The Standard Galleries - Holland Part 18

=Roelofs, Painter of A Marshy Landscape.=--Familiar to the Holland traveller is the Marshy Landscape, so true to nature and so charming in color.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ROELOFS Marshy Landscape]

If he had painted nothing else, Willem Roelofs (1822-97) would deserve his reputation because of this work.

This painter was born in Amsterdam and was a pupil of H. van de Sande Bakhuijzen for about a year; then he remained for six years in Utrecht; and settled in Brussels, where he remained forty years, finally returning to Holland. This painter's chief desire is to express himself poetically.

=The Inexhaustible Supply of His Favorite Subjects.=--"His pictures are truly beautiful: cattle standing up to their knees in rich green pasture land; luxuriant meadows; secluded pools reflecting the blue sky and the moving clouds; lakes with floating lilies; rivers, streams, n.o.ble trees, ca.n.a.ls, and the thoroughly Dutch windmill.

Roelofs may be called the pioneer in our country of a broader school of painting, especially that pertaining to landscape. Much of this he may be said to have taken from the French.... Of late years he has added more cattle to his pictures; but whether cattle or trees, land or water, they are painted with the firm belief that they needed no embellishment, but were good enough to be represented exactly as they were. For Roelofs will not invent a subject. And why, indeed, should he do so? Is the supply exhausted? _He_ does not think so, for no summer pa.s.ses but he packs up his paint-box and with his little stool, his easel, and his umbrella, goes off either to Noorden, or Abcoude, or to Voorschoten, to study nature again and again, as if he did not know her well already."[27]

=J. Maris, Skilful in producing Ethereal Effects.=--Of Jacob Maris, Zilcken writes:

"No painter has so well expressed the ethereal effects, bathed in air and light, through floating silvery mist, in which painters delight, and the characteristic remote horizons blurred by haze; or again the gray yet luminous weather of Holland, unlike the dead gray rain of England, or the heavy sky of Paris."

This artist may be studied in this gallery by A Beach, two Views of a Town, The Ferry, and The Two Windmills, which latter represents two windmills standing as sentinels over a rather dreary landscape at the edge of a river and a ca.n.a.l.

=His Training and his Aim in Art.=--Jacob Maris (1837-99) was born in The Hague and was sent to Stroebel's studio, and later studied in the Antwerp Academy of Drawing. He was also a pupil of Louis Meyer in The Hague, and in 1865 went to Paris and studied with Hebert. Returning to The Hague, he devoted himself to landscape. He painted views of streets, country lanes, small hamlets, windmills, ca.n.a.ls, rivers, and, sometimes, _genre_ pieces. In all his work his aim was to make an impression. One day he said: "A picture is finished as soon as you can see what it is intended to represent."

=Marius on the Beauty of his Work.=--The Dutch critic, G. H. Marius, writes:

"If you stand before one of Maris's pictures for a long time you discover many objects which you had not noticed at first--houses, bridges, trees, all looming out of the mellow misty light which is diffused over the entire canvas.... What an endless variety of windmills he immortalizes! Some of his canvases have but a small solitary windmill, while others have a crowd of these gigantic, c.u.mbersome structures. Some pictures have a fringe of them upon the horizon.

"However simple the subject, it is ofttimes made almost dramatic by the rays of the setting sun, or by the brilliancy of a silver-lined cloud. These effects of light and shade are rapidly pa.s.sing, and we gaze with admiration upon the skilful work of a man who can produce such a faithful picture, which his eye could have seen but momentarily. Sometimes he paints a ca.n.a.l with a barge pulled by a weary-looking horse, tramping along the muddy road the ruts of which are filled with water from recent rain (his horses are generally white). Or it is a bit of rich agricultural land, the long furrows stretching into the far distance; against a wonderful sky you see the profiles of distant houses, trees, mills, etc., all dying away into the horizon, showing the flatness of our Dutch landscape, where there is nothing to impede or obstruct the eye for miles."

=Willem Maris's Relish for painting Cows.=--Willem Maris (1844- ) studied with his brothers Jacob and Matthys, and all three worked together. As early as 1868 he sold a picture which found its way to The Hague Gallery. This, representing cattle in a green meadow, at once showed his talent for painting warm sunlight. A typical picture of Cattle hangs in this gallery; for the chief subjects of Willem Maris's pictures are cows in meadow lands; sometimes they are waiting to be milked, or are being milked; sometimes they are standing or lying under the trees; and sometimes they are knee-deep in one of the lakes.

Mr. Marius says:

=Willem's Style contrasted with his Brother Jacob's.=--"The two brothers Maris [Jacob and Willem] treat their skies in exactly opposite manners. The one depicts clouds, threatening storm, and changeable weather, whereas the younger brother gives us only suns.h.i.+ne and a sky of turquoise blue; if, however, clouds are introduced, they are like small white feathers or like the petals of a white rose. Each in his own way true to nature, and beautiful to gaze upon, yet methinks that we must give the preference to the one who gives us that greatest of all blessings, suns.h.i.+ne.

"A very favorite aspect of his is a cloudless sky, the brightest of suns, and part of the canvas thrown into deep shade, producing a wonderful contrast.

"Another bewitching feature, so truly Dutch, in Maris's landscapes, is the rising mist after the heat of the day. It rises from the meadows at sunset and covers the land like a cloak, especially after a hot day when the ground has been baked."

=A Socialistic Artist with Romantic Visions.=--Matthys Maris, the second of the three, joined his brother Jacob in Paris, and eventually he settled in London.

"Thys Maris found rest and isolation in a suburb of London; a few faithful friends, such as Swan (the animal painter) and Van Wisselingh, break in occasionally upon his solitude. But his ideas are still socialistic, not only theoretically, but materially; and, without looking around, he gives what he receives. On this point he is likewise very sensitive. To be waited on by another, although that service is paid for, he considers humiliating; and, in order to avoid such a possibility, he lives without the comfort of attendance.

"Many might pa.s.s by the works of Maris without even noticing them; many may consider them impossible and inexplicable, and pa.s.s on, almost out of humor, perhaps even angry with them; the rational spectator will put questions to which he will receive no satisfactory replies.

"Though in his early years he painted still-life pieces, his fame rests chiefly on his visionary women seen in his romantic dreams, and portrayed with the clouds and mists of dreamland about them."[28]

In this gallery The Bride represents him worthily.

=Two Pictures representing Albert Neuhuys.=--Albert Neuhuys, born in Utrecht in 1844, studied in the Academy of Drawing in Antwerp, and settled in Amsterdam, the painter of landscapes and scenes from homely and humble life. He is represented by The Doll's Dressmaker and By the Cradle, which represents a mother leaning over the cradle of her baby lying comfortably on pillows. It is interesting to note how thickly the artist has spread the paint on the canvas.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A. NEUHUYS By the Cradle]

=A Characteristic Picture by Christoffel Bisschop.=--Christoffel Bisschop (1828-1904) may be studied by The Lord Gave and the Lord hath Taken Away, Sunday in Hindeloopen, Sister of the Bride, and Winter in Friesland, also called Repairing Skates. This is a very characteristic and typical picture. Friesland is not only the home of a peculiar style of brightly painted furniture, but also the home of a school of skating of which there are two schools,--the Dutch and the Frisian. The latter, which is the older, aims at speed; and the skater wears a peculiar kind of skate, well shown on the foot of the young girl seated on the right, who is having the other skate repaired. The carved and colored sledges are also typical of Friesland. An escort waits at the door. The painter was himself a native of Friesland, and therefore depicts the costumes, furniture, houses, and people of this most picturesque corner of Holland with accuracy, charm, and sympathy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BISSCHOP Winter in Friesland]

=Christoffel Bisschop.=--Christoffel Bisschop is the Dutch colorist _par excellence_. He entered the studio of Schmidt in Delft, and worked at The Hague under Huib van Hove. He also studied in Paris with Le Comte and Gleyre, and in 1855 established himself in The Hague. A visit to the quaint town of Hindeloopen charmed his artistic eye, and henceforth the peasants, with their gay costumes, and the brightly painted furniture and quaint houses, have furnished themes and settings for his pictures.

=H. W. Mesdag.=--Born in Groningen in 1831, Hendrick Willem Mesdag was destined to follow the family business of banking. Art, however, claimed him; and after painting for several years as an amateur he started work in Brussels in 1866. Except for the criticisms of Roelofs, Alma-Tadema, and other artists, Mesdag may be said to be self-taught. In 1869 he removed to The Hague, so that he could be near Scheveningen, for he had found his special talent. "I must go and live near the sea," he said, "gaze upon it daily, not only for weeks, but for months and years; watch and study its every movement, this ever-changing element, this amazing, stupendous work of the Almighty!" In 1870 he exhibited at the Paris Salon, and his Breakers in the North Sea received the gold medal. His fame was now established. France has decorated Mesdag more than once, and one of his sea pictures hangs in the Luxembourg.

=His Style.=--Mesdag is a realist, and with broad, bold strokes of the brush he portrays what he sees and feels. He depicts the ever-changing ocean in all its moods, at all times of day and in all seasons; and the life of the fisherfolk on the sh.o.r.e and in the fis.h.i.+ng-boats is also treated with sympathy. His Calm Sea by Sunset, painted in 1878, and Fis.h.i.+ng-boats at Sea and Beach, the two latter painted in 1895, belong to this gallery.

"High up in the scale, and standing somewhat apart, is Henry William Mesdag, the marine painter. Into a branch of art which had been treated in so masterly a fas.h.i.+on in former centuries by Willem van de Velde and Van Capelle, not to speak of Lodewijk Backhuysen and Bonaventure Peeters, he introduced a thorough reform. In the beginning of the century he was preceded by men of note, such as Schotel, Waldorp, Meyer, Greive, Van Heemskerck, Van Beest, Van Deventer; but their chief aim was to remain true to the tradition of the great period. They painted pretty little s.h.i.+ps sailing on calm seas, their white sails catching a gentle breeze and reflecting the rays of the sun; or again they would paint large vessels, driven before a gale over mountainous waves. But the one was as artificial as the other; their water was like gla.s.s, their s.h.i.+ps as if made of tin, their skies seemed cut out of oilcloth, and not one showed that he felt any love for the sea.

"Mesdag was the first to paint the sea as it is, the turbulent, restless, omnipotent, unlimited sea, that free, majestic, and mysterious element which cannot be brought within any formula, but can only be rendered in its tossing and pitching, peopled by its 'children of the sea' living on its sh.o.r.es or drifting on its billows. He studied every movement of the waves, every tint of the water, every change in the ever-changing sky; he bade good-bye to large vessels, huge castles of the sea, and took to painting small s.h.i.+ps and fis.h.i.+ng smacks, the cottages, so to speak, of the ocean. His painting is as broad and manly as the element wherein he moves and the s.p.a.ce it covers; not as soft and transparent as the works of landscape painters,--those who give us meadows and downs,--but yet a revelation."[29]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MESDAG Sunrise on the Dutch Coast]

=Other Works in the Stedelijk by Modern Artists.=--Other works by modern artists worthy of attention are: Ca.n.a.l in Amsterdam and Sinking Piles for the Erection of a House, by G. H. Breitner (1857); Te Deum Laudamus, Groote Kerk at The Hague, Oude Kerk at Amsterdam, Groote Kerk at Edam, and Barn-floor in Guelderland, by J. Bosboom (1817-91); Mother and Child, by B. J. Blommers (1845); Arrival of the Water Gueux at Leyden, by C. Rochussen (1814-94); Episode from the Siege of Leyden, Battle at Castric.u.m, and Mellis Stoke Presenting his Rhymed Chronicle to Floris V., Count of Holland, by K. Klinkenberg (1852); River Scene in Winter, by L. Apol (1850); Scheveningen in Rainy Weather, by S. L. Verveer (1850); Queen Fredegonda and St. Praetextatus, by Alma-Tadema (1836); Mary Magdalen at the Foot of the Cross, by Ary Scheffer (1795-1858); A Landscape, by H. van de Sande Bakhuijzen (1795-1860); Church at Zandvoort, View in Enkhuizen, Town Hall in Cologne, and Heeren-Gracht at Amsterdam, by C. Springer (1818-91); and A Prison of the Spanish Period, and Norwegian Women Bringing their Children to be Christened, by H. A.

van Trigt (1829).

=A Survey of Modern Dutch Art.=--A brief survey of modern Dutch art, condensed from the learned pen of Max Rooses, will not be unwelcome, particularly as we shall meet many more examples of the modern artists.

=The French Neo-Cla.s.sical School.=--He tells us that the group of Dutch and Belgian figure-painters of the beginning of the century were descendants of the French neo-cla.s.sical school; and until 1850 the principles of David, Gros, and Girodet were highly respected. The best-known representatives were John William Pieneman in Holland, and Bree, Navez, and Paelinck in Belgium.

=The Romantic School.=--Thereupon followed the Romantic school, whose leaders in France were Eugene Delacroix, Horace Vernet, and Descamps; in Belgium, Wappers and De Keyser; in Holland, Huib van Hove, Herman Ten Cate, Charles Rochussen, Stroebel, and Van Trigt. This school departed from the academic tendency of its predecessors, just as romantic literature declared war against cla.s.sicism in poetry.

=The Secret of the Success of the Romanticists.=--Another source helped to swell the stream of Romanticism in Holland. The artists of the neo-cla.s.sical school, with their pompous but severe forms, paid more attention to line than to color. They took their example from the Italians of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Their successors set themselves to study the masters of their own country, and learned to appreciate the rich coloring, the warm lights, and harmonious tones of the golden period of their own art. We can see that they were filled with admiration for the effects of light and color in Rembrandt's works and in those of De Hooch, Gerrit Dou, and Ter Borch.

Not only did they find subjects for rich and warm coloring and pleasing treatment in the history of former days, but also in that of their own times. They took, in fact, a great step forward in that they observed the daily life around them, and kept in touch with their fellow-creatures, their ways and habits. To this group belongs Hubert van Hove, who was the first to admire the works of the old masters, and again to carry on the broken tradition; Charles Rochussen, Stroebel, to whom the effects of light and color were particularly attractive; and Herman Ten Cate and Van Trigt, the talented painters of romantic scenes derived from history.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ISRAeLS Old Jewish Peddler]

=Josef Israels, a Brilliant Painter in this Group.=--To this group belongs Josef Israels in his earliest works. During this period of his brilliant career he was filled with enthusiasm for all that is sweet, joyous, and charming in the world, all that is fair in youth and nature; this is the period of his Children of the Sea, his Fishwomen, and his Knitting Girls. Later his subjects became more serious, and more serious, too, the claims of his art. Many followed Israels's example.

The group of admirers of the master, those who saw the world as he did,--though with their own eyes,--may be called the pith and kernel of the young Dutch school. Blommers, Valkenburg, Neuhuys, and Artz may be placed at the head. They did not take life quite so sadly, they did not wish to obscure light and color but allowed the sun to blaze and triumph over mystery and darkness.

=A New Party opposed to the Romanticists.=--In opposition to these "champions of twilight and tenderness" arose those who preferred the real and substantial: Breitner; Sosselin de Jong, the portrait-painter; Witkamp; Therese Schwartze, and Van der Waay.

A similar movement took place in landscape-painting. The most important landscape-artists in the first half of the nineteenth century were Kobell, Koekkoek, and Schelfhout. Their great ideal was a careful, almost painful, working out of detail; they selected subjects rich in material, ma.s.ses of big trees against water, producing great effects of light and shade. They sought to captivate the eye by an abundance of detail, and to depict woods and meadows with a smoothness which was more artificial than natural.

=Bilders, Roelofs, and their Followers.=--What was called the picturesque in a landscape became unnecessary to the younger men of the newer school; they painted Nature in its own beauty and in the simplicity of its charm, as they saw it in their daily lives. Of this group Bilders is the most important. He admired in the landscape, not a favorite spot, or a pretty pool, or a gayly colored cow; he saw rather land and meadow and wood in the ma.s.s, as one whole, beautiful by reason of its grand lines, its rich tones. William Roelofs went a step further; his first works differ little from those of his predecessors, but by degrees he tore himself away from the accepted style and became a true reformer. It was no longer the color or the beautiful contours of a view that attracted him, but the country itself, the vegetation, the verdure, the cattle in the meadows, the sky that seems always holiday-making, the ever-changing clouds, always full of beauty.

A whole school followed in this new track,--Van de Sande Bakhuijzen, Mevrouw Bilders van Bosse and Mevrouw Mesdag, Van Borselen, Storlenbeker, Gabriel, who depicted with extraordinary fidelity both land and sea; John Vrolijk, whose cows are always grazing in sunny meadows under a brilliantly blue sky; De Haas, whose cattle are more heavy and ma.s.sive; Du Chattel, who prefers the effect of light in Spring and in Autumn; Apol, who devotes himself almost exclusively to snow scenes, producing singularly charming effects of the sun s.h.i.+ning upon monotonous whiteness; Mari Ten Kate, De Bock, Wijsmuller, Weissenbruch, and Tholen.

=Another Step in the Modern Direction.=--Another step in the modern direction was taken by artists who gave themselves up entirely to the impression of the landscape, and painted exactly what they saw; Ter Meulen, for instance, who loves Nature for the mood which she awakes in him, and who understands so well how to convey light and tone into his clever and refined pictures; Anton Mauve, and the brothers William and Jacob Maris, were also accomplished interpreters of nature, and all that lives and moves therein.

[Ill.u.s.tration: J. MARIS Two Windmills]

=Modern Dutch Painters pursuing Independent Lines.=--Of other modern Dutch painters pursuing different lines may be mentioned Bosboom, who devoted himself chiefly to the interiors of old churches, bringing out the play of light and shadow among the pillars; Klinkenberg, who paints Dutch streets and ca.n.a.ls and the old buildings upon them in full suns.h.i.+ne; Jansen, who paints the Amsterdam docks and quays; Alma-Tadema, painter of cla.s.sical scenes; Bisschop, the great colorist; David Bles, "the witty portrayer of morals and manners of years ago"; Henrietta Ronner-Knip, the famous painter of cats and dogs; Henkes, who depicts in grayish tones old-fas.h.i.+oned scenes and characters; Bakker Korff, who paints similar scenes, but in miniature; the brothers Oyens; Elchanon Verveer, painter of jolly old fishermen; Sadee; Mejuffrouw van de Sande Bakhuijzen, and Mejuffrouw Roosenboom, painters of flowers and fruit; Eerelman and Van Essen, the animal painters; Allebe, the colorist, painter of human figures and animals; and Kaemmerer, who is fond of painting figures in the costumes of the Directoire.

FOOTNOTES: