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THE ART OF
THE LOW COUNTRIES
THE ART OF
THE LOW COUNTRIES
STUDIES
BY
WILHELM R. VALENTINER
TRANSLATED BY
MRS. SCHUYLER VAN RENSSELAER
ILLUSTRATED
UNIVERSITY OF [TORONTO
EPAREMENT OF ABT AND ARCHAEOLOC
GARDEN CITY NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
1914
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Copyright, 1914, by
DouBLEDAY, Pace & CoMPANY
All rights reserved, including that of
translation into foreign languages,
including the Scandinavian
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AUTHOR’S PREFACE
ischen Kunst, which is to appear simultaneously
in Germany (Bruno Cassirer, Berlin), contains
two articles that are not included in the German edition:
the one on Govert and Raphel Camphuysen, which was
first published in Art in America, and the hitherto
unpublished list of the Rembrandts in American collec-
tions.
Several of the other articles were first published in
German, French, or English periodicals: the one on
Quentin Metsys in Les Anciens Arts de Flandres, Rem-
brandt at the Latin School in the Jahrbuch der kéniglich-
preussischen Kunstsammlungen, Rembrandt’s Blinding
of Samson in the Burlington Magazine,and Rembrandt’s
Representations of Susanna, part of the article on van
Dyck, and the one on Rubens in the Zeitschrift fiir
bildende Kunst.
The lists of the paintings by Rembrandt, Rubens, and
van Dyck in American collections are possibly not com-
plete. Although most of the works of these artists
that have come from Europe during the last twenty
years have been traced to public or private collections,
(ke American edition of Aus der niederland-
vu
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
there may be some in private hands that are still un-
known to me. |
I feel it to be a piece of good fortune that a book
written in a foreign language should be presented to
the public in a translation which not only does full
justice to the author’s meaning but has a charm of its
own, and I beg to express to Mrs. Schuyler Van Rens-
selaer my most grateful appreciation.
WiLHELM R. VALENTINER.
Metropolitan Museum of Art,
New York,
June, 1914.
TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE
break of the war, Mr. Valentiner remained in Ger-
many to do his part for his country as a volunteer,
he has seen none of the pages of this book in type.
Nor has he seen in their present form any of the il-
lustrations, which, owing to the different size of the
American volume, have necessarily been made anew.
Before he left New York, however, he read in the manu-
script almost the whole of the translation, and sanc-
tioned the few changes which would be found were it
compared with the original.
It was not possible to translate more literally the
German title of the book, Aus der niederliindischen
Kunst. In English “the Netherlands” is the true name
of the kingdom to which, colloquially, we give the name
of its chief provinces, Holland. ‘“‘The Low Countries”’
is the only English term that covers the Flemish as well
as the Dutch provinces, Belgium as well as the Nether-
lands. This distinction has, of course, been respected
in the text as well as in the title of the book.
The names of many Dutch and Flemish artists were
written in their time in diverse ways, and are so written
T should be explained, I think, that as, at the out-
1X
TRANSLATORS PREFACE
in our own. I have been careful to preserve the forms
selected by Mr. Valentiner excepting in a few cases
where another form chances to be much more familiar
to the readers of English. In writing the names of
Dutchmen and Flemings I have, as is proper, written
van with a small v, but in citing American names of
Dutch origin I have used, as is customary with us, a
capital V.
M. G. Van RENSSELAER.
9 West Tenth Street,
New York,
September, 1914.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Author’s Preface .
Translator’s Preface .
Linear Composition in Dutch ee ae
The Church Architecture of the Netherlands in
the Middle Ages ;
The Haarlem School of Panties in vthe Fifteenth
Century... areas
The Satirical Work at aera Met ave: ne
The Brothers Govert and Raphel Camphuysen
Dutch Ceramic Tiles... Te eee
Rembrandt at the Latin School
Rembrandt’s Blinding of Samson .
Rembrandt’s Representations of Susanna .
Works by Rubens in American Collections
Works by van Dyck in American Collections
Bibliographical Notes
Appendices:
I. List of Works by Haarlem Painters of the
Fifteenth Century
II. List of Works by Rubens in nenean Col-
lections ..
Ill. List of Works oe Van’ Deck in Secor
Collections
IV. List of Works by Ranbtandt in Aero
Collections
[xi]
PAGE
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
LINEAR COMPOSITION IN DUTCH ART
Drrx Bouts, THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER .
Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin.
Lucas van Lreypen, Ecce Homo
Engraving.
REMBRANDT, Ecce Homo
Etching.
Ter Borcu, THe FortunE TELLER
Albertina, Vienna.
JONGKIND, River View .
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
THE CHURCH ARCHITECTURE OF THE NETHERLANDS
P. SAENREDAM, CHURCH OF St. Mary,
UTRECHT
Amsterdam.
P. SAENREDAM, CHURCH oF St. Mary
~ UTRECHT
Amsterdam.
CuurcH oF St. Servatius, MAASTRICHT
Cuurcu or St. Pancras, LEYDEN
[ xiii |
10
12
14
18
20
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
G. BeRKNEYDE, CuurcH oF St. Bavon, HAARLEM
London.
P. SarenREDAM, CHuRCH OF St. Bavon, HaAar-
LEM : ; ; : : ;
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
Cuorr, Cuurcu or St. Bavon, HAARLEM.
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING IN THE
FIFTEENTH CENTURY
Dirx Bouts, MADONNA AND CHILD .
National Gallery, London.
Dirx Bouts, THE GATHERING OF THE MANNA
Pinakothek, Munich.
Dir« Bouts, St. CHRISTOPHER
Pinakothek, Munich.
Dirk Bouts, Portrait or A MAN . :
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
OuwatTeR, THe Raisina or LAZARUS '
Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin.
FoLLOWER OF Dirk Bouts, MADONNA AND CHILD
Collection of Mr. Stephenson Clarke, Hayward Heath, England.
FoLLoweR oF Dir« Bouts, Tue Raisine or
LAZARUS
Mexico.
FoLLoweEr or Dirx Bouts, THe Srpyt AND THE
Emprror AUGUSTUS.
Staedel Institute, Frankfort.
FoLtLtower or Dirk Bouts, THE MARRIAGE OF
JOSEPH AND Mary es
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
[ xiv |
FACING
PAGE
22
26
26
38
40
42
44.
46
48
50
52
54
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
In THE MANNER OF GEERTGEN, PORTRAIT OF THE
BURGOMASTER OF SCHIEDAM . : ; 58
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
GEERTGEN, PIETA . : . . . 60
Hof Museum, Vienna.
GEERTGEN, THE ADORATION OF THE Maai . 62
Rudolfinum, Prague.
GEERTGEN, St. JOHN THE Baptist... : . 64
Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin.
In tHE MANNER OF GEERTGEN, St. Martin _— 68
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
MAsTER OF THE Martyrpom orf St. Lucy, THE
CRUCIFIXION. ; / 5) 4g
Rijks Museum, Amsterdam.
Master or Tur Martryrpom or St. Lucy, THe
Martyrpom or St. Lucy . x : ; 74
Rijks Museum, Amsterdam.
GERARD Davin, THE VIRGIN AND St. JOHN . 76
Museum, Antwerp.
JAN Mostarert, THE SrpyL AND THE EMPEROR
AUGUSTUS .. . . 84
Museum, Antwerp.
JaAcoB CoORNELISZ, THE CRUCIFIXION cee? 6 86
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
THE SATIRICAL WORK OF QUENTIN METSYS
QuEenTIN Metsys, Otp Man Dancinc....__— 88
Uffizi, Florence.
QuENTIN Mersys, THreE Men Carousinc . 90
Uffizi, Florence.
[xv]
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
QuENTIN MEtTSys, SEDUCTION. ; : :
Collection of the Countess Pourtalés, Paris.
Quentin Metsys, St. JEROME
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
FACING
PAGE
91
92
THE BROTHERS GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
GOVERT CAMPHUYSEN, PorTRAIT GROUP .
Museum, Stockholm.
GOVERT CAMPHUYSEN, HEN ALARMED BY A CaT
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
GOVERT CAMPHUYSEN, THE HALT AT THE TAVERN
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
GOVERT CAMPHUYSEN, THE Farm NEAR THE
VILLAGE ;
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
RapHeL Dirxksz CAMPHUYSEN, CATTLE
Collection of Mr. John D. McIlhenny, Philadelphia.
RapPHeL Dirxsz CAMPHUYSEN, CATTLE NEAR A>
CASTLE ; :
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
PIETER DE Hoocn, INTERIOR (SHOWING TILES).
Rijks Museum, Amsterdam.
TILES . ; : ;
About 1580-1630. Italian Influence.
TILES . : :
About 1580-1630. Italian Influence.
TILES ’
About 1650. Chinese Influence.
[xvi]
100
104
106
108
112
114
118
122
124
124
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Bive AND Wuite TILEs
About 1630-1670.
Biue AND Waiter TILES
About 1630-1670.
PoLYCHROME TILEs .
A. About 1725. B. About 1750.
REMBRANDT IN THE LATIN SCHOOL
REMBRANDT, DIANA AND CALLISTO
In the possession of the author, New York.
REMBRANDT, THE Rare or Europa
Collection of Herr Kappel, Berlin.
REMBRANDT, THE RapE oF PROSERPINE
Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin
REMBRANDT, A SCHOLAR
Print Room, Dresden.
REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
REMBRANDT, THE BLINDING OF SAMSON
Staedel Institute, Frankfort.
RemBranpt, THE BLINDING OF SAMSON (DETAIL)
Staedel Institute, Frankfort.
REMBRANDT, CHRIST BEARING THE CROSS
Print Room, Berlin.
REMBRANDT’S REPRESENTATIONS OF SUSANNA
P. LastMan, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin.
REMBRANDT (AFTER LASTMAN), SUSANNA AND THE
ELDERS
Print Room, Berlin.
[ xvii |
FACING
PAGE
126
128
128
136
138
140
148
156
160
162
164
164
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
Print Room, Berlin.
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
Print Room, Amsterdam.
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA
Mauritshuis, The Hague.
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin.
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
Print Room, Berlin.
WORKS BY RUBENS IN AMERICAN COLLECTIONS
Rusens, Romutus anp Remus
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
Rusens, Portrait oF A Man anp His Wire
Collection of Mrs. R. D. Evans, Boston.
Rusens, WoitF AnD Fox Hunt . :
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Rusens, A FEeaAst orf THE Gops .
Collection of Mrs. Untermyer, Yonkers, New York.
Ruspens, THe Entrance or Henri IV into
Paris
Collection of Mrs. J. W. Simpson, New York.
Ruspens, Portrait or HeLtioporo DE BARRERA
Collection of Mr. F. T. Fleitmann, New York.
Rusens, Tue Fatu or Icarus . : ‘
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
Rupens, THe Rape or THE SABINES ;
Collection of Mr. P. A. B. Widener, Philadelphia.
[ xviii |
FACING
PAGE
166
166
168
170
172
176
178
180
184
192
194
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
Rusens, THe RECONCILIATION OF THE ROMANS
AND SABINES . ; ; . 196
Collection of Mr. J. G. Sere Philadelphia.
Ruspens, LANDSCAPE : . 198
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
Rusens, Cows. . 198
Collection of Mr. J. G. Juhani Philadelphia.
WORKS BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICAN COLLECTIONS
Van Dycx, AN APOSTLE a Ot es Soe Wee ee
In Private Ownership, New York.
Van Dyck, Stupy Heap . : . 200
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
Van Dycx, THe REPENTANT MAGDALENE . 201
Collection of Mr. J. G. Johnson, Philadelphia.
Van Dyck, Portrait or FRANS SNYDERS _ 202
Collection of Mr. H. C. Frick, New York.
Van Dyck, PorTRAIT OF THE Marcuesa DurRAzzo 204
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Van Dyck, Portrait or Lucas vAN UFFELEN 206
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Van Dyck, Portrait or THE MARCHESA Bric-
NOLE-SALA . ; : ; . 208
Collection of Mr. P. A. B. Widener, Philadelphia.
VAN Dyck, PORTRAIT OF THE MARCHESA Cat-
TANEO . ‘ . : . 810
Collection of Mr. P. A. B. Wickens, Philadelphia.
Van Dyck, Portrait oF A GENOESE Lapy . 212
Collection of Mr. C. P. Taft, Cincinnati.
[ xix |
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
Van Dyck, Portrait of ViscouNT GRANDISON 214
Collection of Mr. H. P. Whitney, New York.
Van Dycx—Porrtrair or THE DvuKeE or Ricu-
MOND AND LENNOX : ; : = SiG
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
[xx ]
THE ART OF
THE LOW COUNTRIES
DIRK BOUTS, THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER
KAISER FRIEDRICH MUSEUM, BERLIN
I
LINEAR COMPOSITION IN DUTCH ART
Belgium into the Netherlands, we are surprised
by the grave and simple character of the
landscape, especially in the regions where art assumed
its finest forms, the two provinces of South and North
Holland. Instead of a hilly country clothed with
vegetation of various kinds and cut up into fields of
different colours, we find wide monotonous levels of
meadowland intersected only by narrow ditches or
broader canals running off toward the horizon. The
roads, bordered by rows of slender trees, mostly elms
and ashes, run parallel with these intersecting lines
or, along the coast, are flanked on the seaward side by
sand-dunes scantily overgrown. From the slightest
elevation, even from the highroad, we see a symmetrical
network of lines which, bounded in the most impressive
way by the level unbroken sweep of the horizon, gives
the landscape a serious character instinct with the
quality which in the language of art we call style.
Only the sand-dunes disturb the uniformity, swelling
and sinking as though the sea were repeating its rhyth-
[3]
‘OR: for the first time from Germany or
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
mic motion for a last time on the land and thus effecting
a transition to the reposefulness of the interior country.
The disposition of the buildings accords with the way
in which the land is thus divided by horizontal lines,
marked out into wide rectangles. When a village is
viewed from a distance the roofs seem to cling close
to the soil in continuous stretches, for the houses dare
present no wide expanses to the sea wind, and the mas-
sive body of a church, lifting the lines of the houses
somewhat higher, often makes more effect than its
tower. When we walk the streets the regularity of the
arrangement grows still more striking. Even in elder
days the houses were commonly placed side by side
in straight rows, parallel with the walled canals. The
windows are so regularly inserted that, looking along
the facades, the sills blend into long horizontal lines
with which the level roof-ridges generally correspond.
Since the eighteenth century these roof-ridges have for
the most part supplanted the more ancient, less weather-
proof gables, and now they assist the effect of breadth
in the houses. In the larger buildings string-courses
of lighter coloured stone usually aid. the horizontal
accentuation. In contrast are the determining per-
pendiculars — the jambs of the windows, the dividing
lines between house and house, the trunks of the trees
along the canals, and the piles that at intervals reinforce
their retaining walls.
The ground-plan of the individual house, like that
of the town or village, is extremely simple, and may as
a rule be resolved into a few geometrical figures for
which the lines of the canals supply the main axes.
These arrangements go back to earlier periods when the
[4]
ea
*
-
‘ ‘4
a
att
ad
LUCAS VAN LEYDEN, ECCE HOMO
ENGRAVING
LINEAR COMPOSITION IN DUTCH ART
unlikeness of the plans of house and town to those of
neighbouring countries, and especially to the much more
complicated plans of Germany, was already apparent.
This intimate relationship in style to the landscape
sprang in a great degree from practical necessity. The
canals, straight-lined from the first of course, supplied,
as has been said, the keynote for a severely regular way
of building, and the damp insalubrious climate of the
lowland prohibited the angles and bays of the German
dwelling-house. An effect of cleanliness and symmetry
made up for the lack of an expression of comfort in the
exterior of such houses.
Their interiors corresponded to their rectilinear
plans. Reconstructing an apartment of the typical
time of the seventeenth century, we wonder at the
bare, straight-lined arrangement. A square fireplace
occupies, perhaps, the centre of one wall, a pair of
plainly framed pictures or maps hanging symmetri-
cally beside it. In the corner a stiffly shaped chair
stands on a podium; the whitewashed wall behind it is
covered by a rectangular piece of ornamented leather,
and the other walls are divided by the decided lines of
the windows, under which stands a simple table, and
those of the door, the great, widely projecting wardrobe,
and the cupboard containing the bed.
Going a step farther, from the practical to the artistic,
and considering either monumental architecture or the
industrial arts, we find the same sense of style. The
great Gothic churches and municipal halls; the build-
ings of both the chief architects of the Late-Renais-
sance and Baroque periods, Hendrik de Keyser and
Jacob van Campen; the modern buildings of Berlage,
[5]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
the architect of the Amsterdam Exchange; all, com-
pared with the contemporaneous structures of neigh-
bouring countries, have a bald and simple character —
a plan that may be resolved into a few large rectangles
and an elevation where the vertical and horizontal lines
of construction are plainly shown and the undecorated
fields of walls are emphasized. Or let us consider cer-
tain products of the minor arts and crafts. In the
designing of furniture there is now a return — with a
modern interpretation, it is true — to the principles of
that Baroque art which in Holland, with its strongly
constructional shapes and its simple geometrical or-
namentation, differed in so radical a way from the
pompously contorted forms it assumed in other lands.
Old Dutch, like modern Dutch, bookbinding is also
marked by a love for linear patterns sparsely filling the
field. The outer lines follow the edge of the cover, and
toward the middle surround a few diagonally placed
rectangles one of which contains the title. To their
ceramic tiles, again, other countries have given a rich
variety of shapes but Holland only one, the square
shape; only in Holland does the plain white ground play
so large a part in the general effect; only here is the pat-
tern restricted to so small a field, or is sameness in the
ornament — for example, in the filling of the corners —
so marked a feature of the design.
But the most striking proof of the existence, as a
national characteristic, of a sense of style consistent in
respect to nature and to art, speaks from the uncon-
scious employment of the linear scheme of Dutch land-
scape by the Dutch painter whenever he has concerned
himself with stylized composition. This tendency has
[6]
Ee see
REMBRANDT, ECCE HOMO
ETCHING
LINEAR COMPOSITION IN DUTCH ART
marked the art of every period from the earliest to the
latest — from Geertgen van Haarlem’s to Lucas van
Leyden’s and Rembrandt’s and down to the modern
work of Jongkind and van Gogh. As in Italy the tri-
angle, so in Holland the rectangle, is used by prefer-
ence to turn a fragment of nature into a composition
complete in itself. Laterally the rectangle is formed
by architectural or natural side-scenes; or, in the case
of groups, by the vertical lines of their outermost
figures and those that are prolonged above their heads.
If a general outline is lacking, separate parts of the
picture are composed into rectangles; in the representa-
tion of single figures it may even be that the upper and
lower parts of the body are enclosed in such a pattern.
Usually the artist avoids putting the geometrical dia-
gram directly in the centre; in the Baroque time es-
pecially he pushes it to one side, to preserve the effect
of the accidental in nature. Of course I do not imply
that this kind of composition may be found in all Dutch
paintings; but for five centuries, all through the long
development of this school of art, it so often reappears,
particularly when the greatest masters are trying to for-
mulate the laws of composition, that it seems the nec-
essary expression of the sense of style of the painters of
Holland. In the stead of the innumerable examples
that might be given I can mention only one or two
pictures by a few leading artists.
A recognized trait of the two Dutch Primitives of chief
importance, Dirk Bouts and Geertgen van Haarlem, is
their preference for making their figures, when there are
many in the composition, all of the same height and
ranging them almost without movement side by side, an
[7]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
ordering which in itself emphasizes the lines of height
and breadth. A typical example is the Feast of the
Passover of Bouts in the Berlin Museum. The fig-
ures might be almost exactly enclosed in a quadrangle
which is pushed somewhat away from the middle of
the picture so that the symmetrical effect may not be
conspicuous. Occasionally we find that the early
Dutchmen, influenced perhaps by compositions of
southern origin, strive also for the triangular, the
pyramidal, arrangement; but just these exceptional
pictures prove that it did not quite suit their sense of
style, for emphatic vertical lines accompany the diago-
nal ones and enhance their effect. An instance of
this is the Gathering of the Manna of Dirk Bouts, in
the Pinakothek at Munich, with the triangular group
in the centre and the upright figures on either hand.
Naturally, examples of stylized composition may
most often be found in pictures where the figures are
brought into harmony with the severe lines of an archi-
tectural background. Well-known early pictures of
this kind are the Holy Fellowship of Geertgen van
Haarlem in the Rijks Museum at Amsterdam and, in
the same collection, the Virgo inter Virgines, the painter
of which we call by its name. And an engraving of
Lucas van Leyden’s with an architectural background
— the Ecce Homo — may be cited as a specimen of the
many-figured compositions that were in vogue at the
beginning of the sixteenth century. Perhaps a print
like this, where amid long rows of stiff figures the princi-
pal group is scarcely distinguished, may not strike us as
one of the great engraver’s happiest compositions. But
if it had not corresponded precisely with the Dutch
[8]
TER BORCH, THE FORTUNE TELLER
ALBERTINA, VIENNA
i
LINEAR COMPOSITION IN DUTCH ART
sense of style Rembrandt would not have imitated it a
century later in a familiar etching, the large Ecce Homo
of 1655, where the architecture, built up of rectangles,
still more distinctly gives the keynote for the disposal
of the groups and single figures.
If has often been remarked that at the time when
Rembrandt produced this etching, a time when he more
frankly strove for stylized composition than at an
earlier or a later period, he seems in certain works to
have combined his figures into squares. This ten-
dency to stylizing he shared in the sixth and seventh
decades of the seventeenth century with a number of
the greatest Dutchmen such as Pieter de Hooch, Jan
Vermeer, and Gerard Ter Borch. It was the time of
the finest flowering of the art of Holland, when the
greatest ability expressed itself in the simplest possible
form. In choosing this form the artist, instinctively
falling back upon the art of the best of the early Dutch-
men, returned to the accentuation of vertical and
horizontal lines. In many exterior and interior views
by Pieter de Hooch and Jan Vermeer this linear scheme
is immediately apparent in the structure of the houses,
in the decoration of the rooms, in the disposition of the
figures, even in the construction of the figures them-
selves, and the rectangle clearly shows as the geometri-
cal basis upon which the composition is built up.
Moreover, a study like the Fortune Teller of Ter Borch
in the Albertina Collection at Vienna —a drawing
which has something almost academic in the straight
lines of the contour and in the adaptation of the body
to geometrical forms — is a proof that the artist did
not thus stylize in a wholly unconscious way.
[9]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
In fact, the decline of Dutch painting followed very
quickly upon its most classical phase, for even the
ablest artists could not long continue to combine
stylized design of a large and simple kind with a vital
rendering of nature. French art was able to win the
influence that it exerted upon Dutch art in the last
third of the seventeenth century because it accorded
with the tendency of the Hollanders toward severe
straight-lined forms. In their linear scheme the rec-
tangular gardens in the style of Le Notre, such as we see
in the backgrounds of the unsatisfactory late pictures
of Pieter de Hooch, are not very different from Dutch
gardens of the preceding period, nor, in the same sense,
are the columned porticos in which an aristocratic
society disports itself unlike the plain interiors where
simple burgher folk took their ease. Only, the external
scheme no longer truthfully expresses the inner meaning.
If, finally, we turn to modern painting and seek, in
the work of the ablest artists, for proof of a sense of
style inspired by the landscape of Holland, we have no
trouble in finding examples. With Vincent van Gogh,
and still more with Jongkind, we constantly see that,
to give repose to the elements of the picture, they lay
stress upon the lines of height and breadth. If these
painters are compared with the Frenchmen with whom
they grew up, their pronounced Dutch character shows —
distinctly in the differing linear arrangement of their
pictures, and by reason of this difference they uncon-
sciously stand as supporters of the great national tra-
dition.
[ 10]
MYOA MON ‘LUV JO WOGSAW NVLITOCOULAN
MGIA YAATH SANIMDNOL
II
THE CHURCH ARCHITECTURE OF THE
NETHERLANDS IN THE MIDDLE AGES
would necessarily take into account the results
of the unending struggle of the people with the
encroaching waters. It would consider the achievements
of hydraulic engineering and the influence that they
exerted upon architectural monuments, for the build-
ing of canals and dikes helped both to determine
the artistic character of the landscape and to develop
in the architect the qualities that it demanded of him —
a sense for sober and correct ways of building, for regu-
larity in planning, and for the accurate estimating of
structural strength.
The earliest constructions of which we know in the
Netherlands were works of engineering. When Rome
conquered the country of the Batavians they were liv-
ing upon hills which they had thrown up along the
coast and which still exist to-day, notably in Gron-
ingen and Friesland. So vast in extent are these so-
called Terpen or Wierden, in certain regions stretching
out for miles, that the labour of building them has been
[11]
, HISTORY of architecture in the Netherlands
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
not unreasonably compared with the task of erecting
the pyramids of Egypt.
The earliest canals seem to have been the work of
the Romans, although a systematic development of
inland waterways was postponed to a later day and
accomplished by the Netherlanders themselves. With
this exception the Romans built in the Netherlands
much as they did in their other provinces, constructing
camps and citadels, market-places, temples, and ceme-
teries, which, of course, can hardly be credited to Dutch
architecture. Some of them still survive in ruins —
submerged in the sea like the Nehalennia temple near
Domburg and the citadel of Brittenburg near Katwijk-
Buiten, or on inland sites like the Forum of Hadrian
near Voorburg and the citadel of Romburg at Leyden.
In the Netherlands, as in other Germanic countries, —
the earliest efforts at self-expression in art followed the
great racial migrations which, fertilizing the land with
new blood, developed new powers and energies. Of
the result, however, exceptionally little is known in
just these regions. The Franks, the Saxons, and the
Frisians distributed themselves over the territory of
the Holland of to-day in a way that held good ever
after, and in the planning of their houses soon displayed
their racial peculiarities. Even now the farmsteads of
the three races differ, in so far that among the Frisians
the dwelling is separated from the stables and barns
and among the Saxons is united with them under one
roof, while among the leading people, the Franks, the
separation of the domestic and the farm buildings is
but partially effected.
The houses still had no touch of art. They were ©
[12]
UTRECHT
AM, CHURCH OF ST. MARY,
SAENRED
P.
AMSTERDAM
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
caves, pile-dwellings, or mere huts of mud and wattle.
Although nothing is left of them we may imagine their
aspect, for even now in certain parts of Holland similar
primitive ways of building survive — for example, at
Assen, where pile-dwellings are still erected, and at
Maastricht, where houses are excavated in the soft mar]
of the Pietersberg.
The first impulse toward a somewhat more ambitious
manner of building was the desire for a waterproof
structure for the worship of the gods. Early Christian
sources declare that, especially in Friesland and Dren-
the, there were numerous heathen temples containing
statues that stood on the high altars in honour of Wotan
and Thor. They also tell how the monks came, shattered
the figures, overturned the altars, and in the stead of
the temples erected small wooden churches, and how,
when the heathen took up arms, returned, and destroyed
the churches of the little congregations, the conflict long
surged hither and thither before the:Frisians aban-
doned a religion which, as it seems to us to-day, gave a
soul to local nature and valued human wisdom less than
a sensitiveness to the hidden life of field and forest.
We may form an approximate idea of the heathen
temple from recent comparative investigations which
have established, for the pre-Carolingian period, the
existence of a common style in all the northerly Ger-
manic countries and have found a clue to their temple
architecture in the surviving ancient churches of Ice-
land. According to the description given by Albrecht
Haupt,
They consisted of two contiguous rectangular rooms. The
smaller choir-like room was intended for the erection of the altars
[13 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
of the gods and was the place of actual sacrifice; in the larger room
the worshippers assembled, and here, drawn up after the sacrifice
in long rows along the walls about the central hearth, they cele-
brated the sacrificial feast under the leadership of the priest who
had his official seat against the wall toward the room in which the
altar stood.
This ground-plan seems to have influenced the ar-
rangement of the earliest Christian churches. Indeed,
it is obvious that, in spite of all spiritual disagreements,
the Christian architect must in practical life have con-
formed as much as possible to existing conditions. Ac-
cording to Haupt, the earliest wooden churches of
the Netherlands, which can be reconstructed upon the
evidence of the oldest existing Scandinavian buildings,
consisted like the pagan temple of two rooms of unequal
size, but these rooms were connected at first by a
narrow opening and later by the chancel-arch uniting
choir and nave. It was an influence from the south,
the influence of the basilican type of church, that first
developed a more elaborate arrangement with a narrow
choir and a broad nave. Then chapels were sometimes
added to the choir, and occasionally a vestibule stretched
in front of the nave.
Nor is the existence of a consistent Early-Germanic
art of the north our only warrant for assuming analogies
between the early buildings of the Netherlands and of
Scandinavia. The two countries were in actual and
close relations. The Frisians were often allied with the
Northmen, and in the early Middle Ages several Dan-
ish kings believed that they had a right to East Fries-
land and North Holland. Moreover, coins have been
found, struck at Dorestadt near Utrecht, which show a
resemblance to those of Danish and of Finnish origin.
[14]
P. SAENREDAM, CHURCH OF ST. MARY, UTRECHT
AMSTERDAM
SL aba Saleen aes pee
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
In the Netherlands Christian civilization spread
more tardily and more slowly than elsewhere — roughly
speaking, between the sixth and the eighth centuries;
and even then it was unable for a long time to establish
firm roots except in the southern parts of the country.
For an understanding of the development of Dutch art
it is important to remember that during the Middle
Ages and even later the Netherlands lay on the con-
fines of European civilization, and that, strong though
the influence of neighbouring peoples was in the border
districts, frequently though the overlordship changed
in the Netherlands themselves, the old stocks were able
to preserve their independence. Thus it had already
been in Roman times, for although in the days of
Drusus and Germanicus the authority of Rome imposed
itself even upon the Frisians, it was a precarious power
as the uprising of the Batavians made plain. In fact,
Roman civilization merely touched the Netherlands.
Afterward, the disseminators of Christianity were wise
enough to accommodate themselves more to local con-
ditions. In the Belgium of to-day, where the civiliza-
tion of Rome had won a firmer footing, they established
their bishoprics in lieu of the old Roman provinces and
thereby furthered the spread of the Roman leaven, but
farther north they did not thus connect themselves with
the vague tradition. The only bishopric founded in the
northern Low Countries, Utrecht, lay in the territory
of a purely Germanic race and could therefore soon
become a local and a national centre. It was a long
time, truly, before art here attained to independent
utterance. In architecture, as in the other arts, the
beginnings of a national style are not to be discerned
[15 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
until near the end of the Middle Ages, long after the
artistic growth of the southern Low Countries had
reached maturity. From the time of the advent of
Roman civilization these southern regions had main-
tained a lead of almost a hundred years, a lead that
was still perceptible in the time of the van Eycks and
even later, even in the time of Rubens. But if a na-
tional art developed more slowly in the north, it stood
there upon broader foundations, for nothing had ham-
pered the unfolding of the individuality of the people.
The clearest manifestation of its unlikeness to the
art of the southern Low Countries during the first half
of the Middle Ages was the adoption and adaptation
of elements of German —that is, of Rhenish and
Westphalian — origin. One of the earliest Christian
churches of which we hear in Holland was founded at
Utrecht in the eighth century; and the fact that the
initiative came from Cologne is important as a sign-
post, for during the subsequent Carolingian and Ro-
manesque periods Rhenish architecture exerted a
determining influence in the Netherlands. It was
from the Rhine that the art of Charlemagne reached
them. While they were under this great ruler the
political constellations were so favourable that it
seemed as though their time for a high development of
civilization had arrived. After he united all western
Germany and the Netherlands to his empire, the regions
between Cologne and the mouths of the Rhine became
the heart of his realm. Aix-la-Chapelle, as every one
knows, was his favourite place of residence, and at Liége
a school was founded that soon grew famous. When
one of the important trade-routes of the empire led
[16 ]
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
up along the course of the Rhine, trade seemed to
develop in the Netherlands, especially among the
Frisians. Then arose the oldest medizval building
that still exists in Holland, the palace-chapel of Char-
lemagne on the Valkhof at Nymegen, which, like the
little cathedral, often called a chapel, at Aix-la-Chapelle,
was attached to a palace with a great banqueting hall.
And that Carolingian civilization did not stop at this
point is proved by a building in the far north of Holland
that was long forgotten, the Church of St. Walburg at
Groningen. It was begun in the year 811 and was torn
down in 1619, but is preserved in old pictures that have
enabled Peters to reconstruct its original plan. Deriv-
ing from the cathedral of Aix-la-Chapelle, it had the
same centralized plan and was of similar importance but,
like the chapel at Nymegen, not quite so large.
In spite of its small size this chapel at Nymegen
makes an imposing effect, greatly aided by its beautiful
site on the last spur of the Rhenish hills, the river
Waal running in wide curves at the foot of the slope.
Above its elevated central part lies a low dark vault
with polygonal sides, built of clumsily squared stones
intermingled with bricks some of which are Roman
tiles bearing the stamps of the legionaries. In the
massive design, the colossal walls, we may trace the
spirit of the mighty but still half-barbarous ruler of
Europe who, here as at Aix-la-Chapelle, drew upon his
memories of the south, and especially of Ravenna, but
used them in novel creations of a bold northern char-
acter.
For two centuries the buds of this Carolingian civili-
zation unfolded no farther in the Netherlands. The
[17]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
country could not stand up against the repeated at-
tacks of the Northmen who again and again destroyed
all signs of renewed vitality. Better times for the
Netherlands did not return until, under the Hohenstau-
fens, architectural activity spread along the valley of
the Rhine, producing cathedrals of the greatest beauty.
Akin in style to these Rhenish structures were two
churches that then arose at Maastricht and Roermond,
the most important that have been preserved in Hol-
land from the Romanesque period. Even finer, per-
haps, was once the Church of St. Mary at Utrecht.
Torn down in the year 1814, it is shown in the drawings
of the architectural painters of the seventeenth century,
notably in those of Pieter Saenredam and Lambert
Doomer which have been published by Hofstede de
Groot. Probably it was erected by the founder of the
cathedrals of Mainz and Speyer, the greatly gifted
Emperor Henry IV, in fulfilment, if tradition speaks
truly, of a vow that he would build a church to the
Virgin because he had injured the cathedral of Milan
in taking the city. The likeness in plan between St.
Mary’s and the Church of San Ambrogio at Milan may
be thought to support this story. In construction St.
Mary’s, which must have had an importance for the
Romanesque architecture of the Netherlands such as
the cathedral of Utrecht had for the Gothic, was a
vestibuled church designed according to what the
Germans call the gebundene System — that most per-
fect solution of the problems of medieval architecture,
in which the crossing of nave and transept is taken as
the unit of construction and two bays of the aisles
correspond to one in the loftier nave.
[18 ]
LHOINISVVW ‘SOILVAUAS “LS JO HOUNHO
Z
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
The churches at Roermond and Maastrict — the
finest, as has been said, that remain from their period
— are admirable examples of the intrinsic strength and
animated grouping of the fully developed Romanesque
style. St. Servatius at Maastricht is the more elabo-
rate of the two in design, and in the Gothic period
was further enriched by the addition of chapels. The
massive structure with its five towers — simple in
plan, splendidly separating itself in elevation — forms
an harmonious, vigorously animated silhouette. The
double crypts, the dwarf arcade around the semicircular
apse, and the square towers pierced by rows of windows
near the top, are characteristic features of the archi-
tecture of the Lower Rhine countries, and by way of
Maastricht were transmitted to Belgium and especially
to Tournai.
Maastricht still possesses another great Romanesque
building, the Church of Our Lady, important for its
interior effect and particularly impressive in its great
crypt borne by three rows of slender columns. Out-
side, however, it is not comparable to St. Servatius.
Although it dates from the eleventh century an older
building, of the end of the tenth century, was unskil-
fully utilized in its construction, so that the main front
now consists of an over-lofty featureless mass of wall
flanked by two small staircase turrets.
Besides these buildings in the southern part of Hol-
land there must be noted in the north, in Friesland and
Groningen, a little group of Romanesque villagechurches
built on an unusual plan which, as Dehio has pointed
out, is also to be found in Anjou and in Westphalia.
They have no aisles, a quadrangular choir with a flat
[19]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
east-end, and barrel vaults. The thick walls, sloped
on the outside, the small windows, and the plain stumpy
towers give them a gloomy fortress-like air. Probably
these Angevin arrangements were introduced from
Westphalia, for the relations of this region with Anjou
are apparent in other fields as well as in architecture
and were brought about, perhaps, by the English who
ruled over Anjou in the twelfth and thirteenth cen-
turies.
If during the first half of the Middle Ages the archi-
tecture of the Netherlands is still incomplete and can-
not yet be separated from the art of adjacent countries,
from the time of the upgrowth of the cities in the thir-
teenth and fourteenth centuries the picture shows more
variety, and in the fifteenth century we find archi-
tectural enterprise as vigorous in the Netherlands as in
any of the chief centres of Late-Gothic art. The true
flowering of Dutch medizval church architecture, con-
temporaneous with the beginnings of the art of paint-
ing, survives to-day in almost every picture of a Dutch
city, for the principal church was usually Gothic, and
in most cases there were also fortified towers or town
gates of the same period. Numberless are the Gothic
churches of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, but
here, to make plain their general character, only a few
of the chief examples can be cited.
The finest of them all is the cathedral at Utrecht.
The incomparable choir was built at about the same
time as the cathedral of Cologne and, indeed, in con-
junction with it; the somewhat later brick tower speaks
more of Flemish influence. This cathedral was a
beacon of the church for the whole country, and from
[ 20 ]
CHURCH OF ST. PANCRAS, LEYDEN
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
the time of the van Eycks’ Ghent altar-piece it
constantly appears, symbolically introduced, in the
landscape backgrounds of Early-Dutch pictures. Most
of the principal churches of the other large cities of
Holland are known from the landscape paintings of
the seventeenth century. In the pictures of van
Goyen, for example, we usually see the tall tower of
the Great Church of the Hague, now replaced, unfortu-
nately, by a clumsy iron spire, or the lofty massive naves
of the chief churches of Leyden, St. Peter’s and the
Hooglandsche Kerk, also called the Church of St.
Pancras.
The distant views of Jacob Ruisdael and the city
pictures of Gerrit Berckheyden have made familiar
the gigantic Church of St. Bavon at Haarlem with its
graceful fléche.* The towers of both the principal
Gothic churches of Delft, the Old Church and the New
Church, often rise beyond the courtyards of Pieter de
Hooch. And in the backgrounds of numerous paint-
ings by Albert Cuyp we meet the Great Church of
Dordrecht, its unfinished square tower crowned by a
provisional seventeenth-century termination. More-
over, all who have visited Holland must remember the
Old Church at Amsterdam, for its finely proportioned
tower is a feature in the first impression one gets on
leaving the railroad station, and also the so-called New
Church on the Dam, only a little later in date, where
*For want of a better, I use this word to indicate the openwork spire which on
continental churches often stands above the intersection of nave and choir. The
German term is Dachreiter, “roof-rider”’, explanatory and picturesque. We may
suppose that there is no good English equivalent (although “lantern” is sometimes
used) because a fléche rarely if ever occurs in England where even the largest medi-
eval churches were kept so low that a great tower could be made the central feature
of the composition. — TRANSLATOR.
[21]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
the bare walls are broken by enormous windows strik-
ing even in an exterior view. With these churches the
Church of St. James at ’S Hertogenbosch (Bois de Duc)
and the Church of St. Nicholas at Kampen must be
named as two of the largest with five aisles. All of
them date in greater part from the fourteenth and the
end of the thirteenth century and were finished in the
fifteenth.
, The character of the Gothic churches of Holland is
clearly revealed when we contrast them with Belgian
buildings. To be frank, the comparison is not in
Holland’s favour. The cathedrals of the southern Low
Countries, subjected to French influences, display all
the splendours of Late-Gothic art. Rich and brilliant.
is the decoration of the surfaces, in animated fashion
the various parts of building group themselves together,
and the pompous bright interiors are filled with a spirit
of joyous life. In Holland there are no such intoxicat-
ing effects as in the cathedral of Antwerp or in St.
Gudule at Brussels. In Holland no one has ever been
impelled to speak, as in Belgium, of the Flamboyant
style or to use the sonorous word “‘cathedral,”’ although
several of the principal Dutch churches surpass the
Flemish in size.
In fact, if we consider the Dutch churches only from
the standpoint of architectural history, they are balder
and less interesting than the contemporary buildings
of any neighbouring country. Too large, and almost
clumsy and rustic of aspect, they look like magnified
village churches. Their construction shows no com-
plexities, for their stone vaults, dangerous undertakings
[ 22 ]
NOGNO'T
WATUVVH ‘NOAVE “LS JO HOUNHO SAGAANMUAA ‘YD
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE -AGES
because of the instability of the soil, were added, not
very skilfully, at a later day. In many respects, more-
over, these churches often look unfinished. The towers
in particular were seldom completed in Gothic days,
for the rise of the cities in the fifteenth century was
followed by a period of unrest and by the religious
cleavage which, at the time of the Reformation, hin-
dered the completion of gigantic religious edifices.
And, it may be added, beautiful buildings often fail of
their intended effect because of the introduction of the
novel arrangements of Protestant congregations. Such
is the case with the church at Goes, now divided by a
wall through the middle into two parts, and with the
transept of the cathedral of Utrecht which has been
altered into a Reformed church. Moreover, nature
has worked more destructively here than elsewhere.
Storms shattered certain towers, like the one at Alk-
maar, and the nave of the cathedral of Utrecht; and in
other buildings the original wooden ceilings, generally
used instead of stone vaults, fell a prey to fire together
with parts of the superstructure and of the choir.
Often the sandstone ornamentation with which the
customary brickwork was at times enlivened has not
withstood the weather; and where only sandstone was
used, as in the Maastricht region, it has so disintegrated
as to demand renovations amid which scarcely anything
of the old structure remains.
In short, at a first hasty glance there seems little
in the way of praise to be said of these churches which,
now that only a small part of them is occupied by the
congregation, seem doubly arrogant in their excessive
size. Nevertheless it is here that the individuality in
[ 23 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
style of the art of the Netherlands first expressed itself,
earlier than in painting or in sculpture. Here, in the
still undeveloped simplicity of a primitive art, we find
the characteristics which afterward came to such ad-
mirable development in the painting of the great period
—an innate strength proper to the whole nation, a
puritanical temperament recognizing only realities, and
above all a mastery of pictorial effect, always better
understood by the Dutch than architectural effect.
These buildings owe their imposing air mainly to the
simple cubical shape of their parts, to the exceptional
height and breadth of the three aisles, which are not
combined in any strictly prescribed way, to the great
undecorated wall spaces, and to the gigantic undivided
window openings. The body of the church usually
seems too large in comparison with the tower which is
seldom finished and is treated, so to say, for its own
sake or is confused in idea with a fléche; too large also
in comparison with the surrounding houses which we
know to have been much smaller in the old days than
either French or German houses, while the churches
yielded nothing in size to those of other lands.
In village churches, especially in Zeeland, strong
buttresses flanking the walls and a primitive square or
sometimes six-sided tower increase the massiveness
of effect. Generally there are buttresses also at the
corners of the tower, often spreading so widely that
they seem to support it on a sloping pedestal. The
plain pointed windows with which it is pierced on each
side give an idea of the great thickness of the walls,
due in the beginning to the unskilfulness of the builder
but afterward retained for artistic reasons. On the
[ 24 ]
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
other hand, in these village churches and just as often
in the larger ones the windows of the aisles, being
carried very low down as they are in Dutch houses,
add an air of comfort to the monumental effect. One
advantage of the use of wooden vaults or flat wooden
ceilings was that the architect, with no great weight to
support, could give his interior unusual breadth and its
pillars a wide spacing. And this abundance of space
and light, expressing a taste that Late-Gothic archi-
tecture everywhere reveals, could here be enhanced
by a more open fenestration of the clerestory than a
stone vault would have permitted.
The distinctive beauty of these buildings lies, how-
ever, not so much in their construction as in their
correspondence in spirit with their environment and
in their pictorially effective composition. Delightful
from a painter’s point of view is above all the grouping
of the different parts of the structure. Commonly the
large churches lack a dominating and unifying feature,
for in no branch of effort was balanced composition the
strong side of the Dutch artist. Not only are the aisles
and the nave separately roofed but usually each bay of
the aisle has its own roof, and the diversified picture
created by these peaked and saddle roofs is enhanced
by the coverings of the apsidal chapels or of smaller
accessory buildings along the sides of the church. The
five-aisled churches in particular seem to fall into
varied masses of distinct buildings crowded together
and, in form and in material, so happily harmonized
with the surrounding houses that they have no look of
isolation. In a Dutch city the church, in any near
view, stands out much less prominently from the street
[ 25 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
picture than it does in Belgium. And it is precisely in
this regard paid to the environment in the designing of —
a church that the art of the Dutch architect shows to
the best advantage.
Even the uninstructed traveller in Holland imme-
diately perceives the skill displayed in combining the
church with the silhouette of the city square, or in
using it to close a street perspective, or in so building
up church and street along the edge of a canal that,
with the surrounding trees, they mirror themselves in
the water. Nor can he fail to note the delicate feeling
shown in harmonizing the form and the colour of the
material with the adjacent buildings and, indeed, with
nature as a whole, in considering in the choice of the
small bricks the play of light on the water and the
shimmer of sunshine on the leaves of the elms, and in
leading up through the lighter tones of the lithic adorn-
ments to the white doors and windows of the houses.
These charming street compositions seem to have been
arranged by the architect especially to serve as models
for the painter. So it was only natural that a distinct
class of landscape painters should devote themselves to
the rendering of such views, and that others should dis-
cover the beauty of the church interiors, equally pic-
torial in their charm of light and colour.
The chief sources of our pleasure in one of these inte-
riors are the great clear wall spaces, where every play
of light is apparent, and the fine simple harmonies of
colour — the white of the walls, the beautiful brown of
the wooden stalls and ceilings composing with the
golden yellow of the brass chandeliers and choir screens,
a few reddish spots where the tile pavement is visible, and
[ 26 ]
es
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FE cat MO aR a, ay
P. SAENREDAM, CHURCH OF ST. BAVON, HAARLEM
COLLECTION OF MR. JOHN G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
OPT ae ee
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—
,
CHOIR, CHURCH OF ST. BAVON, HAARLEM
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
perhaps also the warm dark green of the great curtain
which in former days shut off the nave from the choir.
These tones offered material enough for a rich variety
of compositions by such masters in the painting of
church interiors as, to name but a few, Saenredam, de
Witte, van Vliet, and Houckgeest.
Originally, it should be said, the interior decoration of
these churches was not quite as simple as it has appeared
since the seventeenth century. Under the whitewash,
which from the Gothic time onward did, indeed,
cover the greater part of the walls, remains of mural
paintings have here and there been brought to light,
proving a desire for a varied spot of colour or a grace-
full decorative pattern in certain conspicuous places.
The pillars of the choir were usually painted with brocade
or carpet patterns that served instead of the actual
stuffs displayed on feast-days only. Here and there,
especially in the choir, devotional pictures which in-
cluded portraits of their donors were hung about on
the walls in a naive irregular way. The capitals of the
pillars and the keystones of the vaults were gener-
ally ornamented with colour, and in some churches,
as in the one at Gouda and the Old Church at Amster-
dam, a colouristic treatment of the windows in the
grand style was begun. But this was not carried far,
for, in the retarded development of Gothic architec-
ture in Holland, interior decorations were completed
only at the end of the fifteenth century or during the
sixteenth, when ecclesiastical glass-painting was in its
decline.
Most often, however, this sporadic decoration of an
interior was concentrated on the ceilings. The wooden
[27 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
vaults —the art of building which was evidently
nurtured in the Netherlands by the art of the ship-
builder — are often bound and woven together by
geometrical patterns so skilful that in themselves they
produce a highly decorative effect; and this was en-
hanced by carrying over them a graceful design of
spiky leafage which grows from the capitals of the
pillars up to the crown of the vaults. At times, again,
the whole ceiling is decorated with Biblical pictures
broadly handled and painted in tempera directly on the
boards; or the semicircular vaulting of the choir, which
takes the eye as one enters the church, bears a picture
of the Last Judgment. The effect of these ceilings
with their strong tones in lively contrast to the colour-
less walls is best appreciated in the church at Naarden,
not far from Amsterdam, which was painted in the first
third of the sixteenth century by an artist who, poor
though he was in invention, was rich in decorative
ability.
A similar taste in decoration marks the exterior of the
churches and especially their spires and fléches which,
again, should be judged from the painter’s rather than
the architect’s point of view. As the solid towers
begun in the thirteenth or fourteenth century proved
unstable or for pecuniary reasons were left unfinished,
their torsoes were topped in the fifteenth century or
later by graceful openwork terminations upon which
the wind had no purchase; or, if a tower had not even
been begun, the crossing was taken as the dominant
point and adorned by a tall fléche.
The spire soon became a typical feature of Dutch
churches; and as the Late-Gothic style, which remained
[ 28 ]
CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN THE MIDDLE AGES
in use until the end of the sixteenth century, was di-
rectly succeeded by various versions of the Baroque
without the intervention of a purer Renaissance style,
forms like the bulbous spire, already employed in
Late-Gothic, had a long life in which to develop toward
perfection. An incomparable taste determined the
proportions of the different stories of the tower as well
as its outline and the individual motives of its orna-
mentation. Thus, as is also the case with the products
of the industrial arts of Holland, the adornment is not
spread over the whole work but is economically con-
centrated in a single place, there to be all the more
carefully applied in an ingenious elaborate design.
This embellishment of the spire or fléche above the
massive unadorned substructure may be compared to
the delightful ornaments with which the simply attired,
wide-petticoated Dutch peasant enlivens her headgear
at certain points.
With these general characteristics there must be
noted certain local diversities in the Gothic church
architecture of the Dutch. But first it may be said,
as has already been implied, that genuine Late-Gothic
work, in the sense of a luxuriance of design running into
the fantastic, nowhere exists in Holland. Until about
the year 1500, moreover, the Hollanders built in the
simple Gothic style of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries, so that if documentary evidence were lacking
we should fix too early a date for their buildings, espe-
cially those in the smaller towns, and above all in Zee-
land.
In the larger Dutch cities the three-aisled basilica
predominates, built of brick with wooden ceilings and
[ 29 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
round pillars; such, among others, are the Old Church
and the New Church at Amsterdam, St. Bavon at
Haarlem, the Great Church at Rotterdam, and the
Church of St. Lawrence at Alkmaar. Brabant and the
adjacent parts of Zeeland hold, in architecture as in
painting, a middle place between Holland and Belgium.
The chief churches of Breda, Bois le Duc, Goes, Veere,
and Bergen op Zoom approach the Belgio-French cathe-
dral type, having sometimes five aisles, apsidal chapels,
and a richer development of triforium, window traceries,
and flying buttresses. The smaller churches of Zeeland
retained until an advanced date the older Early-Gothic
type, and have a defiant gloomy air. As a rule they
have no side-aisles, the choir ends with a flat wall, and
there is no ornamentation. Such a church, uplifting a
tower of pronouncedly sloping shape, seems the defender
of the village that clusters around it and a seamark
for the fisherman.
The churches of the eastern provinces’ resemble
each other less, leaning now toward the Dutch and now
toward the Rhenish-Westphalian manner of building.
While the round-pillared type rules in the north, the
basilican type with rectangular piers is most common in
Guelderland and, indeed, in Nymegen, Arnhem, De-
venter, and Zutphen. In the Hanse towns of Zwolle
and Kampen the Gothic churches, although among the
oldest of the thirteenth century, were widened in the
fifteenth and retain from the Early-Gothic period only
the central alley of the nave.
[ 30 |
Il
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING IN
THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY
seventeenth-century Holland — Frans Hals and
Rembrandt — came, the one from Haarlem, the
other from Leyden, for in a very literal sense these two
cities were the birthplaces of Dutch painting. Although
in other Dutch cities individual painters were at work
during the Late-Gothic period, shortly before and after
the year 1500, only in these two did coherent schools of
painting exist at so early a time. As Frans Hals was
Rembrandt’s senior by a generation, so also the early
school of Haarlem had antedated that of Leyden; as
at Haarlem the flowering of seventeenth-century art
began, so also had it been with the flowering of Primi-
tive art.
Yet we must not imagine too regular an historical
sequence, fancying that the art of the great period of
Hals and Rembrandt grew directly from that of the
earliest masters. More truly, the impetus felt by
Primitive painting at the end of the fifteenth and the
beginning of the sixteenth century spent itself with the
[31]
|: was not fortuitous that the greatest painters of
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
passage of two productive generations. A decline set
in, as must happen with every people in the course of its
general development, after a rapid unfolding of energy,
and in this case it was made manifest by the absorp-
tion of the public in other concerns, chiefly social and
political. The conflict with Spain about religion and
trade, which soon led to open war, concentrated the
mind of the nation upon questions of subsistence and
weaned itfrom art. Therefore art was forced to strug-
gle for life and, because of its weakness, came un-
der foreign and particularly under Italian influences.
Only a few painters of genius like Pieter Breughel the
Elder and Antonio Moro, who wandered to Flanders
or to still more distant places, kept the national flag
flying, and even they could not rescue art from the
general decline. Not until the beginning of the seven-
teenth century, when the war of liberation in the Neth-
erlands had been virtually fought to an end, did the
shallow waters of provincial effort gather themselves
into the broad stream that upbore a Frans Hals and a
Rembrandt. Then it was in the cities of Hals and
Rembrandt, in Haarlem and Leyden, that the new life
first awakened, for here, thanks to a great past, art
had remained more vigorous than elsewhere during the
days of darkness.
The flowering of Dutch painting in its first phase
covered approximately the years from 1470 to 1530,
but, as we shall see, the beginnings of an independent
art may in all probability be found several decades
farther back. It is more difficult to set a term for the
beginning than for the end of this period. Until
lately, indeed, we hardly dared to speak of fifteenth-cen-
[ 32 ]
<_*. i
THE HAARLIEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
tury Dutch painting, so impossible did it seem to dis-
tinguish it from the contemporary art of Flanders.
While in Flanders the beginnings of an independent art
of easel painting coincided with the advent of the van
Eyck brothers, Dutch painting freed itself from this
sister development only by degrees, and at the outset
in a scarcely perceptible fashion. Basing itself upon
the great achievements of the Flemings — of the van
Eycks, Rogier van der Weyden, and Robert Campin —
it took over from them, at first almost literally, the
grand style that united in so incomparable a way the
delicate technique of miniature painting with the realis-
tic spirit of Burgundian Gothic sculpture. Dirk Bouts,
who was the first Early-Dutch painter of importance,
might almost as justly be numbered with the Flemings,
and his follower Ouwater still worked so entirely in the
manner of the van Eycks that we may well wonder
whether, had the origin of these two painters not been
known, the critical study of their works would have
discovered the Dutch characteristics which, neverthe-
less, are undoubtedly present in their art.
This resemblance between the early painters of Hol-
land and of Flanders is easily understood when we re-
member that politically the northern and southern
Low Countries were regarded as a unit. During the
greater part of the fifteenth century, down to the death
of Charles the Bold in 1477, both regions belonged to
the Duchy of Burgundy, whose princes resided by pref-
erence at Bruges, Ghent, and Brussels, where the van
Eycks and van der Weyden were at home. Although
Holland was an outlying possession, and although its
counts as well as its cities were striving for indepen-
[ 33 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
dence, in all departments of culture it was affiliated
with Flanders, and through Flanders with Burgundy.
A change of government, bringing with it greater free-
dom for the Netherlands, took place in 1477 after the
fall of the Duchy of Burgundy. United again, the
southern and northern Low Countries passed to the
Hapsburgs, the heirs of Mary of Burgundy, and were
joined to the German Empire. Then followed the
flowering of Early-Dutch art, during the reigns of
Maximilian I and Charles V._ It is true that the Haps-
burgs troubled themselves little about the Netherlands,
but the connection with theempire brought these provin-
ces into more vital relations with German culture. In
respect to the arts, more manifold ties united them to
the Upper Rhine, to Nuremberg, to Suabia, and above
all to Cologne which for a long time had been bound to
the Low Countries by the ties of trade. We realize
how closely the painters of the Low Countries and
those of the Lower Rhine lands were related when we
find how hard it is in many cases to decide whether
pictures painted in the neighbourhood of the year 1500
belong to the one group of artists or to the other.
Meanwhile the connection between the arts of Hol-
land and of Flanders persisted as a factor in the joint
development of the two regions; indeed, it again became
so close when the school of Antwerp was in its prime,
from about 1510 to 1530, that it is difficult now to dis-
tinguish the works then produced in Holland from those
produced in Flanders. At this time the source of in-
fluence was the art of the rich commercial and cosmo-
politan city on the Scheldt, which then attracted so
many artists from other places. But even then the
[ 34 ]
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
Dutch adapted in independent ways the impressions
they received, and during the last third of the fifteenth
century the art of Holland had had a clearly apparent
character of its own, and had even given of its strength
to the art of Flanders. The extraordinary achieve-
ment of the cities of the southern Low Countries,
especially of Bruges, Ghent, and Brussels, in producing
during the early and middle years of the fifteenth cen-
tury a long line of painters of genius, had been followed
by a relaxation of energy that profited the north. Here
the intellectual conditions had long been prepared for
the development of an indigenous form of artistic ex-
pression. The cities that had grown up during the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, steadily enlarging
their liberties, contained a population which from the
very first had been marked by strength of character and
self-assurance. Never until the last moment before the
downfall of a new over-lordship could the Netherlands
be prevailed upon to accept it, and always all the ele-
ments of their population — the clerical element con-
- eentrated in the bishopric of Utrecht, the aristocratic
led by the Counts of Holland, and the urban — were
striving toward independence. These three elements,
representing the strength of the nation, were also the
supporters of artistic culture. The cities, where vital
energy was strongest, produced the artist; and the chief
givers of commissions were, with the bourgeoisie, the
ehurch, and the aristocracy which supplied some of the
incumbents of church offices.
This first flowering of the art of the Netherlands,
this Early-Dutch art, may be divided into two periods,
[ 35 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
one covering the last third of the fifteenth century and
the other the first third of the sixteenth.
In the first of these two periods the school of Haarlem
(which alone concerns us here) stands preéminent with
Dirk Bouts, Aelbert van Ouwater, and Geertgen tot
Sint Jans (Geertgen van Haarlem) as its leaders. Two
other painters of eminence were elsewhere at work at
the same time —the so-called Master of the Virgo
inter Virgines, who lived perhaps at Gouda or at Delft,
and Hieronymus Bosch, the great fantastical painter of
Bois le Duc. Of these five artists Bosch alone was still
active in the second decade of the sixteenth century.
In fact, he holds a middle place between the two periods
of Early-Dutch painting.
In the second period the school of Leyden, with
two great masters, Cornelis Engelbrechtsz and Lucas
van Leyden, was of chief importance. But Haarlem
still produced a few excellent painters, notably Jan
Mostaert and Jan Joest, and it was from this place that
the art of painting, now winning for itself a broader
footing in Holland, spread to Amsterdam and Utrecht.
Jacob Cornelisz is the most important painter of Am-
sterdam, Jan Scoorel of Utrecht.
i
DIRK BOUTS
Born at Haarlem about the year 1410, Dirk Bouts
belonged to the generation that followed the van Eycks
and Robert Campin (the Master of Flémalle) and was
some ten years younger than Rogier van der Weyden
and Jacques Daret. Phlegmatic in temperament, he
can hardly have developed early. Probably he went
[ 36 ]
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
to Flanders for his training, for there is no reason to
believe that before his advent anything of an indepen-
dent kind was achieved in Holland in the novel art of
easel painting while, on the other hand, the beginning
of his career coincides precisely with the splendid flower-
ing of the school of Tournai under Robert Campin
and van der Weyden. The gaunt and bony aspect and
angular movements of his figures, and his efforts to
render characteristic types and strongly marked ex-
pressions, for the sake of which he often sacrificed
beauty, may well indicate that he attached himself
especially to van der Weyden. Settling in Haarlem
at the end of his student years, at some time after 1440,
he gave the first impulse to the development of art in
this city. By 1448, however, we find him once more in
Flanders, at Louvain, where he seems to have settled
permanently, obtaining in the course of time impor-
tant commissions from the municipality. Here we can _
follow him in his work from the year 1462 until his
death in 1475. But it may confidently be assumed that
in spite of his removal to Flanders he kept up relations
with his birthplace, for he was still held in lively re-
membrance at Haarlem in the time of van Mander* —
it was still known in which house he had lived; and,
as we shall see, his style was carried on in a number of
pictures that were painted at Haarlem in the ’seventies
or at earliest in the ’sixties of the fifteenth century.
No product of the years that Bouts spent in Haarlem
prior to 1448 is known to us, and probably little of im-
portance survives from this early period, for all of his
existing pictures that can be dated belong between the
*Karel van Mander, Het Schilderboek. Amsterdam, 1604.
[ 37 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
’£fties and the ’seventies and with these the others must
be classed. The total number, about twenty-five, is
considerable as compared with the legacies of other
Primitive masters; nor need this fact surprise us, for
the pictures themselves bear instant witness to an
industrious, an indefatigable, painter. Moreover, long
years of activity were vouchsafed him.
Dirk Bouts has rightly been ranked with the greatest
of the Dutch Primitives. At first sight, indeed, there
is nothing very attractive in his gallery of figures.
Solitary, aloof from the world, his personages stand
around in his pictures, the hard gauntness of their
forms all the more noticeable because they are placed
so far apart from one another. Most of them have a
joyless outlook upon life and a bourgeois, dry, and
wooden bearing. One might suppose a painter of a
somewhat philistine, pedantic nature, a genuine Hol-
lander in his phlegmatic temperament and his lack of
all feeling for grace and charm. And yet his work
possesses in a high degree the qualities that attract us
so strongly to the Primitive masters. Under the shy
reserved demeanour of his figures there hides an inti-
mate and genuine kind of sentiment for which we vainly
seek in the painters of later centuries. Sincerity and
veracity of expression redeem that harshness in the
forms which was due, not to the artist alone, but
also to the general taste of his time. The unbeautiful
Madonna with the high osseous forehead, the narrow
eyes, the pursed-up mouth, is so imbued with all the
qualities of motherhood that we cannot help admiring
her. The Child expresses its infantile thoughts so sim-
ply, so convincingly, that we watch its behaviour with
[ 38 ]
DIRK BOUTS, MADONNA AND CHILD
NATIONAL GALLERY, LONDON
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
greater interest than we should if its movements were
more graceful. It is, however, in his masculine char-
acters, with their measured expressive gestures and their
quiet thoughts absorbed in a world of their own, that
Bouts succeeds most admirably.
His keen eye for individual facts is nowhere more
plainly shown than in that rendering of the accessories
for which Primitive painters have always been famous.
The furs and brocades of his costumes are painted with
the same love and the same sure sense of the material
as the utensils on the table or the simple ornaments on
the wall, as the fireplace, the buffet, the wash-basin in
the niche. Wherever a window or a door permits a
glimpse of the outer world the painter is sure to give
an exact report upon the interesting details of street or
garden or of the landscape back to a faraway distance.
So it sometimes happens that a subordinate scene is the
most charming part of the picture, and that the com-
position lacks organic unity. And as it is with the
different parts of the picture so it is with the figures:
they are so individually conceived that they cannot
easily come into relationship with their neighbours.
This narrative way of presenting the subject — ranging
the figures loosely one beside another and laying stress
above all upon the pregnant characterization of the
individual and the environment — is, again, part and
parcel of the art of the period. It will be remembered,
perhaps, how similar was the procedure of contem-
porary painters in Germany and Italy — of Martin
Schongauer, for example, and the Master of the Life
of the Virgin, or of Fra Filippo Lippi and Ghirlandajo.
It meant, in comparison with the art of the Master
[ 39 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden, an advance in
the observation of details that was certainly not favour-
able to unity of composition, for these earlier masters
had known how to hold their groups together in the
interest of the main theme, and had always thought
more of the whole than of its parts.
Among the chief merits of Dirk Bouts are his rare
_ feeling for colour, in which he surpasses most of the
Flemish Primitives, and his technical skill. He is not
a great colourist in the sense that by subordinating all
ne tones to a few he achieves an integral harmony,
This ideal, indeed, lay far ahead of the painters of his
day. But he sets his vivid varied colours side by side
in such a way that each accords with the next and raises
it to the highest possible degree of brilliancy. In this
sure accordance of the different hues and in their warm
and glowing depth only a few of his contemporaries
equal him. In fact, for parallel effects we must look
back to the van Eycks. The progress of time is shown,
however, by Bouts’ acquaintance with mixed tones,
such as a gray-lilac and a pink, which do not appear —
in the work of the van Eycks or of van der Weyden.
The strong yet rich variety of colour, the inner glow
and warmth, that are characteristic of Bouts’ pictures,
as of most of those of Early-Dutch origin, distinguish
them from the Flemish products of his time which are
lighter and paler in key. And the purity of his colours,
attained by means of a technique hardly inferior in its
scrupulous carefulness to that of the van Eycks, gives
his pictures a freshness that has outlasted the centuries.
The most famous of his works are the two, in the ;
Museum at Brussels, which interpret a legend from the
[ 40 ]
DIRK BOUTS, THE GATHERING OF THE MANNA
PINAKOTHEK, MUNICH
xk enh ad aot
sinks ovens ALAA OAL DBA Lib
Pr Pa
n
wena
rere tt yates nos
a" | — see errr eer SS =~ _
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
life of the Emperor Otto III —a theme that was
chosen by the municipal councillors of Louvain, who
gave the commission, as an example of the results of
judicial injustice. But these pictures, painted at Lou-
vain during the last years of the artist’s life, between
1468 and 1475, do not show him at his best, for it was
beyond his power to render dramatic action with figures
the size of life. Under his hand the drama of a dreadful
judgment scene becomesa long-winded tale in which only
certain admirable portrait heads stand out as of much
significance. Nor, indeed, did the Dutch painters of
a later and greater time often achieve anything of a
dramatic kind on a large scale, although even the
Primitive Flemings, like van der Weyden and the
Master of Flémalle, true precursors of Quentin Metsys
and the remoter Rubens, filled great panels with pas-
sionately animated compositions.
Bouts appears to much better advantage in the
triptych of the Martyrdom of St. Hippolytus in the
Church of St. Sauveur at Bruges — one wing of which
containing the figures of the donors was finished, after
his death, in a masterly way by Hugo van der Goes
— and in the somewhat earlier altar-piece, the Mar-
tyrdom of St. Erasmus in the Church of St. Peter at
Louvain. These pictures are full of splendid passages
in the colours of the costumes and in the landscape;
but again the stolidity of the artist interferes with a
proper solution of difficult dramatic problems. Most
entirely suited to his temperament, perhaps, are the
beautiful triptych of the Adoration of the Magi at
Munich and certain scenes in the Louvain altar-piece
representing the Last Supper, especially in its wings
[41 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
which are now in the public galleries at Berlin and Mu-
nich. A picture like the Gathering of the Manna bears
witness to the character of the artist as well as to his
method of composition and his conception of land-
scape. With what slow patience do the three fore-
ground figures collect the manna! How deliberately
they have stooped so that their garments shall not
drag ungracefully on the ground! And how shyly does
the little child that the meek meditative mother leads
by the hand beg for some bread from the basket! The
landscape with its jagged rocks is still conventionally
composed, but, enlivened by little figures of diminish-
ing sizes, it stretches away in various vistas to a far
blue distance. As a whole, however, it still surrounds
the human beings as might an interior space, closely
and comfortably. This conception which, down to the
time of Rembrandt, we encounter again and again in ~
Dutch pictures, interprets a peculiarity in the land-
scape of Holland that was well observed by the Primi-
tive painters — the constantly recurring contrast be-
tween far distances and an enclosed area near at hand.
In the verdant avenues with drooping branches, in the
low forests, among the dunes, and on the tree-planted
squares of the compact villages, one walks as in an
interior that affords through little windows glimpses of
far-spreading plains.
In his biography of Aelbert van Ouwater, van
Mander remarks that the earliest painters spoke of |
Haarlem as the place where landscape painting de-
veloped. And Dirk Bouts has the first claim to be
considered the founder of this great branch of Dutch
art which in the seventeenth century counted at Haar-
[ 42 ]
DIRK BOUTS, ST. CHRISTOPHER
PINAKOTHEK, MUNICH
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
lem some of its chief representatives, such as Jan van
Goyen and Jacob and Solomon Ruisdael. Although
the composition of; his backgrounds is antiquated,
Bouts observes aerial perspective and cloud formations
better than his Flemish forerunners, and he is the first
who strives to indicate in a picture the particular time
of day. In the Gathering of the Manna and on the
wing belonging to it, which is now at Berlin and rep-
resents Elijah in the Wilderness, the evening shadows
in the valleys are rendered with a delicate power of
observation. In the background of a picture of Christ
Taken Prisoner, in the Pinakothek at Munich, Bouts
tries to give the effect of torchlight and moonlight.
And the St. Christopher which forms one wing of
the Munich tripytch of the Adoration of the Magi is
rightly famous as the first representation of a sunset in
easel painting. Certainly it was not by accident that a
Hollander was the first who observed so closely the re-
flections of the setting sun on the water and the land,
and who tried to render with his restricted linear
scheme what was afterward so perfectly reproduced by
the painters of Rembrandt’s time, above all by Albert
Cuyp.
It seems natural that an artist who took so much in-
terest in characteristic heads should have painted in-
dividual portraits, all the more because in this field he
had predecessors as great as Jan van Eyck, van der
Weyden, and the Master of Flémalle. Two such works
are known —a portrait of a man in the National
Gallery at London and another in the Altman Collec-
tion in the Metropolitan Museum of Art at New York.
Both of them, definite, simple, and rapt in expression,
[ 43 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
stand worthily at the very beginning of Dutch art
which in portraiture was to achieve perhaps its greatest
triumphs.
A general survey of his work shows Dirk Bouts as a
continuator of the great Flemish tradition no less than
as one of the founders of Dutch painting. It would be
a mistake to wish to dissever him from the course of
Flemish developments and to consider him as a purely
- Dutch painter, for he produced his most important
works amid Flemish surroundings and under Flemish
influence. On the other hand, his Dutch character-
istics are so pronounced that he cannot be judged solely
from the point of view of Flemish art. The important
double place that must be given him in the history of
painting is indicated by the fact that in Flanders as
in Holland he founded a school upon which, in the
one country as in the other, the art of the following —
period was based. In Flanders as great a master as
Quentin Metsys sprang from his school. In Holland
the whole school of Haarlem blossomed from his art.
This art forms the first stage in the progress of Dutch
painting which, just then, was freeing itself in spirit
from the art of the neighbour land. From the moment
when the artists for whom Dirk Bouts had done such ex-
cellent preparatory work remained in their native country
Dutch painting stood upon its own feet.
In Louvain numerous works issued from the school of
Bouts, and a group of them may be ascribed to one of
his sons, Aelbrecht Bouts. But these pictures, intrin-
sically of small importance, need not be considered in
connection with Dutch painting for, in spite of an
affinity with Bouts’ compositions, they are markedly
[ 44 ]
DIRK BOUTS, PORTRAIT OF A MAN
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, NEW YORK
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
Flemish in their colouring as well as in their types which
show the influence of Hugo van der Goes. We may
therefore turn to Haarlem where in Aelbert van Ou-
water we find the most important of the immediate
followers of Dirk Bouts.
II
AELBERT VAN OUWATER
The criticism that is based upon stylistic grounds
has been more barren of results in dealing with Ouwater
than with any other great Primitive painter. After a
successful first step — when Dr. Wilhelm Bode, shortly
before the year 1890, discovered in Italy one of the two
pictures by Ouwater that van Mander had described —
our knowledge of the painter has not advanced by a
single degree, for not one of the works ascribed to him
during the last thirty years can stand the test of careful
criticism. The only surely authenticated picture of
Ouwater’s is still the one that Bode discovered, the
Raising of Lazarus, now in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum
at Berlin. Yet it is very probable that about as many
of his works are still in existence as have been left us by
other Primitive painters — at least a dozen.
The records are also surprisingly barren, mentioning
Ouwater only once, in the year 1467, when he buried a
daughter in St. Bavon, the principal church at Haarlem
—a fact which does not help us much in determining
the dates of his career. We can depend, therefore,
only upon the single picture in Berlin which, according
to the witness of its style, dates from about the year
1460, and upon the brief statements of van Mander.
These imply that Ouwater was still alive in 1480. As
[45 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
his name indicates, he came from Ouwater, a village
near Gouda; and from his picture we gather that he
studied with Dirk Bouts. His activity must have
covered, approximately, the years from 1450 to 1480.
As he painted a high altar for the Church of St. Bavon,
and as some of his paintings were known in Italy, he
must have achieved considerable prominence.
The most unfortunate result of the limitation of our
knowledge to a single one of his pictures is the impos-
sibility of defining with precision the part he played
in the development of painting. So plainly, however,
as far as form is concerned, does this picture speak the
language of Dirk Bouts that, as long as a wider knowl-
edge of Ouwater’s art is denied us, we must regard
Bouts and after him Geertgen tot Sint Jans as the
masters who definitively determined the development
of art at Haarlem.
Through his one picture, however, we can in some
degree make acquaintance with Ouwater himself. In
his careful, minute, and brilliant workmanship he stands
almost as near as Dirk Bouts himself to the classic
tradition established by the van Eycks. Costumes
and brocades, furs and silken turbans, he renders with
the same astonishing technique, and, like his master,
he achieves a beautifully diversified effect of colour, as
of old stained-glass windows. Only, the tones are
somewhat lighter and brighter — perhaps, in our pic-
ture, because of the artist’s wish to render the diffused
light streaming into the choir of the church. The types
are in accord with the more cheerful colour scheme,
for although they are closely related to the types of
Dirk Bouts they reveal a different temperament. The
[ 46 ]
OUWATER, THE RAISING OF LAZARUS
KAISER FRIEDRICH MUSEUM, BERLIN
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
figures have less of the grave and reserved spirit and
nothing of the strained intensity of expression that
we find in Bouts; instead, they have a mild and modest
oranaively stupid mien. Their bodies, though slender,
are less bony and are short in their proportions, with
delicately formed extremities. Timid and earnest in
their demeanour, when they grow animated they ex-
press themselves with childishly direct movements.
How moderate, how gentle, are the astonished gestures
of the awakening Lazarus! How shyly, with low
voices, the figures back of Jesus comment upon the
event! Even the Pharisees venture but diffidently to ex-
press their doubts. Only Peter zealously addresses his
nearest neighbours, and a few of the spectators beyond
the grating, crowding eagerly forward, seem to share his
mood. More impressive, however, are the Christ with
his simple bearing, his calm and gentle look, and the
sister of Lazarus at prayer in the foreground, true Bib-
lical piety written on her countenance. We are in Rem-
brandt’s country, these two figures remind us, and the
art of Primitive painters like Ouwater prepared the way
for his incomparable interpretations of Bible stories.
Van Mander praises our painter especially for his
landscapes, and in Italy also they were known as early
as the beginning of the sixteenth century. It is hardly
doubtful, therefore, that in landscape painting Ouwater
carried farther the important innovations of Dirk
Bouts —a proof of the remarkable consistency with
which Dutch painting developed along its own path.
In the composition of the Raising of Lazarus we
find, again, a hint with regard to the later development
of Dutch art. It is the first Dutch picture of a church
[47]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
interior, the forerunner of the numerous interior views
which, in the time of Rembrandt, formed a special
department of Dutch painting. It is true that Flemish
art had supplied Ouwater with more than one example
of a similar arrangement, but he was the first who
observed the individual character of the interiors of
medizeval Dutch churches — the pictorial effectiveness
of their clear lighting and the admirable fitness of their
bare wall spaces as backgrounds for many-coloured
costumes.
Il
VARIOUS PICTURES IN THE MANNER OF DIRK BOUTS
There were other painters besides Ouwater who,
working at Haarlem at the same time, derived in their
art from Dirk Bouts. Such isolated anonymous ex-
amples of their work as are known to us, dating mostly —
from the seventh and the beginning of the eighth decade
of the fifteenth century, deserve attention for their own
sake as well as for the sake of their significance in the
development of the Haarlem school.
One picture of this sort, owned by Mr. Stephenson
Clarke at Hayward Heath in England — a Madonna
and Child seated on a grassy bank — has often been
tentatively ascribed to Bouts himself. It is a charming
garden scene, typically Dutch in the rectangular flower-
beds and the straight paths-along which in the back-
ground two saintly women are walking. Beyond the
garden, which is enclosed by brick houses and walls,
spreads a wide hilly landscape diversified by groups of
trees, quite like the landscapes in the pictures of Dirk
Bouts. In the cathedral of Leitmeritz, in Bohemia,
[ 48 ]
FOLLOWER OF DIRK BOUTS, MADONNA AND CHILD
COLLECTION OF MR. STEPHENSON CLARKE, HAYWARD HEATH, ENGLAND
SES
i et
be
tare
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
Hofstede de Groot found an identical composition
with a somewhat different background. Both these
pictures are full of simplicity and grace. Idyllic in
suggestion is the portrayal of the delicately formed
mother picking a flower from the grass for the child who
eagerly stretches out his arms, of the saints in the
garden amicably greeting each other, of the flowers and
the turf, the peacocks on the wall, the swans in the
moat. No painter of the Madonna had hitherto gone
so far in transcribing from nature, in portraying genre-
like details. Compositions with enclosed gardens or
courts came to be characteristic of the Haarlem school
and, with differences in the principal figures, will often
meet us again. Undoubtedly they trace back to Dirk
Bouts, for in an altar-piece now at Granada he had al-
ready set in a garden a representation of the Holy
Family.
Another such picture, of about the same date as Mr.
Clarke’s, is a Raising of Lazarus which is said to be in
Mexico and is known to me only through photographs.
From the general arrangement and the attitudes of
Lazarus, his sisters, and the Saviour, it appears that
this artist must have known Ouwater’s picture of the
same name; but he lays his scene in a courtyard of
similar design to the one in Mr. Clarke’s Madonna and
Child. On one side stands the palace, the lowest story
borne by columns; on the other side, connected with
the palace by a low wall, is a high corner or gateway
tower. Beyond the wall we see the castle moat,
hills farther back, and in the distance a city full of
churches. The castle courtyard, its brick buildings
enlivened by stone trimmings and adorned with blank
[49 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
arcades and crenellated cornices, the numerous low |
walls, and the little steps and stairways, admirably
represent the castle architecture of the time, of which —
the Binnenhof at the Hague, although much changed
by restorations, is the most extensive existing example,
The picture in Mexico, it may be added, reveals an
artist who is sturdier and blunter than Ouwater and
who gives his figures a more plebeian aspect.
It has been thought that in another closely related ©
picture, the third which portrays a castle courtyard of ©
the kind just described, the Binnenhof itself may be —
recognized. It is a representation of the Tiburtine
Sibyl and the Emperor Augustus, and is now in the
Stadel Institute at Frankfort. A clearer idea may be
formed of its painter than of the painter of the picture —
in Mexico, for we may confidently attribute to the same
hand another large composition, a portrayal of the Life —
of the Virgin, now in the collection of Mr. John G
Johnson of Philadelphia.
Let us consider first the Frankfort picture. Almost
in spite of ourselves it strikes us as comical. With < —
stupid supercilious expression the Tiburtine Siby
points the emperor, who is splendidly dressed but
coarse in type, to the sky, where in the distance float:
the Madonna with the Child. The connection tha —
should exist between this apparition and the terrestria —
figures is in some degree missed, for the artist, evidenth —
wishing to show neither the emperor nor the siby] fron
the back, has turned the emperor more toward th
observer than toward the Madonna; and for the sam
~
reason the bystanders, who are as boorishly self —
important as the chief personages, also look in th
[ 50 |
LAZARUS
YG OF
RAISII
=
4
FOLLOWER OF DIRK BOUTS, THE
MEXICO
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
wrong direction or else maintain an amusing air of
condescension and indifference, an understanding of
the miracle penetrating but slowly through their thick
skulls. In some of the masculine heads, however,
which are conceived in a portrait-like way, the heavy
features have an imposing character, and two or three
of the councillors at the left of the picture recall figures
by van der Weyden or the Master of Flémalle. The
costumes — the heavy baggy mantles, the high cloth
caps, the pointed shoes, and the Burgundian head-
dress worn by one of the ladies in the background —
show that we are not far from the golden age of Bur-
gundian art. The strength and the decorative breadth
of this art, clearly revealed in Burgundian tapestries
of the sixth and seventh decades of the century,
seem to have been the ideal in the mind of our painter.
In comparison with the work of Dirk Bouts the treat-
ment of the lighting shows progress and at the same
time a development of Bouts’ problems. The courtyard,
- lying in a bright sunshine that casts sharp shadows, and
the figures, standing out from it in dark, almost flat
masses, are rendered with a simplified art surpassing
that of the elder painter, and the delight displayed in ac-
cumulating genre-like details in the background belongs
to a later phase of art than his. In these subordinate
scenes the artist appears as a great lover of animals.
Under the palace stairway lies a chained bear, in the
adjacent window sits a monkey, in the foreground
stands a little greyhound, farther back a pair of pea-
cocks promenade; and there are water-wagtails on the
wall by the moat, storks on the roofs, herons in the
field. In the delightful, clearly illumined landscape a
[51]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
horseman is riding away while a dog springs up to him,
a shepherd pastures his flock, and on a pathway are two
lizards drawn, in spite of the distance, on so large a
scale that at first sight we might mistake them for
crocodiles.
The naive love of story-telling with which all such
things are rendered is one of the most charming quali- _
ties of this artist. And it is shared by most of the ©
Early-Dutch painters, who take more pleasure than the |
Flemings in an episodical spinning out of their themes. |
| Full of similar details is a picture, owned by Mr. —
Johnson, of scenes from the Life of the Virgin with the ©
Marriage of Joseph and Mary as the principal subject. —
A comparison of the feminine types and of the bearded |
old men makes it particularly clear that we have here —
to do with the same brush that painted the Frankfort |
picture. Moreover, we find the same clear illumination, |
the same distinctness of detail carried into the far dis- _
tance, and the same predominance of green and a _
strong vermilion. Nor is the little menagerie of tame
beasts lacking. Most conspicuous now is a family of |
rabbits, one of them sitting sleepily on the path, another _
hopping away, a third just disappearing into his hole, —
his hind feet still visible. Admirably rendered also is —
the terrier that accompanies Joachim, boldly leaping |
down the steps of the temple. |
The artist has developed since he painted the Sibyl |
and Augustus. While this picture can hardly be of a
later date than 1465, the costumes in the Marriage —
speak, approximately, of 1480. The garments of the —
women have become closer fitting and more elegant, |
the men wear shorter coats and the flat bérets or fur |
[ 52 |
LHOUMNNVUA ‘ALOLILSNI TACAVLS
SALSNDAV YHOUAMINA AHL GNV IAMIS AHL ‘SLAOM MUIG AO YAMOTION
FRE ERT RIM SLT AE Hees Nhs . ios Sie gs aT,
<2) PRLS, TP SRS VA ANS PRE Se BRN STG po catty a —
\\ b ' Se Toad MP Fost
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
caps with which we are familiar in the early works of
Diirer. Broad slippers replace the long pointed shoes,
giving the men, even on the street, a comfortable
domestic look. In the stead of the Burgundian mode
we have the less cumbrous fashions of France.* And
the personages seem to have altered with their clothes.
They have grown a little more animated and no longer
contemplate the world so gloomily or unconcernedly.
That the rejected suitors of Mary should still look on
with apparent indifference, and that the elegant youth
in the foreground should display a stupid and affected
self-consciousness, is easily understood from the spirit
in which the story istold. Joseph appears all the more
cheerful with his naive countenance, and Mary carries
herself with a meek modesty. But in a more lively
fashion are described the scenes in the background
which set forth Mary’s previous history — the expul-
sion of Joachim from the temple, the meeting of
Joachim and Anne, the birth of Mary, her presentation
in the temple, and finally, far in the distance, the
annunciation to the shepherds. With long steps, pas-
sionately gesticulating in assertion of his innocence,
Joachim departs from the high priest. In serious dis-
course he and Anne accompany Mary, an ugly little
creature, as she approaches the temple and climbs the
steps unassisted and with folded hands. And no less
attractive is the episode of the birth where we catch
sight of the thin face of the newly made mother hidden
behind the half-closed curtains.
Again, this artist has advanced in the way he carries
*For changes of fashion see L. Balet, Geertgen tot Sint Jans. The Hague, 1910. p.
10 et seq.
[ 53 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
his figures into the distance. They do not so quickly
change in their dimensions, without any intermediate
stages, as they do in the picture of the sibyl, but, with a
certain intention, are ranged in gradually diminishing
sizes back into the far distance.
It is probable that the artist himself did not deserve
all the credit for these important forward steps. At
the time when he created the scenes from the Life of
the Virgin a greater master than he — Geertgen, the
painter of the Knights of St. John of Haarlem — had
already appeared, to exert thenceforward an influence
upon all the painters of Holland. This influence is sug-
gested by some of the heads in the Life of the Virgin,
such as the strongly characterized old man with a beard
behind the high priest, and also by the juster relative
proportions of the figures in the background. But
with this artist as with all others Geertgen’s influence
worked especially toward a more animated and incisive
individualizing of the personages. And from him must
also have been derived that manner of characterizing
the remoter figures by more emphatic gestures which he
transmitted to all his successors down to Jan Mostaert
and Jacob Cornelisz.
IV
GEERTGEN TOT SINT JANS
Geertgen was the greatest of the early Dutchmen,
the Rembrandt of the fifteenth century. It is said
that when Diirer saw his work he exclaimed, “Verily,
he was a painter in his mother’s womb.”
Although we are not sure of the dates of his career,
we may deduce them approximately from his pictures
[ 54 ]
FOLLOWER OF DIRK BOUTS, THE MARRIAGE OF
JOSEPH AND MARY
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
2 r tat 4 Bast as Sow 72 -
aa it Ly he a
ap To os at eee ee ete, ag eee ee
ol a a hh al a
i icy \
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
and the brief remarks of van Mander. Born, appar-
ently, about the year 1465, some fifteen years later he
was working under Ouwater in company, perhaps, with
Gerard David who, even before he removed to Bruges
in 1483, was strongly influenced by Geertgen’s art.
Geertgen’s brief activity filled, it seems, the decade
between 1483 and 1493, upon which his death soon fol-
lowed. Although he did not become a member of the
order of the Knights of St. John he lived with them at
Haarlem, and for them he created his masterpiece, an
altar-picture of which only a single wing, bearing on the
one side a Pieta and on the other a Burning of the Bones
of John the Baptist, is preserved, hanging now in the
Hof Museum at Vienna.
As his career was so brief it would be rash to try to
map out for Geertgen a course of development. But it
may be said that the altar-piece just mentioned, with a
Nativity in private ownership at Berlin and the John
the Baptist in the Berlin Museum, must belong to his
ripest period, while the small Adoration of the Magi at
Amsterdam, the Christ in the Sepulchre at Utrecht, and
perhaps the Holy Fellowship ina church interior, likewise
in the Amsterdam Museum, must mark the beginning of
hiscareer. Thus far we know, in all, fourteen of his pic-
tures. All are in one and the same style and reveal a self-
sufficient personality almost inaccessible to outside
influences, the relationship to Ouwater or Dirk Bouts
being merely of the general kind that exists between
painters of the same school.
In the presence of Geertgen’s pictures we distinctly
feel for the first time a material relaxing of the tech-
nical tradition established by the van Eycks. They
[ 55 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES —
lack the brilliant effect, as of enamelled colours, and the
miniature-like, sharply detailed finish that are charac-
teristic of these elder masters. The colours are duller,
the handling is looser, revealing the touch of the painter
who unconsciously expresses his personality by the
stroke of his brush. The figures have grown much
more plebeian. They are robustly built rustic Dutch-
men who have moved into the city and there achieved
independence and consideration. ‘The men have osse-
ous heads, clean-shaven faces, and gigantic beards, the
women have unbeautiful, long, chubby-cheeked coun-
tenances, the children are broad-headed and oldish-
looking. ‘The men walk with a proud strut, the women
squat clumsily on the ground, the children behave in a
rude grotesque way. What is great in this little bour-
geois world is the deep and sincere feeling of its in-
habitants. So elementary is any expression of joy or
sorrow wrung from one of these reserved and sturdy
people that the astonished observer cannot refrain
from sympathy. The counterweight to this intensity
of feeling is a sense of humour fed by the observation
of the discords of the outer world. Later on we shall
find this trait again in Rembrandt, whose temperament
on its purely human side is very like Geertgen’s. As
in Rembrandt’s work, so too in Geertgen’s, the humour
is of a reticent sort appearing only in accessory scenes,
as in the droll children of the Amsterdam Holy Fellow-
ship, who look like figures of Pieter Breughel’s. Geert-
gen seems to have been by nature serious and reflective
and, if we read his works aright, was not among those
who are on easy terms with life.
As regards the general development of art, the most
[ 56 |
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
important thing that Geertgen accomplished was, per-
haps, his preparation of the way for the warmth of
sentiment revealed in the work of Rembrandt; but, in
addition, every element of Dutch painting felt the stim-
ulus of his art.
In his pictures the colours are, indeed, still bright
and varied, yet they begin to subordinate themselves
to a general tone, a warm red-brown which becomes
reddish in the faces, giving them a heated look, and
which already suggests the favourite colour of the
Dutchmen of Rembrandt’s time. In his preference
for red in the costumes Geertgen became the standard
for the whole Haarlem school. We find red as the princi-
pal colour in the pictures of all his followers down to Jan
Mostaert and Jacob Cornelisz, and at last it becomes the
intense vermilion which expresses, so to say, the warmth
of feeling of Rembrandt and his associates — Nicholas
Maes, Pieter de Hooch, and others.
Even in the landscape backgrounds of Geertgen’s
pictures a stronger feeling for tone is perceptible. Al-
though there is still a remnant of the traditional division
into a blue distance and a brownish-green middle dis-
tance, these tones pass more gradually into each other,
and sometimes only a diminutive bit of the far distance
is shown. In these landscape backgrounds Geertgen
goes far beyond his contemporaries, and in some parts
of them he often seems astonishingly modern. Like the
great landscape painters of the seventeenth century,
like Jacob Ruisdael and Hobbema, he loves hilly wooded
regions interspersed with quiet pools and enlivened by
one or two solitary wanderers. He still makes use at
times of those traditional rocky motives which can
[ 57 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
scarcely have been reproduced from the artist’s own
observation, and he still renders distant details with the
precision characteristic of Primitive painting. Never-
theless we feel, perhaps for the first time in the pres-
ence of Dutch art, that we are looking at landscapes
that might really exist, and that have an intimate charm
_which invites us to visit them.
As yet we do not know of any authenticated in-
dividual portraits from Geertgen’s hand although a
portrait of the Burgomaster of Schiedam, dating from
the year 1489 and now in the Johnson Collection, has a
close kinship with his work and proves how much more
simple, less anxious about details, and more broadly
inclusive in the expression of character, portraiture had
become since the time of Dirk Bouts. Moreover, in
one of Geertgen’s pictures at Vienna there is a splendid
group of portraits of the Knights of St. John who, as
the donors of the altar-piece, have their place in the
devotional scene. Here, as has often been remarked,
is the starting-point of the Dutch portrait group which,
later on, was freed by Jan Scoorel and Antonio Moro
from its association with religious compositions, and
in the seventeenth century became one of the most
distinctive branches of the pictorial art of Holland.
Geertgen’s instinct for the path that painting was to
follow in his country shows in a still more striking way,
perhaps, in two pictures that portray church archi-
tecture. It was no novelty to set a religious scene in a
church, as did Geertgen in his Amsterdam Holy Fellow-
ship; not only Ouwater but also van der Weyden and
Jan van Eyck had supplied him with noteworthy ex-
amples. But Geertgen went much farther than they in
[ 58 ]
—
rRUS. VEENLANT GCONSUESCHIEDAMEN
& MAXIMILLANW ROMANORU REGI
COMIPrris’ MOLLANDIA “14 So
IN THE MANNER OF GEERTGEN, PORTRAIT OF THE
BURGOMASTER OF SCHIEDAM
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
depicting a church interior, showing a Dutch Gothic
church with the wooden vaults above the central alley
of the nave, the flat board ceilings in the aisles, the
rood-screen, and the decorated altar, with so much truth
and such accurate observation of the incidence of the
light that he stands as a worthy forerunner of the great
seventeenth-century masters of interior architecture,
like Pieter Saenredam and Emanuel de Witte.
In an interior view of the cathedral (the Church of
St. Bavon) at Haarlem, which is mentioned by van
Mander and is still in its original place in the church,
he has even bequeathed us an architectural picture
independent of a religious scene; and although it looks
as though it had been produced in connection with the
masons’ guild of the cathedral, perhaps as a model,
nevertheless it remains the first and the only oil paint-
ing of its sort that has been preserved from the fifteenth
century, in the city where afterward, in Rembrandt’s
time, the great painters of churches celebrated their
triumphs.
Naturally such a painter as Geertgen was not weak
where all the great Dutchmen were strong — in chi-
aroscuro. His conception of the story of the Nativity,
in a picture now in private ownership at Berlin, was long
believed to be the earliest in pictorial art with a noc-
turnal setting. In all previous presentations of this
theme the light had been the light of day, although the
artist had sometimes put a candle in Joseph’s hand to
suggest the hours of darkness. Geertgen himself had
so treated the scene in an earlier picture. In the
later one he not only renders the nocturnal lighting with
admirable success but also introduces into art the
[ 59 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
scheme of illumination which in the next generation
Correggio made famous in Italy. That is, he makes the
light emanate from the Christ Child and thus makes
him, materially as well as spiritually, the focus of the
scene.
In his broadly human aspect, however, Geertgen
ranks even higher than as a factor in the development
of the art of painting. The painters of the beginning
of the sixteenth century, not excepting even Lucas
van Leyden, suffer from their effort to express more
than they have in themselves, and adhere to the style
in vogue in their day. Geertgen expresses himself
as he is, with a natural simplicity which, it may seem,
should be the first and most obvious trait of a true
artist but is in fact the rarest. He is able to portray
both joy and grief with complete freedom of spirit.
Excepting Rembrandt, what Netherlander has known |
how to express suffering as Geertgen does in the Christ
of his Pieta at Vienna? Intrinsically, this Christ has,
indeed, little of the divine, but he is as piteous as ever
mortal could be. Silently and humbly he has strug-
gled, and so he is now less gruesome than the dead
Christ of Holbein whose open mouth still bears witness
to his outcries. Here only the corners of the mouth
are slightly hollowed by pain, and the prominent cheek-
bones cast shadows upon sunken cheeks. The body
has arched itself with the intake of the last difficult
breath, and the lifted breast and sunken abdomen rest
naturally on the mother’s lap. In none, perhaps, of
the innumerable representations of this theme has a
painter found for the Christ so reposeful a position,
one that so directly and profoundly expresses the rela-
[ 60 |
SS ee ee a
GEERTGEN, PIETA
HOF MUSEUM, VIENNA
Sn 2h ht daha fe mh Be RANT daha Arde
ertTaarpa ha re minha ian
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
tion between mother and son. In earlier pictures
Mary, with a medieval simplicity palpably embodying
the deepest love, takes the whole corpse upon her lap.
A dreadful idea — that a mother should hold the naked
bleeding body with her own hands upon her knees!
Only in a country where the Mother of God was not
a woman but a goddess could such a conception be
spiritualized, as where the Madonna of Michelangelo
holds the mortal burden lightly upon celestial draperies.
With van der Weyden and with Bouts Christ already
rests with his feet on the ground, but Mary still encir-
cles the awful form with her arms and kisses its mouth.
Geertgen conceives his theme in a more restrained way
than the vehement explosive van der Weyden, in a
more human way than the diffident Dirk Bouts. Ona
white shroud Christ lies upon his mother’s knees; she
does not kiss him or embrace him; in her gaze lie
adoration, love, and an unspeakable sorrow that the
head should no longer turn toward her pleading eyes.
The communion between mother and son is undisturbed
and shut away from all the world, for the encircling
mourners are not saints of the church who descant in
concert upon the misfortune that has befallen them but
human beings who in their sympathetic grief have for-
gotten external things. Abandoning themselves to
their suffering, each one self-absorbed, they weep in as
childlike a way as Homeric heroes. John, the beau-
tiful youth with the elongated face and the splendid
curls, grasps with a large gesture the folds of his cloak,
to press them to his eyes. He neither supports the
Christ nor consoles Mary as in the representations of
other artists. Mechanically he points to the dead man,
[ 61 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
as though thinking of friends to whom he is explain-
ing the inconceivable harshness of fate. The women
also find no help in themselves, but seek comfort in
prayer or look toward the observer as though plead-
ing for aid. Hardly more self-possessed are the three
other men. Joseph of Arimathea, a stern and daunt-
less figure, has been brought to his knees by the power
of the Saviour’s meek personality. An old man behind
him holds his head with a naive gesture, as though
it threatened to sink. Behind them all, with a fixed
and quiet gaze, stands an elderly man, great experi-
ence and great suffering depicted on his countenance.
It is like an epic, this picture, embracing the mun-
dane and the spiritual life of man, the momentary oc-
currence and the eternal existence of nature. Although
in the background we see the brutal deeds of the day on
Golgotha, the foreground group appears like a silent
world of sadness. Or, if we glance at the other side
of the landscape, full of a secluded peacefulness, we
feel, in contrast again, the tumult agitating the souls
of the friends of Christ.
Although the separate episodes in this picture may
seem to have small connection with one another, they
are conceived in the same mood, as grows plain if we
look at another of Geertgen’s works, an Adoration of
the Magi at Prague. How joyless seem the bare rocks
of the Pieta and the gloomy wood with the solitary
pool, how displeasing the dreary labour of the men on the
hill, by contrast with the fresh and living world that
now opens to our eyes. Here again are rocks, but the
sun illumines them and vegetation clothes them. Here
again are wooded slopes, but friendly cottages gleam
[ 62 ]
GEERTGEN, THE ADORATION OF THE MAGI
RUDOLFINUM, PRAGUE
wee
he x, eit
ie NU es nah ea
_ :
al a pte Brin es
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
out from them and palaces and castles are ranged up
the heights. And the water lies, not apart, but amid
the cheerful activity of the village street; the hand of
man has dammed and bridged it; its surface mirrors
gayly dressed, wide-cloaked figures grouped in eager
talk. For whom has the landscape thus put on a Sab-
bath garment? For whom do proud horsemen on white
palfreys dash over the shining sand, to pause where the
wise men of the land philosophically discuss a great
event? It is all for the sake of the little prince who in
the foreground sits, confident and bold, upon his
mother’s lap. No Christ Child is this, with eyes full
of a knowledge of the world and forebodings of suffer-
ings to come. Closer to the northern painter lay the
conception, “‘When I was a child I spake as a child, I
understood as a child, I thought as a child.” Blithely
the babe stretches out the bare arm that is clasped by
the fingers of the gray-haired king and the supporting
hand of Mary. The fingers of his other hand are con-
tracted as though about to grasp at the glitter of the
golden vase. But the mother, who esteems herself as
naught in the presence of her son, receives the adora-
tion of the kings with the modest self-possession of
childlike natures. And the kings correspond in char-
acter to this gentle earnest being. They do not parade
into the stable with steeds and cavaliers, with pages and
soldiers; as friends, dignity blending with modesty, they
dedicate to the infant Christ their thoughts rather than
their gifts.
As a rule Geertgen is the enemy of all exaggerated
vehement gestures; his figures are born to keep silence.
In the Amsterdam Holy Fellowship he resolves the
[ 63 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
problem of harmonizing the personages and the archi-
tecture by making, so to say, columns of the figures,
Broadly and heavily built women with stony faces sit
upon the ground; men with beards like primeval
forests stand about motionless. Their poses are care-
fully calculated: almost without exception they are
shown in full or in half figure — seven of them in full
face, three in profile, three from the back. Only the
awkward intrusions of a couple of children cut across
the structure of regular lines, like the grotesques on a
Gothic capital. In the same restrained manner the
unworldly artist dealt with the portrayal of John the
Baptist in the Wilderness. With Geertgen, as with all —
the great Dutchmen, the feeling for individual person-
ality was so strong that in compositions of many figures
it was apt to impair unity, as is the case in the second of
his pictures at Vienna. It is in the portrayal of single |
figures that the artists of Holland have often given us ©
their very best.
Sunk in an endless reverie the Baptist sits low down
in a pleasant wooded landscape of flowing lines that
lead the eye back to a distance dotted with cities. He
takes no heed of the animals that play around him, of —
the roe-buck by the water, the hares that nibble the
fern, or the birds in the air, or even of the Lamb that
rests beside him. Absorbed in himself he crouches on
the ground. Nothing is left of the typical art of the
fifteenth century, which represented the Baptist stand-
ing and pointing to the Lamb. Here he is like all the
great artistic personifications of deep meditation —
the Melencolia or the St. Anthony of Diirer, Michel-
angelo’s Jeremiah or Lorenzo de’ Medici, Rem-
[ 64 |
GEERTGEN, ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST
KAISER FRIEDRICH MUSEUM, BERLIN
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
_ brandt’s young man lying at the feet of Christ in the
_ Hundred Guilder Print — in that he has seated himself
- naturally and negligently without thought of the spec-
tator and, as deep reflection paralyzes physical effort,
has suppressed all tendency to external action, drawing
his limbs together into the smallest compass and press-
ing his hands and feet close to his body.
The defects characteristic of the period — the too
great height of the point of view in respect to the land-
scape, the detachment of the figures from the back-
ground, the discordant proportions of the people and
the animals —do not disturb us here, for all the
_ separate parts are individually and largely observed.
It might, for example, be hard to distinguish the species
_ of the trees and plants, as one may do with Dirk Bouts
who saw details better than anything else, or with the
_ van Eycks who were still affected by the persistent medi-
_ evalway of working. Yet by subordinating the details
_ ofalandscape to a general impression Geertgen achieves
| the effect of a faithfully rendered natural scene more
_ completely, perhaps, than any other Primitive painter of
_ the Low Countries. It suffices us that the ferns, the dan-
_ delions, the thistles, the trees, are so shaped as to awaken
_ our general recollections of such plants. The greatest
_ landscape painters have not been the best botanists.
If they had been, it would mean that the love of science
_ must always be a factor in art, as it was with Diirer
_ and Leonardo, but not with Ruisdael or Hobbema and
_ still less with Rembrandt or Rubens in whose paint-
_ ings even the species of the trees cannot be identified.
Geertgen was a forerunner on the path that they trod,
_ a path that led to a stage where, in imaginary land-
[ 65 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
scapes, living nature down to the last characteristic :
detail was infused with the painter’s sense of style,
Unconsciously Geertgen was more concerned that the
spirit of the artist should express itself in the portrait-_
ure of every leaf than that the pattern supplied by —
nature should be distinctly apparent.
If in this picture of the Baptist all passion is immured |
in the depths of the soul, in another work of Geertgen’s, ©
which we must look upon as exceptional, it bursts forth
with unparalleled violence. Here, in the Christ in the
Sepulchre at Utrecht, the Saviour is drenched with the
blood that flows from his wounds in broad streams.
With a feeble hand he tries to stanch the fount in
his gaping side. His tottering form is broken by the —
weight of the cross which, bulky and black, leans against ©
him. Great teardrops fall from his eyes, and all those
around him — Mary and the Magdalene, St. John and
the angel — are also weeping. All restraint is thrown |
aside. With a kind of sentiment that is proper to the —
north the composition is shaped by the spirit of the —
scene, the form is as wild and confused as its inner _
significance. How impossibly the figures move in an
impossible place! We do not see how Christ stays in >
the sarcophagus, how the cross stands, or how the
Magdalene kneels or Mary and John find room for them-
selves. The lines of the tomb lead the eye toward the —
distance in a direction that is reversed by the horizontal
arm of the cross. The angels who, by reason of their
relative size, ought to be farther back are forced into
a nearer plane by the way in which they impinge upon
the contours of the foreground figures and upon the
frame. And as the planes of the picture thus intersect, —
[ 66 ]
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
so the attitudes of the figures in relation to one another
_ are as strongly contrasted as possible. The straight-
lined objects — the cross, the edge of the sarcophagus,
the lances and pikes — divide the closely filled surface
of the picture with thick dark strokes. And the bi-
secting of the figures by all four sides of the frame
enhances the resemblance to a veritable scene from life.
Something, it is true, has been done to mitigate this
impression as of a frightful reality. The gold ground,
which by this time was unusual, and the inconceivable
arrangement in an unreal place, label the picture as a
work of ecclesiastical conventionalism; and that thought
of the observer which, for the sake of greater reality,
was avoided in the picture of the Baptist, is here ex-
pressed by the attitude of the Christ. The apparent
_eonfusion of the composition is solved, however, by
closer observation. The poses repeat themselves in
regular rhythm, three of the figures are placed on either
side of Christ, and in the centre the design approxi-
mates to a triangle the point of which is formed by his
head. But the spiritual meaning of the picture affects
us more strongly than the harmony of the composition.
We ask ourselves, Is it great art which so stuns us that
we forget to demand material beauty? Certainly it
is not art of a kind that can be measured by the usual
tests, no more than is the late work of Rembrandt. It
Is a conflict, not a victorious procession like all the art
of the south; and it knows only one kind of triumph —
the triumph of extreme individuality.
The painter who achieved so greatly lived only
_ twenty-eight years. But the charm that marks artists
who die young, their much-bepraised lovableness, does
[ 67 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
not irradiate his figure. The youthful traits in Geert-
gen are his naively drastic way of expressing him-
self, the intensity with which he feels suffering, and
the simplicity and grandeur with which he portrays
it, as though he had no time to condescend to small
things.
Among the pictures that resemble Geertgen’s, one
of the most beautiful is a St. Martin in the Johnson
Collection at Philadelphia. It is too simple and too
fine to be called the work of an imitator, but because of
the somewhat divergent types and the more cursory
treatment of the background it can hardly be ascribed
to the master himself. It plainly shows the influence
of one of those many statues of St. Martin that werepro-
duced, especially in Belgium and the north of France,
>. peet. Cie is ER oe;
during the last third of the fifteenth century. In few ©
of these, however, can the theme have been conceived
with as much feeling or with such a sense of style; in
few can so much dignity and sincerity have been con-
ferred upon the saint, so much grace, in spite of all
defects in drawing, upon the horse, or upon the beggar
an air of gratitude so natural and yet so free from obse-
quiousness. It is as though the artist wished to re-
strict himself to the expression of the most important
things, and considered all display of details unsuitable |
to a scene of the kind. :
Geertgen’s advent impelled other artists to take a
genuine interest in the psychological content of their —
themes. How highly the painters of his time esteemed
his art is shown not only by the strong influence that —
it exerted in every direction but also by the copies that
were soon made from his pictures. We have three such ©
[ 68 ]
IN THE MANNER OF GEERTGEN, ST. MARTIN
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
copies, dating from the first half ofthesixteenth century.
One, a sketchy copy of the Pieta in the Museum at
Vienna, was made by Jan Mostaert, the principal
painter of Haarlem in the earlier part of the century,
as is proved by the fact that he added wing-pictures of
his own composition. The two others, especially in-
teresting as reproductions of lost originals, are the
painting owned by Sir Charles Turner in London, with
scenes from the life of St. Domenick, and the well-
known triptych in the National Gallery at London with
the Madonna and saintly women in a forest.
The first of these two is a stately composition, of
somewhat the same kind as the Amsterdam Holy
Fellowship, where the apparition of the Madonna owes
its impressiveness to the dignified yet simply human
way in which it is conceived. The second is particu-
larly remarkable for the naive fairy-tale poetry of the
theme and the marvellous rendering of the mood of the
forest. The unsymmetrical grouping and the irregular
association of the different motives seem at first sight
typically Dutch. But this artless transcript from scenes
actually observed in nature is not without artistic effec-
tiveness. How convincing is the naked awkward Christ
Child whom the mother has carefully set upon a cushion
on the ground so that he may take care of himself while
she devotes herself to the perusal of a pious book! How
natural seems the complaisance of the holy women and
the angels in amusing the babe, who accepts their minis-
trations as a matter of course! The saints have lost all
trace of the stately bearing given them in pictures of
the time of the van Eycks. They are persons from
Geertgen’s own environment who behave as they think
[ 69 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
fit, unconcernedly following their own impulses. One
of the angels has interrupted his flute-playing to bring
the women a basket of fruit, another lets a stream of
water from the spring fall upon a shell full of cherries, a
third gathers flowers in his lifted mantle. The saints
who wander in the shade between the trunks of the trees
would be undistinguishable from aristocratic town
ladies of the time if they were not leading a lamb by a
cord in token of their saintliness. The orange trees
and cypresses and the deep blue sky with its soft and
feathery white clouds are rendered with remarkable
truth, as though the artist were familiar with southern
regions. |
The close resemblance of the types to Geertgen’s,
and the originality of the conception, have led more
than one critic to attribute this picture to the mas-
ter himself, all the more because the two figures of
St. John on the wings point to the patron saint of the
order in whose house he dwelt at Haarlem. But keener
eyes have recognized in the work a somewhat later
Dutchman who had especially attached himself to elder
masters — to Memling, to Geertgen, and still more to
Quentin Metsys—and who made use in his own work
of their imaginative powers. Friedlander has named
him the Master of the Morrison Triptych, in reference
to a painting owned by Mrs. Alfred Morrison in London,
which is a free copy of Memling’s well-known triptych
at Vienna. As he was not at all deficient in inventive-
ness, very likely he altered Geertgen’s composition,
and it is possible that he gave its southern character to
the landscape. However this may be, the picture is
one of the most delightful creations of Early-Dutch art
[70 ]
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
and one of the masterpieces among the Primitive paint-
ings in the National Gallery at London.
¥
PAINTERS INFLUENCED BY GEERTGEN
Were there no other proof of Geertgen’s importance it
might be divined from the number of pictures that re-
veal his influence. In assigning these works to their
places I must cite a long line of painters who are not
always as delightful to study as is their great model.
Six artists demand attention above all others as fol-
lowers of Geertgen. Three of them must have been at
work in Haarlem at the same time as he or but little
later — the: Master of the Martyrdom of St. Lucy, the
young Gerard David, and the Master of the Antwerp
Triptych. The other three — the Master of Alkmaar,
Jan Mostaert, and Jacob Cornelisz — won their promi-
nent places in the art of Holland at a later time, in the
first half of the sixteenth century, and it is therefore
only their early work that concerns us here.
THE MASTER OF THE MARTYRDOM OF ST. LUCY
As with all great artists so with Geertgen we find
that some of his followers imitate their model so closely
that on the surface their art is deceptively like his own,
betraying the imitator only by a lesser intensity of
feeling. It was a painter of this kind who produced
the altar-piece representing the Martyrdom of St.
Lucy, now in the Rijks Museum at Amsterdam. Three
other paintings also came from his studio — a Cruci-
fixion in the same collection, a similar picture now in
the Archiepiscopal Museum at Utrecht (formerly in
[ey
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
the Church of St. Vitus at Naarden), and a Descent
from the Cross in the possession of Herr Figdor at
Vienna. These pictures are unlike in execution, for
the two Crucifixions, hastily painted, seem like the
products of some great workshop. In general, an
antiquated technique, which still uses gold and silver
in the details and especially in the armour, alternates
with a sketchy way of painting that derives, indeed,
from Geertgen’s manner but less surely hits the mark.
The types, even to the reddish flesh-tones, are wholly
taken from Geertgen, and the colours — the warm red
conspicuous in the costumes, the red-brown that domi-
nates in the foreground of the landscapes, and the
greenish-brown farther back — also recall his pictures,
although hotter and more uniform in tone. Probably
the artist often copied figures from Geertgen’s paint-
ings, for some of the motives seem almost too original
to be his own. In one case, indeed, in the Descent
from the Cross, the borrowing can be demonstrated:
the man on the ladder who holds a large hat in his hand
is imitated from the kneeling masculine figure in
Geertgen’s Pieta at Vienna. Both the Crucifixions,
where the Christ and the angels are most noticeably in
Geertgen’s manner, originated perhaps in borrowings
from the central part of the Vienna altar-piece, now
lost to us, for at a later time, in representations of
the crucifixion by Jacob Cornelisz, we find similar
motives which seem to have been taken from Geertgen’s
compositions. As is often the case with the imitators
of great masters, the influence on the pupil is detri-
mental in so far that he adopts the simplifying, sum-
marizing method of his teacher without basing it upon
[72]
LUCY
MARTYRDOM OF ST.
MASTER OF THE
THE CRUCIFIXION
AMSTERDAM
RIJKS MUSEUM,
—
2 ee
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
a corresponding power and pregnancy in the rendering
of the forms. Painters of the rank of this pupil of
Geertgen’s would perhaps have done admirably, within
their limits, in the time of the van Eycks when they
would not have been tempted to slight details. Geert-
gen did away with this miniature-painting, and as a
result the pictures of his followers look empty. On the
other hand, the work of the one whom we are now con-
sidering excels in decorative effect when seen from a
distance, as the landscape, the architecture, the cos-
tumes, and the human forms are all treated in broad
planes.
The best picture of the group is the Martyrdom of
St. Lucy, which makes its mark among the Primitives
in the Rijks Museum by virtue of its strong colours —
the warm reds and red-browns, the light notes of certain
white costumes, and the lively blue of the sky. The
painter tries as hard as he can to infuse his figures with
spiritual feeling but lacks the power to make them
lifelike. Those in the foreground especially have the
look of dolls, and there is a touch of the marionette
theatre in the way in which one executioner stabs the
saint, and another, affected by the scene, wipes his eye
while the old king stands morosely by. Very charming,
however, are the accessory scenes of the background
where the simplified treatment is better in place. The
pair of lovers on the bench in front of the house, the
feast that is visible through the window, and the ad-
ministration of the sacrament to the anxious saint while
a sorrowful introspective choir-boy assists, are portrayed
in a lifelike way that reminds us of the later genre-paint-
ers of Pieter Breughel’s time.
[ 73 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
From the few pictures by this artist that are known
to us we may gather that he was at work from 1480
until shortly after 1500. During this time the Haarlem
records mention two brothers, Mourijn and Claes
Simonsz, who between 1485 and 1490 painted the wings
of the high altar for the Church of St. Bavon. Mourijn,
who is always named before Claes, appears to have
been active for a longer time. First mentioned in 1473,
he became a widower in 1478 and did not die until
1509. Perhaps these brothers conducted the workshop
in which the pictures that have just been mentioned
were produced, for the use of gold seems to indicate
one of the older painters of the day, and the brothers
were explicitly instructed by their employers to use
gold in the wings of the altar of St. Bavon. Moreover,
another circumstance, of a less important kind, may
support the identification. The early works of Jacob
Cornelisz prove, almost to a certainty, that he was a
pupil of the Master of the Martyrdom of St. Lucy;
he was a native of Waterland, and van Mander wonders
how so famous an artist could come from so poor a place;
but, as we know from the records, the Simonsz brothers
also came from Waterland, and therefore it is natural
to assume that when Jacob Cornelisz betook himself
to Haarlem he went to school to his fellow countrymen.
GERARD DAVID
With regard to the life of another of the artists
whom Geertgen influenced, the greatest of all who fol-
lowed in his steps, Gerard David, we are better in-
formed. Like Dirk Bouts, David was a Dutchman by
birth and active for a time in Haarlem but migrated
[ 74 ]
MASTER OF THE MARTYRDOM OF ST. LUCY
THE MARTYRDOM OF ST. LUCY
RIJKS MUSEUM, AMSTERDAM
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
to Flanders and lived there for the rest of his life.
It is probable, however, that he worked at Haarlem
for a briefer time than Bouts; and as his style was more
strongly affected by the new environment at Bruges,
there is even less warrant in his case than in the case
of Bouts to claim him exclusively for Holland. He
ean hardly have been more than twenty-five years of
age when he left his own country, and, less gifted by
nature with imagination than Bouts, he was constrained
to utilize the artistic products of his new home for the
benefit of his own art. Nevertheless until the end of
his life he retained Dutch characteristics; and as we are
fortunate enough to know a long series of the works of
his Haarlem period we are able in some degree to isolate
what is typically Dutch in his art.
Dutch above all is the seriousness and the sluggish-
ness of his figures, the shyness and taciturnity of their
deportment — traits which in his riper period change
_ toa noble dignity mingled with deep and tender relig-
ious feeling. Dutch also is that lack of dramatic power
which is one reason why he did not succeed much better
than Bouts with such subjects as scenes of martyrdom,
like his Christ Nailed to the Cross in the Antwerp
Museum or the Flaying of Sisamnus in the Town Hall
at Bruges. He is dryer and less spontaneous than
Geertgen, colder in feeling, more impersonal, and more
ecclesiastical. But on the other hand he can disasso-
ciate himself better from the themes that he treats, and
he pays more attention to the form in which he presents
them — to symmetrical balanced composition, and a
beautiful and decorative use of colour and line. His
strength, like that of Dirk Bouts, lies in the domain of
[75 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
the lyrical, but Bouts is infinitely fresher and more
direct although, it must be confessed, more bourgeois.
David is an aristocrat; and it is in devotional subjects,
above all in portrayals of the Madonna and Child ac-
companied by saintly women or angels, of the annun-
ciation, and of the Virgin lamenting her son, that he
achieves the greatest beauty.
We get the impression that in the long run Geertgen’s
influence was not the best for him; indeed, it is seldom
that one great artist can educate another. David was
not fully conscious of his own personality until he
found himself in the peaceful environment of Bruges
where there were no such progressive elements as at
Haarlem and the tradition of the great, almost im- ~
personal art of the van Eycks was still alive. When he
learned to know their work and that of the gentle
lovable Memling, he began to recognize the value of the
highest technical finish, and developed for himself the
style of much distinction with which he created the
last great examples of the splendid medizeval art of
Bruges. The works of his early Haarlem period lack
this perfect completeness of execution for which Geert- —
gen cared little; and as they fall short of a convincing
accent of personality they are rather meagre and empty
in effect. It is true that some of them, particularly
the St. Jerome of the Salting Collection in the National
Gallery at London, testify that Geertgen had shown
him the way toward a deeper psychical expressiveness;
and perhaps to this influence, felt in his days of pupil-
age, may be traced the impressive results which he
afterward achieved in some of his work at Bruges. In
externals his Haarlem pictures bear a close resemblance
[ 76 |
eS eS
GERARD DAVID, THE VIRGIN AND ST. JOHN
MUSEUM, ANTWERP
Lhe rrr ary
Rates Ee oe oe ei SAD Sp Na ES POLLED EE ERIE ER Stes Seer a ARES
:
ee ee eee a) es | ee
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
to Geertgen’s. In the Christ Nailed to the Cross, the
central part of which is in the possession of Lady Led-
yard at Venice while the wings are at Antwerp, and in
the wing-pictures, showing John the Baptist and St.
Francis, in the von Kaufmann Collection at Berlin, the
types are so like Geertgen’s that this painter has often
been thought of as their creator. The warm colour-
ing also, with its brown shadows and reddish-brown
flesh-tones, and the broadly handled foliage speak alto-
gether of Geertgen; later on at Bruges they change in
accordance with the much cooler colouring of Flemish
pictures. Again, we sometimes find in Geertgen the
stiff ranking of the figures with their heads at the same
level, but the liking for it seems to have been more
firmly rooted in the nature of the younger artist, and
with its aid David developed the austere monumental
effects that distinguish his later compositions.
It has rightly been remarked that the dates of Geert-
gen’s career do not fit in with the belief that Gerard
David was actually his pupil. It is much more per-
- missible to think that David, who came from the same
place as Ouwater, was Ouwater’s pupil and in his studio
made acquaintance with Geertgen. It is nothing out
of the common that the fellow-student should have
exerted a greater influence than the master. Here in
Holland we find the same thing at a later day: Rem-
brandt’s influence upon those who worked with him
under Lastman, and especially upon Lievens, was much
stronger than their master’s.
Some of the motives for his compositions David did,
perhaps, take from Ouwater. For instance, there is
preserved in the Johnson Collection at Philadelphia a
[77]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
version of Dirk Bouts’ Adoration of the Magi which
greatly resembles three of David's youthful works, now
in Budapest, in the von Kaufmann Collection at Berlin,
and in private ownership in France; and probably
Ouwater transmitted to David this composition of
Bouts’. Yet even here David reverted to Geertgen’s
conception, borrowing the idea of a nocturnal setting
and using it in a richer fashion, and in the works that
he produced at Bruges many years later we can still
divine the strength of Geertgen’s influence. Pictures
which were not painted until ten years, perhaps, after
David’s change of residence, like the beautiful Adora-
tion of the Magi at Brussels and the Tables of the
Law in the Town Hall at Bruges, and which already
show the assimilation of Flemish influences, still dis-
play individual motives and colours that unquestion- —
ably trace back to the great Haarlem master.
THE MASTER OF THE ANTWERP TRIPTYCH
Gerard David had none of the dry humour that
Geertgen occasionally reveals in the subordinate parts
of his pictures. But the temperament of another of
Geertgen’s pupils, the painter of the little triptych in
the Antwerp Museum which shows the Madonna in
the centre and St. John and St. George on the wings,
seems to have been in accord with the master’s leaning
toward the burlesque. To the same artist have rightly
been attributed a Madonna with the Donors and St.
Michael in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum at Berlin,
and an Assumption of the Virgin at Bonn. He comes
nearest to Geertgen in the Berlin picture where the
narrow-eyed Mary is the very image of the great
[78 |
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
master’s Madonna types. The St. Michael who pro-
tects the donors with a grand gesture as he makes
obeisance to the Child is also quite worthy of the
master. ‘To a greater degree than most of Geertgen’s
pupils this one strives to rise from petty genre-like
conceptions to a monumental style. But he does not
get beyond a good beginning; his handling is hard and
wooden, and in the rendering of children in particular
he drops into the grotesque. Their droll irreverent
behaviour, the worldly appearance of his saints as the
| Antwerp pictures show it, and the self-conscious air of
his Madonna, make it plain that religious sentiment is
less strong with him than with Geertgen or even with
Bouts and Ouwater, and that, original and powerful
painter though he is, he falls in with the current ten-
dency toward the secularizing of devotional pictures.
While we cannot follow any of these pupils of Geert-
gen’s much beyond the end of the fifteenth century,
excepting Gerard David whose development came to
its full flowering in Flanders, the three others who have
been named are best known to us in the subsequent
phase of Dutch art, in the first third of the sixteenth
century. The pictures of their youth are those that
reveal the influence of Geertgen.
THE MASTER OF ALKMAAR
This painter gets his name from the seven pictures in
the Church of St. Lawrence at Alkmaar which represent
the Seven Works of Mercy and bear the date 1507.
He worked at Haarlem and has been identified — cor-
rectly, it is probable — with Willem Cornelisz, the
teacher of Jan Scoorel. On the testimony of the Alk-
[ 79 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
maar pictures it was thought that his art derived from
Geertgen’s, and this belief has been confirmed by an-
other painting from his brush, a St. Anne with the
Virgin and Child, recently in the hands of a dealer,
which dates from about 1490 and is very evidently the
work of a pupil of Geertgen’s.
It is a votive picture, as is shown by the two nuns
who kneel in the foreground in front of their patrons,
St. Francis and St. Stephen. In the centre Mary and
her mother, seated on either side of the Christ Child,
try to attract him by holding up, the one a bunch of
grapes, the other a pear. ‘The theme and the arrange-
ment of this group are of frequent occurrence in Early-
Dutch wood-carvings such as may be seen in the
Museum at Utrecht and elsewhere; they appear in the art
of Haarlem as early as in that of Antwerp and Brussels;
and at a later period we find in the art of Leyden also a
number of interpretations of the same theme with a
similar grouping. The scene of our picture is set, in
true Haarlem fashion, in a little garden encircled by
low brick walls and laid out in terraces to make possible
the placing of the personages one above the other. The
most interesting figure is, perhaps, the John the Baptist
in the upper left-hand corner, inspired, as is instantly
apparent, by Geertgen’s Baptist in the Wilderness.
But what has happened to the grand creation of the
great master? In the stead of a saint in profound
meditation we see a quite cheerful one who plays with
his lamb as though trying to put it through a course of
training. The crossing of the feet, which with Geertgen
is explained by the introspective, concentrated mood of
the Baptist, is ignorantly and awkwardly copied. It
[ 80 ]
|
i
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
_ is instructive, also, with Geertgen’s carefully observed
details in mind, to notice how impossibly lies the mantle
that has been thrown over the saint’s shoulders, and
_ how unnaturally its folds are bunched on the ground
f —a typical example of the way in which Geertgen’s
large and significant conceptions become petty and
_ trivial in the paraphrases of his pupils. The farther
_ away this artist gets from Geertgen, the less possible
it is to make friends with him. If he is really identical
_ with that teacher of Jan Scoorel who, according to van
_ Mander, made use in dishonourable ways of the more
gifted among his pupils, we may almost read his char-
acter in the figures in his pictures, surly of air with
squinting, ill-natured glances. In his later works, for
example, in the two large wing-pieces in the Rijks
Museum at Amsterdam and the picture in the Johnson
Collection, these ugly and unsympathetic types, angu-
lar and wiry in movement, are especially numerous.
Yet he proves himself an intelligent follower of Geertgen
‘by the interest he takes in effects of light, showing
particular pleasure in the rendering of cast shadows
and sometimes using an astonishingly effective scheme
of artificial lighting. In his stylized landscape side-
scenes, with their steep rocks and overhanging stretches
of meadow, he already suggests Scoorel, in his cool
opalescent colouring, Lucas van Leyden.
JAN MOSTAERT
Jan Mostaert was the chief painter of Haarlem in the
first half of the sixteenth century. In spite of all the
charm of his art it proves that the local school had
‘begun to decline and that Haarlem was about to resign
[81 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
its leadership to other places—to Leyden, where ;
Engelbrechtsz and Lucas van Leyden were at work; ©
to Utrecht, where Jan Scoorel had appeared; to Amster- |
dam and the founder of its school, Jacob Cornelisz. _
Mostaert became court painter to the Regent Mar-
garet, and with him the art of Haarlem rose from the
simple burgher atmosphere, in which Geertgen breathed,
to a more aristocratic world of gay clothes, graceful
movements, and fresh bright colours. A strict con-—
centration upon the tasks of a narrow local circle gave
way to a lively interest in the artistic life of neighbour- —
ing places and, indeed, of other lands, to a welcoming ©
of foreign influences, Flemish and even Italian. In>
the ’thirties of the sixteenth century Mostaert still
conformed to the stormily emotional style of the
Antwerp painters, as is shown by his Crucifixion in
the Johnson Collection; in the head of John the Baptist.
in the National Gallery at London he is swayed by)
Lombardic ideas; and toward the end of his life he seems _
to have been swept altogether into the channels of ©
Italian art, for van Mander cites a picture of a Banquet
of the Gods, a subject well within the repertory of the
Italianizing Haarlem painters of the second half of the
century, such as Cornelis Cornelisz and van Mander
himself. Mostaert’s long artistic career, which coy-
ered sixty years, joins Geertgen’s great period to the
period in which the ablest Haarlem painter of the
seventeenth century, Frans Hals, was born. Just now,
however, we have to take account only of Mostaert’s
early work, produced during the last decade of the
fifteenth century.
Two very attractive products of the Haarlem school
[ 82]
f
\
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
—a Tree of Jesse in the Stroganoff Collection at
Rome and the Sibyl and the Emperor Augustus in
the Antwerp Museum — fall here into place, as both of
them have been tentatively ascribed to Mostaert, the
one by Friedliinder, the other by Hulin. That the one
and the other belong to the Haarlem school is made
manifest by the setting of the scene in a courtyard, sur-
_ rounded by low brick walls and gabled houses, where
there is no lack of peacocks, storks, herons, and other
_ much-loved creatures. The connection with Geertgen’s
art is again proclaimed, in the picture at Rome, by such
types as the Madonna and the Child, by the warm
_yed-brown colouring, and by the amusingly anecdotal
manner, especially characteristic of Jan Mostaert, in
which the story is set forth. Very original is the com-
position of the Tree of Jesse. The prophets do not
grow, head and shoulders only, from the twigs, as they
do in all earlier representations of the kind, but sit
at full length in daring gymnastic attitudes on the
branches of a realistically painted oak tree on the top
of which the Madonna is enthroned. The worthy
_ graybeards of the Old Testament are transmuted into
elegantly dressed young bucks who trifle with their
| swords and sceptres and stick their heads coquettishly
through the maze of foliage. Only two of the prophets,
the oldest of all, have not joined the climbers but stand
on either side of the hoary Isaiah where he has fallen
asleep under the tree, as though they were listening to
_ the youthful David who sits on the lowest branch play-
ing his harp with a sentimental air. The tendency to
romanticism, to the self-conscious expression of feel-
ing, which here at the turning of the century meets
[ 83 ]
— ager ain =
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
us for the first time, began within a few years to de- —
velop among the painters of the Low Countries into
a deliberate exaggeration of sentiment, into actual man-
nerism.
In a pleasing form Mostaert shows this tendency —
again in his Antwerp picture. The courtly environ-
ment of the Emperor Augustus, the gay bustle of the
palace courtyard, is admirably caught. Ata respectful —
distance the guards, in their fantastic Landsknechi cos-
tumes, stand around in groups or promenade in the
loggia of the palace or along the beautifully tended |
paths. Near the emperor, and holding his richly
adorned hat, kneels a page in a costume plentifully —
embroidered with the imperial initial. The sibyl also
differs radically from the good bourgeois figure in the |
earlier representation of the theme that we found at |
Frankfort. She seems entirely at home at court and is
attended by elegant dames who converse with affected |
gestures about the miracle of the apparition. At the|
back of the courtyard we discover a little genre-picture:
a young dandy, fashionably attired, sits nonchalantly on
the balustrade in front of one of the palaces, amusing |
himself, apparently, with a servant-maid in a red dress |
and a white apron who is drawing up the bucket from |
the well.
To-day a picture of this sort has a special attraction, |
for we are not accustomed to finding in Primitive
painters a consciousness of their own naiveté — a sign |
of the coming of Renaissance culture. We may think
that when Jan Mostaert conceived Biblical and legen-
dary stories as multicoloured pictures of the court in his |
own vicinity it was because a naive religious sentiment |
[ 84 ]
mete
—
=
JAN MOSTAERT (?), THE SIBYL AND THE EMPEROR AUGUSTUS
MUSEUM, ANTWERP
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
led him to translate the old tales into the current
vernacular; but it was much more truly because he
liked better to study the life of a contemporary court
than to ponder upon the content of the story to be
pictured. With the great elder masters, with van der
Weyden, Bouts, or Geertgen, we also find contempo-
rary costumes but only on the accessory figures, and
all thought of the period is secondary to a concern for
the idealistic significance of the representation. The
more exactly, in the progressive development of paint-
ing, the fashions of the time are reproduced, the farther
religious significance departs from the simple homely
conceptions of elder days. This may be still more
distinctly seen in the work of Jacob Cornelisz, the
latest of the painters who can be described as under the
influence of Geertgen.
JACOB CORNELISZ
Jacob Cornelisz was about of an age with Jan Mos-
taert, butas the more popular painter of the two he seems
more advanced than the conservative court painter.
No juvenile work of his is known to us, but the four rep-
resentations of the Crucifixion in the Rijks Museum at
Amsterdam, the Archiepiscopal Museum at Utrecht,
the Johnson Collection at Philadelphia, and the Liech-
tenstein Gallery at Vienna, seem to belong to his earlier
period and probably were painted not long after 1500.
As has been said already, the connection between these
compositions and those of the Master of the Martyr-
dom of St. Lucy is so evident that we must consider Cor-
nelisz as a pupil of this painter. Therefore his relation to
Geertgen was indirect, yet it is clearly apparent, not in
[ 85 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
these paintings only, but in the work of his whole life-
time. The oval faces of the children in the pictures of
the Crucifixion, the profiles with short snub noses, the
wooded backgrounds with many-coloured little figures
in stilted attitudes, the warm brownish flesh-tones, and
the frequently recurring red costumes, all trace back to
Geertgen. The spirit of his teaching seems to speak
also in Cornelisz’ sense of the humour of children, gro-
tesquely shown in an altar-piece now at Naples, of
about the year 1512, and in the Madonna pictures at
Antwerp and Berlin. Finally, the love for a naive
portrayal of various episodes in the background of a
picture no longer strikes us as novel, nor does the ro-
mantic air bestowed upon youthful saints. The es-
sential difference between this artist and his elders is
a result of the passage of time. Massed composition —
now takes the place of a concentration of interest upon
a few figures. The whole foreground is filled with
figures, and the remaining space back into the depth of
the picture is developed chiefly by their aid. Instead
of a dramatically accentuated incident we have the
actions of crowds of people among whom the princi-
pal personage is often hardly to be discovered. Such ~
arrangements, which demand perhaps greater execu-
tive ability than the earlier kind of composition but
not the same intense degree of feeling, were employed
by all Dutch artists who came under the influence of
the Renaissance. They belong to a new period with
which we are not here concerned.
With the beginning of the sixteenth century the
Haarlem school lost its unique position in Holland.
[ 86 ]
JACOB CORNELISZ, THE CRUCIFIXION
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
|
|
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING
The followers of Geertgen still produced work of im-
portance in the elaboration of accessories and the
portrayal of graceful anecdotes, thus furthering the
development of genre-painting; but in all other di-
rections — in portraiture, in the depiction of architect-
ure, in landscape — they were, if anything, retrograde
as compared with Geertgen. The painters who made of
other cities independent centres of art seem, however,
to have had Haarlem as their point of departure:
Jacob Cornelisz, as we have seen, was a pupil of the
Master of the Martyrdom of St. Lucy, Jan Scoorel of
that Willem Cornelisz who was probably identical with
the Master of Alkmaar; and the first of the great paint-
ers of Leyden, Cornelis Engelbrechtsz, was at the start
—as for example in his St. Anne with the Virgin and
Child at Amsterdam —in touch with the art of the
Haarlem school.
[ 87 ]
IV
THE SATIRICAL WORK OF
QUENTIN METSYS
UENTIN METSYS stands in contrast to Diirer
somewhat as Erasmus to Luther — an aristo-
cratic intelligence sensitive to charm of every
kind in contrast to the primitive, blunt, and rugged
nature of a man in heartfelt sympathy with the plain
people whose very embodiment he is.
A new faith was fermenting in the minds of strong
men, great and simple in their modes of thought, who
had risen from the lower walks of life, and the masses
were staking their lives upon the same ideals. Mean-
while, in a world apart, the culture of a highly polished
upper class was flowering in an art which, nourished
upon experience and knowledge of every kind, played
with forms and colours in a self-complacent dainty way
that bordered upon affection. The spirit of this culture,
which possessed almost every artist of the Netherlands,
of Flanders, and of the Lower Rhine countries, revealed
itself differently, according to the temperament of the
individual and the character of the race. Mild and
charming with the painters of Cologne — the Master of
[ 88 ]
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QUENTIN METSYS, OLD MAN DANCING
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SATIRICAL WORK OF QUENTIN METSYS
St. Bartholomew and the Master of St. Severinus —
harsher and less graceful with the Dutchmen Lucas van
Leyden and Cornelis Engelbrechtsz, livelier and more
extravagant with the Flemings, everywhere it betrayed
itself by the same effort to express a subtile elegance and
the greatest possible degree of sensibility.
More than any one else Quentin Metsys seems to have
been swayed by this spirit. Opalescent tones melting
into one another envelop the nervous play of facial
expression and gesture in his etherealized personages.
Women of a goddess-like delicacy, with almond eyes and
long slim fingers, live a mystical life among transparent
glassy columns and carpets with exotic embroideries.
Diaphanous veils are wound in their hair, sparkling
jewels encircle bosom and wrist, golden ornaments and
carvings heighten the splendour of thrones and canopies.
The men have an air of distinction, their compressed
lips show intelligence, their gestures a consciousness
of their own greatness. ‘They know how to speak wisely,
to bear themselves proudly. It seems strange enough
to find wild rude fellows with hanging noses and wide
mouths suddenly appearing in this select circle, to the
apparent destruction of all harmony. But in fact this
_ startling contrast has a salutary effect. At one stroke
}
uncouth Flemish vehemence cools an atmosphere over-
heated by excessive sensibility. The reaction in the
mood of the creative artist is, however, so violent that
he now leans as far toward caricature as he did before
toward sentimentality.
Often and with good reason Quentin Metsys has
been compared to Leonardo da Vinci. In his work as
in Leonardo’s the contours are effaced by filmy shadings;
[ 89 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
he, too, takes pleasure in giving his figures a feminine
delicacy, even to a weakening of the masculine type;
and with him also reaction means the depicting of
monsters. But while Leonardo, as an Italian, had an
inborn distinction and a nature that demanded modera-
tion in all things, Quentin Metsys, striving for mastery
in one thing, often lost the feeling for another.
Moreover, the work of the southern artist was known
to the northerner. This is evident in certain drawings
in the Uffizi at Florence which are there attributed to
Pieter Breughel the Elder, but are much more probably
the work of Quentin Metsys and are doubly noteworthy
as. a complete revelation of his contradictory char-
acteristics. They might be studies for a kirmess with
dancing carousing peasants —a picture that would
have been unspeakably grotesque. A bald and beard-
less, misshapen old man with an abnormally large
head and spindle shanks is dancing, a satanic smile on
his lips. Another, running with outstretched hands,
throws his skirts to the wind. A third, who looks like
an old toper, staggers drunkenly about with tucked-
up sleeves. Again, a horrible trio of old men are drink-
ing together; the dreadful long nose of one of them dips
into the contents of the cup that he is draining with
indescribable gusto, while the others — the standing one
holding a jug, the second crouching on the ground —
are trying with bizarre grimaces to take the cup away
from him. And on a fifth sheet an old man with a
cudgel is striking at a man lying on the ground and
clothed only in a scanty mantle and a loin-cloth.
Such drawings reveal a remarkable mental state.
-—~ What a contrast between these grimacings and these
[ 90 |
ew. Pp
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AES,
QUENTIN METSYS, THREE MEN CAROUSING
UFFIZI, FLORENCE
QUENTIN METSYS, SEDUCTION
COLLECTION OF THE COUNTESS POURTALES, PARIS
SATIRICAL WORK OF QUENTIN METSYS
artistically managed gestures, between these coarse
contours and the nervous touch that tremulously
follows every hair and every wrinkle! The same
contrast appears in other works by the same hand, as
in. the grotesque couple, on a panel belonging to the
Countess Pourtalés in Paris, composed of a handsome
artful affected minx and a horrible old man who makes
coarse advances to her, and in the Adoration of the Magi
formerly in the Rodolphe Kann Collection at Paris and
now in the Metropolitan Museum at New York, which
shows a delicate Madonna, a diminutive Child with
small refined features, a grizzled old king, and a throng
of attendants grotesque and sensual of face. There is a
certain kinship with the satires of Erasmus in these
pictures, altogether different in spirit from the outbursts
of wholesome bourgeois humour in a Diirer or a Luther.
It is known that Diirer came into personal relations
with the cultivated circles of Antwerp. He drew the
great scholar of Rotterdam busy with a sharply pointed
pen over some intricate piece of work, and received
in payment from Erasmus a Spanish mantilla. He also
visited ‘‘Master Quentin” in his home, and we can
imagine how he laid his knotted fingers in the nervous
hand of the slender Antwerp painter, how he must have
marvelled at the elegant fittings of the studio. In his
journal he expresses his wonder at the furnishings of the
guild-house of the painters of Antwerp, at the silverware
and the choice viands with which their table was spread;
and after his visit to St. Michael’s Abbey he exclaims:
“In Antwerp they are not sparing of such things, for there
they have plenty of money.” It is touching indeed
when at one place he remarks that, for the entry of
[91]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Charles V, the painters and cabinet-makers of Antwerp
had erected a triumphal arch at a cost of four thousand
guilders, and immediately afterward records among his
scanty earnings the sale of sixteen prints of his Little
Passion at four guilders apiece.
We can hardly wonder that at Antwerp the Ger- —
man artist, avid of new impressions, was touched by —
artistic influences which he turned to good account,
For example, his St. Jerome, now in the museum at
Lisbon, has an affinity with the conception of Metsys.
The inspiration is generally thought to have come
from Diirer and, in fact, there are numerous more or —
less faithful Dutch copies of Diirer’s picture, which
remained for several years at Antwerp; in especial,
variants of it were constantly produced in the studios
from which came the group of artists who go by the
name of the pseudo Herri met de Bles, and in others
which had relations with the Master of the Death
of the Virgin.* Nevertheless the original conception
must have been Quentin Metsys’. From his Money
Changers, now in the Louvre, which was painted be-
fore Diirer’s visit to Antwerp, it is only a short step
to the half-length of St. Jerome. It is true that no
original of Metsys’ composition has yet been discovered,
but there are half-length representations of the saint,
indoors and out of doors, painted by Metsys’ followers
— Marinus van Roymerswaele, Jan van Hemessen, and
others — which stand much nearer to his manner of
conception than to Diirer’s.
* To give a few among dozens of examples I may cite the pictures at Carlsruhe, at
Schleissheim, and at Genoa (Palazzo Bianco), and those in the Uffizi, in the John-
son Collection at Philadelphia, and in the collection of Dr. Stillwell of New
York.
[ 92 ]
QUENTIN METSYS, ST. JEROME
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
——_ ea oe PS Se. ee” a
SATIRICAL WORK OF QUENTIN METSYS
However this may be, whether it was Diirer or
Metsys who inspired the other, it is precisely in the
picture where superficially they draw nearest to each
other that their difference in character most clearly
appears. Compare Diirer’s picture at Lisbon with one,
recently discovered and attributed by Friedliinder to
Metsys and now in Mr. Johnson’s collection, which
shows St. Jerome at half-length standing against a
landscape background. Diirer portrays a passionately
studious scholar striving for a knowledge of the truth,
a gloomy ascetic with a wild and staring glance who
tries by sheer force of will to penetrate the world of
thought. He has arrived at a conviction of the noth-
ingness of existence and endeavours to impose it upon
others by insistently pointing to the skull. With
Quentin Metsys, on the other hand, we see a peaceful
monk, absorbed in quiet prayer, who half sadly, half
eestatically gives himself up to the mysteries of religion,
and who has come to terms with the world in a re- :
signed yet not wholly joyless spirit. With Diirer
every line, every detail appears as clearly and sharply
as does the determined mood of the saint. With
Metsys everything melts into soft forms, into a mystic
twilight from which gleam out only the deep red of the
saint’s mantle and the pale tone of the dying sunset.
Metsys is less forceful than Diirer but more subtile
in the rendering of delicate shades of feeling, and is
therefore particularly well suited to our time which has
a special liking for these psychological semitones. No
one else among the elder Dutchmen abandons himself
so gladly to dreamy mystical sensations and unusual
delights of line and hue. None understands as well as
[ 93 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Metsys how to make strong splendours of colour shin
through a thin veil of mist, or how to paint the tremu.
lous surface of life so that we see the blood running ir
the veins, so that we feel the breath that comes fron
the slightly parted mouth, and divine the movement o;
the lips, the trembling of the nostrils, and the quivering
of the nerves in the tips of the fingers.
[ 94 |
ee
i
_ —
V
THE BROTHERS GOVERT AND RAPHEL
CAMPHUYSEN
OT many of those among the genre-painters of
| N Holland whose main province was the landscape
with animals rose above mediocrity. Five
of them — Albert Cuyp, Paul Potter, Isack van Ostade,
_ Adriaen van der Velde, and Philip Wouwerman — have
_ always, and of right, borne the most famous names.
But because of the general change in taste from the
| romanticism of the middle of the last century to a love
_ for the sincere unvarnished interpretation of nature,
- eertain of their fellows, such as Berchem and Lingelbach,
_ Dujardin, van Bergen, Both, and Pynacker, who until
_ about thirty years ago were ranked as high, please us
- much less to-day. When an exceptional personality
_ like Rembrandt’s does not absolutely impose upon us
its own way of looking at nature, we would rather read
sentiment into a picture ourselves than accept it as
prescribed by an artist of lesser genius. The Dutch
painters, once so greatly prized, who depicted Italian
landscapes virtually from hearsay, had not enough
imaginative power to make their dreams of the south
[ 95 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
convincing. Sentimentality took its place, and well-
endowed artists, who might have done admirably in
simple transcripts from their own surroundings, pro-
duced untruthful sugary pictures which in their lack
of substance ill-beseem the strong and sober Dutch
character.
In times of changing taste, however, we are apt to go
too far in the way of elimination. To give an instance,
two of the five great painters just named, Adriaen van
der Velde and Philip Wouwerman, had almost been
condemned when, fortunately, it was discovered that
they had joined the company of the merely clever only
at times, in their later years, and that both had pro-
duced masterly works of a genuine Dutch sort — van
der Velde in his unpretentious silvery paintings of
forests or pastures, done between 1657 and 1661, and
Wouwerman in his pictures of sand-dunes, often almost —
void of figures, and occasionally in his winter land-
scapes.
It is much easier to reject what no longer appeals to
us than to discover works of other kinds which may
satisfy our new needs. Yet the storehouse of the past
is so rich that the seekers of every period may make their
own discoveries, and find substitutes for the famous
figures that are gradually sinking back into obscurity.
Two painters who, with the art-lovers of to-day, may
well take the place-of such as Berchem or Lingelbach are
Govert Camphuysen and his brother, Raphel Dircksz
Camphuysen.
As regards the history of the Camphuysen family,
Bredius and Moes have done good service in their
thorough treatise published in Oud Holland in 1908.
[ 96 |
GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
30 carefully have they considered the work, not only
_ of Govert, but also of an elder pair of brothers, Rafel
and Jochem Camphuysen, that in respect to details of
_ fact I may here confine myself to a brief summary.
_ Two generations are brought to our notice. Rafel
and Jochem Camphuysen, working from about 1620
- to 1660, belong to the first period of the Dutch art of
_ the seventeenth century, the time of Frans Hals and
yan Goyen. Rafel painted winter scenes and pictures
of eanals in the style of the period, simple, colourless,
and definite; Jochem, by preference, woodland scenes
at an evening hour, somewhat in the spirit of Aert
_ van der Neer but harder and emptier in drawing and
composition. One of the few examples of Jochem’s
_ work that is signed in full was formerly in the Dahl
Collection in Diisseldorf and is now in the Johnson
Collection in Philadelphia.
As neither of these brothers is an important repre-
sentative of van Goyen’s period neither excites more
‘than a passing interest. The family of artists to which
they belonged accomplished its best in the work of
~Govert Camphuysen, a really important artist, and
of his brother, Raphel Dircksz, a painter still quite
unknown, for they were at work when Dutch painting
was in its splendid maturity, in the time of Rembrandt.
Although Raphel Dircksz was the elder of the two, the
witness of his style and the fact that he lived twenty
years longer than Govert incline us to place him in the
third period of the seventeenth-century art of Holland.
We shall find him an admirable exponent of the Dutch
classic style, still too little esteemed, of the sixth and
seventh decades of the century. Thus the Camphuysen
[97 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
family illustrates in miniature the development of Dutch
art.
The main fact in Govert’s career is that he lived for
ten years in Sweden. Born at Gorkum in 1623 or
1624, at the age of twenty-two he moved to Amsterdam
where he stayed about six years. Then followed the
years in Sweden, from about 1652 to 1663, and then a
second period, of ten years, at Amsterdam, ending with
his death in 1672.
It is not recorded why he went to Sweden, a country
then virtually unknown to the painters of Holland,
but we may guess how it happened. As a result of the
Baltic trade of the Dutch their architects had won a
footing in Sweden as well as in the other Baltic coun-
tries, and in the year 1652 one of the greatest of them,
Jost Vinckboons, the creator of the Trippenhuis at
Amsterdam, was called to Stockholm to take charge
of the erection of the Ridderhuset, the senate chamber
of the aristocracy. Although he stayed only four years
he impressed his genius upon the Ridderhuset which,
except for the addition of a French roof, was completed
according to his plans. Perhaps the most beautiful
Dutch building in any foreign country, it is one of the
chief ornaments of a city rich in important seventeenth-
century structures that show a Dutch influence. As
Govert Camphuysen probably came to Sweden in the
same year as Vinckboons and, like Vinckboons, must
have had relations with the aristocracy, for we soon
hear of commissions from the court, it is natural to
suppose that the Amsterdam painter was directly or
indirectly induced by the Amsterdam architect to make
the journey to the northern city.
[98 ]
El
GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
It can hardly have been by virtue of his personal
merits only that a simple painter of pasture-lands and
cattle won a footing in a foreign land and even attained
to honour at a foreign court. More probably his success
was largely due to the high repute which in his time
Dutch art enjoyed in stranger lands. The influence
that the art of any country exerts beyond its own
borders is usually a result of over-production. In the
middle years of the seventeenth century Holland pos-
sessed such a multitude of artists that she could spare of
her wealth to the foreigner and, indeed, was obliged to
do so if her painters were to gain a livelihood. At
home, private and public buildings were pretty well
filled with pictures and, as commissions fell off, the
artist was all the more ready to welcome the call of
foreign countries. On the other hand, these countries
gladly received the influence of Dutch art, for it had
‘then attained to heights whence it was visible from
afar, and was beginning to serve not merely local needs
but those of the whole civilized world. Sweden was
not the only country visited by Dutch artists. They
streamed at the same time into Germany and England,
France and Italy, Denmark and Norway, and even into
regions beyond the sea. To name only a few, we find
one still-life painter, Jan Weenix, at Diisseldorf, and
another, Hendrik Fromentiou, at the court of Berlin.
Ter Borch was busy at the peace conference at Miin-
ster in the year 1648. In England Dutch portrait
painters in particular — Jansen van Ceulen, Mytens,
Hanneman, Lely — quickly achieved success. France
showed favour to genre-painters who took their themes
from the life of the court, painters like Caspar Netscher
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
or Jacob van Loo, the founder at Paris of the family of
artists of this name. The portrait painters Jacob
Wuchters and Juriaen Ovens and also the younger
Karel van Mander, a painter of heroic compositions,
were at work in Denmark. And to Norway had already
drifted Allaert van Everdingen, an excellent landscape
painter whose impressions of the north reacted upon
Dutch art in the work of Jacob Ruisdael. It is not
strange, therefore, that Camphuysen should have ad-
. ventured in a region where he may well have seen wide
opportunities opening before him as the first representa-
tive of the pictorial art of Holland.
The course of his development must have been deter-
mined during the six years that he had previously spent
at Amsterdam. Here he must have come into relations
with Paul Potter, with whose work his own has so often
been confused that more than half his pictures are still
mistakenly assigned to Potter. It is true that Potter
was by three years the younger, but he developed very
early and appears to have been of a simple, self-sufficient
nature. Nor need we assume that in the relations of |
the two artists Potter alone had anything to give.
Perhaps they jointly formed their style. At all events,
in many of their pictures they are much alike as regards |
the peasant types, the occasional preference for a
plein air kind of treatment, and the lively stippled |
handling, each retaining, nevertheless, his own artistic |
personality — Potter’s narrow but within its limits |
well-rounded and complete; Camphuysen’s deficient in |
certain directions but studious, experimental. Camp- |
huysen may have been influenced also by the precocious |
Isack van Ostade, who was of about the same age, even |
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GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
though Ostade lived at Haarlem, for the currents of
art flowed freely back and forth between that city
and Amsterdam. Occasionally Camphuysen’s outdoor
scenes, like the Halt at the Tavern, but more especially
his interiors flooded with a golden light, remind us in
theme and in conception of Ostade’s more naive and
more charming art. With Cuyp, again, Camphuysen
has sometimes been confused, as in a small portrait
group in an open-air setting in the museum at Stock-
holm. There are, in fact, resemblances in the foliage
and in the way that the light falls on the trees, but of a
kind as easily explained by a current tendency evident
in almost all the landscapes of Rembrandt’s time as
by a direct relationship between Camphuysen and the
Dordrecht painter who worked at a distance from the
cosmopolitan activities of Amsterdam.
| As only a very few of Camphuysen’s pictures are
_ dated, little more can be said about his development.
_ To his first Amsterdam period probably belong most
of his kitchen and stable interiors, two of which, ac-
cording to Bredius, are dated 1645 and 1650, and also
perhaps some of his landscapes, particularly those, like
The Farm near the Village, owned by Mr. Johnson, and a
similar painting sold at auction by Frederick Muller at
Amsterdam in 1912, where the technique is Paul Potter’s.
To his Swedish period may presumably be assigned all
the works that are now in Sweden, listed to the number of
twelve in Olof Granberg’s valuable treatise on the pri-
vate collections of the country. They include all sorts
of subjects — stable interiors, peasant brawls, pictures
of poultry, cattle-pieces, and even one portrait, with
which must be placed the portrait group in the Stock-
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
holm Museum, painted (as it bears the date 1661) toward
the end of Camphuysen’s stay in Sweden. To the
last decade of his life doubtless belong important works
like the great woodland landscape in the Hermitage at
St. Petersburg, the Halt at the Tavern in the Johnson
Collection, and the Pasture near the Castle in the Wallace
Collection at London — carefully composed canvases, all
conceived in the same mood, where the figures are better
proportioned and less rude in effect than in earlier ex-
amples, and more often represent persons of an upper
class.
As was the case with all the important painters of
Rembrandt’s time, Camphuysen did not confine himself
to a single narrow range of subjects so that they be-
came a mere basis for the application of a good formula.
Instead of that exaltation of the exterior aspect above
all else which had prevailed in the time of Frans Hals,
the pictorial content came again to the front. Great
masters like Rembrandt treated it imaginatively; lesser
ones, who had to depend more upon direct observation,
thought to make their art more interesting by varying
their themes. Thus Camphuysen seizes upon all the
diverse incidents of the rural life of Holland, painting
kitchen and stable interiors, tavern scenes, meadow
landscapes, park views, cattle markets, farmyards,
chickens and ducks, and portraits. Even a bear fight
and an equestrian portrait are named as among his
legacies. Nor can it be said that one kind of subject-
matter or another suited him best — only, that he was
perhaps least successful in portraiture and that he was
particularly good in landscapes with cattle, although
in other directions he sometimes did equally well.
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Instead of enumerating the many pictures that we
have from his hand (a task in the main already ac-
complished by Bredius), I shall merely try to give,
by means of a few diverse examples, a general idea of
his art.
In America he has found a good friend, for Mr.
Johnson owns seven excellent specimens of his work,
some of them almost unique of their kind. One of
the most unusual is the remarkable picture of a Hen
Alarmed by a Cat, where, sitting on her nest in a
stable with a couple of chicks near by, the white hen
looks around, apprehensive and angry, at the insolent
intruder inquisitively thrusting his head through an
opening in the wall. Here Camphuysen’s individual
point of view clearly appears if we compare him with
such painters as Hondecoeter and Albert Cuyp, the
first that occur to mind in connection with pictures of
poultry. He chooses a more dramatic moment than
Cuyp whose chickens flock together undisturbed by
enemies, and concentrates more than Hondecoeter
whose multitudinous fowls are usually flying wildly
about, frightened by a descending bird of prey. The
colouring also is different, less golden than with Cuyp,
less diversified than with Hondecoeter. The white of
the hen and the chicks, the light coming in at the win-
dow, and the reflections on the shining utensils stand
out in strong relief from the prevailing warm brown
tone. The broad and vigorous touch, as well as the
incidence of the light, reminds us of Rembrandt, from
whose influence in the middle years of the century no
one at Amsterdam could escape. But all his own, I
may repeat, is the remarkable dramatic quality of
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Camphuysen’s picture, where not oily the predatory
spirit of the cat, but also his predatory attitude, is sug-
gested by the portrayal of the head alone, and the
alarm of the experienced hen is delightfully contrasted
with the simple curiosity of the inexperienced chick.
The finest of Camphuysen’s interiors are perhaps in
the museum at Brussels and the Carstanjen Collection
at Munich, but I prefer to cite, as showing more fully
his characteristic tendencies, the one in the Museum
at Copenhagen, a domestic scene in a peasant’s cottage
where a single great barn-like room serves as living-
room, kitchen, and stable. In the foreground sits a
woman near a cradle which she is rocking by means of
a cord. Not far away the fire is burning in the chim-
ney-place and a cat is warming herself. On the other
side of the picture the father is throwing fodder to the
two cows that stand in the stall. Sunlight, streaming
in at the open door, illumines the scene and especially
the still-life features of the foreground.
There is good reason why this picture should reelible
in its composition the work of more than one of the
ablest painters of the time, for the artists of Holland
were so closely associated in cities separated by such
‘short distances that, especially in this most prolific
period, the ties between them were astonishingly close.
The intimate expression of domesticity in Camphuy-
sen’s scene reminds us of Pieter de Hooch, the rendering
of the lofty barn with its brown shadows and the care-
ful drawing of its framework suggest the two Ostades,
and the still-life of the foreground, which consists of a
copper kettle, an old Delft dish, a jug of the stoneware
of Cologne, and a pendant beef’s liver very brightly
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GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
coloured, recalls the treatment of such things in the
best early pictures of van der Poel or in those master-
pieces in the grand style of Dutch genre-painting, the
small interiors of Willem Kalf. The individuality of
Camphuysen lies in the blending of these diverse ele-
ments into an integral whole presenting a fresh version
of the most modest kind of plebeian existence — a ver-
sion which lacks, indeed, the delicate poetry of Pieter de
Hooch but, on the other hand, has none of the coarse-
ness of most of the Dutch painters of peasant life.
Nowhere has the art of genre-painting been better
understood than in Holland, where a leisurely episodi-
cal method of exposition suited the sedate temperament
of the artist. Avoiding the attempt to force the imagi-
nation of the observer into sympathy with a lively
episode, he gives his theme only such an amount of
interest as may lead the eye hither and thither into
the various corners of the picture and thus apprise it
of the full beauty of the artistic interpretation. What
remains in our memory of the actual incidents in the
pictures of Ostade, of Metsu, of Ter Borch? Nothing;
nothing more than a recollection of delightful afternoon
moods, of gay costumes, of charming gestures. Camp-
huysen also was a master in the art of choosing the
right theme to serve as a starting-point for a fine atmos-
pheric rendering of nature. A good example is a pic-
ture as plentifully enlivened with figures as the Halt at
the Tavern in the Johnson Collection.
A heavy farm-wagon carrying a merry company has
stopped before a cottage that nestles cozily under the
trees. Two couples in the wagon have already provided
themselves with wine, while the man of the third pair,
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
helped by the girl, is climbing back into his place.
The fiddler on the driver’s seat is playing his little tune,
and the driver is feeding the horses. While the host
disappears into the house with the wine-can, the host-
ess busies herself with a new arrival, a well-dressed
gallant on horseback to whom she is handing up a
glass of beer. It is a harmless episode without dra-
matic point, invented simply to give interest to the
interpretation of an open-air summer mood. There-
fore the painter has spent less time and pains in char-
acterizing the thick-skulled peasants, awkward of gesture
and good-humoured of face, than in rendering the golden
rays that fall through the dark green foliage, the bright
red and yellow costumes vividly relieved against the
warm brown shadows around the cottage, and the soft
tones of the evening sky.
While this picture shows Camphuysen as a rival of
painters like Isack Ostade and Cuyp, with whom the
Halt at the Tavern was a favourite subject, a simpler
composition of a wholly different kind — the Pool in
the Forest, now in the Hermitage at St. Petersburg —
points in another direction. A luxuriant oak wood
surrounds a quiet pond on the borders of which two
cows are grazing. In the shadow of a mighty oak
that mirrors its trunk in the water two men are draw-
ing in their nets, while on the other side of the picture
an aristocratic sportsman on horseback examines, as
a page holds it up to him, a hare that he has shot.
The portrayal of a forest pool recalls the most beautiful
works of Jacob Ruisdael, dating from the seventh
decade of the century; the incident of the horseman
conversing with a person on foot often occurs in the
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GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
pictures of Adriaen van der Velde; the cows and the
treatment of the background of forest also suggest this
painter, and the technique is most nearly related to
Potter’s. But, once more, everything is adapted, is
independently worked over. The passage of bright
light where the rider sits on the white horse is delight-
fully contrasted with the mysterious darkness around
the pool, and very far from commonplace are the sil-
very tone of the landscape and the delicate combina-
tion of the purple dresses with the bluish green of the
trees and the gray of the sky.
Finally, we have still another side of Camphuysen’s art
in The Farm near the Village, perhaps his most beautiful
picture, which Mr. Johnson owns. It is one of the few
Dutch pictures of farmstead or pasture where human fig-
ures are almost dispensed with in order that the great
unvarying features of nature may be emphasized — a
conception peculiarly in accord with our modern pref-
erences. Nor would it be easy to find a composition
embracing in a more typical way the pictorial motives of
Dutch landscape. Here is the large, almost square
cottage of the province of North Holland with the
hipped roof thatched with straw which covers a single
lofty room such as we saw in Camphuysen’s cottage
interior. In the foreground we have the placid canal
with its clear reflections and narrow bridge of planks.
On the other side of the house, beyond the elms, runs
the raised highroad back of which the sailboats emerge
as though floating over the meadows. Still farther
away stand the low gabled houses of the village and,
raised on its high substructure, the windmill, sign and
symbol of the land of Holland. All this is subordinated
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
to the meadow in the foreground where the light-brown
spotted cows look as though they grew organically from
the brownish-green grass. And over this simple homely
bit of nature spreads the vaporous silver-clouded sky,
wrapping the narrow strip of land in a luminous veil
of air.
The small weaknesses of excellent painters are usually
more evident than the greater faults of those whose
mediocre gifts enable them to treat all things with equal
skill but without artistic charm. So we see at once
that Camphuysen is in some respects inferior to painters
like Berchem and Lingelbach. He is ponderous, slow
to apprehend, and weak in imagination. He is unwill-
ing to attempt more than a direct transcript from nature,
and is often unskilful when driven to compose. Again
and again he takes counsel of other artists, and he
never ceases to search and to experiment. The figures
of men and animals in his landscapes often seem me-
chanically posed and are weak in drawing, particularly
when foreshortened. At all these points he was out-
distanced by the accomplished Italianizing painters
who, possessed of a clever facility in design and execu-
tion and a sureness in drawing that seldom went wrong,
soon turned their backs on nature and worked out some
sort of a scheme which they used with perfect mastery,
and to which they clung as long as they lived.
Nevertheless a painter like Camphuysen seems to us
more important and more interesting, for anything in
process of growth, anything that reveals an inner strug-
gle, appeals to us more strongly than the finished, easily
accomplished result behind which nothing lies concealed.
Camphuysen’s pictures seem more real than those of
[ 108 ]
GOVERT CAMPHUYSEN, THE FARM NEAR THE VILLAGE
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
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he tll 2
GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
the painters just named because in every detail he had
to recur to nature, because we live over again with
him the effort of production. As he is not deceived
in regard to his deficiencies, he always begins to work
afresh in directions where he has not yet ventured,
hoping that here he may achieve perfection. Therefore
his work is richer in varied themes and problems than
is that of the clever craftsmen who constantly turn in a
circle, repeating themselves over and over again. From
the sincerity of his character springs also the faithful
loving manner in which he portrays his native soil, the
warm sympathy with which he pictures the humble life
of the cottage or the pasture. Only a genuine attachment
to his surroundings made possible such an harmonious
characterization of the farmstead, such a good-natured
commentary upon its inhabitants, such an appealing
study of all its paintable corners. And only froma
genuine artistic endowment could an art develop which
persuades one to forget the theme as such in the ad-
mirable rendering of its aspect, the incident in the mood
that it evokes.
In the Johnson Collection there is a cattle-piece
which has often been remarked for individuality in
composition, simplicity of handling, and an admirable
rendering of evening light. A number of cows standing
stiffly about in various positions almost fill the canvas
up to the front; a castle with a tower and a garden wall
form the background. More than one painter has been
suggested in connection with this remarkable picture,
which bears no signature: Hendrik Ten Oever whom we
know in several effective landscapes where, however, the
[ 109 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
figures are placed farther away in a silhouette-like fash-
ion; Gerit Berckheyde who generally painted, although
in a more conventional arrangement, cows at pasture
by a city wall in an afternoon light; and finally Govert
Camphuysen. As this last name seemed the most
plausible, I attached it, tentatively, to the description
of the picture in my catalogue of the Johnson Collec-
tion, despite the fact that the owner was never quite
convinced of the correctness of the attribution. Al-
most the first picture I saw offered for sale in Paris
in 1913 appeared, even at a glance, to be a second ex-
ample of this unknown artist. It was then in a dealer’s
hands and has since passed into the collection of Mr.
John D. MclIlhenny in Philadelphia. Unsigned, it
gave no help in regard to the painter’s name. But
soon afterward, by a happy chance, I visited the Semeo-
now Collection at St. Petersburg in company with the
owner of the first-named picture. Here we discovered
a third painting from the same hand, and here at last
was the wished-for signature. The name was Camp-
huysen, and although the Christian name was not
Govert but was concealed in a monogram hard to
decipher, nevertheless the attribution in the Johnson
catalogue was not far wrong, for the painter was a
relative of Govert’s who stood close to him in his art.
Neither of the Camphuysens of the elder generation,
neither Rafel nor Jochem, could be thought of, for the
style showed that the picture could not have been
painted in their lifetime. Otherwise no painter of the
name had been mentioned at any length excepting a
younger Govert or Godefridus, a nephew of the well-
known Govert, who was born in 1658, married in 1678,
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GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
and as early as 1686, it seems, exchanged his occupation
for that of a wine-dealer; and he, again, cannot have
painted our pictures. In the first place he lived later
than the time to which we must assign them, none of
a similar kind having been produced in Holland after
1680; and in the second place his name does not corre-
spond with the monogram. It may be added that the
solitary picture of this Godefridus that is known, a
Nativity in the manner of Cornelius Saftleven, seems
to be but a bungling piece of work.
Only one other Camphuysen — Raphel Dircksz, an
elder brother of the well-known Govert — is anywhere
mentioned as a painter, and he is thus referred to but
once, quite incidently, and in words that have not even
been preserved in an original document of the seven-
teenth century. But although we have these words
only in an eighteenth-century transcript of an entry
in the archives of the city of Leeuwarden, they are more
trustworthy, perhaps, than has hitherto been thought:
Raphael Kamphuysen. Volgens begravenis Briefje Op’t
kathuysens Kerkhof 1691 den 6 Juni, geweest schilder.
(Raphael Kamphuysen. According to the bill for the
burial in the Carthusian Churchyard, 1691, June 6, was
a painter.)
The artist who, as we are thus informed, lived until
1691, was born in 1619. He and his younger brother
Govert were the sons of Dirck Raphaelsz Camphuysen,
renowned in his time as a poet. As the second Raphel
was called for his father, his full name was Raphel
Dircksz Camphuysen, while the full name of his brother,
in which also the father’s name was incorporated, was
Govert Dircksz Camphuysen. It can no longer be
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
doubted that the painter we are seeking was this Raphel
Dircksz, for the monogram on the St. Petersburg pic-
ture consists of an R and a D.
Although Raphel was older than Govert, his style
seems more like Govert’s carried farther than like
an earlier manner. He must have painted the three
pictures that are known to us at the end of the sixth
or the beginning of the seventh decade of the century,
for from this period date all the works by other masters
which are composed in a similar way — deliberately,
with calculated intention. But even though this kind
of composition represents a step beyond Govert’s
naively realistic style, none the less Govert may have
been influenced by his brother, particularly in his later
years. In the works he then produced — in the Halt
at the Tavern, in the great picture at St. Petersburg,
the one in the Wallace Collection, and others besides —
we constantly find horses or cows so placed that they
are seen, foreshortened, in a direct front or back view.
Raphel also had a predilection for this unusual kind of ©
foreshortening, and it was from him, most probably,
that Govert learned it. This we feel because in Go-
vert’s pictures the positions often seem forced and
motiveless, and are so faultily depicted that they but
half perform their intended service in indicating grada-
tions of space, in developing the depth of the scene,
while, on the other hand, Raphel’s pictures prove ‘him
a master in drawing and in treating the problems of
space — one whose every form and line has a definite
constructional meaning and assists the effect of the
composition as a whole.
In Raphel’s picture in the McIlhenny Collection the
[112]
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RAPHEL DIRKSZ CAMPHUYSEN, CATTLE
COLLECTION OF MR. JOHN D. MCILHENNY, PHILADELPHIA
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GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
development of the different zones from the foreground
to the background begins at the left-hand corner where
the foreshortened horse leads the eye directly to the
middle distance. A second line runs toward the right,
over the three cows that are turned in this direction, to
the boy sitting by the ditch whose staff forms the con-
necting link. The intentional character of these lines
is proved by the close alliance of the successive curves
formed by the backs of the recumbent beasts. A third
gradation of space is defined by the line that leads from
the white cow lying at the left of the picture to the steer
seen in profile in the middle distance, and then to the
cows of diminishing sizes in the farther distance near the
wall of the church. These lines, without any acces-
sory details to help them, develop the receding zones
in regular succession at equal intervals. In addition,
main horizontal and vertical axes also appear in the
composition. The vertical ones are formed at deter-
mined intervals by the horse, the church tower, the
standing cowherd, and the singular tower at the right,
and the horizontals by the shadow of the ditch and the
long outline of the body of the church and the adjoining
wall, while both verticals and horizontals are echoed in
brief by the rectangular profile of the steer in the centre
of the canvas. These straight lines give the picture a
solemn reposefulness that well befits the evening hour.
The void passages, notably in the architecture where
hardly anything speaks except factors of height and
breadth, produce an impression of great spaciousness,
of monumental design, which is even more striking when
the picture is viewed from a distance.
The artist, it should be noted, employs his architect-
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
ural features to establish the dominant lines on his
canvas and then impresses an architectural stamp upon
the other elements, the figures of the men and the ani-
mals. This accord between architectural forms and
animate figures appears again in the smaller picture in
the Johnson Collection. Here also the animals are so
placed that they develop the successive zones of space
toward the background, which again is formed by a
church and a wall, but the studied character of the
design is less evident because it is masked by a greater
profusion of detail.
The third picture, the one owned in Russia, has no
architectural elements. . The development of the steps’
that give its depth to the scene is effected wholly by
means of a number of animals and a herdboy. Prob-
ably the latest in date of the three, it is the simplest
in composition and the most colourful, the black of the
cows, the red of the boy’s costume, and the orange tone
of the sky forming a brilliant colour scheme.
Raphel Camphuysen is one of the few Dutch artists
who subordinated details for the sake of well-defined
lucid composition. Accomplished in drawing and in
the rendering of space, he had no reason to be afraid to
show his constructional lines and forms unadorned and
unconcealed by a profusion of minor facts. In the
simplifying of his figures and the rounding-off of their
contours he goes as far as Vermeer and Pieter de Hooch,
whose works, it must be confessed, have a greater
charm than his by reason of their more attractive
themes. As in Vermeer’s compositions so also in
Raphel’s, the foreground objects sometimes project
beyond the first plane in order that they may the more
[114]
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RAPHEL DIRKSZ CAMPHUYSEN, CATTLE NEAR A CASTLE
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
GOVERT AND RAPHEL CAMPHUYSEN
quickly lead the eye of the observer into the picture.
The lighting recalls Pieter de Hooch, and so does the
construction of the rectangularly shaped figures such
as we see in the group in Mr. Johnson’s example. And
Raphel shares with both these artists the desire to
accentuate horizontal and vertical lines and to gather
the elements of the design into rectangles. In another
place I have tried to show how this method of com-
position recurs again and again in important paintings
of every period of Dutch art, how it seems to be a funda-
mental principle which may be explained, perhaps, by the
- rectangular ordering of the actual landscape of Holland.
More consciously than before, Dutch painters employed
it in the time of the most perfect flowering of their art,
_ shortly before its decline began — roughly speaking,
between 1655 and 1675. Heir to the rich artistic devel-
opments of two generations, in full possession of the
power to imitate nature, the artist then began to strive
more consciously for the embodiment of esthetic ideas.
Especially at Amsterdam, the centre of artistic ac-
tivity, a style was developed which, if the word had
not acquired a displeasing significance, might be called
academic. Assuming a high degree of understanding in
its public, the art of painting endeavoured for its own
sake to pay more attention to problems of form, of de-
sign. Undoubtedly there was a connection between
this tendency and the tendency of the architecture of the
period, as represented by the work of Jacob van Campen
and Pieter Post, to strive for a classic simplicity, to
return to the geometrical in fundamental forms. In
painting, the leaders of the movement were Rem-
brandt, after the year 1655, and such masters as Pieter
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THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
de Hooch and Ter Borch. And from this point of view
the art of Raphel Dircksz Camphuysen assumes addi-
tional importance, for he was the only representative
of the geometrical style in the domain of the landscape
with animals.
[116]
VI
DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
UTCH tile-painting was at its best during the
great period of Dutch art, the seventeenth cen-
tury. As the Hollanders were then the leaders
of all Europe in the paths of world-wide traffic, it may
easily be believed that their tiles, like all the other prod-
ucts of their applied arts, found a market in many lands.
They were exported to the German coasts of the North
Sea and the Baltic and as far to the north as Denmark,
and in the other direction as far as Spain and Morocco.
Even in the East Indies, in the old houses of Java, as
well as in certain parts of America, they must still
exist in numbers. But they found their natural place
in Holland itself, in the land of frequent downpours
where the walls of the houses can scarcely dry out,
where earth and sky are for the most part attuned to
neutral harmonies of colour, and the inhabitants long
for whatever is bright and gay, white and shining.
Style in the products of the applied arts has usually
a utilitarian as well as an esthetic basis. We may
say, for example, that the Dutch love brass utensils
and take pains to keep them bright because as their
[117]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
paintings convincingly prove, they take pleasure in
golden lustres and the shimmer of reflected light; but
we may also say that they polish so assiduously be-
cause they must, because a day suffices to dim the
brilliancy of door and window fastenings. And so it
may be said of their tiles that while they served the
practical purpose of protecting the walls against damp-
ness they also harmonized admirably with the white
walls and with the floors which in fine houses were
of white marble, in peasants’ cottages of wood sprinkled
with white sand.
When the best tiles were produced, during the first
sixty or seventy years of the seventeenth century, they
were used but sparingly in the decoration of rooms.
They were set in a row along the foot of the wall where
they served a practical end as baseboards. Sometimes
in subordinate places, in the bedroom, the corridor,
or the kitchen, they covered small expanses of wall
breast-high. And they were also used in and around
the fireplace where two or three rows of them were set
vertically on the two projecting wall-spaces, and often
across the space above the fireback. Here again they
were very useful as they could easily be washed free of
soot and from their glazed surface radiated more heat
than other substances.
The Dutch living-room of the seventeenth century
was so very simple, so white and almost bare in effect,
that the tiles with their pleasing hues applied on a
white ground introduced a welcome note of colour.
As decorations they had the same value, perhaps, as
one of the few pictures that constituted the adornment
of the walls. And it was because they were of so
[118]
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DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
much importance in the room and were not used in
quantities that in the seventeenth century they were
artistically fashioned. When in the eighteenth century
the custom arose of lining certain rooms, such as kitch-
ens, from floor to ceiling with tiles, the value of the
individual tile was less considered.
The production of ceramic tiles must always remain
a handicraft. We cannot demand of it the highest
artistic results, and still less can we expect to find great
masters among the designers of patterns. In general,
_ artists made designs that were mechanically copied by
artisans. But the repertory of such patterns was as-
tonishingly large in the period when natural objects,
figures and plant motives, were reproduced. Among
forty or fifty tiles there may not be two alike. Nor
at this time, it is certain, was the actual execution
wholly in the hands of artisans. Itis easy, upon exami-
nation, to decide whether the brush of an artist laid
the strokes with sureness and intelligence or whether
the stiff hand of an artisan copied a pattern in a slow
painstaking fashion. In fact, the records tell that cer-
tain painters in oil— for example, Frydom and Abra-
ham de Kooge — were also tile-painters. And at Delft,
the centre of the faience industry, painting and ceramic
art undoubtedly exerted a reciprocal influence. It suf-
fices to remember the chief painters of Delft, Jan
Vermeer and Carel Fabritius, who, whether they were
actually or only indirectly Rembrandt’s pupils, stand
in their choice of colours, in their preference for white
and blue and a light yellow, at the opposite pole from
Rembrandt with his golden-brown colour scheme. Their
favourite colours are precisely those of the Delft faience-
[119]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
painter. And their manner of setting their figures
against a light-coloured wall and letting the white
background dominate the colour scheme is the exact re-
verse of Rembrandt’s way of letting the heads show light
against a dark ground, but recalls the contemporary
ceramic style. It can hardly be by chance that the
picture of Carel Fabritius, in the museum at the
Hague, of a goldfinch in front of a white wall was
painted at Delft. It stands quite by itself in Dutch
pictorial art, but similar motives are common on indi-
vidual tiles, and in the eighteenth century a single bird
sitting on a branch or in a cage with a white wall behind
it was one of the most popular designs for the tile-
pictures that were then composed with a number of
parts. Again, with Vermeer of Delft not only the
choice of colours but also the handling with its glassy
polished effect and beady fat touches is so like the treat-
ment of faience surfaces as to make it probable that
the painter of pictures busied himself also with this
branch of the applied arts.*
It is not likely that actual patterns for tiles with fig-
ure subjects will often be discovered. Prints by Jacob
de Gheyn the Elder were used, indeed, for a series of
soldiers in armour, not very well done and now rarely
found. But in most cases the designs were made es-
pecially for the tiles; otherwise they would not so well
have served their purpose as decorations. The de-
signers were artists like Antonis Palamedeo, Pieter
*As early as the year 1866 Burger-Thoré called attention in the Gazette des beaux
arts to this probability and cited certain tiles, in {collections now dispersed, as
possibly painted by Vermeer. But his statement that the designs seemed to repro-
duce pictures by Vermeer refutes rather than supports the idea that they were ex-
ecuted by Vermeer himself.
[ 120 |
eet —-
DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
Codde, Willem Buyteweck, and Leonard Bramen. Ex-
amples of such drawings with a single soldier who
seems to stand upon air, as the only indication of space
is a short line of shadow, may occasionally be met with
in print collections, as in the one at Amsterdam and in
Dr. Hofstede de Groot’s at the Hague.
Prints may more often have served as patterns for
the later Biblical scenes. There are no well-known
series of them, but I once found, offered for sale, a
picture Bible, without any text, in which the illustrations
were drawn in outline and enclosed in borders as they
are on tiles. Perhaps it was a tile-painter’s pattern-
book. In any case the important point is that the
patterns were prepared especially for the tiles or, if
they were taken from other sources, were so adapted
that it is impossible to distinguish them as having been
borrowed from the art of the engraver or the painter.
As regards the technique of tile-painting, it is note-
worthy that in the old days the ground was first covered
by a white glaze upon which the design was executed
in colour. To-day, on the contrary, the painting is
usually done directly on the paste, and afterward the
whole surface is covered with a translucent whitish
glaze. The same difference in the process marks, of
course, all old Dutch faience-painting as compared
with the modern Dutch product. Thus the old Dutch
potters could be indifferent to the colour of the clay
that was to be painted upon, as it would be entirely
covered by the glaze. At first the material was some-
times reddish, sometimes yellowish, and not very clean.
Later it became a yellowish-white and cleaner but more
brittle.
[121 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Three periods may be marked in the development of
tile-painting. An exact chronological arrangement is
hardly possible, but it may be said in a general way
that the main development covered the years: between
the end of the sixteenth and the end of the eighteenth
century, the first period running approximately from
1580 to 1630, the second from 1630 to 1670, and the
third, broadly stated, from the end of the seventeenth
century to the end of the eighteenth.
The products of these three periods may easily be
distinguished by the eye. In the first the ornamental
character predominates. The decoration is broad and
vigorous and fills the entire space, the colours are a
strong yellow and red-brown with a dark blue and a
copper-oxide green, the pattern carries well, and the tiles
are relatively thick, measuring about one centimetre.
In the second period, when Dutch art was in its
prime, the patterns have the greatest variety. To the
plant motives, which become much more realistic with-
out any loss of style, there are added figures of soldiers
and artisans and sea-monsters, a few landscape mo-
tives, and, above all, ships. The horror vacua of the first
period, when the whole field was covered, is forgotten.
A single motive — a flower, a solitary figure, a vessel —
is set freely and lightly in the space so that the white
ground plays an important part in the result. The
colour of the pattern is blue, the beautiful Delft blue
that was never achieved except in this period, the sec-
ond half of the seventeenth century. The technique
has been perfected, the white is milky and shiningly
bright, the glaze brilliant yet not vitreous in effect.
The tile has lost one third of its thickness.
[122]
TILES, ITALIAN INFLUENCE
ABOUT 1580-1630
DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
In the third period the dominant colour is a manga-
nese purple, a weak mixed tint that speaks of the Rococo
time. Decorative simplicity has vanished; here, too, the
influence of the art of painting, which destroyed sculp-
ture in Holland, has worked disastrously. There is
an evident desire to put a whole picture on a single tile,
to paint landscapes and scenes with many figures,
especially pastorals and Bible pictures. Together with
these there reappears a decorative ornamentation,
spreading over several rows of tiles and rich but restless
and weak in effect —a Rococo design of leafage and
flowers that in Dutch hands has become rather heavy
and ungraceful. The tiles are now only half as thick
as those of the first period. Most of the tile-pictures
were made at this time.
The first period, when there was an interplay of vari-
ous influences, presents the greatest number of histori-
eal problems. The technique was still primitive and
unskilful, yet the outcome, in spite of all dependence
upon foreign styles, is full of naiveté and strength. No
such brilliant intensity of colour was achieved in after
days. In this respect these tiles, be the disparity what
it may, can be compared only with those of the Orient,
for Spanish and Italian tiles are usually duller and less
varied in colour, or else their small area is sprinkled
with such numerous little spots of colour that they make
no coherent colour impression. If we put Dutch and
oriental tiles side by side, the northern specimens,
equally intense in colour, may be distinguished by the
warm and heavy but very decorative tone from the ori-
ental, which depend for their decorative value upon a
luminous clarity, a sensuous luxuriance of effect.
[ 123 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
In developing from the greatest colouristic richness
to monochrome this Dutch product took an opposite
course from the majolica ware of Italy. The reason
can easily be read. The ceramic art of the Dutch fol-
lowed, chronologically, that of the Italians and was
inspired by their late polychromatic style. The sim-
plicity of the colour combinations in the earlier Italian
majolicas had been due to a primitive undeveloped tech-
nique and to a connection with the colourless faience
of Spain. The contrary development at the north, from _
polychromatic to monochromatic design, was part and _ |
parcel of the general character of the art of Holland. |
In touching upon the connection with Italian ma-
jolica wares we come naturally to the question of the
beginnings of tile-making in Holland, which is identical
with the question of the origin of Dutch faience. A
knowledge of the tiles themselves contributes largely
to a solution of this much-discussed problem.
Usually the beginnings of the Dutch industry are
placed in the early years of the seventeenth century.
The records of the city of Delft mention faience-
painters for the first time about the year 1610. The
earliest specimens that we have of their handiwork, im-
itations of Chinese porcelains with designs in blue,
are attributed by Havard to dates between 1640 and
1650, and are cited as the earliest by Brickmann also.
In style they correspond with the second period in
tile-painting. Heer Pit, the director of the Netherland
Museum at Amsterdam, takes a long backward step in
the matter of dates because of certain small apothecary
pots, imitated from albarelli, that were found at Mid-
delburg on the site of an apothecary shop which was
[ 124]
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DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
not in existence at a later date than 1580. These pots
he believes to be the earliest existing specimens of
Delft faience, made about 1570. It is a question,
however, whether they may not be Italian, for Wallis
has published pictures of just such pots in his writings
on the Italian majolicas of the fifteenth century. In
England also such shapes were very often imitated
during the eighteenth century in the factories that
produced the so-called Lambeth Delft, as is shown by
specimens at Liverpool and in the Victoria and Albert
Museum in London. On the other hand, Pit is cer-
tainly right when he claims a Dutch origin for two or
three fragments discovered at Delft which, according
to a date upon one of them, must have been made in
the second decade of the seventeenth century. They
have precisely the strong, brightly varied colours of the
oldest tiles. A plate in perfect preservation, which I
- saw in the museum at York, is perhaps a little older,
and the fact that it was made at Delft may be assumed
with some confidence from its affinity with Dutch
tiles.
But we must draw our knowledge of this early period
chiefly from the tiles unless a larger number of early
Delft faience pieces are discovered. It is by no means
an unwarranted assumption that tiles were made in
quantities at an earlier time than faience vessels. Cer-
tainly they came sooner into general use. In the pictures
of de Hooch, Vermeer, Metsu, and other painters of the
*sixties and seventies of the seventeenth century, where
tiles may usually be seen on the walls of the rooms, the
furnishings include scarcely a single Delft vase, although
the descriptions in the catalogues of certain picture col-
[125 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
lections give this name to objects that are really Chinese
porcelains.
A more definite account of the earliest use of tiles
has been given by Heer Muller, the archivist of
Utrecht. He says that they took the place of the so-
called ‘‘fireplace stones” — bricks impressed with sunken
patterns — which bear no dates later than those be-
tween 1607 and 1614, with occasional exceptions that
are dated as late as 1621. Thus the tiles drove out the
“fireplace stones” between, approximately, 1610 and
1620. Muller has reference to those with figures done
in blue, and he is right in saying that the costumes
indicate the beginning of the seventeenth century. At
least this is true of some of them where the figures wear
the dress of the time of Hendrick Avercamp, Esaias
van der Velde, Aert Aertzen, and their fellows. But
the figures on many others display the modes of the
thirties and “forties. In any case tiles with polychro-
matic ornament must have been made some time
before the blue-and-white ones, which show a more
developed technique. And two specimens, recently
on sale in Holland, speak of the eighties and ’nineties
of the preceding century, bearing pictures of women,
the head and bust only, in the dress of the second half
of the sixteenth century.
These years are indicated also by that relation to Italy
which is patent in all the Dutch art of the sixteenth
century. Beyond a doubt, technical methods were ac-
quired directly from Italy. It cannot here be discussed |
whether they came in by way of Antwerp where an Italian
craftsman, Guido da Savino, was at work, or by way of
Spain where at Seville there was an Italian tile-factory,
[ 126 ]
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TILES
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DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
the products of which resemble Dutch ceramic wares.
However this may be, there is evidence to prove that the
earliest Dutch tile-painters had travelled as students in
Italy and Spain.
On the oldest tiles the motives are Italian — pome-
granates, large grapes, and quinces. From Italy also,
in all probability, came the corner ornament, the lily,
_ from which the various corner patterns on Dutch tiles
of later dates were developed. And Italian, again, is
the colouring —the predominance of orange-yellow
and the use of a deep blue and a copper-oxide green. A
_ thought of these motives and colours must recall to mind
the fat-bellied pots made at Faenza in the early part of
the sixteenth century. The contemporary tiles with
_ figures of animals whose shapes Pit derives from oriental
_art have more resemblance to Italian tiles, probably
- also made at Faenza, specimens of which may be seen in
_ the British Museum and in the Forrer Collection at
Strassburg. Spanish influence is now much less strong,
persisting only, perhaps, in the enframing patterns and
in the occasional occurrence of an arabesque design
covering the whole field. This design, however, may
have come in by way of Italy.
In the second period of tile-painting Chinese porce-
lain plays a part similar to that of Italian faience in the
first period, although not of the same dominating impor-
tance. It influences the colour, for blue now replaces all
other hues, and also the designs, some of which are
taken directly from the Chinese. For instance, Mr.
Victor de Stuers had in his possession at the Hague tiles
with a familiar Chinese design of birds sitting among
blossoms. Sometimes, too, we find more formal pat-
[127]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
terns with emblems, such as rolls of paper from which
extend long cords and flourishes, that are common in
Chinese work of the sixteenth and the early seventeenth
century. . And, finally, the only corner ornament which
cannot be traced back to the lily is a group of short blue
bands, a misunderstood meander pattern of Chinese
origin.
The ornamentation of Dutch tiles suggests a number ©
of zesthetic problems that can merely be indicated here.
The artist had to deal with the need so to fill a small —
quadrangular space that the pattern would tell as a —
unit within the limits of the individual tile and would ©
also lead up to its neighbours. He had to take pains —
to bring similar motives together when associating the ©
tiles, and to secure in the different designs an approxi- —
mation to symmetry. Above all, in his figures and —
landscapes he had to adapt the subject to flat decoration |
and yet preserve truth to nature. For this reason he —
intentionally avoided effects of distance in his maritime _
subjects, portraying the water without any indication —
of perspective, and so placing the vessels that they sup- |
ply a vigorous silhouette while not leading the eye into
the distance. Nevertheless the impression of a freshly
observed bit of nature is admirably preserved. |
During the nineteenth century nothing individual in ©
the way of tiles was produced in Holland. It is not |
necessary to speak of the attempts, wholly unsuccessful |
but affectionately fostered by the people, of certain —
modern Dutch manufacturers to revive the old art by ©
imitating it. The costly tiles and decorative plates —
turned out by these firms show landscapes after Maris
or Apoll, and even figures of Rembrandt’s with ill-drawn
[ 128 ]
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BLUE AND WHITE TILES
ABOUT 1630-1670
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DUTCH CERAMIC TILES
expressionless faces swimming in glaring blue tones.
The colours are as intolerable as the designs — the
grayish white of the ground and the hard blue of the
painting, the revival of which has failed because it is
not a colour that was born of the taste of the faience-
painter of to-day. The diversified mixed colours,
like pearl-gray, pink, and lilac, that were not known in
elder times, are rather more successful, for they were
produced in answer to an independent modern desire.
The designs are absolutely undecorative. It is all
wrong when faience attempts to vie with painting in
oils, which must give that illusion of space, of perspec-
tive, that the earlier painters of faience so absolutely
renounced. |
It is pleasant to know that in recent years a few
artists have been trying to do new things in the spirit
of the old, using other colours, other designs, and a
newly mastered technique. But they meet with little
encouragement because they have not the pernicious
cleverness displayed in the imitations of old Delft.
The tourist in Holland still prefers to load himself down
with these worthless wares when, if he does not care
for good modern art, he might at least search in the
curiosity-shop for one or two of the old tiles which pre-
serve more of the artistic spirit of the old days than can
_ be found in a whole cargo of modern Delft.
[ 129 ]
Vil
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
for the most part inconclusive, are given to his
years at school and at the university. In truth,
it may not seem essential to know upon what school
benches the bored young artist sat, for, possessed by a
single idea, he soon managed to devote himself to art.
He can have been little more than a year at the univer-
sity when he entered a painter’s studio. But it was not
only this brief period at college in Leyden that brought
him into contact with the humanistic culture of the day.
As he was only fourteen at the time of his matricu-
lation, the entry regarding it has been thought to
indicate his admission to the Latin school. For in-
stance, we read of a brief attendance at “‘the Latin
school of the university,”’ although there was in fact no
connection between the school and the college; or we
are told that “the parents took the boy out of the
Latin school,”’ although it is certain that he passed
through it from beginning to end. This means that
he enjoyed seven years or, if we add about a twelve-
month at the university, eight years of such instruction
[ 130 ]
| N the biographies of Rembrandt only a few words,
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
as was suited to an embryo man of letters, for only
those boys were sent to the Latin school whose abilities,
in their parents’ opinion, gave promise of scholarship.
This explains why boys entered the Latin school
earlier than they do to-day, at the age of seven. To
the humanists the number seven still seemed signifi-
cant. For seven years, according to Erasmus, the
future humanist should play, for seven he should attend
school, and for seven the university. So it squares
with the schedule if Rembrandt graduated from the
Latin school at fourteen. If, as seems evident, his
parents meant to bring him up to be a scholar he must
have shown m early youth distinct intellectual ability,
whether or no the father yet recognized the direction
in which it pointed; and certainly it was not to Rem-
brandt’s detriment that at first he was led along plainly
prescribed paths.
Artists of genius who instinctively develop into ex-
ponents of a phase of civilization need a certain amount
of knowledge as a basis upon which, in manifold ways,
their powerful imaginations may build. This does not
mean that they must be, like Rubens or Velasquez,
aristocrats with the means of culture always close at
hand. They may be, by birth and breeding, simple
folk like Diirer or Michelangelo, provided that the
new intellectual life of their time is brought conspic-
uously to their notice, even if only, perhaps, by a
small circle of its representatives. Then, dowered with
broad powers of comprehension, they will assimilate the
proffered material and will embody its essentials in that
conception of life which, without formulating it in words,
they express in their art.
[131 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
According to the general verdict, Rembrandt was
the least cultivated of all great artists. It is true that
he must always have retained a certain slow simplicity
of nature, but the course of his life tended to make of the
miller’s son, in mind and in manners, an accomplished
man. ‘The twenty years that he spent, rich and fa-
mous, in Amsterdam cannot have failed to affect him,
but the training he received in his youth must also have
contributed to his intellectual development.
In a history of the Leyden Latin school there is
mention of a school ordinance which took effect soon
after Rembrandt graduated; and as it was evidently
meant not to alter but merely to formulate existing
conditions it shows what books the boy must have
studied or read. It also informs us in regard to some-
thing more important — the spirit that guided the
teaching. ,
In the year 1600 the Latin school was rebuilt by the
municipality for the furtherance of “piety, the lan-
guages, and the liberal arts,” as is inscribed above the
entrance of the building which still stands to-day. In
the year when Rembrandt entered a wing was added
for the rector and the boarders (among whom Rem-
brandt was certainly not counted), and the graceful
portal of this wing, now in the Riks Museum at
Amsterdam, was adorned by a figure of Pallas Athene,
with the legend, not quite so graceful, Pallas is veilig
door haar schild (Pallas is safe because of her buckler)
and by two lions bearing armorial shields. The school
contained six rooms for the six classes from Sexta
to Prima, only the last of which was divided into two
— Lower and Upper Prima.
[ 132 ]
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
_.The name of the school shows that the main goal
of education was a knowledge of Latin, then the uni-
versal language of the learned. As far as possible it
was to be used by the boys in conversation. In addi-
tion to a grammar the members of the sixth class were
given at once a book containing conversations by
Cordier and an introduction with examples for use in
daily life prepared by Erasmus of Rotterdam. From
the fifth class onward two hours a week were devoted
to disputations about scholastic sophistries pro victoria
loci — that is, “‘for a higher place” in the class. In
the upper classes the pupils learned to extemporize and
to write Latin compositions upon themes chosen by
themselves; and now they were obliged to speak Latin
out of school as well as in school, and to keep watch
upon one another lest they lapse into their mother
tongue. The old humanistic idea of education still
prevailed — the development of men of all-round abil-
ity. It must be confessed that the method was super-
ficial. What were considered the liberal arts were a
-ealligraphy rich in flourishes, the ready writing of for-
mal Latin epistles, and the composition in complicated
metres of Latin hymns and odes. To these things long
school hours were devoted year after year, and thus
the men were trained who, with an eye to immortal
renown, wrote letters like lengthy treatises and pref-
aced their books with endless poems that quenched
in the reader all sense of the purport of the work. As
the school ordinance said, the pupils must be able, as
cultivated men, to make a Latin verse in the turning
of a hand. A comprehensive acquaintance with Latin
authors seemed an essential preliminary. The fifth
[ 133 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
class made a beginning with the letters of Cicero, whose
wisdom, especially as it is contained in his orations,
thenceforward accompanied the boys throughout their
school life. Then followed in due order Terence,
Ovid’s Tristia and Metamorphoses, Virgil’s Eclogues,
the fables of AXsop, Cesar’s Commentaries, certain
cantos of the Aneid, Sallust, Livy, Curtius, Horace,
and others. As is the case to-day, instruction in Greek
was somewhat subordinated to instruction in Latin,
although the ordinance pointed out that the Grecian
tongue was the foundation of all wisdom and that with-
out it Latin itself could not be rightly understood. In
the fifth class the boys began the Greek alphabet, in
the fourth class grammar and the texts. Rembrandt
read Euripides, although neither of the two great elder
tragedians, Sophocles and Aischylus. Hesiod and Ho-
mer are likewise named.
It was also thought that learning should influence
the man as such. Good manners were inculcated, albeit,
according to our ideas, in a wonderful way: the pupils
were to wean themselves from roughness and rude
behaviour by reciprocal displays of these traits. On |
the other hand, they were taught how they ought to ©
behave by specimens of courtly Latin phrases which |
were free, indeed, from prudery but flat and insipid and _ |
seldom fit for the mouths of children. For example, |
sixth-class boys were to greet a young married woman |
with the words, “God grant that you may make your
husband the father of a fine child,”? and to a person |
who sneezed they were to exclaim, “Good luck,” or
*“May God direct it for the best.” A good influence
upon manners was expected from the distiches of Cato
[134 ]
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
and the maxims of Solon, and from the Ethics of
Walius, a Christianized version of Aristotle’s lessons in
behaviour.
This gives an idea of the value set upon Christianity
in the education of youth. It stood upon an equal foot-
ing with classic antiquity. Everything else was subor-
dinated; for example, Rembrandt learned no modern
language. All else that was thought to pertain to
general culture was hastily disposed of in the first class.
Then something of philosophy was taught (logic was
combined with the instruction in Latin), and also the
higher mathematics, geography, and a little history
which, from what we know of the time, must have re-
lated only to the development of states and above all to
the constitution of the Roman state.
The importance of religion was announced by the
inscription over the entrance to the Latin school, of
~ which the school ordinance gave, in this sense, a further
explanation. An appeal to the pupils of the sixth
class in the preface of the first Latin grammar ends
with the words: “‘In the name of Christ, the guide in
all studies, farewell!” In Greek the boys learned to
repeat the Lord’s Prayer in the original and to read the
evangelists. School began and ended with prayer in
common, followed, in the morning, by the reading of
a chapter of the Bible. In the upper classes the
Psalms of David were sung “‘so that the boys might
be accustomed to the pious tunes.”” They were charged
to attend church twice on Sunday, in the morning
and the afternoon, and had to repeat in school what
they remembered of the sermon. The Heidelberg cate-
chism and in connection with it the teaching of dogma
[135 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
were taken up astonishingly early, in the second class.
Religious instruction ended in the first class with dis-
cussions of heretical opinions. |
There is little to be said about Rembrandt’s univer-
sity life, which followed upon his course at the Latin
school, for we do not know how long it lasted. He was
enrolled as studiosus litterarum and therefore attended
the lectures of the professors of a preliminary faculty,
introductory to those of the three main faculties. As
is indicated by the age of very many of the students,
from fourteen to sixteen, the course did not differ much
from school instruction. Rembrandt must have en-
larged his knowledge of Latin grammar and Latin
authors and have followed courses in the history of
dogma and of the Christian Church; and perhaps it was
at this time that he learned Hebrew which, as inscrip- _
tions on his pictures show, he understood to some extent.
This training at school and university left lasting
traces in the artist’s attitude of mind. In his time
humanistic and Christian scholarship were more closely
related to life than they are in our own. At Leyden
even the ordinary man listened with pleasure to the
disputes of the learned upon points of criticism, and
the “‘small burgher”’ strove, as he still does in Holland,
to form an opinion of his own upon dogmatic questions.
In so far as it is possible to divine Rembrandt’s intel-
lectual attitude from his pictures and from the records,
it may be said that Roman antiquity meant more to
him than Grecian, as at school Latin took rank above
Greek. His knowledge of Latin is revealed by occasional
inscriptions on his pictures and portrait etchings; and
that it pleased him in later life to look into the books
[ 136 ]
REMBRANDT, DIANA AND CALLISTO
IN THE POSSESSION OF THE AUTHOR, NEW YORK
ee ae
Sten decaaesi
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
he had known in his youth seems probable in view of
certain representations of themes taken in especial from
Ovid, Livy, and Cicero which, like his Biblical illustra-
tions, adhere so faithfully to the text that we can hardly
think that he created them wholly from memory or
utilized the work of other artists.
Baldinucci relates that on the walls of the house of a
merchant who belonged to the magistracy Rembrandt
painted in oils a number of pictures from Ovid. It is
uncertain whether this statement is correct or not. We
can hardly connect it with the drawings and paintings
of scenes from Ovid that still exist, as these date from
various periods of Rembrandt’s career. I may briefly
indicate what they are, following approximately the
order in which the poems themselves are arranged:
1. Io. Rembrandt has presented three moments in
this familiar myth. In a drawing at Berlin and in one
in the Victoria and Albert Museum at London,* Juno
leads the metamorphosed Io to Argus. Two drawings,
owned by Léon Bonnat and Walter Gay in Paris, show
Mercury lulling the warder to sleep with his flute. A
fifth, in the collection of J. C. Robinson at London, and
a sixth, in the Albertina at Vienna, represent the be-
heading of Argus.
2. Callisto. In a picture at Anholt Rembrandt
strives to render in a drastic way the words in which the
poet describes Diana’s discovery of the nymph’s mis-
step. The scene between Diana and Actzon is also
introduced into this picture. A drawing of the Callisto
episode, of about 1635, is in my possession.
* These drawings and the others that will be named are described by C. Hofstede
de Groot in his Katalog der Handzeichnungen Rembrandt's. Haarlem, 1906.
[137]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
g. Europa. A picture of the Rape of Europa,
owned by Herr Kappel of Berlin, shows the moment
when the god changed into a bull slipped gently from
the shore:
Left the dry meadow and approach’d the seas
Where now he dips his hoofs and wets his thighs,
Now plunges in and carries off the prize. :
and when Europa
‘ looks backward on the shore
And hears the tumbling billows round her roar;
But still she holds him fast; one hand is borne
Upon his back, the other grasps a horn;
Her train of ruffling garments flies behind,
Swells in the air and hovers in the wind.
As far as my knowledge goes, no other artist has so
faithfully adhered to the text in the placing of Europa’s
hands.
4.. Diana and Acteon. In 1630 or thereabouts
Rembrandt both painted and etched the single figure of
Diana as she puts her feet in the water and, startled,
looks around for Actzeon who is no longer visible. In
the picture at Anholt already named (2), which was
painted five years later, the artist borrows directly from
the poet: Diana, accompanied by a number of nymphs,
dashes the water on the bewildered huntsman, the
metamorphosis of whose head is already accomplished.
Rembrandt’s contemporaries must have recognized his
faithful following of the text, for in 1677 a print from
the main group of this picture was used as an illustra-
[ 138 |
NITHGd “ldddVY UNAH AO NOLLOATIOO
VdOUNM AO AdVU AHL ‘SLONVUEWNAY
= a ns a a a er
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
tion in a Brussels edition of Ovid. In two drawings,
one in the Louvre, the other at Dresden, the artist
again makes use of the same material. The second,
which dates from the ’sixties, shows the nymphs, in
accordance with the text, pressing closely around the
goddess to conceal her from prying glances.
5. Narcissus. Ina drawing at Lille Rembrandt has
shown Narcissus mirroring himself in the water. A
mythological representation at Amsterdam which for a
time was called Narcissus, but incorrectly, as the figure
gazing at its own reflection is that of a young woman,
is no longer considered genuine.
6. Pyramus and Thisbe. This story, retold in
poetry a few decades earlier by Rembrandt’s great
kinsman in the spirit, Shakespeare, inspired the artist
of brush and pencil also. In Berlin alone there are
three drawings of the final scene of this tragedy of
love, and to these must be added one at Amsterdam,
another at Munich, and a third in the Friedrich Au-
gust II Collection at Dresden. In one of the Berlin
sketches Thisbe gazes at the dead Pyramus with a
pitying glance. In the one at Amsterdam she clasps
her hands in sorrow at the sight. Grieving, she holds
her head in her hands in the second of the Berlin
drawings. Following the course of the story, in the
sketch at Dresden she draws the dagger from the breast
of her beloved. And, finally, in the third Berlin ex-
ample and in the one at Munich Thisbe stabs herself
with the dagger of Pyramus.
7. Andromeda. A picture dating from about 1632
with the single figure of Andromeda was discovered and
acquired by Bredius not long ago. It seems to have
[ 139 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
been cut away at one side, although it is hard to imag-
ine how a Perseus could have been introduced.
8. Ceres. From the story of Ceres Rembrandt
chose two episodes. In a picture of the Rape of
Proserpine, now in the Berlin Museum, he tells with
the impetuosity of youth, yet with a discreet respect
for the text, of Pluto’s furious chariot-ride, showing
how the flowers which Proserpine had gathered in a
basket and in her uplifted garment “‘fall from the fly-
ing skirt,’ and how her friends convulsively cling to its
long folds while the frightened maiden calls in despair
to her mother as the dark steeds drag the chariot into
the deep-flowing lake called Pergus near the walls of
Enna. The second episode appears in a drawing that
dates from the ’fifties where three figures are standing
quietly together: the goddess, a torch in her hand, is
quenching her thirst, while a woman looks wonderingly
at a boy who is mocking at Ceres.
9. Marsyas. A drawing at Berlin, a naked man
bound to a tree and gazing upward with a despairing
glance, is more probably a Marsyas than, as has been
assumed, a Prometheus.
10. It has not yet been decided what scene from
the underworld is shown in a drawing at Munich
where a number of shades are pleading with Pluto and
Proserpine, Cerberus is on guard in the foreground,
and a woman leads a warrior to another masculine
figure. Ovid tells similar tales in connection with Or-
pheus and Eurydice and with Ino and Athamas.
11. Philemon and Baucis. Rembrandt made seve-_
ral drawings of the visit of Jupiter and Mercury to
Philemon and Baucis. Those at Berlin and at Am-
[ 140 ]
—_-_
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REMBRANDT, THE RAPE OF PROSERPINE
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REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
sterdam are studies for the picture, painted shortly
before 1660, which is owned by Mr. Otto H. Kahn of
New York, and show the artist still searching for the
moment best suited to representation. First he de-
picts Philemon and Baucis preparing the repast —
Philemon, trying to grasp the goose, falls to the ground;
then he decides to render the moment when the gods
reveal themselves — the two old people kneel in prayer
before them. In these compositions the artist proves
his familiarity with the antique world by showing
Jupiter and Mercury in half-recumbent attitudes, by
introducing the sacred birds, and by utilizing for the
head of Jupiter, as is very evident, some work of sculp-
ture like the Zeus of Otricoli. |
12. Vertumnus and Pomona. This story, which in
his day was very often interpreted by the Flemings and
the painters of Utrecht, attracted Rembrandt also.
His version of it is preserved in a drawing now at
Stockholm.
In addition to the Metamorphoses of Ovid Rem-
brandt made use of various passages from Livy’s his-
tory. In several drawings he has told of the fortitude
of Mucius Sceevola, in others of the passion of Tarquin,
who, as Lucretia repulses him, threatens her with a
dagger; and in one drawing and several paintings he
has portrayed the death of Lucretia. At Madrid
there is a picture of the dying Sophonisba, the spouse
of Syphax and daughter of Hasdrubal, to whom Mas-
inissa sent the poisoned bowl. Even a passage from
the eighth Philippic of Cicero must have dwelt in the
artist’s memory, for a drawing at Rennes shows the
scene between Antiochus and the Roman consul, other-
[141 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
wise quite unknown to the art of Holland. To an
external impulse, a commission from the city of Amster-
dam, was due the great composition of the year 1662,
the Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis, a theme supplied
by the Annals of Tacitus. Probably the same may be
said of a large picture in the possession of Sedelmeyer,
the Parisian dealer, which, following Livy or Valerius
Maximus, represents Suessa ordering his father, Quin-
tus Fabius Maximus, to dismount from his horse.
In another group of illustrations of the stories of an-
cient Rome the subjects are clear enough but I cannot
feel sure of the source from which Rembrandt derived
his knowledge of them. They include a mythological
scene, Jupiter and Antiope; one from the history of the
Roman republic, Scipio and the Spanish Bride; and one
from the period of the decline of the empire, the blind
Belisarius sitting as a beggar by the wayside. It can-
not be said whether the etching of Cleopatra men-
tioned in the inventory of Clement de Jonghes soon
after Rembrandt’s death has been lost or should be
recognized in one of those that we possess.
Finally, there are still a few works representing single |
figures of Roman deities, Minerva peacefully occupied
in her study, Bellona panoplied for war, Mars with the
fiery eyes of youth watching for an adversary. Dur-
ing his last years Rembrandt was at work on a Juno
that has not been preserved.
In comparison with the many works for which Rem-
brandt drew inspiration from Latin authors those in- |
spired by the writers of Greece make a scanty showing, —
An etching, not a very successful one, of Jupiter and
Danae and a well-known large painting, the Ganymede |
[ 142 ]
——
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
of the Dresden Gallery, were produced at the time
when he took the most interest in the antique world,
between 1630 and 1635. From this period we have
also a Greek inscription on a picture, the beginning of
the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, which Rem-
brandt doubtless took from the Greek Testament that
he had preserved from his schooldays. When in his
later years he occupied himself with Homer, he was
probably attracted more by the imaginative presenta-
tion of great men and poets than by that charm of
strange tales which had appealed to him at an earlier
time. He owned a copy of the familiar portrait bust
of Homer and pictured to himself how the blind poet
sang — either alone, or like the venerable Goethe with
only a scribe beside him to whom he was dictating, or,
surrounded by a circle of wise men, reciting his poems
under the open sky. Passages from the Iliad and the
Odyssey must have remained in the painter’s memory,
for from the one he took the beautiful scene between
Achilles and Briseis which Rubens also painted, from
the other the story of the vengeance wreaked by Vulcan
when he caught Mars and Venus in a net and exhibited
them to the gods. Perhaps it was Jan Six who brought
Rembrandt, at more than fifty years of age, into
touch again with the Greek world, for the drawing of
Homer on Parnassus of the year 1652 is dedicated to
Six and is bound into the guest-book, called the Pan-
dora Album, of the Six family, and only a few years
earlier Rembrandt had etched an illustration for Six’s
tragedy, Medea, a copy of which he had in his little
library.
As upon Shakespeare, so also upon Rembrandt his
[ 143 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
contemporaries made two diverse demands: he was
expected to exert a moral influence and to represent
the figures of antiquity. Seldom could either great
artist successfully solve the problem so inartistically
presented. In Shakespeare’s case we feel it superfluous
when the moral of a drama is set forth at its conclu-
sion, and we cannot fully enjoy scenes of poetic import
when they are filled with pictures from the antique
world. Neither the poet’s portrayals of antiquity nor
Rembrandt’s allegories show his art at its best. As
didacticism disturbs us in the poet’s case so in the
painter’s does the Baroque setting of his scenes, hardly
suited to a world which, according to modern ideas,
must have been symmetrically and harmoniously fash-
ioned, but which revealed itself to the fancy of a young
self-confident northern painter in the likeness of his
own time. Moreover, the tales of ancient Greece and
Rome are less familiar now than they were to a culti-
vated Hollander of the seventeenth century, and there-
fore the fundamental human significance that underlies
them in Rembrandt’s work is not immediately apparent.
It is not as quickly grasped as when an incident is
drawn from a Biblical narrative. Something better,
perhaps, has taken the place of this kind of learning
in the modern mind —a conception of the artistic
spirit of antiquity; and it no longer coincides with the
ideas of the painters of the Baroque period.
None the less Rembrandt, who was born to express
the essence of all the intellectual and artistic aspira-
tions of his race, has given us the best interpretation
of the classic world that was produced in his fatherland.
How unbearable are the antique or allegorical essays
[ 144 ]
4 a ne ——
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
of the other important Dutchmen of his time — Jan
Vermeer’s commonplace New Testament allegories, Jan
Steen’s grotesque picture of the Rape of the Sabines
or of the Temperance of Scipio, Metsu’s unmeaning
blacksmith Vulcan or his clumsy allegories of Justice
or Faith, Paul Potter’s almost comical Dutch Orpheus
surrounded by tame beasts, the incredible Argus of
Adriaen van der Velde — not to speak of lesser masters
and their unintentional drolleries! It is true that in
the earlier works of Rembrandt himself the gods make
merely the effect of costumed Dutchmen in an environ-
ment of customary studio properties. But in the course
of time his constant familiarity with the works of art
of other nations developed the ability to give his scenes
a more truthfully historical setting, and as his types
came more into keeping with the prescribed conditions
the disparity grew less between the two worlds, the
‘elassic and the Dutch, that he wanted to combine.
How truly Roman seems to a naive beholder the Tri-
umph of Suessa where lictors march beside the military
commander while the insignia of Rome — eagles, ban-
ners, and escutcheons — are carried behind him. And
looking at Rembrandt’s hoary Homer, who can think
first of the fact that he was created by a Hollander of
the Baroque period? Who can fail to recognize at
once a great artist telling of a poet of the older time
in a language that every age must understand? If
the greatest artists of northern countries concerned
themselves at times with the study of the antique,
despite the feeling they must have had that to accept
the ideals of an unfamiliar world would at the outset
do them more harm than good, it was because they were
[145 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
rightly convinced that in the end a knowledge of a
purer language of form could not fail to exert an inspir-
ing and enlightening influence upon their own style.
It was by reason of Rembrandt’s acquaintance with
the art of other peoples, and especially those of the
south, that his personages developed from inhabitants
of a small Dutch city into figures which to the eye of
every observer seem to express the best in his own nature.
Not only Rembrandt’s portrayals of antiquity, but
also certain fragments of humanistic ways of thinking
that are preserved in his biographies, remind us of the
training that he received at school. Calligraphy,
verse-making, and “disputations” are occasionally men-
tioned. For many years the painter was on friendly
terms with Coppenol, one of the foremost calligraphists
of Amsterdam, twice he painted his portrait, and in
the inventory of his art collections there is mention of
a portfolio of admirable specimens of writing which
were probably from Coppenol’s pen. Rembrandt him-
self wrote a hand that shows training. Very crabbed
and unskilful by comparison is the writing of his father
or his mother. He does indeed form his firm letters
according to his own sovereign will, but he likes to
adorn the long ones with flourishes, loves ‘scrolling ini-
tials, and has a personal and singularly beautiful way of
arranging his page.
What seem to us in his letters stilted or involved
expressions may well have been thought in his day the
elements of beauty of style. The current liking for
‘occasional’? poems speaks emphatically from numer-
ous verses in praise of his work that were composed
even during his lifetime. Some are of the most naive
[ 146 ]
REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
and simple kind, like the lines that his pupil Philip
Koninck wrote on one of the master’s landscapes:
Dees tekeningh vertoont de buiten amstelkant
Soo braaf getekent door heer Rembrandt's eygen hant.
(This picture shows the Amstel’s outer strand,
So bravely painted by Heer Rembrandt’s hand.)
And from distiches of this sort the tributes range to
the most Baroque rhymed compositions where sophis-
ticated phrases about the relations of nature and art are
woven into complicated rhythms. At least one little
rhyme, a witness to the uprightness of his character,
has been preserved as Rembrandt himself wrote it in
1634 in the album of a German traveller from Wei-
mar:
Een vroom gemoet
Acht eer voor goed.
(An upright spirit
Holds honour above wealth.)
Verse-making of this kind reveals that striving for
clever turns of phrase which, in all times of high artis-
tic development, characterizes the conversational and
literary intercourse of cultivated men, as we realize
if we remember the sonnet-writing of the Italian Ren-
aissance and the dialogues in Shakespeare’s plays.
And this striving must have been more pleasingly
expressed in verbal contests — in “disputations,” to
use the term that was current in Rembrandt’s scholarly
time — than in the “occasional”? poem which put
trifling thoughts into complicated forms in the effort
to preserve them to all eternity. Hoogstraaten, one
[147]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
of Rembrandt’s pupils, tells how he and his studio
associates often disputed with the master upon theo-
retical questions, and such conversations were prob-
ably couched in the lively sparkling turns of phrase
then in vogue. There was more concern for art in the
utterance, for piquant brilliant retorts, than for the
expression of significant ideas. For mstance, one mem-
ber of the circle, Carel Fabritius, asks: ‘‘How may
one know whether a young painter gives promise of
ability?” Hoogstraaten answers: “By the fact that,
as befits his age, he not only seems to love art but ac-
tually is in love with the portrayal of nature.” Or
Hoogstraaten asks: ‘“‘How can one tell whether a
story is well interpreted?”’ And the answer runs: “ From
a knowledge of the story.”” There is more mean-
- ing in the advice Rembrandt himself gives his pupil
when he bothers him with needless questions about
the secrets of the artist’s craft, but Hoogstraaten
cites it chiefly on account of its admirable form —
partially lost, of course, in a translation: ‘Take pains
to use well the knowledge you already have; thus you
will soon. enough discover what is now concealed.”
Nothing testifies more clearly to the influence that hu-
manistic culture exerted upon Rembrandt, who stood
at the centre of this little circle of painters, than these
deliberately artistic locutions in which at a later period
he still indulged.
It is not necessary to speak farther of the impor-
tance to Rembrandt of the religious views so assiduously
inculeated at the Latin school. In this connection no
stress should be laid upon his school training, for the
main thing was the religious feeling that was a funda-
[148 ]
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REMBRANDT, A SCHOLAR
PRINT ROOM, DRESDEN
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Sony Pein
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REMBRANDT AT THE LATIN SCHOOL
mental part of his nature before he went to school.
Yet when we remember that the boy must have had a
daily familiarity with the Bible — even at home where
his mother loved to absorb herself in its perusal, and
perhaps read it aloud to him while he was painting her
portrait — then it seems worthy of note that outside
influences should have strengthened early tendencies
in so marked a degree. Nor may we forget that in
later days Rembrandt loved to portray the Psalmist
whose songs he had sung in school, that he owned a
harp, and that he was able to depict in an impressive
fashion the effect of the harpstrings and the voice of
song upon the wrathful spirit of Saul.
It is certain that Rembrandt did not turn his back
in disgust upon scholarship when he determined to
become a painter. His life’s work shows that as time
went on he seemed to behold, as though encircled by a
nimbus, that humanistic career upon which he had
entered as a child, partly, perhaps, by his own desire.
In after years, so a contemporary declares, he was
always one of those who liked to learn from books how
to give their pictures a truly historical aspect. In
fact, something like the scholar’s spirit must have been
part of hisendowment. His art collections are another
proof of this. They included, as we know, important
products of almost every land and period; and while he
acknowledged their value by the frequent use he made
of them in his own compositions, he showed in regard
to the art of other men a just discrimination, based
upon historical knowledge, which in his time the his-
torians of art did not possess — not even Vasari or
van Mander. Only the modern science of criticism
[ 149 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
judges in so well-balanced a way. Rembrandt stands
almost by himself among great artists as regards this
many-sided view of art; Rubens alone had the same
cosmopolitan outlook. But while, as the elder artist,
Rubens seems to have thought little of the Dutch
master, Rembrandt admired the great Fleming and
his circle in spite of the fact that their art is so alien to
his own that many lovers of the one find it difficult to
do reverence to the other.
Rembrandt’s understanding of the scholar’s spirit
is manifested also in external ways. No other Dutch
painter portrays with so much pleasure and sympathy
the sage who is striving for knowledge. Rembrandt
idealized him in pictures that, as the logical successors
of the studious St. Jeromes of Primitive painters,
give these a broader significance, and he interpreted
the characteristics of men of learning in portraits that
are more veracious than those by other artists of the
time. The scholars of Jan Vermeer or Gabriel Metsu
coquet with learning; they are dandies who consider
how they may sit most comfortably at their desks, and
who love to listen to the scratching of their own pens.
Those of Gerard Dou or Thomas Wyck are pedants
or slovenly dirty bookworms who shut their eyes to the
beauty of the world and think that they have compassed
all knowledge because they live in a cage full of folios.
But the earnest eyes of Rembrandt’s sages tell that an
inner impulse drives them to effort, that they make use
of learning to express the best in their own natures,
that they have seen much of life and can give much by
giving of themselves.
[ 150 ]
Vill
REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
HE mastery of chiaroscuro shown in Rem-
brandt’s pictures may suggest that he was an ar-
tist of an equable temperament who lived out of
the world in peaceful seclusion. Nothing could be far-
ther from the truth. Strength is the predominant factor
in hisart. His technique is the best proof that his own
nature expressed itself forcibly even when he was most
deeply affected by the theme that he was treating. If,
straying through the Rijks Museum at Amsterdam,
where all his contemporaries dwell under the same roof
with him, we compare the excellences of one and another
and then come upon a work of Rembrandt’s, they all pale
and shrink in the presence of his Promethean force.
Manifold conceptions of art speak from their paintings.
From Rembrandt’s there speaks a personality that has
more power than art of any kind. His way of seeing
and of rendering what he has seen testifies to such
strength of will and such an unremitting tension of the
emotions that we are convinced that no one ever pene-
trated farther than he into the deep and hidden things
of life, or fought the battles of the soul more valiantly.
[151 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
In the products of his latter years this passionate
intensity is a masked, a hidden, force. But there was
a period in his career when he interpreted life with his
full powers and with a direct and vigorous purpose —
the period when his fame was greatest, between 1635
and 1640. And of no work is this more true than of
his Blinding of Samson, a picture which was not
rightly valued until it had been transferred from a
badly lighted private collection in Vienna to the Stidel
Institute at Frankfort.
The hanging of Rembrandt’s paintings, it may be
noted, is not a matter of small importance. It is not
by accident that more in regard to its placing has
been written of the Night Watch than of any other
picture. Rembrandt’s art is as subjective as it is
vigorous. It can come to its full flowering only in a
special atmosphere, just as it needs for its right under-
standing a specially constituted observer. When Rem-
brandt presented the Blinding of Samson to his
distinguished patron, Constantijn Huygens, he wrote:
*“‘Hang this picture, sir, in a strong light, and so that
one may stand at a distance from it; thus it will appear
at its best.”’ ‘This is the only mention of one of his own
works in the few letters of Rembrandt’s that have been
preserved, and it refers to the matter of lighting.
Rembrandt’s Blinding of Samson may be con-
sidered from various points of view. As a picture,
quite apart from any questions of origin, it will at once
impress both artist and layman. The layman will
think primarily of the subject, and in this case he has a
right to do so, for the theme and its dramatic shaping
were important to Rembrandt himself. And who could
[152]
——
REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
resist the appeal of this drama? — the sight of this Titan
dashed from shining heights into nocturnal darkness,
borne down on the right and the left by steel-clad hire-
lings as by two mighty cudgels while, triumphing in her
‘joy, his vanquisher waves like a firebrand the ‘“‘seven
locks” of hair. But there is as much justification for
the artist who, attentive to external qualities, admires
the complicated arrangement of the picture, for with
inimitable skill Rembrandt has achieved an harmonious
interplay of movement and counter-movement, of plas-
tic forms and unfilled spaces, of long-drawn curves
and short rippling lines. The colouring — Samson is
dressed in yellow, Delilah in blue, and the soldier with
the halberd in red —is of the greatest simplicity yet
of the greatest richness. It should be noticed how
varied are the shades of the blue where it comes into
contact with the costume of the Landsknecht, how it
takes a pearl-gray tone when it stands near purple, or
a sky-blue or, again, a violet-gray tone, according as it
meets scarlet or red-brown, how the modifications of
the red correspond to the incidence of the light, and
what delightful tints the greenish lemon-yellow of Sam-
son’s doublet assumes under the strong illumination.
At the same time each colour is appropriate to the char-
acter of the wearer: the strong yellow befits the hercu-
lean strength of the hero, and the flickering blue, the
colour of yearning passion, suits the sensual excitement
that possesses Delilah. Furthermore, the colours are
made to play their part in the definition of space, for
the succession of red, yellow, and blue toward the depth
of the picture accords with the relative length of the
ether-waves that produce these colours.
[ 153 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
In addition to its general artistic interest this picture
has an historical significance that must appeal to all
who like to see great periods and the great spirits of the
past mirrored in immortal works.
By nature the Hollander is peaceful and moderate,
serious and thoughtful, as Rembrandt’s work, taken as
a whole, goes far to prove. But it would be an error
to assume that he lacks passion. Fearing to compro-
mise his dignity, he long maintains his reserve; but
when passion overcomes him it suddenly breaks forth
with an impetuosity that bursts every barrier. What
an expression of unrestrained brutality often charac-
terizes the peasant scenes of Dutch painters! Among
Latin peoples suavity and grace may consist with an
outbreak of passion, and to the light Flemish nature
strong emotions are not so unfamiliar that they are apt
to declare themselves abruptly. But in his more ex-
ceptional moods the Dutchman loses the self-control
which at other times he maintains to an excessive de-
gree, and becomes as naive and ruthless as a child, as
terrible as a madman.
Compared with one of the fallen angels of Rubens, a
figure like Rembrandt’s Samson is full of hard corners
and edges. At certain points hands and feet are bent
at right angles. Rubens would not have permitted
such sharp lines as those of the soldier’s halberd in the
foreground and the corner of the curtain to cut across
the composition, nor would he have created such abrupt
diagonals as those of Samson’s right foot and the lines
that unite it with the head of the man who is lying under
him. In this composition of only five figures the hard
lines running counter to one another produce a more
[154]
REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
vivid impression of a wild chaotic turmoil than the
harmonized lines of other painters in compositions with
ten times as many figures. When Rubens paints a
dramatic scene the individual bends before the whirl-
wind that sways the group as a whole. But in this
picture of Rembrandt’s each personage obeys only the
laws of his own being, and with incredible vigour en-
forces his will upon the course of the action. Every
movement — the action of the self-confident soldier
firmly grasping his halberd, of Samson clenching his
fists, of the executioner who seizes the hero around the
body, and of the one who fastens the fetters — is with-
out a parallel as the expression of an intense and con-
centrated act of will.
Nevertheless there is a unifying element in the com-
position which offsets the disintegrating force of ac-
centuated individuality. It is not, as with Rubens,
the vigorously combined action of bodies all swaying
in the same direction; it is a rhythm of contrasted
movements controlling all the figures. Samson has
been thrown sidewise to the ground toward the right
while the helmeted soldier who is wounding him
thrusts at him from the opposite side; the second sol-
dier draws the fetters together toward the left again,
and on this same side the third presses forward from
the right-hand corner of the picture. These counter-
movements are most conspicuous in the two main fig-
ures, Samson and Delilah. The action of Delilah,
pressing toward the other side of the frame and form-
ing a contrast to the axis of the figure of the fallen hero,
is brought back within the confines of the picture by
the opposite movement of the Landsknecht whose arched
[155]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
silhouette forms an admirable finish to the composition
on this side. Although this rhythm prevails all through
the picture it is most effective in the figures that can
be separately considered, Delilah and the Landsknecht.
And this seems natural when we remember that this
particular kind of rhythm is merely a result of that
tendency to individual characterization which succeeds
best with detached figures. As in Rembrandt’s com-
positions each figure reluctantly sacrifices its person-
ality in the interest of the whole, his representations of
crowds are often confused in effect, as is here the case
in a small way with the group of soldiers around Sam-
son. It needs a search to discover to which figures
in this tangle the various limbs belong. It is possible,
indeed, that the artist made his soldiers somewhat _
alike in type and in costume in order to give the group
an inner coherence, and perhaps he needed a certain
confusion to augment the horror of the scene. Yet it
cannot be denied that the most impressive figures are
the two that are detached, Delilah and the Landsknecht,
whereas with Rubens the figures that are separated from
the mass are often weak in effect because insufficiently
individualized. How strongly characterized are Deli-
lah and the Landsknecht! The man is a vagabond of
the kind that excites no anger, for he is full of the poetry
of gypsy life. He is at one with his picturesque cos-
tume as is the Cossack with his horse. It is a triumph
of northern costume-painting that we cannot think of
him apart from his dress. The bristly moustache and
the cocked-up fur cap, the huge fists and the broad
shoes, the wide trunk-hose, the bluntly curved point
of the halberd, the clumsy curve of the scabbard, and
~—©[ 156]
LYOAMN Vu
‘ALALILSNI TACAVLS
NOSWVS JO ONIGNIIG AHL ‘LONVUENAY
SE
REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
the thick turned-up nose — all seem to have been cast
in the same mould. Of course at bottom it is simply
the artist’s sense of style that gives the figure such
completeness. But only a genius can thus infuse with
his own spirit, his own style, a complicated as well as
a simple subject. In Delilah we have an absolute con-
trast to the women of Rubens whose life, as some one
has said, is wholly on the surface. She is the very
embodiment of the passion that glows within her and
flames from her eyes. Only a master who knew how
to translate into colour and line the utmost refinements
of emotional experience could have expressed in this
countenance such mixed feelings as voluptuousness and
cruelty, pride and the joy of victory. |
Moreover, Rembrandt’s art has succeeded in making
us sympathize with the victor in this gruesome scene. In
Delilah we recognize the triumph of a subtile intelligence
_ over the gross folly of her lover. Yet we admire the way
in which one man struggles with the superior strength
of four and almost prevails against it. We look with
astonishment at these fighters’ fists, and believe in
their power to carry off the gates of cities and to break
the pillars of palaces in pieces. But as in all this ten-
sion of elemental force the mind, the soul, has no part,
we sympathize more with the mercenaries, for, worthy
representatives of the common sort, they are perform-
ing their task like men, in a careful and competent way.
Riegl once called the Hollanders the painters of atten-
tiveness. The Landsknecht is a striking example of this,
a true Dutch type, a combination of conscientiousness,
persistence, and unerring observation.
_ The Blinding of Samson breathes the spirit of the
[157]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
time as well as the spirit of the race. It dates from
that period of the artist’s life when he was most strongly
influenced by Baroque art, as may at once be seen
in apparently unimportant details. The canvas is al-
most square, with rounded upper corners, a form that
Rembrandt repeatedly chose — for example, for the
Sophonisba at Madrid, the Preaching of John the
Baptist at Berlin, and the Danae at St. Petersburg.
It is a form characteristic of the Baroque period which,
loving to break away from the simple proportions of
the Renaissance, used the oval in place of the circle,
and an oblong or only approximately square shape in
place of the actual square. So also it rounded the
corners of the upper part of a picture into shallow curves
instead of preserving the semicircular shape preferred
in Renaissance times. Probably the Blinding of Sam-
son was originally fitted into a slightly curved Baroque
frame.
All the decorations of the splendid scene are also
Baroque in taste —the draperies, the fantastic cos-
tumes, the vessels in the style of Lutma on the table,
and the various weapons which are specifically Baroque
in their outlines. For instance, for the dagger used to
blind the fallen Samson, Rembrandt chose not merely a
Javanese creese but one with a wavy blade; and this
dagger harmonizes with the short serpentine lines as-
sumed by the contours in all parts of the composition,
for wherever these seem to be elongated, as in the main
diagonals, they are always curved, to be cut off flat at
the ends or to form obtuse angles with lines that run
counter to them.
Finally, the distribution of the light is Baroque, and
[158 ]
REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
in a double sense. On one side it throws the figures
into more than half-relief; elsewhere it reduces them
almost to silhouettes. In both directions this exagger-
ation, if one dare call it so, was unknown to the Renais-
sance. To take an example from an allied art, we need
only compare a Renaissance medal — one of Pisanello’s,
say — with a Dutch medal of the seventeenth century.
The diversity in conception that marks the two periods
shows at once in the difference in the character of the
relief, the subject in the one case scarcely emerging
from the field while in the other it is raised so high
that the figures almost seem to be severed from the
background. Ina similar way the seventeenth-century
painters, markedly subjective in temperament, usually
show a tendency to let certain parts of a picture stand
out in front of its first plane. It is not needful to dwell
upon this in the case of painters like Rubens and Jor-
daens; but with Rembrandt too it often happens that
hands are stretched out to us, horses spring forward
from within the frame, and — the Night Watch is an
instance — figures appear to be stepping forth from
the canvas. About the year 1635 Rembrandt seems
to have made studies with such ends in view. His por-
trait of himself with a helmet at Cassel supplies a sort
of precedent for the two helmeted men who stand out
from the Blinding of Samson in such strong relief;
and later on we find in the Night Watch an analo-
gous figure of a soldier whose head is boldly modelled
out from the picture. This exaggerated kind of relief
is counterbalanced by the attenuation of substantial
things to shadowy outlines. These methods of treat-
ment, fully developed in Rococo art, had their begin-
[ 159 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
nings in Baroque art, and to no small degree in the art of
Rembrandt. As a rule Rembrandt depicts the shadow
that a figure casts upon the wall and fuses the figure with
the shadow or shows it as a silhouette upon a luminous
field, as in the early representation of the Supper at
Emmaus in the André Museum at Paris. A similar
although less conspicuous effect may be noted in the
treatment of our Landsknecht where the characteristic
contour, making the same demands as a silhouette, has
been studied with exceptional care.
But everything in this picture that expresses the
spirit of the time or the spirit of the race is comprised
in its expression of personal experience. In this respect
it is the chief monument of Rembrandt’s formative
period, which has been called his period of storm and
stress, and which coincided with the first happy years
of his married life with Saskia whose type of face may
be recognized in Delilah’s. It was then universally be-
lieved in Amsterdam that he was leading a riotous ex-
istence and squandering his possessions upon his young
wife.
The picture voices a delight in richness, splendour,
and profusion. It reminds us of some tale from the
Arabian Nights. Samson is clad in silk with a brightly
variegated girdle, Delilah is adorned with a filmy veil,
bracelets of pearl, and golden chains, and the soldiers
shine in burnished armour, richly chased weapons in
their hands and feathers on their heads. At this time
Rembrandt loved to give his personages full voluptuous
forms, and eyes such as he gave them neither in earlier
nor in later years, passionate eyes that turn a wide gaze
upon the world and drink in all they see. Even in his
[ 160 ]
REMBRANDT, THE BLINDING OF SAMSON (DETAIL)
STAEDEL INSTITUTE, FRANKFORT
REMBRANDT 'S BLINDING OF SAMSON
portraits he gave his sitters this look and surrounded
them with the splendour of jewels and rich stuffs. The
two portrait figures in the Liechtenstein Gallery at
Vienna, painted in all their pomp in the same year as
our picture, may well be compared with the heads of
Delilah and the Landsknecht.
In the paintings of this period, including the Blind-
ing of Samson, there is a threefold revelation of
Rembrandt’s mood. They reveal sensuality and cruelty
and, lying back of both these traits, a wild and
vague kind of excitement that drove the figures that
_grew beneath his hand into agitated tempestuous ac-
tion. More than once pictures like the Danae at
_$t. Petersburg and the idealized portrait of Saskia as
Flora, owned by the Duke of Buccleugh, have been
grouped together as betraying sensuality; and beside
them may be set the indecent sketches that give rein
_to the broad humour of a northern barbarian and even
_ inject it into Biblical scenes such as the Preaching of
_John the Baptist at Berlin. As sensuality and cruelty
are blood relations, it is not by chance that we find
compositions of this period that seem to reveal an
utter lack of feeling which Rembrandt less than any
one else might be expected to show. In the year 1635
he etched the Stoning of Stephen where one of the
executioners poises a huge stone that threatens to
crush the feeble and slender body of the saint. And
_ in the same category belong a number of representa-
tions of the Passion and certain other drawings — for
_ example, the Beheading of Holofernes where the trunk of
_ the dead man immediately confronts the spectator.
Examples of the expression of strong excitement
[161 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
need hardly be cited. Closely akin in spirit to the
Blinding of Samson is the Abraham’s Sacrifice of
the same year, particularly the second version of it
which is now at Munich. In the study for this, pre-
served in the British Museum, the fluttermg garments
and contorted limbs look as though they were caught
in a whirlwind. Another drawing, equally tumultuous,
the Christ Bearing the Cross in the Berlin Print
Room, vividly recalls our picture in its arrangement.
The Virgin, who is sinking back, and the woman be-
hind the cross, who is hurrying forward, may be com-
pared in their contrasted movements to the figures of
Samson and Delilah. In other cases where the con-
ception speaks less plainly of the passionate mood that
possessed Rembrandt at this time the technique shows
it clearly enough. In the drawings of these years the
pen bites deep into the paper, and restless confused
flourishes accompany the vigorous main lines.
This picture of the Blinding of Samson, which
gives the key to an understanding of all the forces
that swayed the artist during his period of storm and
stress, forces that elsewhere reveal themselves singly,
will not appeal to every one. It will not please the
feminine spirit which can seldom accept brutality even
when it assumes an artistic form. It will not content
the decadent sentimentalist who would rather see the
Landsknecht playing with his dagger in front of Samson’s
eyes, as Salome disports herself before the head of John
the Baptist in Quentin Metsys’ picture at Antwerp,
or who may crave a more definite portrayal of sensu-
ality than is attempted here, where the charm is broken
_ and the conflict ended. Nor will it satisfy those among
[ 162 ]
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REMBRANDT’S BLINDING OF SAMSON
the painter’s admirers who care only for the Rem-
brandt of those latter years when he was sinking
into depths of meditation. But how is it possible to
understand the final results of the life of such an artist
unless we accompany him along the path that led to
them?
Certainly there speak from his later works an un-
fathomable experience, an astonishing faculty of spirit-
ual perception, and a dominating sense of melancholy
calm that were not foretold in the works of earlier
years. But on the other hand his old age lacked what
the stormy transition period between youth and man-
hood had possessed — exultant joy, burning passion,
and confidence in his own boundless powers and in a
great future. It is by reason of these qualities that
Rembrandt’s earlier works instantly take us captive.
But we cannot have all of his characteristics in the
same work of art; there is not room in the soul for
storm and peacefulness to dwell together. And while
it may be that his later works should be more highly
prized than the earlier ones, while it may be that the
development of a great master always means progress,
nevertheless this much is certain: in many of the pic-
tures that Rembrandt painted between 1630 and 1640
he reached the very highest level. An incessant change
of problems is more conspicuous in his career than a
growth in ability; and criticism should not try to meas-
ure these steps if it is thereby tempted to depreciate
what is great in favour of something that may be even
greater.
[ 163 ]
IX
REMBRANDT’S REPRESENTATIONS
OF SUSANNA
E have long been accustomed to the unfa-
: \ ; vourable criticisms passed by mediocre painters
upon the works of other artists. Great paint-
ers are milder in their judgments. They may, indeed,
be gruff and evasive when they are in the creative mood,
preoccupied with themselves, or when they are forced to
put their views into words. Then, awkward perhaps
or scornful, they may over-emphasize an opinion. But
this is not their way in the pregnant moments when they
are gathering impressions for future use. Then they
are content with the humblest material that presents
itself. It almost seems as though they lingered longest
in front of the most commonplace examples of their art.
Perhaps the only way they can learn of others is by
using what they gather to express themselves, and are
therefore best pleased when not confronted by a very
lofty personality.
At times Rembrandt studied insignificant painters
like Marten van Heemskerk, a mannerist — not even
a refined but merely a clumsy mannerist — who has
[164 ]
P. LASTMAN, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
KAISER FRIEDRICH MUSEUM, BERLIN
ELDERS
NA AND THE
REMBRANDT (AFTER LASTMAN), SUSAN
BERLIN
PRINT ROOM,
A A tat
ee STO
REMBRANDT S REPRESENTATIONS. OF SUSANNA
hardly any importance to-day except from the historical
point of view. Rembrandt’s teacher, Pieter Lastman,
also seems to us to have little individuality, permanent
though the impression was that he made on the great
painter.
It has been pointed out that a well-known large red-
chalk drawing of Rembrandt’s, in the possession of
Léon Bonnat at Paris, reproduces a picture of Pieter
Lastman’s, now in private ownership in Russia, which
was famous in his time. A comparison of the large
drawing of Susanna in the Berlin Print Room with a
picture of Lastman’s in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum
shows a similar relationship, being, again, an almost
exact copy. So when we remember that in the Fried-
rich August Collection at Dresden there is a third
drawing in red chalk of about the same size, after
Leonardo’s Last Supper, it seems possible that all
these pages formed part of a sketchbook containing
copies by Rembrandt of the works of other masters.
It is not a thing to grieve about when scientific criti-
cism traces back to another artist some theme which
has been thought of Rembrandt’s own invention. We
admire him all the more when we see what he created
with the aid of the work that lay before him. Put
Lastman’s and Rembrandt’s paintings of Susanna
side by side and the distance between them seems
immeasurable. Psychological intention, material em-
bodiment, technique, even the fashioning of the figures
as regards external beauty — there is nothing in which
Rembrandt does not far surpass his predecessor. His
delicate charming creature with her shy gestures is like
thistledown compared to Lastman’s broad and heavy
[165 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
figure sitting in a bundle of clothes on a misshapen
stone sphynx. As light as the ripples that lave her
feet she slips into the water, the supple body obeying an
agile spirit, while with Lastman’s Susanna the form
responds to the spirit with an evident indolence. Rem-
brandt’s Susanna is in strong illumination as the
centre of the scheme of lighting; everything around
her, including the two elders, sinks into shadow. With
Lastman the graybeard is too prominent. He stands
like an Italian draped statue but blank and meaning-
less, for neither in the structure of his body nor in the
folds of his garment is there a trace of beauty. His
face is almost concealed, and so is that of the other
elder in which we might expect to find a reflection of the
action. The gestures of both are importunate but not
at all expressive; one trembles with excitement — to
the spectator he seems. almost comical — while the
second, likewise draped in the Italian manner, makes
pathetic signs behind Susanna’s back although she can-
not see him. Rembrandt’s elders, on the other hand,
are full of a glowing sensuality that speaks from the
hasty steps with which they come forward, and from
their loose and bulging garments. How repulsive are
their faces distorted by desire, how ardent are their
glances, almost overpassing the goal in their excitement,
how vulgarly one of them laughs with pinched nostrils
while the other protrudes his lips and by the fist that he
holds up to his mouth betrays the import of his whispers!
The great advance in plastic feeling that marked the
thirty years between Lastman’s painting and Rem-
brandt’s shows also in the different way of indicating
depth in the picture. Rembrandt’s foliage, instead of
[ 166 ]
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
PRINT ROOM, BERLIN
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
PRINT ROOM, AMSTERDAM
REMBRANDT 'S REPRESENTATIONS OF SUSANNA
forming a flat dark wall as it does in the earlier work,
arches into broad masses defined by streams of light.
In place of the rectangular palace with its lean sil-
houette a heavily massed circular building soars high
above the splendid terraces that encircle it. And here
the three figures clearly mark three successive degrees of
distance, while with Lastman two are in the same plane
and the third is too much in shadow to help much in the
indication of depth.
It is true that Lastman’s picture bears witness to
well-trained powers and an upright sturdy spirit, but
they are shallow powers, a shallow spirit, as compared
with the sagacity, the brilliancy, the profound intelli-
gence of Rembrandt. Thus all of Lastman’s pictures
dwindle to insignificance if contrasted even with the
awkward juvenile essays of his great pupil. They may
serve us as milestones with which to measure the long
road that from this point of departure Rembrandt
traversed.
As regards his portrayals of Susanna, the first
step is marked by the red-chalk drawing at Berlin.
In spite of the rapidity with which it must have been
done, it betters the original at more than one point.
In particular the bearing of the hesitating elder has
grown more dignified; he is hoping to make an impres-
sion by a convincing display of self-restraint. Su-
sanna’s glance is now almost devoid of fear and is much
more intense and repellent. The second elder is
more prominent, the mantle has fallen from his face,
and he seems to be grasping Susanna by the hair.
Were the sketch carried farther the expression of his
face, important as explanatory of the action, would be
[ 167 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
more clearly marked than it is with Lastman. A
change in a subordinate feature of the composition also
shows the desire to give the action more point: with
Lastman both the peacocks sit quietly on the branches;
with Rembrandt one of them flutters up as the old man
comes too near him.
A pen-drawing of about the year 1635, which is also
in the Berlin Print Room, where almost all of Rem-
brandt’s studies of Susanna chance to be gathered
together, marks a second step away from Lastman.
In the action as well as in the penstrokes it reveals
the vehement agitation of this period of the artist’s
life. Susanna is crouching in terror and _ shielding
breast and body with her hands, for the elders are
close upon her. Intending to seize her, one of them has
set his foot on her stone seat but draws back as she
impetuously turns her head. The other is pointing
excitedly over her head into the distance — a gesture
which is not clearly connected with the action but is
intended, perhaps, merely to enhance the effect of Su-
sanna’s hasty movement. She is, indeed, still seated
with her feet together as in Lastman’s picture, but
in the elasticity of her body we read the impulse to
rise.
The same idea is expressed more fully in the picture
in the Mauritshuis at the Hague, painted most prob-
ably in 1637. Susanna is advancing her feet for flight
as she thrusts them into her slippers, and at the same
time is trying to screen her body. The rendering of
the movement that indicates this double intention pro-
claims the power of Rembrandt’s art, for it bears
witness to the great freedom of spirit that he bestowed
[ 168 ]
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA
MAURITSHUIS, THE HAGUE
REMBRANDT’S REPRESENTATIONS OF SUSANNA
upon his figures. Such differentiations would have
been impossible to Lastman. Characteristic of Rem-
brandt again is a detail which, hindering the action,
emphasizes the emotional disturbance — the failure of
one of the feet to find its way into the slipper.*
In the presence of the original of this picture it may
often have been remarked that the treatment of the
foliage to the right of Susanna with its cabbage-like
forms, and of the garments with their crisped and wavy
folds, conspicuously recalls Lastman’s work. This re-
semblance, exceptional at this period of Rembrandt’s
career, is explained by our knowledge of the fact that
he had recently been studying one of his master’s most
important canvases. |
All the rest of Rembrandt’s representations of Su-
sanna at the Bath, with the exception of one drawing
of later date, group themselves around the Berlin pic-
ture. They include two studies in oil with the single
figure of Susanna, one of which is in the Louvre and
the other in Bonnat’s possession, and two drawings —
a crayon-drawing at Berlin,j likewise portraying Su-
sanna, and a detailed composition in pen-and-ink at
*In a similar way the St. Jerome in Ecstasy in an early work, which we know only
in the print by Vlietsch, is losing one slipper, and so, in the picture at St. Peters-
burg, is the Prodigal Son as he begs his father for forgiveness. The creators of
the modern psychological novel are not the first to observe that at critical moments
in the life of the soul the attention may be focussed upon unworthy trifles.
TIn my opinion Hofstede de Groot in his catalogue of Rembrandt’s drawings, and
_ Bode in the third volume of his book on Rembrandt, date these drawings ten years
too early (about 1635-37). The turn of the head and the position of the back
correspond with the picture at Berlin, and the model wears the same cap as in the
studies in oil at Paris. About the year 1645 Rembrandt commonly used this black
_ crayon for his drawings, as in the sketches for the young girl at Dulwich College
and for the old woman at St. Petersburg, in studies of beggars, and in landscape
sketches.
[ 169 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Amsterdam.* As Herr Hofstede de Groot kindly
informs me, there are furthermore two studies, un-
known to me, for one of the Jews in the Berlin picture —
a sketch in oils owned by Léon Nardus of Suresnes near
Paris and a drawing in the Heseltine Collection at
London.
In painting the Berlin picture Rembrandt probably
had the earlier one, the one now at the Hague, under his
eyes, for it is hardly conceivable that otherwise he could
have reproduced the pose so exactly, especially as regards
the lower part of the body. But the type of face has
changed. Instead of the elongated type recalling Sas-
kia we have now the rounder, more childlike girl’s face
that begins to appear in Rembrandt’s work somewhere
about the year 1647 — the type of Hendrickje.t The
whole conception has become tenderer and more
charming as appears if we compare, for example, the
Berlin sketch for the picture at the Hague with the
very delightful childlike composition at Amsterdam
which, dating from about 1645, is, on the other hand,
a study for the Berlin picture. Instead of a bold out-
break of gross passion we have an eager but almost
harmless pursuit, a game between two comically elo-
quent old men and a child whose hair, loosened in her
fright, falls in thin strands as though it were wet.
In both of the pictures, because of the slower
*The very elaborate drawing at Budapest (reproduced in the Publikation der AI-
bertinazeichnungen and recently in Graul, Finfzig Handzeichnungen Rembrandt's,
Leipzig, 1906) is certainly not an original, but is probably a pupil’s copy from the
picture, and was therefore quite rightly rejected by Hofstede de Groot.
{I still adhere to the belief I have already expressed that by this time Hendrickje
was living with Rembrandt and influencing the type of his female figures. Com-
pare also in this connection Charles Sedelmeyer’s essay of 1912 on the Woman
Taken in Adultery of the Weber Collection.
[170]
NITUGA ‘WAASOW HOMGAINA YASIVY
SYddTa AHL GNV VNNVSOS ‘LONVUGNAY
a ee ee se
EE
oot rng er
REMBRANDT’S REPRESENTATIONS OF SUSANNA
process of painting in oil, the conception has grown
quieter and psychologically more complicated. At the
same time it has grown less naive, for the fact that
Susanna is looking out from the picture indicates a
thought of the spectator. By this means Rembrandt
avoided that over-abrupt turning of Susanna’s head
toward the elders which had not been successful with
Lastman and which has a touch of exaggeration in his
own first drawing. Perhaps, too, Rembrandt was no
longer pleased with the rather heavy line of the back
and shoulders in the earlier picture, for he begins to
work at it in the studies for the picture at Berlin. In
the crayon-drawing and in both the Paris studies in oil
he pays particular attention to the articulation of the
arm at the shoulder, to the back, and to the muscles of
the neck at the turn of the head; the study in the Louvre
is especially careful in regard to the left foot and the
arrangement of the drapery which forms along the
back a fold ready for the elder’s grasp; and the sketch
owned by Bonnat is concerned with the facial expres-
sion. As a result, the line of Susanna’s back is more
vital in the later than in the earlier painting and wins
an added grace from the concave curves at the neck
and the hip. The last trace of materiality that clung
to the figure has disappeared.
Once again, about ten years later, Rembrandt re-
turned in a passing way to the same subject, in a pen-
drawing now at Berlin. As is usual in the works of
his old age, he no longer seeks for new subjects. He
is content to simplify or, if you will, to repeat in a
blunter fashion what he had thought out at an earlier
time. In the grouping of the figures and the attitude
[171]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
of each of them there is a close likeness to the Berlin
picture, but the subtile interpretation of the essence of
the theme has been foregone and the mystical glamour
has vanished. There is now no pleasant hollow among
verdant branches, no soft murmur of foliage, no radi-
ance of scattered light. Broad clusters of leafage con-
verge from the two sides, forbidding to the eye any
glimpse into the distance. The expression of sensuality
is more pronounced. The figures stand closer together
and nearer to the spectator; they are larger in propor-
tion to the space and their attitudes are less complex,
being reduced to a couple of strongly angular move-
ments. Accessories are renounced, the composition
that encloses the figures on the right hand and the left
is of narrower shape, and the contrast between the
nude female figure and the architecture that enframes
the group in a broad symmetrical fashion is more
strongly marked. Nor does Susanna now slip away,
light-footed, from her pursuers. She is standing up to
her knees in the water; escape is impossible.
We can hardly help wondering at the consistent way
in which, during so long a period, Rembrandt’s imagi-
nation worked upon this series of representations of
Susanna. Between one and another of them there lay
hundreds of sketches and completed works inspired by
different themes and ideas, and only im a single instance
can we perhaps plausibly assume that the artist had
an earlier version of his subject actually under his eyes.
We wonder whether at other times he may have re-
membered with distinctness one of the sketches done
several years before. But it seems more probable that
his nature remained from first to last essentially so
[ 172 |
———— _ a
REMBRANDT, SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS
PRINT ROOM, BERLIN
REMBRANDT S REPRESENTATIONS OF SUSANNA
unchanged that the same subject always suggested to
his imagination a picture of fundamentally the same
kind. In truth, Rembrandt’s whole development, which
seems to us so rich, was simply a development in the
outward shaping of ideas which had possessed him from
the very beginning.
PES phere Te,
[173]
X.
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
R a S is less well represented in American
collections than the other great masters of the
seventeenth century — than Rembrandt, Frans
Hals, or Vermeer, than Velasquez or van Dyck. I have
~ seen about forty of his pictures, some twenty of them
sketches and most of them unpublished, but this is a
very small number compared with those preserved
in Europe where there must be almost a thousand.
America has now about one eighth of the pictures of
Rembrandt (about eighty in a total of six hundred and
sixty) and of Velasquez (about twelve in one hundred);
it has one sixth of those by Frans Hals (about fifty in
three hundred) and almost one fourth of Vermeer’s
(about eight in thirty-seven); and if it has relatively
fewer of van Dyck’s (about forty in a total of eight
hundred), the level of excellence is all the higher, espe-
cially in the pictures of his Genoese period.
While the great private collections of America long
since admitted van Dyck, they open their doors more
hesitatingly to his great master. In the Altman, Frick,
and Huntington Collections in New York Rubens is
[ 174 ]
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
not represented at all. Mrs. Gardner of Boston has
only one portrait, Mr. Widener of Philadelphia only a
single sketch. ‘The laudable exception is Mr. Johnson
of Philadelphia who has a special liking for Rubens’
studies and owns almost one fourth of the works from
his hand that have thus far crossed the ocean. As in
general the great collectors still show so little interest
in Rubens, small examples are more numerous than
large and finished pictures intended for a church or a
palace. But this is not a matter for regret to any one
who wishes to speak of them, for by common consent
Rubens’ sketches reveal the very essence of his genius.
To express these new-born ideas, which are conceived
in the joyous mood of a discoverer and do not seem to
ask for a more explicit rendering, Rubens used canvas
and brush, whereas Rembrandt, whose work tends more
toward monochrome, generally sketched his composi-
tions with a pen on paper. Such drawings in crayon
and in pen-and-ink as Rubens did produce are almost
all careful preparatory studies for certain parts of his
large paintings. Therefore his sketches in oil hold the
same place in his work that is held in Rembrandt’s
by the compositions that we find among his drawings.
And the same difficulties attend a study of the one
group and the other. We might suppose that it would
be particularly hard to imitate great artists in their
hasty sketches, but Rubens’ sketches in oil, ike Rem-
brandt’s drawings, were so cleverly copied by his pu-
pils that their transcripts, unless betrayed by a direct
comparison with the originals, might usually be mis-
taken for them. Three or four instances of this simi-
larity occur in the series representing the story of
[175 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Achilles, of which I shall speak again on a later page;
the first studies, smal] in size, recur two or three times,
and there is also a series of rather larger ones which
are likewise so broadly and sketchily handled that if
the originals were unknown we should hardly think of
them as done in part by pupils.
In considering the works by Rubens in American col-
lections we may group together the pictures of the first
half of his career, from about 1603 to 1620. The most
important of the finished compositions of this period
are the double portrait owned by Mrs. Robert: D.
Evans of Boston and the Wolf and Fox Hunt in the
Metropolitan Museum of Art at New York, but a few
sketches and large pictures are of earlier date than these.
The Marriage of St. Catherine in the collection
of Mr. Rodman Wanamaker of Philadelphia, known
through the reproduction in Rosenberg’s Klasstker der
Kunst, is thought to be the earliest Rubens in America.
Waagen was the first to point out that this rather timid
piece of work must date from the end of Rubens’ Italian
period, from about the year 1604. Dr. Gliick attrib-
utes it, probably with justice, to one of Rubens’ pupils,
Jan Boeckhorst. I have not as yet had access to the
picture.
A Crucifixion owned by Mr. Johnson brings us to the
time of that great unfolding of the artist’s powers in
official ecclesiastical paintings which brought him world-
wide fame, the time of the Raising of the Cross
and the Descent from the Cross in the cathedral at
Antwerp. Mr. Johnson’s picture, painted about 1610
and perhaps not entirely by Rubens’ own hand, is a
variant of the oft-recurring composition with a simpler
[176 ]
VIHdTdaV1IHd ‘NOSNHOf ‘D ‘f ‘UW AO NOLLOATIOO
SQOWdY GNV SOTOWOU ‘SNUG
—- i
7?
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
and more sympathetically studied landscape. Although
the dramatic success of such scenes merits the highest
admiration, their passionate appeal to the spectator is
so undisguised that they can hardly stir his deepest
emotions.
In a sketch in the same collection, showing Paul and
Barnabas at Lystra, and probably painted about 1612,
the pagan priests are trying to prevent the followers of
Christ from denouncing their idolatrous rites. The
varied play of gesture in this row of similar figures and
the great diversity of their attitudes, arranged though
they are with their heads at the same level, remind one
of the Woman Taken in Adultery, at Brussels, and
the Diogenes, at Frankfort. Characteristic of the
style of this period are the tight contours of the heads,
the heavy elongated folds of the draperies, and certain
masculine types such as the high priest and the bearded
old man with bent head in the centre of the composi-
tion. The sketch, which has been somewhat repainted,
is done chiefly in brown slightly tinged with green and
yellow in the illumined parts.
To realize Rubens’ marvellous versatility we may
compare these studies with one, a little later in date,
of the Childhood of Romulus and Remus, also in Mr.
Johnson’s collection. Here there is nothing of the
conventional ecclesiasticism of the Crucifixions and
nothing of the impassioned yet monumental action of
the scene at Lystra. The buoyant spirit of the artist
has turned a cold allegorical theme, the glorification of
the founding of Rome, into a delightful genre-picture
with a landscape setting. Roma, the young mother,
is trying in vain to keep both her sturdy struggling
[177]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
boys on her lap; one of them is clambering up to his
father, Mars arrayed for battle, who has plucked a
fruit from the tree for him, while the other leans back
toward the wolf that gently submits to be stroked. A
shepherd, a satyr, and Father Tiber, lying at his ease
among the reeds, take pleasure in the charming scene.
It is a masterpiece, this study, in the art of grouping.
Each figure is in natural and animated relations with
the others, and the artist’s imexhaustible dramatic
power, which can never let his figures come to rest, has
given them here a delightful eloquence. The joyous
mood of the sunny landscape is reflected in the spring-
like colours of the costumes, a tender blue and a pale
rose-colour standing out. against the thinly brushed-in
brown of the background. Only one picture by Ru-
bens of Romulus and Remus has hitherto been known,
the familiar one, dating from about 1607, in the Capitol '
at Rome. The present study may be identical with —
the sketch mentioned in the inventory of the Lunden
family, who were kinsmen of Rubens, and perhaps also
with the work that in 1781 Sir Joshua Reynolds saw
in the house of Danoot, a banker at Brussels.
An authentic work, probably of the year 1615, is the
Bestowal of the Keys, formerly owned by Mr. W. R.
Bacon and more recently by Blakeslee the art dealer —
in New York —a picture that was shown to the Euro-
pean public at the Brussels Exhibition a few years ago.
In the solid effect of the red and yellow hues and in the
heavy handling it resembles the Doubting Thomas
at Antwerp and the Penitent Sinners in the Presence of
Christ at Munich, which are similar in composition and
were painted at the same time. |
[178 ]
|
!
q
RUBENS, PORTRAIT OF A MAN AND HIS WIFE
COLLECTION OF MRS. R. D. EVANS, BOSTON
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
To this time must also belong the striking double
portrait owned by Mrs. Robert D. Evans of Boston.
Here the difficult problem of uniting two persons in
one picture is solved by the use of a diagonal arrange-
ment, frequently employed by Rubens and also by
Rembrandt, which comports with the preference for
asymmetry that characterized the Baroque period.
The woman is seated, the man is standing behind her,
and the two figures are bound together by the light
that, falling on both the heads, is carried in a slanting
direction to the woman’s bodice and hands. Com-
bining in a rare degree the careful rendering of details
and a personal succinct manner of presentation, Rubens
has portrayed the inmost nature of the two simple
burghers — the man with the frank, naively sensuous
temperament, and the blooming young woman with the
roguish smile and the enticing upward glance which
van Dyck, adding a touch of theatrical subtilty, so
often gave his sitters. The straightforward realism
of the picture and the smoothness of the handling re-
call the best works of Cornelis de Vos, while in breadth
of style and in the vitality of the figures it reminds us
of Jordaens, although both these painters lacked the
keenness of perception and the highly intellectual
power of characterization revealed by the expressive
heads. Even though a portrait was in question Jor-
daens, to whom this one has sometimes been attributed,
would have been more attracted by the externals than
by the spirit of his theme, as is proved by his master-
piece in portraiture, his own likeness in the Uffizi.
Here we have the same type, but in comparison with
the head in Rubens’ picture the features lack nobility,
[ 179 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
the mouth is coarser, the eyes are duller. Comparing,
again, the woman’s head with the one in the Family
of Jordaens at Madrid, I am tempted to believe that |
the double portrait represents Jordaens and his wife.
If so, it must have been painted in 1616, the year when
Jordaens married Catherine Noort, and is a beautiful |
memorial of the friendship between the two comrades
in the studio of Adam Noort, Rubens’ teacher and Jor-
daens’ father-in-law.
The large Wolf and Fox Hunt in the Metropoli-
tan Museum takes us from the artist’s intimate sur-
roundings to that phase of his activity in which he met
the requirements of foreign aristocrats.
While his great devotional altar-pieces established
his fame in the high ecclesiastical circles of Flanders,
the large hunting scenes produced between 1612 and
1616 seem to have carried it into the aristocratic cir-
cles of foreign lands, and especially of England. As is
well known, the Wolf Hunt of the New York Mu-
seum, which has been published several times in recent
years, came from Lord Ashburton’s collection and is
considered a replica of a still larger canvas that the
Duke of Aerschot obtained from Rubens and that is
thought to be lost. A letter, published by Rooses,* _
from the agent Toby Mathew to Sir Dudley Carleton, |
who was for a time ambassador of England at the
Hague, tells us more about this larger picture. Carle-
ton had caused an offer for the first version of the Wolf
Hunt to be submitted to Rubens who refused it as too
low. The Duke of Aerschot had then got ahead of the —
Englishman and had paid the artist’s price, about |
*D’euvre de P. P. Rubens. Vol. II, p. 93.
[ 180 ]
AND FOX HUNT
WOLF
RUBENS,
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART,
NEW YORK
SEA te oars
Stes Rate
eae
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
£100. Thereupon Mathew urged Sir Dudley not to
be dissatisfied, proposing that he should secure a some-
what smaller replica which could be had for the sum
he was willing to pay. Rubens, he said, had seen
that the first picture was too large, that it could be
hung only in the apartments of a great palace, and,
because of his liking for the subject, had painted another
which measured only 7 by 10 feet whereas the first
measured between 11 and 12 by 18 feet. Apparently,
Sir Dudley Carleton obtained this second canvas which
Rooses has identified with the one in the possession
of Lord Methuen. It does not seem very probable
that in addition to these two pictures Rubens painted
a third, of about the same size as the first, and that all
knowledge of it has been lost. It is easier to suppose
that the New York picture is the one acquired by the
Duke of Aerschot. The difference in dimensions evi-
dently prevented Rooses from so deciding, But if we
compare the New York picture with Soutman’s en-
graving we see that it has been considerably cut down on
all sides, and especially at top and bottom; and if we add
the missing strips we have a canvas of about 10 by
163 feet, which is not very far from the dimensions given
by Toby Mathew. Moreover, technically considered,
the New York picture is all of a piece, and this confirms
the supposition that it was the first, for the original
rendering of the subject would be much less likely
than the third to show collaboration in any marked
degree. Such a threefold division of the work as has
sometimes been assumed, giving the animals to Snyders,
the landscape to Wilders, and the rest to Rubens, is
hardly credible. It is unlikely that Rubens asked
[181 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Wilders’ aid for the little stretch of landscape, very
freely painted, that he himself could have brushed-in
in a few minutes. And neither in action nor in tech-
nique do the animals suggest Snyders; on the contrary,
they show how greatly, even in this direction, Rubens
excelled him.
If we must assume the collaboration of pupils, the
most plausible supposition is that, after Rubens had
reproduced his sketch at full size, he left the general exe-
cution to his assistants but finally went over the whole
thing with his own hand. This would explain why the
general effect of the picture is rather hard and why,
nevertheless, we can everywhere trace the brushstrokes
of the master himself. Naturally, the final retouching
by Rubens precludes any attempt to separate the work
of different hands. In style the picture is very like
the Wild Boar Hunt at Marseilles, also engraved by
‘Soutman, in which we find again the type of the horn-
blower and of the lady on horseback.
It seems as though Rubens had determined to por-
tray all the different ways of hunting wild beasts that
were practised in Europe or, according to hearsay, in
the Orient. Besides the wild bear and the wolf hunts
there are well-known lion and bear hunts, stag hunts,
crocodile and hippopotamus hunts. And to these may
be added a hitherto unknown sketch of a steer hunt,
owned by Ehrich, the New York art dealer, which is
probably a reproduction of the smaller study that was
sold at the Sedelmeyer auction in 1907.
This sketch is composed like a frieze within a long and
narrow frame, a shape for which Rubens often showed a
preference in the latter part of his life. Probably it
[ 182 ]
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
dates from about 1635, but in view of its subject it may
best be considered in connection with the other hunting
pieces. Such scenes of combat as these that Rubens
created, scenes so absolutely convincing in their dra-
matic power, have no parallel in the history of European
art. In this steer hunt the movement of the animals,
rushing headlong at their topmost speed, is rendered
with the same keenness of observation that we find in
oriental art, and, moreover, the action, which in ori-
ental art is almost always in one direction, or is sus-
tained by symmetrically advancing groups, here brings
into equilibrium two counter-movements of equal force,
the participants coming from opposite directions and
crashing together in the centre in a wild medley where
the eye can but slowly discover the organic relation-
ships of the component parts. The dramatic content
corresponds exactly to this external arrangement. It
is an ever-renewed surprise to find that the fury which
produced such a turmoil was not miscalculated. The
dramatic crisis in a hunting scene is usually the mo-
ment when the bold hunters are in greatest danger from
the wounded beast yet their victory is nevertheless
foreseen. In the present picture the steer has attacked
in his blind rage the horse of one of the hunters who,
pale of face and scarcely able to hold his lance, is falling
from the saddle; but the fatal stroke has already been
planted between the horns of the bull, and the superior
strength of the assailants who, on foot and on horse-
back and helped by their dogs, press in with lance and
sword, leaves the outcome in no doubt.
Furthermore, we have a study of the Adoration
of the Kings, in the collection of Sir William Van
[ 183 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Horne at Montreal, and two studies of the heads of the
oldest two of the Kings, owned by Mrs. Charles H.
Senff of New York, which were all painted at the end of
the second decade of the century. The studies of heads
were last seen in Europe in 1881, in the Wilson Col-
lection,* which contained also the third King of the
same series, a study that was lent to the Brussels Ex-
hibition by Heer van Gelder of Uccle. These three
pictures prove that, although the current belief that
finished reproductions of parts of Rubens’ well-known
compositions are not his own work is usually correct,
sometimes it is mistaken. In the year 1618, as Rooses
discovered, Rubens made separate replicas of the heads
of the Three Kings in his great altar-piece at Mechlin
for the three sons of Balthasar Moretus, in whose family
the eldest three sons were always named for the Three
Kings. The identity of the New York pictures and the
one at Uccle with these replicas is established beyond a
doubt bythe vigour of the handling and the freedom with
which details of the Mechlin altar-piece are altered.
On the other hand, Sir William Van Horne’s sketch
of the Adoration of the Kings, likewise autographic,
is a preparatory study for a large altar-piece. In
general it corresponds with the main group in the pic-
ture of the same name at Munich, painted in 1619 for
the Count Palatine Wolfgang Wilhelm von Neuburg.
The divergencies prove that it is not a copy but an
initial version, and in vitality of effect it surpasses
the altar-piece which was executed for the most part
by pupils.
Rubens once wrote: “I realize that I am by nature
_ *M. Rooses, L’wuvre de P. P. Rubens. Vol. I, p. 172.
[ 184 ]
MUOA
MON *‘SHAMNOK WaAAWYALNOD ‘SUN AO NOILOAUTIOO
SdOD WHL JO LSVad V ‘SSNHgTOY
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
more inclined to produce very large works than little
curiosities.’’ He must have known in which direction
his ability was greatest. Yet he sometimes ventured
with singular success into regions outside of his true
field, as when he collaborated with Pieter Breughel
the Elder, a painter whose concern was precisely with
“little curiosities.”” It seems as though an external
impulse may sometimes stimulate the powers of great
artists. For example, neither Frans Hals nor van Dyck
often created anything more perfect than the little
portraits that they prepared for the engraver’s use on a
scale to which they were unaccustomed. So, too, the art
of Rubens seems to be brought to a focus in the small
pictures he painted with Breughel, one of the most
beautiful of which is in America, the Feast of the Gods
in the collection of Mrs. Samuel Untermyer at Yonkers
near New York.
We are not very well pleased to-day by the idea of a
collaboration between artists as dissimilar as Rubens
and Breughel. We have a keener desire than prevailed
in their time to understand the personality of a painter,
and, easily finding the line between the handiwork of
these two, we are tempted to draw comparisons. The
result is unfavourable to Breughel who holds about the
same place in relation to Rubens as does Gerard Dou
in relation to Rembrandt. In dwelling upon details
he loses the thread of the narrative and, notwithstand-
ing all his care, produces only cold and unnatural com-
positions, while Rubens seems to mock at this confused
kind of miniature-painting with the glimmering joy-
ous beauty of nude bodies that stand out, plastically
rounded, in the light of a southern sun.
[ 185 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
In his designs for tapestries Rubens adopted per-
force the same careful manner of treatment within a
small space, for he was obliged to facilitate to the
utmost the task of the pupils to whom the enlargement
of the sketches was entrusted. During the last twenty
years of his life he prepared designs for three sets of tap-
estries: in 1621 or 1622 for a History of Constantine,
between 1626 and 1628 for a Triumph of Dogma,
and between 1630 and 1635 for a History of Achilles.
Several sketches with scenes from these series are
owned in America, and they afford a good chance to
learn how complicated is the task of distinguishing
Rubens’ own handiwork from studio copies.
Perhaps the most beautiful of these sketches is the
one, belonging to the first series, that is reproduced
in Rosenberg’s Klassiker der Kunst (p. 231) and is now
owned by Mr. Johnson. The Emblem of Christ Ap-
pearing to the Emperor Constantine is depicted in light
and brilliant colours with a sensitive feeling for the
sparkling airy vitality of the sunbeams, and this burst
of light from heaven floods the groups of warriors that
crowd around the young emperor, attracting as though
in a magnetic stream the glances of the rhythmically
moving figures.
The second and longest sequence of tapestries, which
presents a complicated allegory in fifteen pictures, con-
sists, as Rooses explains, of three parts, showing the tri-
umph of the eucharist over its enemies, the incidents in
Old Testament history that are prophetic of the euchar-
ist, and the portraits of the evangelists, the fathers of
the church, the sovereigns, and the popes who were
defenders of the eucharist. To the second part belong
[ 186 ]
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
the two sketches now in America — the Meeting of
Abraham and Melchizedek in the Johnson Collection
and a sacrificial scene from the Old Testament that has
been offered for sale in New York. There are several
versions of almost all the sketches of this series. Mr.
Johnson’s, which is probably identical with the one cited
by Rooses as in the possession of Mr. Spencer F. A.
Smith at Clifton Hill in England, may be found again
in the Prado and also in Lord Northbrook’s collection,
and the other corresponds with a design owned by Lord
Spencer who also owns the original design for the bor-
der of the tapestry. Both the sketches now in Amer-
ica are freely and surely handled, much in the great
painter’s own manner. If no duplicates were known,
the idea that they may be studio copies would never
suggest itself.
Still more complicated is the question of the authen-
ticity of the designs for the third set of tapestries,
dealing with the story of Achilles. The six pictures
owned by Lord Barrymore in London, and exhibited
at the Grafton Galleries a few years ago, are considered
by almost every one the original sketches. They in-
clude: (1) Thetis Dipping Achilles in the Styx; (2) Chiron
Training the Young Achilles; (3) Thetis Causing Vul-
can to Forge the Weapons; (4) Achilles and Agamemnon
Contending for Briseis; (5) The Death of Hector; (6)
The Death of Achilles. But as one of the sets of tapes-
tries that were made from these designs was among
Rubens’ effects at the time of his death, and as it
consisted of ten pieces, it seems as though four of the
original sketches must be missing from Lord Barrymore’s
series. On the other hand, the engravings made by
[ 187 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Ertringer in 1679 show only eight designs, the two that
are lacking in Lord Barrymore’s series being: (7) Achil-
les Among the Daughters of Lycomedes, and (8) The
Return of Briseis to Achilles. It has therefore been
supposed that the set consisted of only eight pictures,
and that two of the ten in Rubens’ possession were
duplicates. But this can hardly be correct. More
likely a ninth design is preserved in a tapestry which is
now owned by Mr. George-Robert White in Boston and
which, as it portrays Thetis Consulting the Oracle in
Regard to the Young Achilles, may well be the first of
the series. Consequently we may believe that there
was originally a tenth picture which has since disap-
peared.
Two sketches with the missing scenes 7 and 8 are in
American collections — the one with Briseis owned by
Mr. Jacob H. Schiff in New York, the one with Achilles
Among the Daughters of Lycomedes in the Wilstach
Collection in the Fairmount Park Museum at Phil-
adelphia; but their size and their technical character-
istics prove that they do not belong with Lord Bar-
rymore’s. Rooses notes that in 1643 designs for the
Achilles sequence were in the possession of Daniel
Fourment, Rubens’ father-in-law. Beyond a doubt
these were the originals. They were painted on wood,
as are Lord Barrymore’s sketches. But Mr. Schiff’s
Briseis sketch is on canvas (not transferred from wood)
and is larger by a few centimetres than the correspond-
ing sketches in England. It belongs, as does the sketch
of the Death of Achilles in the Berlin Museum, to a
second series of studies which, although hardly inferior
in quality to the first, can only be a studio replica. On
[188 ]
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PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
the other hand, the little picture of Achilles Among the
Daughters of Lycomedes in the Philadelphia Museum
is painted on wood and looks authentic but lacks
the border that completes the sketches in England.
And it is not very probable that sketches of this kind,
without the border, are originals, for it appears that
Rubens always designed the borders with the pictures.
In fact, his patterns for tapestries excel in just this
respect those of other painters, the borders for which
were often separately treated or were even borrowed
from other sets of tapestries.
From Rubens’ sketches his pupils — according to
Rooses, Theodor van Tulden in particular — executed
larger pictures, measuring about 107 by 108 centimetres,
which were sent as patterns to the tapestry works and
there, most probably, transferred to large cartoons.*
As Rubens himself retouched these pictures, they are so
admirably effective in execution that only close study
reveals the handiwork of pupils. Until a few years ago
*T may note in passing a few more studio replicas of sketches by Rubens that are
owned in America. In the Museum of Fine Arts at Boston there is a study for the
great altar-piece of 1628 in the Church of the Augustins at Antwerp, but it is infe-
rior in quality to the autographic sketches at Frankfort and Berlin. That a little
picture of St. Theresa Interceding with Christ, owned by Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan
and now in the Metropolitan Museum at New York, was painted from the altar-
piece and is not a study for it has already been pointed out by Rooses who saw the
picture in the collection of the king of Belgium. Of small importance is also the
little picture of the Repentant Magdalene now in the collection of Senator Wil-
liam A. Clark in New York and formerly owned by an art dealer in Vienna. It is
reproduced in Rosenberg’s Klassiker der Kunst as an original, but it is not, as Ro-
senberg thought, identical with the life-size painting of the same subject now in the
Linde Collection and formerly in New York. I cannot agree with Rooses that this
is the original and that a third and larger version in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum
at Berlin (formerly in the royal palace) is an enlargement made by pupils. On the
contrary, the Berlin example is, artistically, the best, and the pictures in the Linde
and Clarke Collections are studio copies of portions of it.
[ 189 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
eight pictures of this series were in the possession of the
Duke of Infantado at Madrid; then six of them passed
into the collection of the Duchess of Pastrana, and the
remaining two into the Salamanca Collection. The
duchess gave two of her six to the museum at Pau; a
third, representing Thetis Dipping Achilles Into the
Styx, came through the Parisian art dealer Pacully
into the possession of Dr. John E. Stillwell of New York;
a fourth, showing Achilles Among the Daughters of
Lycomedes recently appeared in the German art market.
It is small wonder that the sketches for this set of
tapestries should have been copied. Surely, never
before or since has the story of Achilles been more ad-
mirably illustrated. Rubens’ enthusiasm for classic an-
tiquity, his profound understanding of the spirit of the
ancient writers, and his ability to shape a world of
beauty analogous to theirs, enabled him to create by
means of only a few figures dramatic pictures of Ho-
meric simplicity and grandeur. The figure of Achilles
with his lust for combat and victory and his propensity
for heroic suffering must have taken a strong hold on
the artist whose own life was a whirlwind. It expresses
more of Rubens’ own feeling than we find elsewhere.
How clearly the inner conflict is portrayed on the
countenance of Achilles where he rushes in threatening
wrath upon Agamemnon who has robbed him of Briseis,
or where Minerva masters him, grasping him by his
blond and flowing hair! How deeply he is stirred by
conflicting emotions where Briseis is given back to
him! The grief he had felt at the bier of his friend Pa-
troclus still speaks from his features, but joy opens his
arms to the maiden who modestly stands before him,
[ 190]
RUBENS, PORTRAIT OF HELIODORO DE BARRERA
COLLECTION OF MR. F. T. FLEITMANN, NEW YORK
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
unconscious of her radiant charms. And with the
same deep sympathy is depicted the death of the hero-
the tragedy is touchingly mirrored in his face as, at
the very moment when he reaches the protection of
the altar, fate overwhelms him.
At about the time when Rubens produced these
tapestry patterns he was at work on the subjects for
a history of Henri IV which was to form a continuation
of the cycle from the life of Marie de’ Medici that is
now in the Louvre. The execution of this grandiose
scheme was interrupted by the arrest of Marie de’
Medici and her flight to the Netherlands. The six
great unfinished paintings were left on the artist’s
hands and were still in his house at the time of his
death. Two of them, the Entry of Henri IV into
Paris and the Battle of Vitry, which found their
way into the Uffizi, give assurance that in all proba-
bility this series of pictures would have surpassed the
Medici series and would have been one of Rubens’
most splendid achievements. He had worked enthu-
siastically on the designs, saying that such purely
historical scenes were much better fitted for pictorial
representation than the allegorical subjects of the Medici
cycle.
As Rubens evidently meant to leave to his pupils
the enlargement of these sketches also, he treated them
with the same care and the same concentrated power
as the designs for tapestries. Two studies for the
Entry of Henri IV are in London — one of them in
the Wallace Collection and the other, according to
Rooses, in private hands; a larger one, probably the
final version, came from Lord Darnley’s possession into
[191 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
the collection of Mrs. John W. Simpson of New York.
A triumphal procession was a theme well adapted to
the art of Rubens who always welcomed a chance
to give a dramatic incident a splendid setting. The
arrangement is that of a great historical play. The
prominent figures are for the most part the spectators
and the accompanying soldiers. A whole world seems
to have bestirred itself to celebrate a great event with
pomp and rejoicing, yet in reality there are only a few
groups which, by their display of varied degrees of feel-
ing, make the effect of throngs of people. Here are
heralds on horseback with flags, warriors on foot with
standards, musicians proudly advancing, and specta-
tors full of enthusiasm and expectation, their joy con-
trasting with the sorrow of the prisoners at the end of
the procession. The whole array is plastically dis-
posed in a concave semicircle densest in the middle
where rises above the seething crowd, as though magi-
cally evoked, the sharp silhouette of the figure of the
monarch, crowned by a winged genius with a wreath
of laurel.
Nothing is more striking than the sight of an art as
personal as that of Rubens stepping down from its
lofty sphere into the actualities of portraiture. Often
it struggles in vain with the insignificance of the sitter,
far beneath the level of the painter’s own nature, and
surrounds it with unnaturally loud accessories as though
to hide the naked truth. But if the sitter is in any
degree in accord with the painter’s aspiring aristo-
cratic character, Rubens’ dramatic power flames up
and creates an orchestral harmony from which a
glorified likeness emerges. Of this kind is the portrait
[192 ]
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RUBENS, THE FALL OF ICARUS
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
of the Earl of Arundel in Mrs. Gardner’s collection at
Boston. Even the animated pose, the forward inclina-
tion of the body, the proud turn of the head, the light
yet firm way in which the hand grasps the truncheon,
express the interest excited in the artist. But the lively
play of line gains an iridescent effect from the flashing
splendour of the light which strikes sharp accents from
the breastplate and the helmet, vivifies the eyes, and
wraps the whole figure in a vibrating atmospheric en-
velope. The only strong chord of colour is formed by the
flowing red scarf as it crosses the bluish steel.
There is a marked contrast in externals between this
‘picture and the masterly portrait of Heliodoro de Bar-
rera, the Jesuit confessor of Philip IV of Spain, owned
by Mr. Frederick T. Fleitmann of New York, which is
unobtrusive in arrangement, in technique, and in the
browns and grays of the colouring. But the same
_ dramatic intensity and the same controlling intelligence
speak from the head of the priest as from the head of
Arundel. It is marvellous how the painter has man-
aged to give of his own flesh and blood to this harsh
countenance with the low forehead, protruding ears,
and piercing eyes, the hawk nose constricted at the
nostrils, and the brutally sensual mouth. There must
have been something that appealed to Rubens in the
autocratic temper or the political sagacity of this Jesuit.
How very differently Rembrandt conceived his monks,
those figures of mild and brooding aspect who seek to
save the world by their example! Rubens portrays the
fanatic to whom politics and religion are one and the
same and whose weapons in the propagation of his
creed are terror and guile. In works of this kind the
[193 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
attitude toward life and the world that sets these two
great painters of the Low Countries so far apart is more
clearly revealed than in the great ecclesiastical and
allegorical pictures intended for public display.
We come now to the works of Rubens’ latter years.
Two large pictures of this period — the Holy Fam-
ily in the Metropolitan Museum and the Diana’s
Hunt from the Ashburton Collection, now owned by
Mrs. Benjamin Thaw of New York — need only be
named for they are well known and, as the one was
partially painted by pupils and the other is not very
well preserved, they are not altogether satisfying. Yet
they are splendid in the singular mixed colours of the
costumes, in that juxtaposition of orange, purple, and
a soft red which is characteristic of Rubens’ later works;
and the nymphs in Diana’s Hunt are very delightful,
instinct with a childlike charm that we do not find in the
more self-conscious sensuousness of the early pictures.
It is, however, the sketches of this period — there
are several in the Johnson and Widener Collections —
that appeal to us most strongly, for they have not only
great artistic power but also the personal quality that
we find, with a difference, in all the late products of
great masters. I mean that while other artists speak,
toward the close of their career, with the voice of trib- |
ulation, Rubens, whose whole life was a victorious —
march, seems to triumph over all the weaknesses of —
the spirit. His last works are ethereal and imaginative, |
full of harmony and joy, radiant with light bright
colours. Only now and then, when he is forced to treat ~
a gloomy theme, do we also find a deepening of his —
feeling for tragedy. Thrillingly he portrays the Fall —
[194 ]
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PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
of Icarus, the despairing cry of the young aeronaut and
the alarmed backward glance of the father, while he
gives suavity and beauty to the scene as a whole, bath-
ing it in the golden light of the sun and spreading a soft
enchanting landscape beneath the falling figure. In
another sketch owned by Mr. Johnson, a touching scene
probably taken from Ovid, a tame stag that has been
wounded seeks refuge with his mistress who, with a
heart-broken look, holds the head of the dying animal
in her lap. The mournful aspect of the stag and the
_ Jamentations of the girl are rendered with a depth of
feeling that we might look for in Rembrandt rather
than Rubens. Probably both of these sketches (the
_ second has appeared in the Paris picture market in a
better preserved but feebler version) were produced
_ about the year 1635 as parts of the series, commissioned
by Philip IV, which with his pupils’ aid Rubens painted
for the hunting lodge of La Parada near Madrid.
In the way of designs for great historical compositions
we have furthermore the Rape of the Sabines in the
Widener Collection and the Reconciliation of the
Romans and Sabines in the Johnson Collection, com-
_ panion pieces (notwithstanding the difference in shape)
that were painted a little later than 1635, at the same
time as the large picture of the Rape of the Sabines
which is now in the National Gallery at London. The
Reconciliation Rubens had treated once before, in
1620 or thereabouts, in a picture, chiefly the work of his
pupils, which now hangs in the Munich Pinakothek.
And in the same list belong the two similar designs,
large autographic sketches, that passed from the Ash-
burton Collection into the possession of Alfred de
[195 |
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Rothschild of Paris. Certain groups in one of these are
exact duplicates of groups in Mr. Johnson’s sketch. It is
not impossible that the two designs in America are later
recastings of the Paris picture that were prepared by
Rubens for two larger compositions, ordered by the
court of Spain and painted most probably by his pu-
pils, which left his studio only a short time before he
died and are now lost. At all events they are in the
grand style of his later works. Mr. Widener’s es-
pecially, the larger and more colourful of the two, is a
marvel of free and artistic composition and of joyous
colour, with a perfect balance of movement and counter-
movement in the surging groups that is well in keeping
with the rhythmic harmony of the tones. The bril-
liant whites of the garments of the rider of the white
horse in the centre and of his captive are enframed by
livelier hues — by the orange and blue of the mantle
of the pleading old man and the red scarf of the warrior
who lifts the maiden onto the horse. Lighter masses
then lose themselves on either hand in the golden
illumination of the landscape and the buildings that
form the background, and in the corners, again, a few
figures stand out in brighter colours, notably the wo-
men at the left, frightened yet hesitating in their flight, — |
whose draperies are shot with the singular bluish-red
and orange-brown tints of Rubens’ latest manner.
All of this is rendered in airy tones with a royal freedom
of hand and an amazing skill in the management of
the masses, which are woven together in an unusual
way, like a splendid ornamental pattern, yet clearly ex-
press the spirit of the scene in its every detail.
While this composition is developed in a vigorously
[ 196 ]
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PICTURES BY RUBENS IN AMERICA
plastic way from the foreground into a distance of
considerable depth, the groups in Mr. Johnson’s sketch
are set against a dark background, more in the manner
of a classic relief, and are so arranged that the action
is for the most part from one side of the picture toward
the other. Instead of being loosely grouped the masses
are now held firmly together and are concentrated not
in the centre of the composition but in two foci. The
lines radiate in both directions from the heads of the
two warriors who rise above the others; and the women
in the centre, involved in these centrifugal streams,
form the material as well as the spiritual link between
the two parts of the design. The vigorous action
achieved, in spite of this concentration, in the various
figures, the complete emotional surrender with which
the women perform their task of reconciliation, the
reticence of the low-toned steel-gray colouring that
gives the scene a pathetically impassioned character —
all these qualities meet in a creation such as only the
loftiest genius curbed by life-long experience could have
brought forth.
During the last five years of his life Rubens lived in
retirement in the country, painting at the medizval
manor of Steen, which with the wide lands belonging
to it he had bought, those incomparable landscapes
that were to have so high a value for posterity and
especially for the art of England as represented by a
Constable and a Turner. The prodigious career of the
great painter came to an end like the ending of Faust.
As is likely to be the case with aging artists, he re-
turned to simple themes and sought for marvels in
natural and obvious things, studying the hilly regions
[197 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
around his‘ estate and the peasants at their humble
happy tasks, observing the all-pervasive influence of
the atmosphere, and noting the intimate dependence
of all living things upon the earth that bears them.
He tried to find peace in an escape from the immediate,
strongly sensuous visions of an imagination trained by
familiarity with human forms. It was not granted to
his restless temperament to know the fulness of such
peace. A life that had been so incessantly impelled
to action by such imperious passions could not suddenly
come to rest in a mood of objective contemplation.
The desire to produce, to create, still persists, express-
ing itself less openly and in a different way. Domi-
nated now by inorganic nature, he transmutes it into
a personality overbrimming with power, as may be
seen in the magnificent sketch, Landscape After Rain,
owned by Mr. Johnson. Here the earth is stirred as
though by a force from within itself, the steaming
heights are lost in luminous wide-spreading clouds,
the verdant fields teem and glow with the sap of life,
and all the lines of the landscape rise and fall in a single
gush of dramatic energy. In this heroic representation
of nature, men and animals are of no more account
than rocks and bushes. A human being can only let
himself be borne along by the tumult of the elements,
or sit by the wayside in thoughtful contemplation of
the great spectacle.
[ 198 ]
RUBENS, LANDSCAPE
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
RUBENS, COWS
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
VAN DYCK, AN APOSTLE
IN PRIVATE OWNERSHIP, NEW YORK
XI
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
AN DYCK, whose gift was primarily for
portraiture, occupied himself at first, as did
Rembrandt also, with studies of the strongly
characterized heads of old men. He cared less, however,
for that revelation of the soul which interested Rem-
brandt than for the decorative sweep of the subject
before him. His apostles are play-actors who, to pro-
duce an effect at a distance, pose in daring attitudes with
over-emphatic gestures while, to express the pathos of
their words, their boldly flung draperies, their flowing
locks and beards, and even their features assume wide
simplified curves.
It is known that at the age of sixteen van Dyck had
already produced two series of Apostles, one of them
with the aid of pupils. Parts of these series are now
preserved at Dresden, in the Louvre, and in Lord
Spencer’s collection at Althorp House; two pictures
belonging to them are in private collections in America
—one in New York and the other, owned by Mr.
F. G. Macomber, in Boston; and a study-head of an old
man which was painted at the same time is in the John-
[199 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
son Collection in Philadelphia. There is still much of
Rubens in the way these heads are painted, but the
pupil betrays himself in the short nervous curves that
break the contour of the forehead, the nose, and the
hair as well as in the warm brown tone of the shadows
and the scarlet reflections around the eyes.
The youthful female type of this period surpasses
in luxuriance of form even the types of Rubens. Yet
these figures of van Dyck’s have lost the robust and
joyous sensuousness of their prototypes; they seem to
faint with desire or to be consumed bya fanatical frenzy.
Some of them are among the most expressive of van
Dyck’s creations outside the field of portraiture — for
example, the girl in the Worship of the Serpent in
the Prado Gallery, in whose face the last upflaring of
wild passion is expressed in a masterly way.* Often,
however, the artist falls into sentimentality; only the
glow of his colour and the fine swing of his design recon-
cile us to his over-accentuation of the note of pathos.
Van Dyck used the same female model in several of
his early compositions, as in the Repentant Magdalene
of Sir Frederick Cook and the one in the Amsterdam
gallery, in the Delilah at Vienna and the Drunken
Silenus at Dresden. The Repentant Magdalene of
the Johnson Collection, one of those works in which
the young painter abandoned himself to his sense of the
woes of the world, looks like a preparatory study for
* In the place where it hangs, this, the most beautiful of van Dyck’s early composi-
tions, is still attributed to Rubens, although it has been restored to its painter by
Bode and by other critics. The studies, preserved at Bremen and in the British
Museum, for the Marriage of St Catherine, which is in the same gallery and is
there attributed to Jordaens, prove that it is also one of van Dyck’s early works. It
was first recognized as such by Hulin and by Buschman (P. Buschman, Jr., J acok
Jordaens. Amsterdam, 1905, p. 133).
[ 200 |
VAN DYCK, STUDY HEAD
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
ow Be
VAN DYCK, THE REPENTANT MAGDALENE
COLLECTION OF MR. J. G. JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
the Amsterdam picture. This restless yielding to the
mood of the moment, a youthful trait with emotional
natures, reveals and, indeed, exaggerates in a mislead-
ing degree all the artist’s inborn qualities. Enthusiasm
and sensuosness, melancholy and sensibility, are all im-
plicit in the unquiet intricacy of the lines that enframe
the figure.
The recent discovery of a portrait of a man by van
Dyck, dated in 1613 when he was only fourteen years
of age, proves that he had already entered upon his
true path when he was making his first studies of heads.
The main period of his activity in portraiture, ante-
cedent to his Italian journey, seems to have been from
1618 to 1621. Then, and especially toward the end of
the period, he painted a number of portraits that rank
among his finest works. Most of them, long attributed
to Rubens and other painters, were restored to van Dyck
by Bode, to whom we are indebted for the first accurate
account of the early phases of the artist’s development.
Among the works of this period that are now in
America the most famous is, quite rightly, the portrait
of Frans Snyders, formerly owned by the Earl of Car-
lisle and now, together with its pendant, the portrait
of Snyders’ wife obtained from the Earl of Warwick, in
the collection of Mr. Frick in New York. The fact
that he had close personal relations with his sitter must
have made a difference even to van Dyck. Snyders
was a friend whom van Dyck, at his own instance, had
painted several times, a friend of like nature with him-
self, if we may assume the veracity of the portraits.
And it is hard not to have faith in them, so amazingly
real is the personality they evoke for us. We cannot
[ 201 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
help believing in them even though we feel that van
Dyck must have put into them a good deal of himself,
for we should hardly divine the painter of brutal ani-
mal combats and reeking butcher shops in this lean
figure with its melancholy eyes and nervous fingers.
A singular rhythm of line, which becomes almost extrav-
agantly mobile in the salient curves of the curtain and
the hands, is in keeping with the over-sensitive aspect
of the figure, and the colouring, dominated by a deep.
blue and a grayish-purple, reflects the wistful expression
of the head.
In addition to this picture of Mr. Frick’s, there are
three portraits of Snyders by van Dyck — the oft-
described double portrait at Cassel, the half-length in
the Liechtenstein Collection at Vienna, and a portrait
at Raby Castle in England which Lionel Cust mentions
but Ihave not seen. I cannot agree with Cust’s opinion
that the 'Frick pictures were painted later than those
at Cassel and Vienna and perhaps not until after van
Dyck’s sojourn in Italy. There is a closer relationship
between the three portraits of Snyders than at first
glance appears. He sat for but one of them; both
the others are autographic copies in which only sub-
ordinate parts are changed. The earliest is undoubt-
edly Mr. Frick’s, which is painted as though without
break or pause, and has all the freshness of a first 1m-
pression. The Liechtenstein picture cannot be a
preliminary study for this one; the accessories — the pi-
laster, the curtain, the costume — are more precisely
rendered than they would be ina study. It is a copy,
of the same date, of part of Mr. Frick’s picture, a copy
that has lost a little of the vitality of the original.
[ 202 ]
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT
COLLECTION OF MR. H.
OF
C.
FRICK,
FRANS SNYDERS
NEW
YORK
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
A comparison of the picture at Cassel with the two in
Mr. Frick’s possession throws light upon van Dyck’s
methods of working. He has fused the two into one,
reproducing exactly the upper parts of the bodies as
well as the outline of the curtain and the landscape,
but, as Snyder’s wife was seated, changing the attitude
of the husband. The chair upon which he leans in the
Frick picture is omitted, while the one upon which he
is now sitting is indicated by a knob introduced above
his shoulder; and he has laid one hand on his breast
and the other on the arm of his wife’s chair. The posi-
tion of the woman’s fingers is unchanged, but now she
lays her right hand upon her husband’s left instead of
upon the arm of her chair. These alterations show how
easily van Dyck worked even when he had no model
before him. Out of two single portraits he makes a
group, retaining the most important parts but, without
the least suggestion of unveracity, altering at his pleas-
ure the position of the arms. The Frick picture tells
why, in the group,. the pillar at the back is preserved
between the two figures, and why the man is posed in a
way which, when closely examined, seems uncomfortable
or even impossible, as his legs must come into collision
with the woman’s chair. The heads lack force when
compared with the portraits in New York. Such a pic-
ture as the Snyders of the Frick Collection marks the
summit of van Dyck’s achievement in the portrayal of
the well-bred bourgeoisie of Holland.
With the pictures of the Genoese period we find him
in another world, the world where for the future he
was to feel most at home. In this new environment his
art grew more exclusive, reserving itself for dwellers
[ 203 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
in palaces and their friends. There has never been
question of its adequacy within this narrow circle, but
ordinary mortals still often bring against it the reproach
of a decadent superficiality. The charge is unjust.
The art of van Dyck may easily fail to appeal to those
who know it only in the cold keeping of a museum, or
may merely, like a street parade of royalties, evoke in
romantic souls a vision of splendid palaces. But it is
wholly convincing where it still serves to glorify an aris-
tocracy with which it shares the task of cultivating
in artistic ways the surface of existence. In magnifi-
cent apartments these portraits gain reality. They
are living decorations that fit into the general frame.
They seem to be speaking with a charming smile of
delightful unimportant things — of an attractive cos-
tume, a graceful pose, a fine saddle-horse, a favourite
dog. The content is naught in comparison to the form
which, like all perfect things, has the easy effortless
look of an instantaneous creation, but in reality is a
slowly evolved result of tradition and hard work. The
cares of life do not stir the surface of these pictures.
Herein they differ from Rembrandt’s which are instinct
with trouble in every stroke and are therefore ill-
adapted to regal surroundings. In such surroundings
Rembrandt is like a philosopher gone astray in a palace
and preaching wisdom to heedless ears in phrases hard to
understand. He claims too much attention; he makes
too great a demand upon the less well-endowed ob-
server. Wan Dyck asks only a passing glance from the
court circle that moves around his feet, only a word of
thanks for immortalizing on canvas the intoxicating
atmosphere of high-bred society. No one else ever
[ 204 |
—————eEEEeeEeEeEeE—— —————
a nae
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT OF THE
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF
MARCHESA DURAZZO
ART,
NEW YORK
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
knew so well how to surround his figures with the inde-
finable glamour — the subtile aroma compounded of
nature and of art and emanating from a gesture, a word,
or a glance — that constitutes the charm of the patri-
cian world.
It is not fortuitous that the pictures of van Dyck’s
Genoese period should have been particularly well
liked by the nascent aristocracy of the New World.
No less than five of the very finest of his portraits of
women are in America. Two belong to Mr. Widener
of Philadelphia who has fittingly housed them, with
four other masterpieces from the same hand, in a room
built for the purpose; a third, the portrait of the Mar-
chesa Spinola, is owned by Mr. J. P. Morgan of New
York, and the others by Mr. Frick of New York and
Mr. Charles Taft of Cincinnati, a brother of the former
President. Two of the most beautiful half-lengths
of the same period, the Marchesa Durazzo from the
Rudolph Kann Collection in Paris, and the Lucas van
Uffelen formerly owned by the Duke of Sutherland, are
in the Altman Collection at the Metropolitan Museum.
And to these must be added several admirable portraits
of Genoese aristocrats in the Frick and Untermyer
Collections in New York.
The biography of the artist tells us something about
the original of one of these portraits. Lucas van
Uffelen was one of van Dyck’s Flemish acquaintances
with whom he grew more intimate during his stay in
Genoa, an Antwerp merchant who controlled part of
the trade between Antwerp and Genoa, and a collector
of works of art. That he also dealt in such works we
learn from the account of the sale at auction, at Amster-
[ 205 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
dam in 1639, of a number of valuable paintings that he
had imported from Italy. As great a person as Rem-
brandt was interested in this auction and made a sketch
of the most important picture — Raphael’s portrait of
Count Castiglione, now in the Louvre — which is pre-
served in the Albertina at Vienna with the high price -
that was paid for the picture noted on the margin.
Van Dyck’s etching of Titian and his mistress testifies
to his friendship for van Uffelen, bearing the dedica-
tion, Al Signore Luca van Uffel in segno daffectione et
enclinatione amorevole. In the Brunswick Gallery there |
is another portrait of van Uffelen by van Dyck, his ©
merchant fleet shown in the background as off the coast
of Italy. The finer one in the Altman Collection re-
veals the road that the artist had travelled since the
time when he painted Mr. Frick’s portrait of Snyders.
The two sitters belonged to the same social stratum,
the bourgeois middle class. But we fancy that we rec-
ognize in van Uffelen the born aristocrat with whom
the expression of the head and the attitude of the body
correspond, whereas with Snyders the expression is too
strongly marked to be duly subordinate to the self-
conscious elegance of the pose. As we see most clearly
in the portraits of women of his Genoese period, van
Dyck now lays more stress than before upon the quality
of distinction in the figure as a whole, upon that har-
mony between all parts of the body which is always
one of the factors in an air of high breeding. Of course
this means a loss of expressiveness in the several parts.
The general outline has grown simpler. The effect of
momentary action, which in the portrait of Snyders is
produced by the strong curves, now emanates directly
[ 206 |
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT OF LUCAS VAN UFFELEN
NEW YORK
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF
ART,
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‘aa
ix, -
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PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
from the subject himself, and the fact that he can retain
the elegance of his bearing despite his sudden change
of position as he turns his head toward a coming visitor
enhances the impression of high breeding. Even more
conspicuous is the difference in colour between the two
pictures. During the years that separated them van
Dyck had made acquaintance with the great Venetians,
and to the aging Titian, whom he portrayed in the
etching dedicated to van Uffelen, more than to any one
else he owed the beautiful warm golden tone that now
envelopes his sitter, the deep luscious black of the cos-
tume, and the play of the peculiar mixed reddish-
brown hues in the curtain and the table cover — hues
which in his colour-loving youth he had not yet learned
to value, but to which his emotional temperament now
gives an intenser glow than they have on Titian’s can-
vas.
A love of elegance was developed in van Dyck by
his intercourse with the Genoese aristocracy. He is
said to have lost his heart to no less a personage than
Paola Adorno, the incomparable wife of the Marchese
Brignole-Sala, and we almost put faith in the tradition
when we remember that he painted her more often
and certainly not with less enthusiasm than any other
great lady of Genoa. Mr. Frick and Mr. Widener own
two of these portraits. In Mr. Widener’s the marchesa,
accompanied by her son as by a page, is seated like a
queen between marble columns. We can divine the ar-
_ tist’s intent to create something unprecedented in the
way of grandeur and beauty of form. He seems, indeed,
to go almost too far. Deferring to the current concep-
tion of beauty, he exaggerates the height of the figure
[ 207 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
which wins importance also from the trailing robe; and
he gives the lady a statuesque air, framing her cool
transparent face between the vertical architectural lines
and showing it in strict, almost schematized, profile.
There is something so superhuman in her grandeur that
we feel there can be no link between it and the boy
with his precociously self-conscious expression.
At this time, when van Dyck was wholly possessed
by the aristocratic ideal, he had little feeling for the
characteristics of childhood. When he painted the
Genoese ladies with their children he used the doll-like
little ones simply as foils to augment the expression of
grandeur and of superior intelligence in their elders,
somewhat as he put beside a great lady — for example,
in the picture owned by Mr. Taft —a playful little
dog whose graceful heedless gambols emphasize by
contrast her dignified placidity. In the portrait of |
Paola Adorno he uses the boy with his splendid red and
yellow velvet dress as a colour-contrast to the deep
black of the satin gown. An art like this was too am-
bitious and too self-satisfied to take an interest in child-
hood. Later on, in his English period, when van Dyck
stood in a calmer, more objective relation to his sitters,
he painted children also with a charming naturalness,
but even then only princely children whom a confident
self-conscious air well befits. »
It was fortunate that he did not paint Elena Gri-
maldi, the Marchesa Cattaneo, and her children on the
same canvas, but chose for her attendant a servant of
whom we are better content to have a superficial like-
ness. The portraits of her son and her daughter which
now hang on either side of her own in Mr. Widener’s
[ 208 ]
a
=r
———— ae. 29
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT OF THE MARCHESA BRIGNOLE-SALA
COLLECTION OF MR. P. A. B. WIDENER, PHILADELPHIA
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
van Dyck room are satisfying companion pieces, their
reticent amber-hued colouring leading up in an admi-
_ rable way to the glowing marvel between them. This is
rightly ranked as one of van Dyck’s most incompara-
ble creations. All nature and all art seem to serve this
sovereignlady. LEverythingexiststo enhance hercharm.
_ Although a full-length portrait of life size always
dominates the observer, seldom has a painter known
how to express so convincingly the physical and men-
| tal superiority of the personage he depicts. As though
_ on Olympian heights the figure sweeps majestically
_ by, casting an indifferent glance on those who stand
below. The elevated position, the hiding of the feet
_ by the long robe, the servile attitude and subordinate
_ size of the negro, the lifted parasol that adds, as it
were, to the height of the figure — everything helps to
_ augment the grandeur of the splendid apparition. Her
slenderness dares to measure itself with the aspiring
_ architecture of the palace, and the definite lines of her
_ dark dress, its aristocratic simplicity emphasized by
the golden yellow of the servant’s costume and the red
of the parasol, contrast effectively with the unquiet
structure of the landscape. The head, relieved against
the background of deep and glowing colour, is such as
we might expect; the flashing eyes, the thin nose and
sensitive mouth reveal a person accustomed to dominate
_by her intelligence and to manifest with unconscious
pride her sense of her patrician birth. Nor does the
_ stage-setting seem too elaborate for the characterization
of such a figure, for the artist understood that in the
portrayal of an aristocrat. the environment counts for
quite as much as the individuality of the personage.
[ 209 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
The marchesa and her surroundings arein perfect accord.
Even the flowers in the foreground and the arrange-
ment of the garden have the air of works of art, and
the veiled yet glowing tones of the sky create a magical
atmosphere from which the figure emerges as from am-
ber-coloured clouds.
It is a remarkable fact that when van Dyck’s art was
full of a lofty energy, a burning enthusiasm, it was his
task to paint high-born personages of the Latin race,
and later, when it had grown colder and paler, to por-
tray the impassive nobles of the English court. Or was
he perhaps of so malleable a nature that he formed him-
self on the aristocrats of alien lands? Was he one of
those pliant, over-excitable beings who come to life
only in the company of others and then show the splen-
dour of their powers as circumstances may dictate?
However this may be, with van Dyck, as with all great
men, inner development and outer achievement seem
to go hand in hand. When he returned from Italy to
the Low Countries his characteristics changed with the
change of climate. Instead of the warm enthusiasm
of the south we have now an attitude of reserve, instead
of a buoyant impetuosity a contemplative subjective
mood, and canvases with a silvery-gray scheme ofcolour
instead of a warm and golden tone. The artist remem-
bers again the ideals of his youth which demanded
above all else the significant characterization of a head.
But as in the meantime he has lost his tendency to ex-
aggerate and has gained the power to express a natural
kind of elegance, he now gives his figures individuality
combined with an air of aristocratic reserve.
Part of the credit for this revival of his interest in
[ 210]
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT OF THE MARCHESA (
COLLECTION OF MR. P. A. B. WIDENER, PHILADI
‘ATTANEO
©LPHIA
Se tap eewe eels
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
the interpretation of character was undoubtedly due
to his sitters. Never, not in Genoa nor later on in
England, had he more important personages to portray
than in the five years of this second Antwerp period,
between 1627 and 1632, for the stage for the chief
events, military and intellectual, in the drama of
European life was then set in the Low Countries.
Almost every great soldier, artist, and statesman who
lived or briefly tarried in the cosmopolis called Ant-
werp sat to the painter who had become world-famous
during his residence in Italy. If it is hard for the ob-
server to remember the features of Genoese and of
English nobles, he does not so easily forget the striking
personalities of this intermediate period — the por-
traits of such artists as Ryckaert, Pepijn, and Snayers,
of such scholars as van der Wouwer, Scribani, and
Puteanus, and such military commanders as Spinola,
Thomas de Carignan, Albert von Arenberg, and Hen-
drick van der Bergh.
The many religious pictures that van Dyck painted
at this time for the churches of Flanders are another
proof of his growth in intellectual seriousness, although
they do not rank among his finest works. Ecstatic in
expression and gray in tone, they reveal an almost
tragic effort to succeed in a direction where he never
developed into anything more than an imitator, with
an exaggerating brush, of his great forerunner, Rubens.
Two portraits now in America, the Count of Nas-
sau in the collection of Mrs. Emery at Cincinnati
and a portrait of a man owned by the late Mr. M. C.
D. Borden of New York, mark the opposite extremes
of van Dyck’s achievement at this time. The Count
[211]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
of Nassau approximates closely in style to the Genoese
portraits. It has the same bold energy and the same
freedom in rendering the self-confident air of the
original, and although cooler in its general tone it
shows the same juxtaposition of a warm red and a
steel-blue that appears in portraits of Genoese generals.
But the drawing is now more definite and decided,
and the more solidly constructed figure has a simpler
aspect. The character of the original, more clearly
revealed, makes a stronger appeal to the observer.
Again the artist has selected a pose in which there are
contrasts of direction, turning the body and the arms
to one side and the head to another as, to give dra-
matic point to the presentment, he did in many of the
Genoese portraits —in Lucas van Uffelen’s, for ex-
ample, and the Marchesa Cattaneo’s. But the turning
of the figure is now managed in a less arbitrary fashion;
it is developed, so to say, more from within, by the
sitter’s own volition, as a comparison with the military
portraits at Dresden and Vienna may perhaps make
plain.
On the other hand, the portrait owned by Mr. Bor-
den is extremely simple, as simple in both pose and colour
as it is possible to imagine a picture by van Dyck.
The head, with the upper part of the body, is shown in
full face, the eyes turned quietly upon the spectator;
the dress is black, the background is gray, and the
unobtrusive technique is altogether unlike the bold
broad handling in works of the artist’s early period.
Nor could he have gone farther in eliminating acces- ~
sories so as to concentrate attention upon the head.
Yet even so he manages to suggest an aristocrat. Per-
[ 212 |
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT OF A GENOESE LADY
COLLECTION OF MR. C. P. TAFT, CINCINNATI
.
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)
5
«
ce
=
.
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
sonal importance and high breeding are both implied
by the way in which the figure is placed within the
frame, by the wide sweep of the cloak, the small size
of the head as compared with the body, and the languid
droop of the hand. The fact that van Dyck could
now conceal the means by which he achieved such a
result is proof of the progress he had made in his art.
From the splendid portraits of the Genoese and the
cooler ones of the later Antwerp period we come now
to those where English courtiers wear an air of reserve
that is evidently theirs by nature. From the attractive
round-faced and dark-eyed types of Italy and the strong
rugged lineaments of Dutchmen and Flemings we turn
to the beauty of thin faces with long chins and blond
hair.
The art of van Dyck drew new life from the new
land. Apparently he was one of those unstable im-
_ pressionable beings who, to keep their faculties alert,
must seek every few years the stimulus of a novel en-
vironment. In a sort of reaction from the gray mood
of his Antwerp period the pictures of his first years in
England are bold of aspect, fresh, and full of colour.
A beautiful example of this manner, splendid by reason
of the reds and yellows of the dress, is the Viscount
Grandison owned by Mr. Harry Payne Whitney of
New York. Abandoning the complicated theatrical
poses that he gave his Genoese nobles, the artist, we
feel, is now striving for a natural, seemingly unstudied
simplicity in accord with the northern ideal of high
breeding. In an animated attitude that expresses an
amiable romantic temperament, the young man stands
with one foot drawn back, doffing his feathered hat and
[213]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
turning his head slightly to one side as though wait-
ing for a word from the observer.
Less fascinating at first sight but better thought-out
in respect to character is the portrait of James Stuart,
Duke of Richmond and Lennox, in the Metropolitan
Museum of Art at New York. Dating from the middle
of van Dyck’s English period, it is one of its very finest
products. Van Dyck painted several portraits of this
rather unimportant looking but attractive friend and
courtier of Charles I, and, as the preparatory sketches
show, he took particular pains with the one that now
concerns us. Probably it was only for the head that the
duke actually sat to him. A beautiful crayon drawing
in the British Museum shows that the dress with the
Order of the Garter was sketched from another model;
and, indeed, we know that at this time van Dyck was
often compelled to finish the costumes in his portraits
as he might see fit. The study for the head, whether
done at once on the large canvas or separately, he used
a second time, with only a few changes, in the portrait
of the duke in the guise of Paris that is now in the
Louvre. Two separate studies of the dog, also in the
British Museum, show how cleverly they were combined
in the picture. In the figure of the duke the qualities
of a courtier are admirably interpreted. He is not
handsome nor does he look particularly intelligent, but
the large dreamy eyes and the long fair curls that ac-
cord so well with the blue of the Garter ribbon give
him a romantic air, and the fawning devotion of the
dog adds a touch of graciousness to the proud person-
ality. Seldom, in line, in handling, or in sentiment,
have a human being and an animal been so well as-
[214]
————e OO ee —
ee
: Ne ae ne re a
VAN
DYCK, PORTRAIT OF VISCOUNT GRANDISON
COLLECTION OF MR.
H. P. WHITNEY, NEW YORK
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
sociated upon canvas. To the observer the bond be-
tween them seems to be less the mutual affection of a
man and a dog than the qualities that they have in com-
mon as consummate representatives of their respective
species.
Comparing this picture with the Grandison portrait
we learn how van Dyck expressed different tempera-
ments by means of differences in pose and contour.
In the Grandison portrait the attitude is upright and
all the lines fall into wide open curves. In the portrait
of the duke the broken curves returning upon them-
selves give a suggestion of indolence; the legs are bent
and seem to advance but uncertainly; everything be-
trays a nonchalant ease in keeping with the tempera-
ment of the aristocratic Englishman.
In conclusion I may note a work of van Dyck’s last
years, the portrait of Catherine Howard, Lady
d’Aubigny, owned by Mr. Widener. In a pale-red silk
dress, with scarcely any adornment excepting pearls
on the neck and shoulders and in the ears, the figure
floats by with a tired indifferent smile. The counte-
nance, almost blank in its expression of refinement, its
air of unconcern, the pale diaphanous figure, the affected
gesture of the extended arm, the fingers scarcely able
to hold the flowers, all seem to say that a blight has
fallen on the great master’s art. Painting means noth-
ing more to him now than a thrice-familiar kind of
play. The technique is facile and unobtrusive and the
colour-scheme as simple as possible —a black back-
ground, a rose-coloured dress, and a uniformly pallid
flesh-tone. The expression of high breeding comes
naturally to the artist’s brush, but his delight in the
[215 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
high-bred world has disappeared; now that he is master
of its aspects it seems to him lifeless and dull. What a
change since his days in Genoa! His enthusiasm for
an unfamiliar world of splendid palaces and princes has
turned into a cool contemplation of lofty personages
whom he considers merely his equals. He had now
been knighted, he had grown rich, he lived like a
prince, and made his journeys with five servants in a
coach-and-four. In Italy his fellow-artists had laughed
when the title Cavaliere was given him. Now more than
one of them sought the favour of Sir Anthony who had
become a power in the realm of art.
Pitiable indeed when we think of such a life seems
the manner of its ending. Was it unnatural that van
Dyck should aspire to the highest walks of life? Did
not other great artists have similar desires, fixing their
eyes on some princely circle and longing to share in its
seductive pleasures, which meant more to the lowly
born than to its own members? They were lucky if
they were not fated to be stifled by such an atmosphere.
Rembrandt could not accommodate himself to society;
thrust back from its portals, he withdrew into him-
self to accomplish greater things. Rubens, intelligent
enough not to heed the invitations of princes to attach
himself to their courts, remained within the narrow
bounds of his own family circle. But the handsome
young van Dyck felt at home in the company of the rich
and followed them up to all the heights and into all
the depths of pleasure. His unsatisfied soul found rest
at a level where the struggle for existence was unknown.
Or was the lassitude that overcame him in the prime
of life due, perhaps, in part to physical causes? Asa
[216]
ee
Pa PLE EI IE ini
aD Hig ti: ay a ne
ae ae
VAN DYCK, PORTRAIT OF THE DUKE OF
AND LENNOX
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, NEW
RICHMOND
YORK
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
boy he overtaxed nature in working at his art, and at too
early an age he won a great success in a foreign land.
So the restless spirit that impelled him to an ever-
increasing activity must all the sooner have exhausted
the overstimulated body. Now it seemed as though
the world were determined, in the hour of his physical
weakness, to take revenge for his vaulting ambition
upon the artist whom it had favoured so long.
It is no wonder that this great painter under whose
eye had passed the cultivated society of a whole con-
tinent and a great epoch, the most distinguished and
the most patrician figures of contemporary Europe,
this painter who had not merely seen hundreds of ar-
tists and poets, scholars and diplomats, generals and
princes, but had learned to know them with the intimacy
possible to a portrait painter penetrating the souls of
his sitters — it is no wonder that, after the death of
Rubens, van Dyck aspired to rule alone in the kingdom
of art; nor is it strange that, loving to entertain his
friends, he made exorbitant demands upon the purses
of the nobles who had combined to spoil him. Which
of the great painters of his time had had such experi-
ences as he? Not Frans Hals or Rembrandt; they
were not of the same social rank. Not Velasquez who
confined himself to the court of Spain. Not Rubens
who was too much occupied with his own daring ideas.
Why, then, since he stood at the top in other respects,
should not van Dyck also fill the place left vacant by
the death of Rubens? It is singular, perhaps, that at
so late a day the ambition of an artist who had painted
portraits a thousand times but large compositions only
once in a while and always under the influence of
[ 217 ]
THE ART OF THE LOW COUNTRIES
Rubens, could deceive himself with regard to his own
capabilities. Perhaps he felt that his powers were.
declining, and thought that a bold start in a new direc-
tion might revive them. While he was young he may
not have been oppressed by the existence of an artist
so much greater than himself as Rubens, although,
indeed, it may have been to escape from his master’s
dominance that he lived for the most part in foreign
lands. But when Rubens died it was very evident
that van Dyck had been waiting for his high place,
for he stood ready to gather up at once all the threads
that his master’s hand let fall. Envious fate, however,
was to grant him no such triumph. As soon as he
returned to Antwerp to take over the deserted studio
his difficulties began. He wanted to do everything
in his own way and better than it had been done before.
His negotiations with Philip IV of Spain, about com-
pleting the works that Rubens had commenced, fell
through because of his large demand that he should be
allowed to start everything afresh. He wanted to
finish the decorations of Whitehall for Charles I —
another piece of work that Rubens had begun — but
asked so enormous a price that again he got no farther.
Then he turned toward Paris, proposing to paint for
the court a series of pictures even more extensive than
Rubens’ Medici series, but the artists of France were
given the preference. Passionately he sought in every
quarter for commissions for such historical or mytho-
logical works as had lain in Rubens’ province but did not
lie in hisown. Everywhere he was given to understand
that his master could not be replaced.
To these professional disappointments there were
[ 218 |
——
Sl pl at P-
PICTURES BY VAN DYCK IN AMERICA
added in his latter years private experiences that wholly
undid him. Some of his friends, chief among them Sir
Kenelm Digby, induced him to waste money and un-
availing strength upon alchemistic experiments. In
order to check his reckless ways of living King Charles
married him to a lady of the court, but the union seems
to have been unhappy. His former mistress, Marga-
rethe Lemon, pursued him with her jealousy and once,
it is said, aimed a knife-blow at his right hand, meaning
to put an end to his painting. When he returned to
London from the fruitless journeys prompted by his
desire to fill Rubens’ empty place his health was already
broken. During his last illness a daughter was born
to him, but in the will that he drew up shortly after-
ward he provided less well for her than for an illegiti-
mate child. He died at the age of forty-two, Sete
months after the death of Rubens.
[219 |
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
jh Rs
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
THE CHURCH ARCHITECTURE OF THE NETHERLANDS IN
THE MIDDLE AGES
The chief authorities consulted in the preparation of
this article were:
Blok, P. J., Geschiedenis van het Nederlandsche Volk.
Groningen, 1893—
Colenbrander, H. T., De Belgische Omwentling. The
Hague, 1905.
Haupt, Albrecht, Die ilteste Baukunst der Germanen.
Leipzig, 1909.
Hofstede de Groot, C. P. Saenredam, Utrechtsche Ker-
ken. The Hague, 1899.
Dehio, V. G., and von Bezold, G., Die kirchliche Bau-
kunst des Abendlandes. Stuttgart, 1892.
de Boer, T., Various articles on the Dutch Farmhouse.
In especial I am indebted to the writings (among
them the privately printed Architektonische Kunst-
beschowing) of C. H. Peters, State Architect of the
Netherlands, whose labours in the investigation of the
medizval architecture of Holland have been of the
first importance.
[ 223 ]
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF PAINTING IN THE FIFTEENTH
CENTURY
Our present knowledge of the history of Early-Dutch
painting is due in major part to Dr. M. J. Friedlander.
It is an achievement of which the science of criticism
may well be proud, for scarcely anything that related
to the Dutch painters of the fifteenth century had been
gleaned from the records and the indications of van
Mander except in regard to three or four altar-pieces
by Dirk Bouts and the two panels by Geertgen that
are preserved in Vienna, whereas to-day we know al-
most a dozen painters of the period and are able to
follow in detail the development of the school through
the second half of the fifteenth and into the sixteenth
century. We have quite a different idea of such
masters as Dirk Bouts and Geertgen now that about
thirty pictures of the one and fifteen of the other are
known to us. The credit for the resuscitation of one of
the greatest of these early Dutchmen, the Master of the
Virgo inter Virgines, is due entirely to the criticism
that is based upon questions of style, for the literature
of his time, in so far as it has come down to us, ap-
parently makes no mention of him. In the following
list of the works of the various painters of the period,
where I have always indicated the fact when I have
not seen the original of a picture, I have adopted for
the most part the conclusions of Friedlinder and
Hulin. The scepticism in respect to these conclusions
that has been expressed (in the works named below)
by Voll and, with regard to certain particulars, by
Heiland and by Balet, has in my opinion led to nothing.
[ 224 ]
ee ne eee eS ee St al
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
The most important writings that I have consulted
are:
Friedlander, M. J., Meisterwerke der niederlindischen
Malerei des XV. and XVI. Jahrhunderts auf der
Ausstellung zu Briigge. Munich, 1903.
Die Briigger Leiausstellung von 1902, in the Reper-
torium for Kunstwissenschaft, 1903.
Geertgen tot Sint Jans, in the Jahrbuch der Kig.
Preuss. Kunstsammlungen, 1903.
Der Meister der Virgo inter Virgines, ibid, 1910.
Hulin, J., Exposition Bruges, 1902. Catalogue critique.
Bode, W., Die Auferweckung des Lazarus von Albert van
Ouwater, in Jahrbuch der Kgl. Preuss. Kunst-
sammlungen, 1890. |
Diilberg, F., Die Frihhdllander im erzbischoflichen
Museum in Utrecht. Haarlem, n.d.
Die Frihh6llander in Italien. Haarlem, n.d.
Die Friihhéllander in Frankreich. Haarlem, n.d.
Voll, K., Die altniederliindische Malerei. Leipzig, 1906.
Heiland, P., Dirk Bouts. Strassburg, n. d. (Dissertation.)
Coffin, A., Thierry Bouts. Brussels, 1907.
Balet, L., Der Friihhéllander Geertgen tot Sint Jans.
The Hague, 1910.
Bodenhausen, E. von, Gerard David und seine Schule.
Munich, 1905.
For a list of the works of Haarlem painters of the fifteenth
century see Appendix I.
THE SATIRICAL WORK OF QUENTIN METSYS
The best treatise on Quentin Metsys is Walter
Cohen’s Studien zu Quentin Metsys (Bonn, 1904),
which I had not yet seen when my article was published
in Les Anciens Arts de Flandres. Dr. Friedliinder’s
[ 225 |
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
essay upon the artist in Museum, 1905, is an ad-
mirable piece of characterization. The relations be-
tween Metsys and Diirer will be considered in detail
by Friedlander and Jan Veth in their forthcoming book
upon Diirer’s journey in the Netherlands. My attempt
to attribute to Metsys the St. Jerome in the Palazzo
Rosso at Genoa now seems to me a mistake, and I have
therefore changed the latter part of my article. This
picture, as also a similar one at Modena, is more in the
manner of Jan van Hemessen.
REMBRANDT S REPRESENTATIONS OF SUSANNA
- I am indebted to Dr. Wilhelm Bode for a knowledge
of Lastman’s picture of Susanna, formerly owned by
M. Paul Delaroff of St. Petersburg. When it was ex-
hibited in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Bode himself
discussed the representations of Susanna in the Amt-
lichen Berichten der Berliner Museum (1910). In
Kurt Friese’s excellent biography of Pieter Lastman
he has spoken exhaustively of the relation of Rem-
brandt to his master. The drawing attributed to
Rembrandt which was recently acquired by the Dres-
den Print Room and was published by Burckhardt |
in the Jahrbuch der kgl. Preuss. Kunstsammlungen,
1912, seems to me dubious.
THE WORKS OF RUBENS IN AMERICAN COLLECTIONS
For some corrections in this article I am indebted
to Dr. G. Gliick of Vienna and Dr. R. Oldenbourg of
Munich.
[ 226 |
nN
=
=
7
By
APPENDICES
I
WORKS BY
PAINTERS OF THE HAARLEM SCHOOL OF THE
FIFTEENTH CENTURY
DIRK BOUTS
Altar-pieces
THE SACRAMENT. 1464-68. Louvain, Church of St. Peter;
Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Museum; Munich, Old Pinakothek.
Tue Fai or THE DAMNED INTO HELL. 1468-70. Proba-
bly a wing of the altar-piece with representations of Justice
that was intended for Louvain. Paris, Louvre.
SCENES FROM THE LIFE OF THE Emperor Orto III. 1470-75.
Two panels. Brussels, Museum.
St. Hiprotytus. About 1475. Bruges, Church of St.
Sauveur.
St. Erasmus. Louvain, Church of St. Peter.
Tue Passion. Granada, Royal Chapel.
Tue Passion. Munich, Old Pinakothek; Nuremberg, Ger-
manic Museum; Worlitz, Gothic House.
Domestic ALTAR OF THE SNoy Famity, the so-called “Pearl
of Brabant.”” Munich, Old Pinakothek.
Other Religious Pictures
Tue Fountain oF Lire. Lille, Museum.
Tue EntompMentT. London, National Gallery (attributed
to Rogier van der Weyden).
Tur LAMENTATION AT THE Cross. Paris, Louvre.
[ 229 ]
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
Q2.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
APPENDICES
Tue Baptism or Curist. St. Petersburg, Leuchtenberg
Collection.
Mosss at THE Burnine Bus. Philadelphia, Johnson Col-
lection. From the Rodolphe Kann Collection, Paris.
CHRIST IN THE House or Simon. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich
Museum (Thiem Collection).
CHRIST ON THE Cross. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Museum
(Thiem Collection).
Tue Nativity. Fragments. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Mu-
seum; Frankfort, Noll Collection.
Tue Nativiry. Fragment. Philadelphia, Johnson Collec-
tion.
Madonnas
VIRGIN ENTHRONED WITH St. PETER AND St. Pauxt. London,
National Gallery.
Maponna. Half-length. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Museum.
Maponna. Half-length. Florence, Bargello.
Maponna. Half-length. Replica of No. 20. Newport,
R. I., Davis Collection.
Maponna. Half-length. London, National Gallery.
Maponna. Half-length. Antwerp, Museum.
Maponna. Half-length. Antwerp, Mair van den Bergh
Collection.
Maponna. Half-length. Sigmaringen.
Maponna. Half-length. Munich, Pourtalés Collection.
Maponna. Half-length. Prague, Rudolfinum.
Maponna. Half-length. Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg.
Portraits
PortraAIT OF A Man. 1462. London, National Gallery.
Portrait oF A Man. New York, Metropolitan Museum of
Art (Altman Collection). From the Oppenheim Collection,
Cologne.
Nos. 6, 25, and 26 I have not seen. The altar-piece at Granada
(No. 6) is universally accepted, while the pictures at Sigmaringen
(No. 25) and in the Pourtales Collection at Munich (No. 26) have
been identified by Friedlander.
[ 230 |
|
APPENDICES
AELBERT VAN OUWATER
THE Raisine or Lazarus. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Museum.
PICTURES IN THE MANNER OF DIRK BOUTS
MADONNA AND CHILD ON A Grassy Banx. Hayward Heath,
Stephenson Clarke Collection.
Replica of No. 1 with a different background. Leitmeritz,
Cathedral.
Tue Ratsinc or Lazarus. Mexico.
THe SrpyL AND THE Emperor Avcustus. Frankfort,
Stiidel Institute (attributed to Dirk Bouts).
Tue MarRIAGE OF THE VirGIN. By the same hand as No. 4.
Philadelphia, Johnson Collection.
Nos. 2 and 3 are known to me only in photographs, and through
Hofstede de Groot (No. 2) and Hugo von Tschudi (No. 3).
GEERTGEN TOT SINT JANS
Hoty Frevtitowsuip (Church Interior). Amsterdam, Rijks
Museum.
Tue Nativity. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
Tur ADORATION OF THE Maar. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
Sr. JoHn THE Baptist. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Museum.
Tue Nativity. Berlin, von Kaufmann Collection.
Maponna. Life-size, half-length. Berlin, von Holitscher
Collection.
Dietycu. Brunswick, Gallery.
EXTERIOR OF THE CHURCH OF St. BAvon. Haarlem, Church
of St. Bavon.
Maponna. Small half-length. Milan, Ambrosiana.
Tue Raisinc or Lazarus. Paris, Louvre.
Tur ADORATION OF THE Maar. ‘Triptych. Prague, Rudolfi-
num.
Curist IN THE SEPULCHRE. Utrecht, Archiepiscopal Mu-
seum.
[ 231 ]
APPENDICES
13. Preta. Vienna, Hof Museum.
14. Tue BurNING or THE BoNEs or St. JOHN THE Baptist.
15.
Vienna, Hof Museum.
COPIES OF LOST WORKS BY GEERTGEN
Tue LeGenp or St. Domenick. London, Turner Collection.
16. Maponna AND Sarnts IN A Forest. Triptych. London,
National Gallery.
This is by the Master of the Morrison Triptych, to whom
Friedlinder rightly assigns the following works as well:
1.
2.
3.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Triptycu. After Memling. London, Morrison Collection.
Tue ADORATION OF THE Macr. Philadelphia, Johnson Col-
lection.
Maponna AND Cuitp. Half-length. Nuremberg, Germanic
Museum (attributed to Quentin Metsys).
PICTURES IN THE MANNER OF GEERTGEN
PORTRAIT OF THE BURGOMASTER OF SCHIEDAM. Dated 1489.
Philadelphia, Johnson Collection.
St. Martin. Philadelphia, Johnson Collection.
Sr. ANNE WITH THE VIRGIN AND CuiLp. Schloss Arensburg
near Biickeburg.
Hoty Famiry. Cologne, Museum.
TriprycH. Spain. Published by Kronig in Les Arts.
This last andthe Morrison Triptych I know only in reproductions.
a ee
PAINTERS INFLUENCED BY GEERTGEN
THE MASTER OF THE MARTYRDOM OF ST. LUCY
Tue Martyrpom or St. Lucy. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
Tuer Crucirixion. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
Tue Crucirtxion. Utrecht, Archiepiscopal Museum.
Tur DESCENT FROM THE Cross. Vienna, Figdor Collection.
[ 232 ]
APPENDICES
GERARD DAVID (EARLY WORKS)
Here I may refer the reader to Bodenhausen’s book and to the
supplement to the list of works there given in the Zeitschrift fiir
bildende Kunst, 1911.
THE MASTER OF THE ANTWERP TRIPTYCH
1, Tue Maponna wits Saints. Triptych. Antwerp, Museum.
2. Tue ASSUMPTION OF THE VIRGIN. Bonn, Provincial Museum.
8. Tue Virein AND St. Micuarey. Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich
Museum.
The relationship between these three pictures was first remarked
by Walter Cohen. The records of the city of Haarlem for the
year 1500 mention a commission for an altar-piece with the
Assumption of the Virgin in the centre which had been given to a
“son of Jan Mostaert”’ by the Church of St. Bavon. This ref-
erence may be thought to indicate the picture now in Bonn but,
to judge by the date, the artist was more probably the father than
the son of the well-known Jan Mostaert.
THE MASTER OF ALKMAAR
1-7. Tue SEVEN Works or Mercy. Alkmaar, Great Church.
8,9. Tue CrrcuMcIsION oF CHRIST; CHRIST IN THE TEMPLE.
Two large panels. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
10. Tue PRESENTATION IN THE TempLE. Amsterdam, Rijks
Museum.
11. Curist 1n Liwso. Prague, Nostitz Collection.
12. Tue Marryrpom or A Saint. Philadelphia, Johnson Col-
lection.
13. St. ANNE WITH THE VIRGIN AND CHILD AND Saints. New
York, offered for sale.
JAN MOSTAERT (SUPPOSED EARLY WORKS)
—_
Tuer TREE OF Jesse. Rome, Stroganoff Collection.
2. Tur SipyL AND THE Emperor Aucustus. Antwerp, Mu-
seum.
I formerly attributed this picture, probably without
[ 233 |
oe
APPENDICES
due warrant, to the Master of the Virgo inter Virgines.
(See the catalogue of the Antwerp Museum.) The attri-
bution to Jan Mostaert is not wholly convincing.
TriIprycH with a Pieta in the centre. A copy of the picture
by Geertgen now in Vienna. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
JACOB CORNELISZ (EARLY WORKS)
°
Catvary. Amsterdam, Rijks Museum.
Catvary. Philadelphia, Johnson Collection.
Catvary. Vienna, Liechtenstein Collection.
Panel with the Crucifixion in the centre and scenes from the
Passion at the sides. Utrecht, Archiepiscopal Museum.
[ 234 ]
|
It
WORKS BY RUBENS
IN AMERICAN COLLECTIONS
1, Sr. Perer. About 1603-4. Larchmont, New York, Col-
lection of Eugene Baross.
2. Tue Crucirixion. About 1610. Philadelphia, Collection
of John G. Johnson.
8. Paut anp Barnasas at Lystra. Sketch. About 1612.
Philadelphia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
4. Portrait or A MAN anv His Wire. About 1614. Boston,
Collection of Mrs. Robert D. Evans.
5. Portrait or a Youna Man. Study. About 1615. New
York, Collection of J. Pierpont Morgan.
6. Tue DeEtivery or THE Keys To St. Peter. About 1615.
New York, Collection of W. R. Bacon.
7. Romutus anp Remus. Sketch. About 1615. Philadel-
phia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
8. Tur Wor anv Fox Hunt. About 1616. New York, Metro-
politan Museum of Art.
9. Tue Steer Hunt. Sketch. Studio replica. About 1616.
New York, Ehrich & Co.
10. Tue Feast or tHE Gops. About 1615. Yonkers, New
York, Collection of Mrs. Samuel Untermyer.
11, 12. Heaps or Two or THE THREE Kincs. Autographic rep-
licas of parts of the altar-piece at Mechlin. About 1618.
New York, Collection of Charles H. Senff.
13. THe ADORATION OF THE Kincs. Sketch for the picture at
Munich. About 1619. Montreal, Collection of Sir Wil-
liam Van Horne.
14. Tue Emsiem or Curist APPEARING TO THE EMPEROR
Constantine. Sketch. About 1621-22. Philadelphia,
Collection of John G. Johnson.
[ 235 |
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22,
23.
24.
25.
26.
Q7.
28.
29.
APPENDICES
PortTRAIT OF AmBroGcio Spinota. About 1625. Chicago,
Art Institute. From the Demidoff Collection.
The same as No. 15, with alterations. About 1625. Chi-
cago (?), in private ownership.
Hory Famiry. About 1625. San Francisco, Collection of
W. H. Crocker. From the Blenheim Collection.
The same composition as No. 17. According to Max Rooses,
the original. St. Louis, Collection of Edward A. Faust.
St. Cecit1a. About 1627. New York, Collection of Mrs.
Henry O. Havemeyer.
Maponna AporED By Saints. Sketch. Studio replica.
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts.
Tue Entry or Henri IV into Paris. Sketch. About 1629.
New York, Collection of John W. Simpson.
Portrait or THomas Howarp, Earut oF ARUNDEL. About
1630. Boston, Collection of Mrs. John L. Gardner.
PortTRAIT OF HELIODORO DE BarRERA. About 1630. New
York, Collection of Frederick T. Fleitmann.
ABRAHAM AND MELCHISEDEK. Study. From a series of de-
signs for tapestries. Studio replica. About 1626-28.
Philadelphia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
Tue TRIUMPH OF THE SACRAMENT OVER Fotiy. From the
same series. Studio replica. Cleveland, Collection of
J. H. Wade.
I am indebted to Mr. A. F. Jaccacci for calling my at-
tention to this study which I have not seen.
Tue Famity or Ruspens. Sketch. About 1630. Philadel-
phia, Collection of John G. Johnson. Formerly owned by
Lord Darnley.
Tuetis DipPpInc THE YOUNG ACHILLES IN THE STYX. From
a series of designs for tapestries. About 1630-35. New
York, Collection of John E. Stillwell.
AcHILLES AMONG THE DauGuters oF LycoMEDEs. Study.
From the same series. School replica. Philadelphia, Fair-
mount Park Museum (Willstach Collection).
ACHILLES AND Briseis. Study. From the same series.
Studio replica. New York, Collection of Jacob H. Schiff.
[ 236 ]
APPENDICES
DzpaLus AND Icarus. Sketch. About 1635. Philadel-
phia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
THe Wovunvep Staa. Sketch. About 1635. Philadelphia,
Collection of John G. Johnson.
THE INTERCESSION or St. THERESA. Studio replica. About
1633-35. New York, Collection of J. Pierpont Morgan.
PorTRAIT OF FERDINAND, CARDINAL-INFANTE OF SPAIN.
About 1635. New York, Collection of J. Pierpont Morgan.
PorTRAIT OF A Lapy IN Brack. About 1635. Baltimore,
Collection of Henry B. Jacobs.
APOLLO AND THE Muses. About 1638. New York, Collec-
tion of William A. Clark.
Tue Rare OF THE SABINES. Sketch. About 1638. Phila-
delphia, Collection of P.A.B. Widener.
THe RETURN OF THE SABINES. Sketch. About 1638. Phila-
delphia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
Two Cows. About 1635-40. Philadelphia, Collection of
John G. Johnson.
LanpscaPE. About 1635-40. Philadelphia, Collection of
John G. Johnson.
LANDSCAPE WITH FIGURES OF PHILEMON AND Baucis. Study
for the picture in the Hof Museum at Vienna. About 1638-
40. Philadelphia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
Hoty Famity. About 1635-40. New York, Metropolitan
Museum of Art.
Tue Stac Hunt. In collaboration with Snyders and Wildens.
About 1638. New York, Collection of Mrs. Benjamin
Thaw.
[ 237 ]
10.
il.
III
WORKS BY VAN DYCK
IN AMERICAN COLLECTIONS
EARLY WORKS
Sr. BARTHOLEMEW. About 1616. Replica of the pictures in
Dresden and at Althorp House. Boston, Collection of
F. G. Macomber.
Tue ApostLE Jupas. About 1616. Norristown, Pennsy]-
vania, Collection of Mr. Charles F. Williams.
Oxtp Man. Study head. About 1616. Philadelphia, Col-
lection of John G. Johnson.
Tue Repentant MaGpatene. About 1616-18. Philadel-
phia, Collection of John G. Johnson.
Portrait or A Man. New York, Metropolitan Museum of
Art. From Lord Methuen’s collection.
Portrait oF A Woman. About 1618-20. New York, Metro-
politan Museum of Art.
Famity Portrait: Man, WoMAN, AND CHILD ON A VERAN-
paH. About 1618-20. Baltimore, Collection of Henry
B. Jacobs.
Portrait or Nicuouas Rocxox. About 1620. Baltimore,
Collection of Henry B. Jacobs.
Portrait oF Frans Snypers. About 1620. New York,
Collection of Henry C. Frick.
PorTRAIT OF THE WIFE oF FrRANs SnypERS. About 1620.
New York, Collection of Henry C. Frick.
Portrait oF A Lapy. 1622. Philadelphia, Collection of
John G. Johnson. Attributed also to Cornelis de Vos.
[ 238 ]
12.
13.
14.
15.
23.
24,
APPENDICES
GENOESE PERIOD. 1621-26
PorTRAIT OF ELENA GrimApI, Marcuesa Carranro.
About 1623. Philadelphia, Collection of P. A. B. Widener.
From the Palazzo Cattaneo.
Portrait OF CLELIA CaTTaNEo, Daughter of Elena Grimaldi.
1623. Philadelphia, Collection of P. A. B. Widener. From
the Palazzo Cattaneo.
Portrait or Finrppo Catraneo, Son of Elena Grimaldi.
1623. Philadelphia, Collection of P. A. B. Widener. From
the Palazzo Cattaneo.
PorTRAIT OF THE MarcuEsA GIOVANNA CATTANEO, Daughter
of Giovanni Battista Cattaneo. New York, Collection of
Henry C. Frick. From the Palazzo Cattaneo.
PortRAIT OF CANEVARI. New York, Collection of Henry C.
Frick. From the Palazzo Cattaneo. :
PorTRAIT OF AN O_p Lapy. Yonkers, New York, Collection
of Mrs. Samuel Untermyer. From the Palazzo Cattaneo.
Portrait OF Paota AporNo, MarcHESA BRIGNOLE-SALA.
Philadelphia, Collection of P. A. B. Widener. From the
Earl of Warwick’s Collection.
The same as No. 18. New York, Collection of Henry C. Frick.
From the Duke of Abercorn’s collection.
PorTRAIT OF THE MARcHESE GIAN VINCENZO IMPERIALE.
1625. Philadelphia, Collection of P. A.B. Widener. For-
merly owned by the Marchese Cesare Imperiale of Te-
nalba.
PortTRAIT OF A GENERAL IN Armour. Philadelphia, Collec-
tion of P. A. B. Widener.
Portrait OF THE Marcuesa Durazzo. New York, Metro-
politan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). From the
Rodolphe Kann Collection, Paris.
Portrait or Lucas VAN UFFELEN. New York, Metropolitan
Museum of Art (Altman Collection). From the Duke of
Sutherland’s collection.
Portrait or A Lapy or Rank. Cincinnati, Collection of
Charles P. Taft.
[ 239 ]
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37,
APPENDICES
PoRTRAIT OF THE DoGarEssA ANTONIA LERCARI (?). Proba-
bly a studio replica of the portrait of the Marchesa Cat-
taneo in the National Gallery at London. Montreal,
Collection of James Ross. Formerly owned by the Mar-
chese Imperiali-Coccapani of Modena.
Hoty Famity: Tue VirGiIn witH THE CHILp, St. Josepu,
AND THE INFANT JOHN THE Baptist. New York, Collec-
tion of Mrs. Henry E. Huntington. A school copy is in the
Palazzo Doria at Genoa and was reproduced by M. Menotti
in Archivio Storice dell’arte, 1897.
Mater Dotorosa. Head in profile. Philadelphia, Collection
of John G. Johnson.
Tue MarrisGe oF St. CATHERINE. Chicago, Collection of
A. A. Sprague.
THE ASSUMPTION OF THE VirGIN. Philadelphia, Collection
of P. A. B. Widener. From the Hope Collection, Deep-
dene.
SECOND ANTWERP PERIOD. 1626-31
PORTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN, presumably Le Roy. New York,
Metropolitan Museum of Art.
PoRTRAIT OF A GUITAR-PLAYER. New York, Collection of
Jacob H. Schiff.
Portrait OF A Man. Probably the engraver Schelte a Bols-
wert. (Compare the engraving by Adriaen Lommelin
after van Dyck.) New York (?), Recently in the collection
of the late M. C. D. Borden.
Portrait or ANNA MariA DE ScHopt. Boston, Museum of
Fine Arts. According to Bode, perhaps by Cornelis de
Vos.
PorTRAIT OF A KNIGHT OF THE GOLDEN FLEECE. New York,
New York Historical Society.
PortTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN. New York, Collection of John
W. Simpson.
PortRAIT OFA Lapy. Cincinnati, Collection of Mrs. Thomas
J. Emery.
PortTRAIT OF HELENE DU Bots. Chicago, Art Institute.
[ 240 ]
38.
39.
40.
41.
42,
43,
44,
45.
46.
APPENDICES
Portrait oF A Lapy. Grisaille. Boston, Collection of F. G.
Macomber.
Tue Crucirrxion. Sketch. Philadelphia, Collection of
John G. Johnson.
ENGLISH PERIOD. 1632-40
Portrait OF JoHN VILLIERS, Viscount GRANDISON. New
York, Collection of Harry Payne Whitney.
PortTRAIT OF GRAF JOHANN VON Nassau-Lizcen. About
1634. Cincinnati, Collection of Mrs. Thomas J. Emery.
From the Ashburton collection.
PorTRAIT OF JAMES Stuart, DuKEe or RICHMOND AND
Lennox. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art. From
Lord Methuen’s collection.
Portrait OF A Lapy. Boston, Collection of Mrs. John L.
Gardner. Formerly owned by the Duke of Ossuna of
Madrid.
PorRTRAIT OF CATHERINE Howarp, Lapy p’AuBiGNy. Phila-
delphia, Collection of P. A. B. Widener. From the Earl of
Clarendon’s collection.
PorTRAIT OF GEORGE Hay, Eart or Kinnourt. New York,
Knoedler & Co. From the Earl of Clarendon’s collection.
PORTRAIT OF THE EaArL OF DerBy witH His WIFE AND
Davucuter. New York, Knoedler & Co. From the Earl
of Clarendon’s collection.
47,48. Portraits or Two Lorp Herserts. New York, Col-
49.
lection of William A. Clark.
PORTRAIT OF THE COUNTESS OF Rivers AND Her SISTER,
EwizABETH THIMBLEBY. Studio replica of the picture in
Lord Spencer’s collection, Althorp House. Baltimore, Col-
lection of Henry B. Jacobs.
[ 241 ]
IV
' WORKS BY REMBRANDT
IN AMERICAN COLLECTIONS
The references to publications in the following lists are chiefly
to Wilhelm Bode, assisted by C. Hofstede de Groot, The Complete
Work of Rembrandt, Paris, 1902 (which is cited simply as Bode),
and to W. R. Valentiner, Rembrandt, in the series called Klassiker
der Kunst, Stuttgart, 3d. edition, 1909 (which is cited as Klassiker
der Kunst). In the case of recently discovered pictures, not men-
tioned in these works, reference is made to other books or periodi-
cals in which they are reproduced. The Hudson-Fulton Exhibition
Catalogue is the catalogue of the loan collection of Dutch works of
art exhibited in New York, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in
1909.
1. Bataam. 1626. New York, Collection of Mrs. Ferdinand
Hermann. Pub.: Klassiker der Kunst, 3; Bode in Art in
America, 1913, 3.
2. PortTRAIT OF THE ArTIsT. About 1628. New York, Collec-
tion of J. Pierpont Morgan. Pub.: Hudson-Fulton Exhi-
bition Catalogue, 74; Hofstede de Groot, Onze Kunst,
1912.
8. PortTRAIT OF THE ARTIST. 1629. Boston, Collection of Mrs.
John L. Gardner. Pub.: Bode, 18; Klassiker der Kunst,
$1.
4. Tue Farner or Rempranpt. About 1629. Boston, Mu-
seum of Fine Arts. Pub.: Bode, 543; Klassiker der Kunst,
43.
5. Srupy or aA TurK. About 1629. Philadelphia, Collection
of John G. Johnson. Pub.: Catalogue of the Johnson Col-
lection, 473.
[ 242 ]
APPENDICES
6. Porrrarror Rempranprt’s Fatuer. About 1630. Chicago,
Collection of Mrs. L. Kimball. Pub.: Bode, Zeitschrift
fur bildende Kunst, 1912, 210. The original of the replica
published in Bode, 29, and in Klassiker der Kunst, 44.
7,8. Two Srupies or Rempranpr’s Farner. About 1680.
Philadelphia, Collection of John D. MclIlhenny. Not yet
published.
9. Portrair or THE Artist. 1631. Toledo, Collection of
Edward D. Libbey. Pub.: Klassiker der Kunst, 33;
Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 75.
10. Portrait oF THE Artist. 1631. Chicago, Collection of
Frank G. Logan. Pub.: Bode, 548; Klassiker der Kunst,
49; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 76.
11. Portrait or Nicuotas Ruts. 1631. New York, Collec-
tion of J. Pierpont Morgan. Pub.: Bode, 51; Klassiker der
Kunst, 66; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 77.
12. Portrait or A Younc Man. About 1631. New York, Col-
lection of Frederick T. Fleitmann. Pub.: Bode, 559;
Klassiker der Kunst, 67.
18. Portrait or A Man. About 16382. New York, New York
Historical Society. Pub.: Hofstede de Groot, Onze Kunst,
1909; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 84.
14. Portrait or A Turk. 1632. New York, Collection of Wil-
liam K. Vanderbilt. Pub.: Bode, 145; Klassiker der Kunst,
145; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 79.
15. Sr.JoHN THE Baptist. 1632. New York, Collection of the
late Charles Stewart Smith. Pub.: Bode, 134; Klassiker
der Kunst, 113; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 80.
16. Portrait or A Man. 1632. New York, Collection of Mrs.
Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.: Bode, 73; Klassiker der
Kunst, 78.
17. Portrait oF A MAN OF THEVAN BERESTEYN FaMILy. 16382.
New York, Collection of Mrs. Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.:
Bode, 82; Klassiker der Kunst, 74.
18. Portrait oF A WOMAN OF THE VAN BERESTEYN Famity. 1632.
New York, Collection of Mrs. Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.:
Bode, 83; Klassiker der Kunst, 75.
[ 243 ]
19.
20.
a1.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
AR
28.
29,
30.
APPENDICES
PorTRAITOFA Man. 1632. New York, Collection of James
W. Ellsworth. Pub.: Bode, 81; Klassiker der Kunst, 82;
Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 78.
Portrait oF A Musictan. 1633. New York, Collection of
Senator William A. Clark. Pub.: Hofstede de Groot, Onze
Kunst, 1912.
Portrait oF A YounGc Man. 1633. Cincinnati, Collection
of Charles P. Taft. Pub.: Bode, 100; Klassiker der Kunst,
96.
Portrait or A Woman. 1633. New York, Metropolitan
Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode, 561;
Klassiker der Kunst, 98.
Tue Timorovus DiscipLes IN THE StoRM. 1633. Boston,
Collection of Mrs. John L. Gardner. Pub.: Bode, 120;
Klassiker der Kunst, 162.
PorTRAIT OF SASKIA. About 1633. Philadelphia, Collection
of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 153; Klassiker der
Kunst, 129; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 81.
PortTRAIT OF A YouNG Man. About 1633. New York, Col-
lection of the late Mrs. Morris K. Jesup. Pub.: Bode, 90;
Klassiker der Kunst, 90; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Cata-
logue, 82.
PorTRAIT OF A YOuNG Woman. About 1633. New York,
Collection of the late Mrs. Morris K. Jesup. Pub.: Bode,
91; Klassiker der Kunst, 91; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition
Catalogue, 83.
Portrait or A Man. 1634. Boston, Museum of Fine Arts.
Pub.: Bode, 111; Klassiker der Kunst, 201.
Portrait OF A WomMAN. 1634. Boston, Museum of Fine
Arts. Pub.: Bode, 112; Klassiker der Kunst, 201.
Tue Finpine or Mosss. About 1635. Philadelphia, Col-
lection of John G. Johnson. Pub.: Bode, 195; Klassiker
der Kunst, 167; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 86;
' Catalogue of the Johnson Collection, 474.
Stupy oF AN OLD Man. 1635. New York, Collection of
W. B. Leeds. Pub.: Bode, 104; Klassiker der Kunst,
190.
[ 244 ]
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
APPENDICES
PorTRAIT OF A Rassr. About 1635. Tuxedo Park, Collec-
tion of Ambrose Monell. Pub.: Bode, 202; Klassiker der
Kunst, 187.
PoRTRAIT OF AN ELDERLY WoMAN. 1635. New York,
Metropolitan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.:
Bode, 224; Klassiker der Kunst, 224.
PorTRAIT OF SASKIA. 1635. New York, Collection of S. R.
Bertron. Pub.: Bode, 154; Klassiker der Kunst, 130.
PorTRAIT OF SASKIA. 1636. Pittsburg, Collection of Mrs.
A.M. Byers. Pub.: Bode, 156; Klassiker der Kunst, 132.
THE SLAUGHTERED Ox. 1637. Philadelphia, Collection of
John G. Johnson. Pub.: Bode, 575; Klassiker der Kunst,
230; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 87; Catalogue
of the Johnson Collection, 475.
Srupy or A Man. About 1643-5. Philadelphia, Collection
of John G. Johnson. Pub.: Catalogue of the Johnson Col-
lection, 476.
PortTRAIT OF AN ELDERLY Man. 1638. New York, Collec-
tion of Philip Lehman. Pub.: Bode, 273; Klassiker der
Kunst, 252.
LANDSCAPE WITH AN OBELISK. About 1638. Boston, Col-
lection of Mrs. John L. Gardner. Pub.: Bode, 230; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 231.
Portrait or HerMAN Doomer (known as “Rembrandt’s
Gilder’). 1640. New York, Collection of Mrs. Henry O.
Havemeyer. Pub.: Bode, 175; Klassiker der Kunst,
Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 88.
PorTRAIT OF AN OLD Woman. 1640. New York, Collection
of Mrs. Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.: Bode, 278; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 256; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue
89.
Portrait or A Man. 1641. New York, Metropolitan
‘Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode, 277;
Klassiker der Kunst, 264.
Tur Tomer or Batusuesa. 1643. New York, Metropoli-
tan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode, 246;
Klassiker der Kunst, 228.
[ 245 ]
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
APPENDICES
PortTRAIT OF A Man. 1643. New York, Collection of Mrs.
Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.: Bode, 286; Klassiker der
Kunst, 270.
PorTRAIT OF A YOUNG Man. 1643. New York, Collection
of Mrs. Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.: W. Bode, 266; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 271.
PortRAIT OF A YOUNG Woman. 1643. New York, Collec-
tion of Mrs. Henry O. Havemeyer. Pub.: Bode, 267;
Klassiker der Kunst, 271.
PortTRAIT OF A JEW. Study. About 1643-45. Philadel-
phia, Collection of John G. Johnson. Pub.: Bode, 579;
Klassiker der Kunst, 356; Catalogue of the Johnson Col-
lection, 477.
Portrair oF A Man. 1644. New York, Metropolitan
Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode, 271;
Klassiker der Kunst, 273.
A Girt Breninp A Door. 1645. Chicago, Art Institute.
Pub.: Bode, 301; Klassiker der Kunst, 323; Hudson-
Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 91.
PortRAIT OF THE Artist. About 1645. New York, Collec-
tion of H. L. Terell. Pub.: Bode, 260; Klassiker der Kunst,
316; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 90.
Srupy OF AN OLD Man (King Saul). About 1645. Boston,
Collection of Quincy A. Shaw. Pub.: Bode, 578; Klassiker
der Kunst, 363.
A Girt SHowrne A Mepat. About 1645. Cincinnati, Col-
lection of Mrs. Thomas J. Emery. Pub.: Bode, 303; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 321.
Srupy OF AN oLD Man. About 1645. Philadelphia, Collec-
tion of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Hofstede de Groot, Onze
Kunst, 1909.
Curist ON THE Cross. Sketch. About 1646. Philadel-
phia, Collection of John G. Johnson. Pub.: Bode, 518;
Klassiker der Kunst, 246; Catalogue of the Johnson Col-
lection, 478. Original of the old copy in the collection of
Léon Bonnat. Pub.: Bode, 318; Klassiker der Kunst,
286.
[ 246 |
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
APPENDICES
PorTRAIT OF A PAINTER (Jan van Cappelle?). 1647. New
York, Collection of Henry C. Frick. Pub.: Bode, 365;
Klassiker der Kunst, 345.
Tue Mity. About 1650. Philadelphia, Collection of P. A.
B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 345; Klassiker der Kunst, 313.
Tue Puiwosoruer. About 1650. Philadelphia, Collection
of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 582; Klassiker der
Kunst, 365; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 96.
PorTRAIT OF AN OLD Man. 1650. New York, Collection of
George J. Gould. Pub.: Bode, $76; Klassiker der Kunst,
866; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 95.
PorTRAIT OF THE ARTIST. 1650. Philadelphia, Collection
of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 346; Klassiker der
Kunst, 319; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 94.
STUDY OF AN OLD Man. About 1651. New York, Collec-
tion of Michael Friedsam. Pub.: A. Dayot, Grands et
Petits Maitres Hollandais (Paris, 1911), 135.
PoRTRAIT OF AN OLD Woman. 1652. Cincinnati, Collec-
tion of Charles P. Taft. Pub.: Bode, 584; Klassiker der
Kunst, 349.
Virait (?) 1653. New York, Collection of Mrs. Henry E.
Huntington. Pub.: Bode, 385; Klassiker der Kunst, 426;
Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 97.
PorTRAIT OF A YOUNG Man. About 1654 (according to Bode,
1665). New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Pub.:
Bode, 495; Klassiker der Kunst, 507; Hudson-Fulton
Exhibition Catalogue, 107.
THe Woman TakeEN 1N Aputtery. About 1654. Min-
neapolis, Collection of T. B. Walker. Pub.: Bode, 338;
Klassiker der Kunst, 537; Hofstede de Groot, Onze Kunst,
1912.
Tuer Poutish Riwer. About 1655. New York, Collection of
Henry C. Frick. Pub.: Bode, 466; Klassiker der Kunst,
435.
Portrait or Titus. 1655. New York, Metropolitan Mu-
seum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode, 442; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 413.
[ 247 ]
66.
68.
69.
70.
yi
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
APPENDICES
PorTRAIT OF A YouNG Artist. About 1655. New York,
Collection of J. Pierpont Morgan. Pub.: Bode, 364; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 346; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Cata-
logue, 93.
Portrait or AJEW. About 1655. Philadelphia, Collection
of John G. Johnson. According to Bredius and Hofstede de
Groot, possibly by Karel Fabritius. Pub.: Bode, 473;
Klassiker der Kunst, 431; Catalogue of the Johnson Col-
lection, 479.
Portrait or A Man. 1655. Montreal, Collection of James
Ross. Pub.: Bode, 448; Klassiker der Kunst, 433; Hudson-
Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 99.
PorTRAIT OF AN OLD Man. About 1655. Washington, Col-
lection of W. A. Slater. Pub.: Bode, 470; Klassiker der
Kunst, 431; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 100.
Curist. Bust. 1656. Philadelphia, Collection of John G,
Johnson. Pub.: Bode,,. 412; Klassiker der Kunst, 390;
Catalogue of the Johnson Collection, 480.
Tue Srpyu. About 1656. Newport, R. I., Collection of
Theodore M. Davis. Pub.: Bode, 528; Klassiker der
Kunst, 386; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 101.
St. Paut. About 1656. Philadelphia, Collection of P. A. B.
Widener. Pub.: Bode, 382; Klassiker der Kunst, 384.
PorRTRAIT OF HENDRICKJE STOFFELS. About 1656. New
York, Metropolitan Museum of Art (Altman Collection).
. Pub.: Hofstede de Groot, Onze Kunst, 1909.
STUDY OF AN OLD Woman. 1657. Philadelphia, Collection
of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 472; Klassiker der
Kunst, 440.
PortTRAIT OF AJEW. About 1657. New York, Collection of
Otto H. Kahn. Pub.: Bode, 407; Klassiker der Kunst, 388.
JUPITER AND Mercury. 1658. New York, Collection of
Otto H. Kahn. Pub.: Bode, 407; Klassiker der Kunst,
388.
PortTRAIT OF THE ARTIST. 1658. New York, Collection of
Henry C. Frick. Pub.: Bode, 428; Klassiker der Kunst,
400; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 102.
[ 248 ]
78.
79.
80.
81.
82.
83.
84.
85.
86.
87.
88.
89.
APPENDICES
Woman Triumine Her Nars. 1658. New York, Metro-
politan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode,
477; Klassiker der Kunst, 444.
Portrait or Titus (so-called Portrait of the Auctioneer,
Haring). 1658. New York, Metropolitan Museum of
Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode, 458; Klassiker der
Kunst, 417.
PortTRAIT OF A Man. 1659. Rochester, Collection of
George Eastman. Pub.: Bode, 461; Klassiker der Kunst,
447,
PortTRAIT OF A YounG Man. About 1660. Rochester, Col-
lection of George Eastman. Pub.: Bode, 455; Klassiker
der Kunst, 491.
HENDRICKJE STorFELs. 1660. New York, Collection of
Mrs. Henry E. Huntington. Pub.: Bode, 438; Klassiker
der Kunst, 411. |
PorTRAIT OF THE ARTIST. About 1660. New York, Metro-
politan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode,
429; Klassiker der Kunst, 411.
PoRTRAIT OF A JEW. 1661. Montreal, Collection of Sir
William Van Horne. Pub.: Bode, 509; Klassiker der
Kunst, 498.
Heaporanoip Man. Study. About 1661. Philadelphia,
Collection of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 592; Klas-
siker der Kunst, 455.
PitegRm AT Prayer. 1661. Toledo, Collection of John
N. Willis. Pub.: Bode, 485; Klassiker der Kunst,
457.
Tue Circumcision. 1661. Philadelphia, Collection of P.
A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 518; Klassiker der Kunst,
465.
PortraIt oF A Man. About 1662. Philadelphia, Collection
of P. A. B. Widener. Pub.: Bode, 487; Klassiker der
Kunst, 500.
PORTRAIT OF AN OLD Man (Dirk van Os). About 1662.
Boston, Collection of Frederick O. Sears. Pub.: Bode, 494;
Klassiker der Kunst, 501.
[ 249 ]
90.
91.
92.
93.
94.
APPENDICES
Tue Accountant. About 1663. New York, Collection of
Charles M. Schwab. Pub.: Bode, 526; Klassiker der
Kunst, 502; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 104.
PoRTRAIT OF AN ELpERLY Man. 1665. New York, Metro- -
politan Museum of Art. Pub.: Bode, 496; Klassiker
der Kunst, 506; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue,
106.
Pirate Wasnina His Hanps. About 1665. New York,
Metropolitan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.:
Bode, 532; Klassiker der Kunst, 468.
PorTRAIT OF MAGDALENA VAN Loo, Wife of Titus. About
1666. Montreal, Collection of R. B. Angus. Pub.: Bode,
537; Klassiker der Kunst, 486. __
Portrait oF Titus (?). About 1668. New York, Metro-
politan Museum of Art (Altman Collection). Pub.: Bode,
535; Klassiker der Kunst, 482; Hudson-Fulton Exhibition
Catalogue, 107A.
Portrait OF MAGDALENA VAN Loo, Wife of Titus (?). About
1668. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art (Altman
Collection). Pub.: Bode, 536; Klassiker der Kunst, 483;
Hudson-Fulton Exhibition Catalogue, 107B.
Opinions differ in regard to the authenticity of the following
paintings:
E.
2.
An Artist IN His Stupio. (Portrait of Rembrandt him-
self?) Possibly an early work of about 1626. New York,
Collection of William M. Chase. Not yet published.
Tue Buinp Tosias AND His Wire. Possibly an early work
of 1626. Engraved by W. de Leeuw in the time of Rem-
brandt. Accepted by Bredius. Philadelphia, Collection
of John G. Johnson. Pub.: Catalogue of the Johnson Col-
lection, 482.
3. Tur ResurREcTION oF Lazarus. About 1632. New York,
Collection of W. Gates. Pub.: Bode, 45; Klassiker der
Kunst, 12. A better example is in the possession of Charles
Sedelmeyer of Paris.
[ 250]
APPENDICES
4. Sr. Francis at Prayer. Philadelphia, Collection of John
G. Johnson. From the Duc d’Orléans Collection. Pub.:
Smith, Catalogue Raisonné, 183. An almost identical
picture, dated 1637, is in the possession of Mr. Otto Beit
of London. Pub.: Bode, 218.
5. LanpscaPe. 1639. Montreal, Collection of Sir William
Van Horne. Pub.: Hofstede de Groot, Onze Kunst, 1909.
A statistical comparison of the sales of paintings by Rembrandt
in different countries within the last few years shows the propor-
tion to be as follows: America has added to its possessions thirty-
four paintings — thirty-two by acquisition, two by discovery —
and has lost two; Germany has added eleven — ten by acquisition,
one by discovery — and has lost four; England has added eight
—two by acquisition, six by discovery —and has lost twenty,
France has added three — two by acquisition, one by discovery —
and has lost eighteen. This shows that America is far ahead in the
number of its acquisitions as compared with other countries, and
that Germany comes next while England and France have suffered
most from the loss of masterpieces by Rembrandt.
[ 251 ]
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