeburn, 300 + +Raphael, 26, 45, 47-57 + +---- Sir Joshua Reynolds on, 85, 270 + +Rembrandt van Ryn, 165, 166, 171-183, 192 + +Reni, Guido, 108 + +Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 267-278, 286-288, 289 + +---- quoted, on Boucher, 243 + +---- ---- on Bourdon, 232, 233 + +---- ---- on Gainsborough, 290-294 + +---- ---- on Hogarth, 260 + +---- ---- on Rubens and Titian, 93-94 + +---- ---- on Titian and Raphael, 85 + +---- ---- on Veronese, 105 + +---- revival of English School due to, 150 + +---- _Refs._ to, 245, 247, 251, 257, 297, 301, 331, 332 + +Ribera, 110 + +Richardson, 257 + +Ridolfi, quoted, 84 + +Rigaud, Hyacinthe, 234, 241 + +Riley, 257 + +Robert, Hubert, 246 + +Robusti, Jacopo. _See_ Tintoretto + +Romano, Giulio, 55 + +Romney, George, 100, 152, 289, 298-300, 301 + +Rossetti, 134, 306, 321, 322 + +Rowlandson, 89 + +Royal Academy, the, 329-333 + +---- foundation of, 279, 286 + +Rubens, Peter Paul, 143-157 + +---- and Van Dyck, 161-162 + +---- and Velasquez, 112, 149 + +---- pupils of, 157-163 + +---- _Refs._ to, 89, 93, 114, 117, 158, 160, +165, 167, 176, 179, 182, 184, 235, 236, 271 + +Rucellai Madonna, the, 5 + +Ruisdael, Jacob, 157, 200, 204-206, 208, 209 + +Ruskin against the Philistines, 313-323 + +---- on Whistler, 327 + + +Sandrart, Joachim, 229 + +---- quoted, 180 + +Sansovino, 89, 102 + +Sarto, Andrea del, 41, 45 + +Scharf, Sir George, 328 + +Schlegel, on Altdorfer, 215 + +Schongauer, Martin, 134 + +Scorel, Jan, 140 + +Sebastiani, Lazzaro di. _See_ Bastiani + +Segar, Francis, 255 + +---- William, 255 + +Seghers, Daniel, 201 + +Semitecolo, Nicolo, 59 + +Shee, Sir Martin Archer, 313 + +Signorelli, Luca, 49 + +Smith, John, Catalogue Raisonne, quoted, 193, 199, 244, 265 + +Snyders, Frans, 154, 157, 159-160, 163 + +Sodoma, 57 + +Spanish School, 108-120 + +Spinello of Arezzo, or Aretino, 17 + +Squarcione, Francesco, 62, 63, 66-67, 70 + +Steen, Jan, 186-187 + +Stevens, 306 + +Streetes, Guillim, 254, 255 + +Strozzi, Bernard, 113 + +Sueur, Eustache le, 232-233 + +Swanenburg, Jacob van, 175, 180 + + +Tassi, Agostino, 229 + +Teniers, Abraham, 158 + +---- David, the Elder, 157, 158 + +---- ---- the Younger, 157, 158, 159, 163, 185 + +Terburg, Gerard, 190-191 + +Thornhill, Sir James, 258, 279 + +Thulden, Theodore van, 156 + +Tiepolo, Giovanni Battista, 108 + +Tintoretto, Il, 99-102, 103, 104, 105, 113, 114, 117 + +Titian, 78-94, 100, 102, 103, 104, 105, 117, 179 + +Turner, 295, 306, 314-320, 323, 327 + +---- Claude's influence on, 230, 231 + +Tuscan Schools, 1-58 + + +Uccello, Paolo, 23-24, 25 + +Umbrian or Perugian School, 48, 49, 51 + + +Vaga, Piero del, 45 + +Van Balen, Henry, 159, 162 + +Van Cleef, Joos, 142 + +Van de Velde, Adrian, 203, 206, 208 + +---- Willem, the Elder, 206 + +---- ---- the Younger, 206-208 + +Van der Helst, Bartholomew, 165, 170-171, 174 + +Van der Weyden, Roger, 132-134, 211 + +Van Dyck, Anthony, 156, 157, 160-163, 165, 166, 178, 236, 272 + +---- ---- in England, 256, 257 + +Van Eyck, Hubert, 121, 125, 126, 127, 143, 150 + +---- Jan, 121, 125, 127, 131, 133, 134, 150 + +Van Goyen, Jan, 186, 199, 202-203, 204 + +Van Huysum, James, 202 + +---- Jan, 201-202 + +---- Justus, 202 + +---- Michael, 202 + +Van Leyden, Lucas, 138, 212 + +Van Loo, Carle, 241 + +Van Mabuse, Jan, 136, 138, 139, 143, 254 + +Van Mieris, Frans, 188 + +Van Oort, Adam, 145 + +Van Orley, Bernard, 140, 143 + +Van Ostade, Adrian, 173, 183, 185, 206 + +---- Isaac, 183, 185 + +Van Swanenburg, Jacob, 175, 180 + +Van Thulden, Theodore, 156 + +Vasari, quoted, on Andrea del Sarto, 41 + +---- on Botticelli, 28, 30, 32 + +---- on Cimabue, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 9 + +---- on Fra Angelico, 20 + +---- on Fra Filippo Lippi, 21, 22, 23 + +---- on Giotto, 10 + +---- on introduction of oil painting, 126, 127, 129 + +---- on Leonardo da Vinci, 34, 37, 39, 40 + +---- on Masaccio, 25, 26 + +---- on Michelangelo, 42, 43, 44, 45 + +---- on Pollaiuolo, 26, 27, 28 + +---- on the Quattrocentists, 18 + +---- on Raphael, 47 + +---- on Spinello of Aretino, 82, 86 + +---- on Titian, 82, 86 + +---- _Refs._ to, 173, 308 + +Vecellio, Tiziano. _See_ Titian + +Velasquez, 89, 109, 110-118, 120, 163, 178, 179 + +Venetian Schools, 59-108 + +Verhaegt, Tobias, 145 + +Vermeer of Delft, Jan, 189, 191 + +Veronese, Paolo, 103-104, 105 + +Verrocchio, Andrea, 34, 35, 49 + +Vertue, George, 251 + +Vinci, Leonardo da, 26, 33-40, 49, 57, 225 + +Vivarini Family, the, 59, 60 + +---- Antonio, 62, 63, 65 + +---- Bartolommeo, 62 + +---- Luigi, or Alvise, 62 + +Vlieger, Simon de, 206 + +Vollon, 325 + +Volterra, Daniele da, 18 + +---- Francesco da, 18 + +Vos, Simon de, 156 + + +Waagen, Dr, quoted, 95, 122-123, 143, 146, 153, 157, 224 + +Walker, Robert, 257 + +Walpole, quoted, 251, 252, 267 + +Wals, Gottfried, 229 + +Watteau, Antoine, 235-239, 240, 241 + +Watts, George Frederick, 306, 322 + +Weenix, Jan Baptist, 154, 197, 198, 199 + +---- ---- his son, 154, 198 + +Wesel, Hermann Wynrich von, 211 + +West, Benjamin, 253, 256, 287 + +Weyden, Roger van der, 132-134, 211 + +Whistler, James M'Neill, 306, 325, 327 + +Wilhelm, Meister, 211 + +Wills, 280 + +Wils, Jan, 199 + +Wilson, Richard, 230, 288, 296 + +Wint, Peter de, 306 + +Wouvermans, Philip, 192-193, 205, 206, 208 + +Wyczewa, M. de, quoted, 117 + +Wynants, Jan, 192, 203-204 + + +Zampieri, Domenico, or Domenichino, 107-108 + +Zoffany, 297 + +Zurbaran, 110 + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] National Gallery Catalogue. + +[2] "Titien," par Henry Caro-Delvaille. Librairie Felix Alcan. + +[3] An old copy of this picture is in the Edinburgh Gallery. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Six Centuries of Painting, by Randall Davies + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIX CENTURIES OF PAINTING *** + +***** This file should be named 29532.txt or 29532.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/5/3/29532/ + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Chuck Greif and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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