Painting of the 19Th Century in Germany, Holland, Scandinavia
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ISO D THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES MASTER M. WILLIAM WRinHT. BY PRINCE PIERRE TROUBETSKOY. ^K ^ Architecture and ^Decoration, fc^ fcj fej fc2 fcj IN THEIR. HISTORY- 'DEVELOPMEHTo^ PRINCIPLES EDITOR,* IN CHIEF EDMUND BUCKLEY, A.M., Pli.D,liniwnrityofCKica9o CONSULTI/fC EDITOFLS J. M .HOPPIN.D.D., Yak University ALFRED V. CHURCHILL ,A.M., Columbia Univerrity fUI/y niusiraivd NATIONAL ART SOCIETY Chicago Art Library Copyright, 1907, bj W. E. ERNST. By couite^y of the lu'tim J*hoto, Co. SYMPOSIUM OF IM,ATO. FKIKRBAL'H. (SEK LESSUN 12.) Painting of the Nineteenth Century in Germany, Holland, Scandinavia and Russia. ROBERT KOEHLER, DIRECTOR OK TIIK MINNEAPOLIS SCHOOL OF FINE ARTS. INTRODUCTION. CLASSICISM, (i) bygone periods, and still persist in admir- ing works that utterlj' fail to meet the Within the limited space allowed, it is requirements of an honest, unbiased and not possible to give a complete history enlightened criticism. It is neither an easy of the art cf painting in the nineteenth nor an altogether pleasant task to shatter century in the countries named. But an popular idols; but the historian cannot be effort is made to bring before the student a guided in his estimate of an artist's merits clear picture of the changing conditions out by his popularity, or the esteem in which of which the art dominating certain periods he may have been held during his lifetime. has grown ; and also to explain the nature It has been said, that an artist's real merit of the gradual development, which, rooting can only be judged by his relation to his in a false conception of the province of art own times; this is only measurably true, at the beginning of the century, resulted, and has nothing to do with a final judgment towards the end of it, in a thoroughly healthy of his period, which may be found sadly aPQ vital art sentiment Since this is still wanting, and the condemnation of which not fully realized even among painters, it is will include his own doom, while some not surprising that the vast n'">;'^rity of tlie almost forgotten contemporary may re- public should continue to entertain entirely ceive high praise for merits utterly ignored false ideas about art based on traditions of in his time. Of the present, therefore, it 579 867272 5 So PAINTING OF THE NINETEENTH may not be altogether safe to speak with his later homage to classic art is no less too much confidence, except in so far as the significant. achievements stand in relation to generally We need but briefly mention that Winckel- accepted principles of progress. mann's teachings were more readily Many names must necessarily be omitted absorbed by the gifted Anton Rafael Mengs, from this brief review, though they may and by the foremost woman-painter of her have equal claims with some that are men- time, Angelica Kaufmann. Mengs was tioned. If the earlier artists have received certainly a notable colorist and also pos- more extensive consideration, it is because sessed of great technical skill. But their careers have closed and a more com- Winckelmann's ideal of beauty was one of prehensive estimate of their importance to form only; it was the beauty chiseled in the history of art was possible, while the marble by the Greeks, v/hich to his percep- work of many of the living has not yet tion never revealed any charm of color, 'assumed that definite character by which never required any. To create beautiful they may ultimately be judged. forms, as the Greeks had done, was the only To understand the art of the nineteenth worthy ambition for a painter; the nearer century, we must first gain a clear concep- he could approach the ancients in this tion of the conditions prevailing at the end respect, the greater w^as his art. of the eighteenth, wlien the joyous art of In the life of their surroundings the paint- the Rococo period had been superseded by ers found no subjects that would readily lend a cold and formal Classicism. In 1764 themselves to representation in this shape, Winckelmann published his "History of so they very naturally turned to mythology Ancient Art," nnd two years later Lessing for the purpose, and produced works which followed with his "Laokoon. " The long- showed their intimate knowledge of classical neglected beauty of antique sculpture was beauty—and their contempt for life. Their once more brought to the attention of man- pictures are in reality only so many Greek kind, and by his sincere enthusiasm Winckel- statues, painted. mann carried all the world with him in his But why paint their statues? Since all admiration for the newly-discovered beauty, their adored originals were of white marble, so that art found a new model after which would it not be more rational to render their to shape its conception of the ideal. A new own conceptions also without the use of ideal! Ever since the ravages of the thirty color? And this they proceeded to do, con- years' war, art in Germany had led but a gratulating themselves—and the world—that pitiable existence. Painters there were, now a new epoch had opened for grand art! but not a single stands for one whose name A. J. Carstens takes the lead in this new anything great or remarkable in art. When- art. Born in 1754 in St. Jiirgen, near ever anything above the average appeared, Schleswig, he evinced quite early a talent it was the work of a foreigner; home talent for art. The literature of the time had a found no encouragement. As in the fine powerful influence on his sensitive soul, and arts, so in literature the national spirit he was filled with a longing to behold and seemed destined to wither, until Lessing study the grand masterpieces of Greek art. appeared and was followed by Schiller and Entering the Academy at Copenhagen, he Goethe whose genius marks the most bril- soon found himself in dispute with his liant epoch in German literature. The lat- teachers, and left the school, preferring to ter in his earlier writings severely attacked follow his own course. He devoted himself contemporary art, and gave preference to arduously to the study of the antique, not, the old German school of Diirer; but after however, drawing directly from the casts, his journey to Italy a change came over but taking mental notes and drawing the him and henceforth the Greek ideal was figures from memory. His desire to behold Goethe's also. While Schiller's connec- the original marbles in Rome he could not tion with fine arts is less intimate, the satisfy until his thirty-eighth year, when his change from his earlier, sounder views to style was already fully developed and ere- CENTURY IN GERMANY. 581 ated something of a sensation, as he himself foreign and alien to its very nature. Gran- asserts in reporting about the exhibition of deur in art is a product of evolution, and his works which he had arranged in Rome. results from the development of an inner Judged by the standard of to-day, we find consciousness, not from foreign guidance little of any real artistic value in these and advice, accepted in good faith and nour- drawings in black and white— for such they ished with the arrogant conceit "I will!" were; but viewed from the standpoint of We shall see that it was not the work of their age we may understand, though we do the classicists that bore the vital spark from not endorse, the high praise bestowed upon which a healthy art could ultimately spring them, when art was following ditTcrent into life. For classicism, unwittingly, let us paths, from the strange windings and color- concede, did its utmost to kill this spark less vistas of which it did not turn for more which was, almost as unconsciously, kept than half a century. Carstens died in alive by that little, unpretentious bandof il- Rome, 1798. lustrators, who, with pencil and graver, kept Among those who continued to work in a pictorial record of the manner and customs the spirit of Carstens, we need but mention of their time, which the classicists, and their the foremost one: early followers, the romanticists, were all Bonaventura Qenelli (1803-1868), was the too eager to ignore or to ridicule. Whoever son of a landscape-painter of some xenown did not aspire to the proud distinction of a in his day. He was a better draughtsman, "historical painter" was not deemed worthy and in the choice of his subjects not so one- of ranking as an artist. The professional art- sided. But he too recognizes only the Greek critic and art-historian, in the production of ideal, and is sparing in the use of colors. which species the age became prolific, had Where he employs it, the result is not a no use for him; the "grand art" appealed to painting, but mcrelj' a Colored drawing, as the ranks of the educated classes, with in his frescoes in the so-called "Roman whom the pursuit of classical knowledge and House" in Leipzig. What may justly be indulgence in philosophical thought seemed accorded him of fame, is owing mainly to the chief object of life. And since in their his cartoons and smaller drawings, illustrat- hands lay the molding of national thotight, ing Homer, Dante and, especially, The and from their ranks hailed the commenta- Life of a Rake, and The Life of a Witch, tors of the artists' creations, as well as their in all of which he displays a fine feeling for patrons and advisors, it was but natural that grace of line.