The Painting Technique ofFour Paintings hy Hendrick Goltzius and the Introduction ofColoured Ground

ElIa Hendriks, Anne van Grevenstein and Karin Groen

In their comprehensive article published in 1973, Miedema and Meijer questioned the relation between the major technical innovations and the stylistic changes which took place in later sixteenth-century and early seven• teenth-century Netherlandish painting. To answer this question, they point• ed out the need for more available technical information. 1 Technical exami• nations carried out during restoration ofa group of paintings by Hendrick Goltzius and his predecessor Cornelis van Haarlem, in the Frans Hals• museum, Haarlem, confirm the important role of the Haarlem Mannerists in the radical technical developments which took place in this period. This technical study was prompted by the restoration of Goltzius's Mercuryand Minerva (see appendix)2 and was extended to include the third painting in the series, Hercules and Cacus, as well as his Jupiter andAntiope (figs. 328-31). Information about Goltzius' Tityus Bound to a Rock, his Liver being Devoured by a Vulture of1613, also in the Frans Halsmuseum, is includ• ed in a survey of ground layers. Comparative material is provided by the technical examinations carried out during the recent restoration ofCornelis van Haarlem's Massacre ofthe Innocents (fig. 332) and The Wedding ofPeleus and Thetis of1593 (on loan to the Frans Halsmuseum from Het Koninklijk Kabinet van Schilderijen, Het Mauritshuis, Den Haag).3 It has been suggested that Mercuryand Minerva were painted to deco• rate a house, possibly Goltzius' own house in 'Jansstraat', Haarlem. The later signed and dated Hercules and Cacus is first mentioned together with these two paintings in 1671, 54 years after Goltzius' death, and thought to be a later commission. The different dimensions ofthe canvas, different ground layer and slightly different construction and moulding ofthe original frame, support the suggestion that Hercules was not planned to form a series with the other two paintings from the start.4 Similarities in the painting's subject matter and technique could be explained as specialisation ofthe painter.

The Canvas Supports Compared to Karel van Mander and Cornelis van Haarlem who continued to paint on the traditional painting support ofwooden panel, as well as can• vas, Goltzius appears more progressive in his virtually exclusive choice of canvas as a painting support.5 Goltzius chose large scale canvases to render Elia Hendriks, Anne van Grevenstein and Karin Groen

318 his monumental figures ofMercury, Minerva and Hercules, which approach Hendrick Goltzius, Mercury, 1611. life size. According to Van Mander, Goltzius' preferenee for working on a Canvas, 211,5 x 117,5 cm. large scale was already apparent in his drawings before he turned to oil paint• Haarlem. Frans Halsmuseum. on laan from Den Haag. Her Koninklijk Kabiner van ing proper around 1600. This accounts for his choice of primed canvas Schilderijen. Her Maurirshuis. rather than parchment, which was too limited in size, as a support for three so-called 'pen works' executed between 1599 and probably 1606. One extant 31 9 pen work, Without Ceres and Bacchus, l!enus would Frieze, 1606 (?), The Hendrick Goltzius, Minerva, 1611. Canvas. 211.5 x 117.5 cm. Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg (fig. 24) is drawn on a primed canvas Haarlem. Frans Halsmuseum. on laan from which measures 219 x 163 cm. and exceeds the dimensions of the paintings which we examined and indeed all his other known works.6 All four works by Goltzius examined, are painted on a single piece of fine, plain weave linen fabric. The canvases are intact, so that one can assume that the smallest dimensions ofthe paintings correspond to the loom widths of the canvas strips. This measures II7,5 cm. in Mercury and Minerva, II2,0 cm. in Jupiter andAntiope and 142,5 cm. in Hercules and Cacus. The canvas