MINERVA 1655. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.MINERVA1655. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.
In the eighteenth century certain connoisseurs had already made collections of his etchings. Catalogues began to be published, and in 1797 Adam Bartsch, keeper of the prints in the library at Vienna, issued the well-known catalogue that bears his name in two octavo volumes. Since Bartsch's monumental work many students of the etchings have striven to sift the authentic from the false. Needless to say, they disagree. Here are the figures:—
M. de Seidlitz's list of 260 was arrived at through consultation with several authorities, and that number is now accepted as approximately correct.
Our enthusiast knew nothing of the work of the labourers in Rembrandt's etching vineyard. He was quite ignorant of the expert contributions of Sir Francis Haden, P.G. Hamerton, and Mr. Frederick Wedmore, although his father, had he been a communicative man, could have discoursed learnedly on their efforts. Fate so willed it that he came to Rembrandt's etchings by chance, and, being sensitively alive to beauty and idealism, they merged into his life, and became as it were a personal possession.
On a certain day, in the window of one of those delightful London shops where first editions, prints, pieces of pottery, and odds and ends tempting to the virtuoso, are exposed for sale, he saw a small opulent picture by Monticelli. Entering to inquire the price, he discovered, as he had feared, that it was far beyond his bank balance. At the invitation of the proprietor, who seemed delighted that his goods should be admired, he stayed to "look round." Strewn upon a rosewood, inlaid table were a hundred and more etchings. Many were quite small, heads of men and women minutely and beautifully wrought; others, larger in size, were Biblical subjects; some were weird and fantastical; one, for example, showed a foreshortened figure lying before an erection, uponwhich a skinny bird stood with outstretched wings, flanked by ugly angel boys blowing trumpets.
TITUS IN A RED CAP AND A GOLD CHAIN 1657. The Wallace Collection, London.TITUS IN A RED CAP AND A GOLD CHAIN1657. The Wallace Collection, London.
"The best are sold," said the gentle proprietor.
The enthusiast was about to ask the name of the artist, when he suddenly caught sight of theChrist at Emmaus. His blood stirred in him. That little shop became an altar of art, and he an initiate. It was not the same version as the Louvre picture, but only one mind—the mind of Rembrandt, only one heart—the heart of Rembrandt, could have so felt and stated the pathos and emotion of that scene. Controlling his excitement, he turned over the prints and paused, startled, beforeAbraham's Sacrifice. What was it that moved him? He could hardly say. But he was moved to an extraordinary degree by that angel standing, with outstretched wings, by Abraham's side, hiding the kneeling boy's eyes with his hand, staying the knife at the supreme moment. He turned the prints, and paused again beforeThe Prodigal Son. Some might call the face of the kneeling prodigal hideous, might assert that the landscape was slight and unfinished, that the figure in the doorway was too sketchy. Not so our enthusiast. This was the Prodigal Son, and as for the bending, forgiving father, all that he could imagine of forgiveness and pity was there realised in a few scratches of the needle. He turned the prints and withdrewTobit Blind. In every line of this figure of the wanderingold man, tapping his stick upon the pavement, feeling his way by the wall, was blindness, actual blindness—all the misery and loneliness and indignity of it.
"Are these for sale?" he asked the smiling proprietor, without the slightest hope that he could afford one.
"Oh yes!Tobit Blindyou can have for two shillings and sixpence.Abraham's Sacrifice,Christ at Emmaus, andThe Prodigal Sonare four shillings each."
The enthusiast could not conceal his astonishment. "I thought Rembrandt's etchings cost hundreds of pounds," he said.
"They do, but these are merely reproductions. Only a millionaire could hope to possess a complete collection of first states. These are the reproductions that were issued with M. Blanc's catalogue. He made them from the best proofs in his own collections, and from the public museums. You should compare them with the originals. The difference will astonish you. It's candle-light to sunlight, satinette to the finest silk."
"But where can I see the originals? I don't know any millionaires."
"Nothing easier! Go to the Print Room of the British Museum or to the Ionides Collection."
A day or two later the enthusiast, carrying under his arm the roll of four Rembrandt's etchings that hehad purchased for fourteen shillings and sixpence, ascended the stairs of the British Museum, and timidly opened the door marked, "Print Room. Students only."
His reception agreeably surprised him. He, an obscure person, was treated as if he were a M. Michel. An obliging boy requested him to hang his hat and coat upon a peg, and to sign his name in a book. An obliging youth waved him to a noble desk running at a right angle to a noble window, and begged him to indicate his needs upon a slip of paper. He inscribed the printed form with the words—"Rembrandt's Etchings and Drawings."
The obliging youth scanned the document and said—"Which do you wish to see? There are many portfolios. I can bring you one at a time."
"Do so, if you please," said the enthusiast. "I should like to examine them all, even if it takes a week."
The obliging youth inclined his head and departed.
There is a delightful air of leisure and learning about the Print Room, and an entire absence of hustle. Two students besides himself were the only other members of the public, one studying Holbein, the other Blake.
PORTRAIT OF AN OLD LADY, FULL FACE, HER HANDS FOLDED 1641. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.PORTRAIT OF AN OLD LADY, FULL FACE, HER HANDS FOLDED1641. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.
The first portfolio that was brought to him contained theChrist Healing the Sick, known asThe Hundred Guilder Print, in several states. It wasthe first large etching by Rembrandt that he had seen, and he gazed with astonishment, admiration, and awe at the almost miraculous characterisation of the figures, at the depth and richness of the blacks, and the nobility of the conception. He passed from that toThe Three Crosses, and was even more moved by the dramatic intensity and realism of those burdened crosses against the profound gloom, and the dim, poignantly realised figures in the foreground. He saw theChrist before PilateandThe Death of the Virgin, lingering before them, studying every detail, realising to the full, through these splendid impressions, the height and significance of Rembrandt's genius. He compared the four prints he had purchased with their originals, and understood why collectors were eager to pay enormous prices for fine states, probably printed by the master himself.
As soon as he had finished one portfolio, the watchful attendant carried it away, and substituted another. It was so easy, so restful, and so invigorating to study a master under these conditions, that he wondered the public did not flock to the Print Room as to a first night at a popular theatre.
On another day he studied the drawings and landscape etchings—that dark, spacious design calledThe Three Trees, and a perfect little drawing ofJoseph Consoling the Prisoners. The large plates inspired him with reverence and profound admirationfor Rembrandt's genius as an etcher, but it was the smaller etchings that won his love and held it. He promised himself, when he came into certain family monies of which there was some prospect, that instead of buying an automobile, he would make himself the proud owner ofThe Three Trees,The Prodigal Son,Abraham's Sacrifice, andTobit Blind—perhaps one, perhaps two, perhaps three, perhaps all four.
Suppose the admiration of our enthusiast for Rembrandt had been noted in the select suburb where he lived: suppose his mother was one of those estimable ladies who hold monthly Dorcas meetings in their drawing-rooms: suppose that while the ladies were working at useful garments for the poor, she persuaded her son to discourse on Rembrandt: suppose, because the petition came from his mother that he, very much against his will, consented.
It was not an easy task, as he took little or no interest in the life of Rembrandt; his interests were entirely with the æsthetic appeal of his work. What, he asked himself, can one say about the life of a man when that life was wholly one with his art—mingling with it, ministering to it at every point. A boy, the fifth child of a miller living at Leyden, is born into the world, takes to art as a duck to water, becomes one of the greatest painters of the world, dies inobscurity, is forgotten, and long after his death is placed among his peers. What is there to say about such a life? He made the attempt.
PORTRAIT OF AN OLD LADY IN A VELVET HOOD, HER HANDS FOLDED 1650. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.PORTRAIT OF AN OLD LADY IN A VELVET HOOD, HER HANDS FOLDED1650. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.
At the age of fourteen Rembrandt entered at Leyden University, but showed little inclination for books. He preferred Lucas van Leyden to Virgil, and his parents, accepting the situation, allowed him to study painting under Swanenburch, and later in the studio of Lastman at Amsterdam. After a few months with Lastman he returned to Leyden, "to practise painting alone and in his own way." So much for his schooling. At the age of twenty-one he produced a picture calledSt. Paul in Prison, and Gerard Dou became his pupil. In 1631 he left Leyden and settled in Amsterdam. In 1634 he married Saskia van Uylenborch, who bore him three children, and Titus was the youngest. Some years later he had two daughters by his servant, Hendrickje Stoffels. Perhaps he married her. She was a kind, good soul, faithful and loyal to her master. His friends do not seem to have disapproved of this irregular union, but the Consistory of her church summoned Hendrickje before them and forbade her to communicate. At the age of fifty Rembrandt was declared bankrupt. From that date until his death troubles encompassed him; but he was happy so long as he could paint undisturbed. His son Titus died when he was sixty-two, and the following yearRembrandt died, and was buried at a cost of thirteen florins.
Our enthusiast did not find it easy to manipulate these facts, and he elected to slur over the Hendrickje episode; but he was able to interest the ladies of the Dorcas meeting by showing them some of Rembrandt's pictures. He collected a series of photographs of the portraits and paintings, including his favourite pictures, such asThe Jewish Rabbiin the National Gallery,TitusandThe Parable of the Unmerciful Servantin the Wallace collection,Rembrandt's MotherandThe Singing Boyat Vienna; and he invested sixpence in a little manual recently published, calledThe Masterpieces of Rembrandt, containing sixty excellent reproductions of his portraits and pictures.
He also displayed photographs of the remarkable series in the Hermitage Gallery at St. Petersburg:The Descent from the Cross, with the brilliant light focussed on the body and winding sheet, and fading away into the darkness of the background; that radiant portrait of Saskia painted just before her marriage to Rembrandt, known asFlora with a Flower-trimmed Crook, standing at the opening of a grotto, with a wreath of flowers upon her head, and the light falling upon her face and gay attire;The Holy Family, the father working at his daily task in the background, and the Virgin, who has laid down her book, drawing aside the curtain from the cot togaze upon the Child. He explained that Rembrandt, in placing this scene in a humble Dutch cottage, knew that he could express the Biblical story better that way than if he had painted an imaginary scene after the manner of the Italians.
"This great Dutch master" (he quoted from Mr. Colvin) "succeeded in making as wonderful pictures out of spiritual abjectness and physical gloom as the Italians out of spiritual exaltation and shadowless day."
FLORA WITH A FLOWER-TRIMMED CROOK 1634. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.FLORA WITH A FLOWER-TRIMMED CROOK1634. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.
At this point of his discourse he began to feel more confidence, and he proceeded to focus his remarks upon four periods in Rembrandt's life—epochs that lend themselves to separate treatment, each epoch marked by the production of a masterpiece, and one remarkable portrait that has a particular and pathetic interest. Those four pictures areThe Anatomy Lesson, painted in 1632, when he was twenty-six; theSortie of a Company of Amsterdam Musketeers, known asThe Night Watch, painted in 1642, when he was thirty-six;The Syndics of the Cloth Hall, painted in 1662, when he was fifty-six; and his own portrait, painted in 1667, two years before his death. "HisAnatomy Lesson," says M. Michel, "was the glorification of Science itself; in hisSortie of a Company of Amsterdam Musketeershe embodied that civic heroism which had lately compassed Dutch independence; and in a group of five cloth merchants seated rounda table, discussing the affairs of their guild, he summed up, as it were, in a few immortal types, the noble sincerity of Dutch portraiture."
The Anatomy Lessonwas the picture that gave Rembrandt his opportunity, and proclaimed his preeminence among the painters in Amsterdam. It was the custom in those days for corporations, civic bodies, and associations of various kinds, to commemorate their period of office by commissioning portrait groups which should hand down their worthy faces to posterity. The desire of the less prominent members of the associations thus painted was that each head should be a likeness, plainly recognisable,—that one burgher should not be treated with more importance than another. This desire for present and posthumous commemoration extended to medical circles. Portraits and portrait groups of famous physicians and surgeons were painted and hung in the theatres where they lectured or operated. Dr. Tulp, an eminent surgeon of the day, commissioned Rembrandt to represent him performing an operation, proposing to present the picture to the Surgeons' Guild in memory of his professorship. The grave, realistic picture calledThe Anatomy Lesson, now hanging at the Hague Museum, was the result. The corpse lies upon the dissecting table; before it stands Dr. Tulp, wearing a broad-brimmed hat; around him are grouped seven elderly students. Some areabsorbed by the operation, others gaze thoughtfully at the professor, or at the spectator. Dr. Tulp indicates with his forceps one of the tendons of the subject's left arm, and appears to be addressing the students, or practitioners, for these seven bearded men have long passed the age of studentship. This picture made Rembrandt's reputation. He was but twenty-six; the world seemed to be at his feet; in the two following years he painted forty portraits.
It was not easy for our enthusiast to explain to the ladies of the Dorcas meeting that the dissection of a body was a suitable subject for the brush of a painter. The Dutchmen of Rembrandt's day were not so squeamish as we have become since. They had a passion for the literal painting of literal things, and this picture was destined not for a Tate Gallery, but for the wall of an operating theatre. Dr. Tulp desired a picture of himself performing an operation, and Rembrandt gave it to him, painted in a way that pleased his contemporaries, and that has astonished the world ever since.
Ten years later Rembrandt painted another Doelen or Regent picture which, under the erroneous title ofThe Night Watch, is to-day the chief attraction of the Ryks Museum at Amsterdam. This time it was not a group of surgeons, but a company of Amsterdam musketeers marching out under the leadership of theircaptain, Frans Banning Cocq. In all these civic or military Regent pictures, each member subscribed a sum towards the artist's fee, and consequently each individual wished to have his money's worth in the shape of an accurate presentation of his face and form. It is an old quarrel between artist and public. Mr. Abbey had to face it in his Coronation picture; Mr. Bacon had to face it in hisReturn of the C.I.V.'s; perhaps the only folk who solved the problem were the complaisant gentlemen who designed panoramas of cricket matches in the last century, where each member of the company blandly faces the spectator. Much water had flowed under Burgomaster Six's bridge since Rembrandt paintedThe Anatomy Lesson. Then he was the obedient student. Now he was an acknowledged master. He paintedThe Sortie of the Company of Frans Banning Cocqas an artist who was profoundly interested in problems of light and shade, with strong views as to the composition of a picture, not as a methodical and mediocre painter desirous of carrying out the commission in a way to please his patrons. They wanted a presentment of the face and figure of each member of the company who had subscribed a hundred florins. Rembrandt gave them a work of art. No doubt the captain and his lieutenant were well enough pleased, for they stride forth in the forefront of the picture, but the rank and file were bitterly hostile.From the painting ofThe Night Watchhis popularity began to wane.
The history of this picture, after it had been hung in the Doelen or assembly hall belonging to Captain Cocq's company, was as troublous as the later life of Rembrandt. Years afterwards when, blackened with smoke and ill-usage, it was removed from the Doelen to the Hotel de Ville, the authorities, finding that it was too large for the space it was destined to occupy, deliberately cut a piece away from each side. This is proved by a copy of the picture made by Lundens before the mutilation, now in the National Gallery. When M. Hopman undertook the restoration ofThe Night Watchhe discovered, when he had removed the surface of dirt, that the sortie is taking place by daylight, and that the work contained something that Rembrandt evidently intended should represent a ray of sunlight. But the popular name of the picture is stillThe Night Watch.
The ladies of the Dorcas Society expressed in eyes and gestures their disapproval of the Amsterdam vandals who mutilatedThe Night Watch. One of them remarked: "It happened a long time ago. So gross a barbarity could not be perpetrated now."
Twenty years later, at the age of fifty-six, Rembrandt, having known what it was to be homeless and penniless, painted his masterpiece,The Syndicsof the Cloth Hall, merely five figures grouped round a table, with a servant, uncovered, in attendance. It is an extraordinarily real picture, the final statement of Rembrandt's knowledge of painting, combined with that rare power of seeing things just as they are—the hundred subtleties that the untrained eye never sees, as well as the accents that all see. It is the perfect painter's vision—a scene grasped as a whole, character searched out but not insistent, the most delicate suggestion of equally diffused light knitting the figures together. He made no attempt to be picturesque as inThe Night Watch; he was content just to paint five men dressed in black, with flat white collars and broad-brimmed hats, and a servant. With these simple materials Rembrandt produced the picture that the world has agreed to regard as his masterpiece. Contemporary criticism says nothing about it. The place of honour at the Ryks Museum at Amsterdam is given toThe Night Watch, but it isThe Syndics of the Cloth Hall—a simple presentation of five grave men seated at a table—that we remember with wonder and admiration.
Our enthusiast, having dwelt upon these three masterpieces, marking epochs in Rembrandt's life, referred again to the magnificent array of portraits scattered in such regal profusion through the thirty years that passed between the painting ofThe Anatomy LessonandThe Syndics. Then noticing,while enlarging upon the etchings, that his mother was casting anxious glances at the clock, he hurriedly referred to the last portrait that Rembrandt painted of himself, two years before his death. He could not describe this portrait, which is in a private collection in Berlin, as he had never seen it, so he quoted M. Michel's description: "This extraordinary work, perhaps the last Rembrandt painted, is modelled with prodigious vigour and freedom. With superb audacity, the master shows us once more the familiar features, on which age and sorrow have worked their will. They are distorted, disfigured, almost unrecognisable. But the free spirit is still unbroken. The eyes that meet ours are still keen and piercing; they have even the old twinkle of good-humoured irony, and the toothless mouth relaxes in frank laughter. What was the secret of this gaiety? In spite of his poverty, he had still a corner in which to paint. Beside him stand an easel and an antique bust, perhaps a relic of his former wealth. He holds his maul-stick in his hand, and pauses for a moment in his work. He is happy because he can give himself up to his art."
THE DESCENT FROM THE CROSS 1634. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.THE DESCENT FROM THE CROSS1634. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.
It was the last of half a hundred portraits of himself, painted and etched without vanity; painted because a man's self is such an accommodating model, always ready and willing; painted because Rembrandt loved to experiment with himself before a mirror,grimacing, angry, stern, "as an officer," "with a casque," "with a gorget," or, as we see him in the National Gallery, on one wall with the bloom of youth and health upon his face, on the other, dulled, stained, and marked by the finger of time. This we can say: that he was always true to himself.
It is generally acknowledged that the greatest masters of painting that the world has known are Titian, Velasquez, and Rembrandt, and to each of the triumvirate we apply the word genius. Among the many definitions of that abused word is one which states that genius consists not in seeing more than other people, but in seeing differently. We acknowledge genius in a painter when, over and above masterly technical power, he presents to us a view of life or of nature which we may never have seen, but which we are convinced is the vision of deeper eyes than our own, and is true. The seer has seen it, and it is only because of the dimness or narrowness or worldliness of our outlook that we do not perceive it also.
A great painter writes us a letter, tells us of the things he has seen or heard or felt, gives us news of the world wherein he lives. He expresses his personality to us, and personality in art is a thingincalculable. Corot'sArcadialandscape delights us because it is the distilled essence of the vision, heart, and character of the personality called Corot. Personality may be expressed by a Rembrandt, abundantly. It may also be expressed by a Velasquez, negatively.
We must be vigilant, in judging a painter, to distinguish between his own personality and the personality of those who interpret him to us. The more we give of ourselves to a painter or an author, the greater is the return of his appeal and interest. Cleave the wood of your brain and you find him brimming with communications, raise the stone of your imagination and he is revealed.
A certain critic, who had devoted his life to the study of Reynolds, while lecturing upon the achievement of that master, threw upon the screen a certain large subject-picture, not one of Reynold's happiest efforts, but a laboured and unattractive design which, we know, gave Reynolds an infinity of trouble.
So scientific, so interesting was this critic's analysis of the picture, so absorbing the attributes he read into it, that many of his audience were persuaded that they were looking upon a Reynolds masterpiece, whereas they were but hypnotised by the subtleties of the critic's mind working upon Reynolds.
Conversely the criticism of some writers tends towards depreciation because of their predilection for objective as opposed to subjective criticism. Thelate P.G. Hamerton, writing upon Rembrandt, says, "The chiaroscuro of Rembrandt is often false and inconsistent, and in fact he relied largely on public ignorance. But though arbitrary, it is always conducive to his purpose."
"Conducive to his purpose!" There is much virtue in those four words. Rembrandt probably knew as well as anybody that his lighting of a picture was not a facsimile of the lighting of nature, or rather not the chiaroscuro as seen by the average eye; but he had an aim, a vision before him, and he did not hesitate to interpret that vision in his own way. Who dares to say that Rembrandt was disloyal to nature? Our concern is not what we should have done, but what Rembrandt did, seeing with his own eyes. And the questions we should ask ourselves are:—Is the interpretation of the world as seen through his eyes beautiful, suggestive, profound, and stimulating? Does the statement of his personality in paint add to our knowledge, educate our æsthetic perceptions, and extend our horizon by showing us things that our imperfect vision does not see except through him?
A YOUNG WOMAN IN A RED CHAIR HOLDING A PINK IN HER RIGHT HAND 1656. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.A YOUNG WOMAN IN A RED CHAIR HOLDING A PINK IN HER RIGHT HAND1656. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.
Comparisons are not only odious, but foolish. No sensible critic attempts a comparison between Titian, Velasquez, and Rembrandt. He accepts them as they are, and is grateful. But even the most obscure of mortals may have his preferences,and a curious chapter in the lives of individuals who have concerned themselves with painting would be the bewildering way in which the pendulum of their appreciation and admiration has swung backwards and forwards from Titian to Velasquez, from Velasquez to Rembrandt, and sometimes back to Titian. It is often a question of mood.
There are moods when the regal abundance, the consummate craftsmanship of Titian, the glow and splendour of his canvases, the range of them fromThe Man with the Glovein the Louvre to theBacchus and Ariadne, force us to place him on the summit of Parnassus. We are dazzled by this prince of painters, dominating Venice at the height of her prosperity, inspired by her, having around him, day by day, the glorious pictures that the genius of Venice had produced. We follow his triumphant career, see him courted and fêted, recognise his detachment from the sorrow and suffering of the unfortunate and unclassed, and amid the splendour of his career note his avidity for the loaves and fishes of the world. Unlike Rembrandt, fortune favoured Titian to the end. His career was a triumphal progress. We stand in that small room at the Prado Museum at Madrid and gaze upon his canvases, sumptuous and opulent, diffusing colour like a sunset, indifferent to their story or meaning, happy and content with the flaming feast outspread for ourenjoyment. We stand before hisEntombmentat the Louvre, dumb before its superlative painting, with hardly a thought for the tragedy that it represents. Titian accepts the literary motive, and the artist in him straight forgets it. We walk fromThe Entombmentto the little chamber where Rembrandt'sChrist at Emmaushangs, and the heart of Rembrandt is beating there. To Titian the glory of the world, to Rembrandt all that man has felt and suffered, parting and sorrow, and the awakening of joy. We do not compare the one painter with the other; we say: "This is Titian, that is Rembrandt; each gives us his emotion." Foolish indeed it seems in the face of these two pictures, and a thousand others, to say that art should be this or that,—that a picture should or should not have a literary or a philosophical motive. Painters give us themselves. We amuse ourselves by placing them in schools, by analysing their achievement, by scientific explanations of what they did just by instinct, as lambs gambol—and behind all stands the Sphinx called Personality.
There are moods when the appeal of Velasquez is irresistible. Grave and reticent, a craftsman miraculously equipped, detached, but not with the Jovian detachment of Titian, this Spanish gentleman stalks silently across the art stage. Hundreds of drawings of Rembrandt's exhibit evidence of the infinite extent of his experiments after perfection. The drawings ofVelasquez can be counted on the fingers of one hand. He drew in paint upon the canvas. From his portraits and pictures we gather not the faintest idea of what he felt, what he thought, what he believed. One thing we know absolutely—that he saw as keenly and as searchingly as any painter who has ever lived. What he saw before him he could paint, and in the doing of it he was unrivalled. His hand followed and obeyed his eye. When the object was not before him, he falls short of his superlative standard. The figures of Philip IV., of Olivares, and of Prince Baltazar Carlos in the three great equestrian portraits are as finely drawn as man could make them. Velasquez saw them; he did not see the prancing horses which they ride, consequently our eyes dropping from the consummate figures are disappointed at the conventional attitudes of the steeds. Velasquez, like Titian, moved from success to success; both were friends of kings, both basked in royal favour, neither had the disadvantage, or perhaps the great advantage, like Rembrandt, of the education of adversity. Velasquez made two journeys into Italy; he knew what men had accomplished in painting, and if he was not largely influenced by Titian and Tintoretto, their work showed him what man had done, what man could do, and indicated to him his own dormant powers.
Rembrandt was sufficient unto himself. Thereare moods when one is sure that he stands at the head of the painting hierarchy. In spite of his greatness, we feel that he is very near to our comprehension. What a picture of the old painter towards the end of his life that saying of Baldinucci presents. We are told that near the close of his career, absorbed in his art, indifferent to the world, "when he was painting at his easel he had come to wipe his brushes on the hinder portions of his dress."
Rembrandt looms out like some amorphous boulder, stationary, lichen-stained, gathering time unto itself. He travelled so little that it can be said he was untravelled. The works of other painters affected him not at all. We are without proof that he was even interested in the work of his contemporaries or predecessors. Life was his passion. One model was as good as another. He looked at life, and life fired his imaginations. He painted himself fifty times; he painted his friends, his relations, and the people he met while prowling about the streets. His pencil was never idle. Imagination, which confuses the judgment of so many, aided him, for his imagination was not nourished by vanity, or the desire to produce an effect, but flowed from the greatness of his brooding heart. He stood alone during his life, an absorbed man, uninfluenced by any school; he stands alone to-day. The world about him, and his thoughts and reflections, were his onlyinfluences. He read few books, and the chief among them was the Bible. Mr. Berenson has written an exhaustive and learned work on Lorenzo Lotto, analysing his pictures year by year, and exhuming the various painters who influenced Lotto at the different periods of his life. Mr. Berenson's book extends to nearly three hundred pages. The influences of the painting fraternity upon Rembrandt would not provide material for the first paragraph of the first page of such a book.
His fame is assured. He is one of the great triumvirate. "He was greater, perhaps," says Mr. Clausen, "than any other painter in human feeling and sympathy, in dramatic sense and invention; and his imagination seemed inexhaustible."
The Ryks Museum at Amsterdam may be said to have been designed as a shrine for hisNight Watch. Near by it hangsThe Syndics of the Cloth Company, excelled, in this particular class of work, by no picture in the world; but it is by the portraits and the etchings that the sweep, profundity, and versatility of Rembrandt's genius is exemplified. Truly his imagination was inexhaustible.
It is an education to stand before his portraits in the National Gallery. Observe theOld Lady, aged 83, the massive painting of her face, and the outline of her figure set so firmly against the background. Here is Realism, frank and straightforward, almost defiant inits strength. Turn to the portrait ofA Jewish Rabbi. Here is Idealism. You peer and peer, and from the brown background emerges a brown garment, relieved by the black cap, and the black cloak that falls over his left shoulder. Luminous black and luminous brown! Brown is the side of the face in shadow, brown is the brow in shadow. All is tributary to the glory of the golden brown on the lighted portion of the face. The portrait composes into a perfect whole. The dim blacks and browns lead up to the golden brown illuminating the old weary head, that wonderful golden brown—the secret of Rembrandt. This old Jew lives through the magic art of Rembrandt. He crouches in the frame, wistful and waiting, the eternal type, eternally dreaming the Jews' dream that is still a dream.
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A.M.B.inThe King.—"By far the most valuable and interesting book on Whistler which has been written, or, indeed, is ever likely to be written."
T.P.'s Weekly.—"An honest and clear study of the great artist."
A.C.R.C.inThe Outlook.—"It bears the impress of actuality, and is probably the truest chain of living pictures of Whistler's personality that any 'follower' could have made."
Dundee Advertiser.—"Told in a most fascinating manner."
The World.—"An extremely interesting and valuable historical document."
Truth.—"At once a superb and an amazing book—superb in the number and excellence of its reproductions of Whistler's work, amazing in its characteristic anecdotes of the Master."
The Connoisseur.—"The illustrations form an invaluable record of Whistler's art, and they in themselves make Mr. Menpes's book a desirable possession."
The Studio.—"Full of deeply interesting data respecting Whistler's methods, of real revelation of his remarkable personality, and of pathetic instances of the devotion of his followers."
The Globe.—"Eminently amusing and very instructive to boot."
Aberdeen Free Press.—"As literature it is vastly entertaining; as art it is an extraordinarily brilliant and abundant collection representative of the work of a remarkable man, in himself a 'school.'"
The Non-Illustrated Edition
WHISTLER AS I KNEW HIM
BY MORTIMER MENPES
SQUARE DEMY 8vo BOUND IN CLOTH
PRICE2/6NET
PUBLISHED BY ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK · SOHO SQUARE · LONDON · W.
EACH WITH FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
PRICE 20s. NET
VENICE
Publishers' Note.—This book treats of Venice not only at one time of the day, but at all times. There is Venice at night; Venice in sunshine; Venice in grey; it is a colour record of Venice, full of actuality. There are all sides of Venice—old doorways; the Riva; the Rialto; St. Mark's before and after the fall of the Campanile; the Doge's Palace; the Salute at dawn and the Salute at sunset; Market Places; Fishing Villages, with their vividly-coloured Fishing Boats—rich orange sails splashed with yellows and vermilions; the Piazza; Churches; and the Islands of the Lagoon.
THE DURBAR
Morning Post.—"This splendid book will be accepted by all as the best realisation of an epoch-making ceremony that we are ever likely to get."
The Academy.—"Unquestionably the best pictorial representation of the Durbar which has appeared."
The Globe.—"Likely to be the most brilliant and lasting record of the historical occasion."
World's Children
The Times.—"Of the cleverness, both of the pictures and letter-press, there can be no doubt. Miss Menpes's short papers on the children of different lands are full of insight, human and fresh experience; and Mr. Menpes's 100 pictures ... are above all remarkable for their extraordinary variety of treatment, both in colour scheme and in the pose and surroundings of the subject."
World Pictures
The Scotsman.—"Mr. Menpes has been a wanderer over the face of the earth armed with brush and pencil, and he has brought back with him portfolios filled with samples of the colour and sunshine, and of the life and form, quaint or beautiful, of the most famous countries of the East and of the West, and his charming book is a kind of album into which he has gathered the cream of an artist's memories and impressions of the many countries he has visited and sketched in."
JAPAN
The Times.—"Mr. Menpes's pictures are here given in most perfect facsimile, and they form altogether a series of colour impressions of Japan which may fairly be called unrivalled. Even without the narrative they would show that Mr. Menpes is an enthusiast for Japan, her art and her people; and very few European artists have succeeded in giving such complete expression to an admiration in which all share."
War Impressions
Daily Telegraph.—"One hardly knows which to admire the more—the skill of the artist or the skill with which his studies have been reproduced, for the colours of the originals are shown with marvellous fidelity, and the delicate art of the impressionist loses nothing in the process. The book, therefore, is a double triumph, and will therefore be prized by collectors."
BRITTANY
Publishers' Note.—Mr. Menpes is perhaps exceptionally capable of producing a true and vivid description of Brittany. He has lived and painted there for many years. Every aspect of the country has been faithfully depicted by him; every mood of Breton life, every trait of character. Whether it is a pig-market that is portrayed, or a dignified Breton surrounded by his household gods of oak and blue china in the atmosphere of his own home—whether it is a fleet of fishing boats hung with cobalt-blue nets, or group of mediæval houses in some ancient town—each and every picture bears the impress of actuality.
PUBLISHED BY
A. & C. BLACK · SOHO SQUARE · LONDON · W.
AND OBTAINABLE FROM ALL BOOKSELLERS AT HOME OR ABROAD
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