William of Germany Part 15

The Emperor, again, would give the artist the freedom to put into his work "that from himself which any artist must, if he is to give the work the stamp of his own individuality." This att.i.tude, too, is admirable, but on the other hand lies the danger, such is poor human nature, that the individuality will be that which the Emperor wishes it to be, not the artist's independent individuality To the foreign eye all the Hohenzollern statues in the Siegesallee, with the exception possibly of two or three, seem to have much the same individuality, though that again may be due to the nature of the subject and the foreigner's inherent and ineradicable predispositions.

Thirdly, art, the Emperor says, can only be educative when it elevates instead of descending into the gutter. Hogarth descended into the gutter. Gustav Dore depicts the horrors of h.e.l.l. Yet both Hogarth and Dore were great artists, and educative too. The Emperor was here thinking of the Berlin Secession, a school just then starting, eccentric indeed and far from "cla.s.sical," but which nevertheless has since produced several fine artists. The Emperor, it would appear, thinks that the antique cla.s.sical school is the true and only good school for the artist. Very likely most artists will agree with him-- at least as a foundation; but the belief, it also appears, is not considered in Germany, or outside of it, to justify the Emperor, as Emperor, in discouraging all other schools and particularly the efforts of modern artists in their non-cla.s.sical imaginings.

The Emperor says art "takes its models, supplies itself from the great sources of Mother Nature." With all courtesy to the Emperor one may suggest that art, and sane art, takes its models not only from Mother Nature, but also from an almost as prolific a maternal source, namely imagination; and that imagination is limited by no eternal laws we know of, or can even suspect. Accordingly it is useless to check, or try to check, the imagination by telling it to work in a certain direction--so long, naturally, as the imagination is not obviously indecent or insane.

Again, the Emperor says that in cla.s.sical art there reigns an eternal law, the "law of beauty and harmony, of the aesthetic" which is expressed in a "thoroughly complete form" by the ancients. It is admittedly a delightful and admirable form, but is it thoroughly complete? Is it the last and only form; and may not the very same law be found by experiment to be at work in future art that cannot be called cla.s.sical, as it was found to be at work in the various n.o.ble schools since cla.s.sical times? One must agree with the Emperor that the Greeks and Romans ill.u.s.trated the "law of beauty and harmony, of the esthetic, in a wonderful manner." But it was wonderfully done for their age and intellect. They did not exhaust the beautiful and harmonious: far from it.

Neither the world nor mankind has been standing still ever since; certainly the mind of man has not, even though his senses have undergone no elemental change. Paganism was succeeded by Christianity, and with Christianity came a new art canon, new forms of beauty and harmony--the Early Italian. The age of reason followed, bringing with it the Baroque and Rococo canons: and as time went on, and the world's mind kept working, came other canons still. The most recent canon appears to be that of naturalism (the Emperor's "gutter ") with which artists are now experimentalizing. None of the canons, be it noticed, destroyed the canon that preceded, because beauty and harmony are indestructible and imperishable. "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever."

But not only the mind of man kept changing: the world itself and its civilization--by war, by treaty, by science, by invention, by art itself--kept changing, and is changing now. Development, physical as well as social, has been constant, and the changes accompanying it have inspired, and are inspiring, artists with new ideas to which they are always trying to give expression. The subjects of art have enormously multiplied. Those introduced by sport of all kinds, by the development of the theatre, by the newly-found effects of light and colour, need only be mentioned as examples capable of suggesting beauties and harmonies unknown to and unsuspected by the ancients.

Hence, in addition to the cla.s.sical art of the day, there is room for the "new art," the secessionist, the futurist, the impressionist, even the cubist, or whatever the experimental movement may call itself. And any day any of these movements may lead to the establishment of a new and admirable school of genuine art as beautiful as the cla.s.sical, if in a different manner. The world has no idea of the surprises in all directions yet in store for it.

The Emperor, too, is at one with all the world in a.s.suming that art, to deserve the name, must possess the quality of beauty. He speaks of "beauty and harmony," but let it be taken that he understands beauty to include harmony. Now, as has been suggested, to answer the question, what is beauty, satisfactorily, is no easy matter. In immediate proximity to it lies the question, what is ugliness? It might be argued that nothing in nature is ugly, and that the word was introduced to express what is merely an inability on the part of mankind to perceive the beauty which const.i.tutes nature; and it certainly is possible that, were man endowed with the mind of G.o.d, instead of with only some infinitesimal and mysterious emanation of it, he would find all things in creation, all art included, beautiful.

The author of the Book of Genesis a.s.serts that when G.o.d had finished making the world He looked upon His handiwork and saw that it was good. There is one advantage in adopting this view, and no small one, that a belief in its truth must impel us to look for beauty and goodness in all things, whether in art or nature--and even in the Secession. Perhaps, however, we shall not be far from the truth in saying, as regards art, that all things in creation are beautiful, that there are degrees in beauty of which ugliness is the lowest, and that the truly inspired artist can make all things, ugliness included, beautiful.

The Emperor thinks the appreciation of beauty is one of our innate ideas, like the ability to distinguish between right and wrong, which we call conscience. There is no agreement among thinkers on the point, and it may be that both beauty and conscience are relative, and simply the result of environment and education. Certainly there is no standard of beauty, and more certainly still, not of feminine beauty.

The Mahommedan admires a woman who has the nose of the parrot, the teeth of the pomegranate seed, and the tread of the elephant.

But though there is no complete standard of beauty about which all people, at all times, in all countries, are agreed, there are two elements of beauty which may be said to have been standardized, at least for the civilized world, by the early Greeks and Romans. These elements are simplicity and harmony, simplicity being the forms of things most directly and pleasingly appealing to the eye and most easily reaching the common understanding, while harmony is the combination of parts most nearly identical with the lines, contours, and proportions of nature. These are two essentials of good sculpture, and the Emperor was talking to sculptors and perhaps thinking only of sculpture.

Yet simplicity and harmony alone do not const.i.tute beauty, while on the other hand beauty may take very complicated forms. A third element one may suggest is essential, and its indescribable nature causes all the difficulty there is in defining beauty. This third element is--charm. A work of art, to be beautiful, must charm, and to different people different things are charming. Plato's theory is that the sense of beauty is a dim recollection of a standard we have seen in a heavenly pre-existence. Accepting it as as good an explanation of charm as we can get, we may conclude by defining beauty as, in its highest form, a combination of simplicity and harmony, resulting in charm.

The Emperor says: "To us Germans great ideals have become permanent possessions, whereas to other peoples they have been more or less lost." The remark is not one of those best calculated to promote friendly feelings on the part of other peoples towards Germany or its Emperor. It is like his declaration that Germans are the "salt of the earth," and of a piece with the aggressive att.i.tude of intellectual superiority adopted by many Germans towards other nations--one reason, by the way, for German unpopularity in the world. But is it true?

Germany has great ideals in permanent possession, but are they more or less lost to other peoples? It is at least doubtful. Great ideals are the permanent possession of every great people; it is these ideals that have made them great; and they are no less great if they differ according to the nature and conditions of each great people. One might go further, indeed, and say that great ideals are the common property and permanent possession of all great peoples. It is a hard saying that any one people has a monopoly of them. The contribution of every great nation to the common stock of great ideals is incalculable, and it would be interesting to investigate which nation is most successfully working out its great ideals in practice.

The truth is the German ideal of beauty in art is not, generally speaking, the same as that of the Anglo-Saxon or Latin foreigner. The art ideals of the Anglo-Saxon and Latin races in this respect are for the most part Greek, while those of the German race are for the most part Roman; and in each case the ideals are the outcome of the spirit which has had most influence on the mind and manners of the different races. The Greek philosophic and aesthetic spirit has chiefly influenced Anglo-Saxon and Latin art ideals: the Roman spirit, particularly the military spirit and the spirit of law, have chiefly influenced German ideals: and, as a result, arrived at through ages during which events of epoch-making importance caused many successive modifications, while the Anglo-Saxon and Latin races are most impressed by such qualities as lightness and delicacy of outline, round and softly-flowing curves and elegance of ornamentation, the German appears, to the Anglo-Saxon and Latin, to be more impressed by the elaborate, the gigantic, the Gothic, the grotesque, the hard, the made, the ma.s.sive, and the square. In both styles are to be found "beauty and harmony, the aesthetic," to quote the Emperor, but they appeal differently to people of different national temperaments. To the Anglo-Saxon and Latin in general, therefore, German art, and particularly German sculpture and architecture, while impressive and admirable, lack for most foreigners the entirely indescribable quality we have called "charm."

The true artist, the Emperor says, needs no advertis.e.m.e.nt, no press, no patronage. The Emperor is right. The true artist, once he begins to produce first-rate work, will obtain instant recognition, and his work will begin to sell, not perhaps at prices the same kind of work may bring later, but at prices sufficient to support the artist and his family in reasonable comfort. If it does not, he is not producing good work and had better turn his attention to something else. As a matter of fact very few true artists do advertise, use the press, or seek patronage. The artist does not go to the press or the patron, for nowadays, the moment the artist does excellent work, the press and the patron go to him, and, when he is very exceptionally good, he is advertised and patronized until he is sick of both advertis.e.m.e.nt and patronage.

Naturally it is different in the case of the artist who is not excellently good, but the Emperor was not considering such. These artists too, however, insist on living and must find a market for their wares. It is an age of advertis.e.m.e.nt, the growth of new economic conditions, for advertis.e.m.e.nt creates as well as reveals new markets.

Hence the vast host of mediocrities, not only in art but in almost every field of human activity, nowadays advertise and seek patronage because only in this way can they find purchasers and live. These artists, often men of talent, dislike having to advertise; they would rather work for art's sake, but having to do so need not hinder them from working for art's sake, since all that is meant by that much misused phrase is that while the artist is working he shall not think of the reward of his work, but simply and solely of how to do the best work he can.

Before leaving the Emperor's speech one is tempted to inquire what should be the att.i.tude of a sovereign towards art and artists. For the Englishman the doctrine of Individualism--the thing he is so apt to make a fetish of--gives an answer, and, it may be, the right one. The Englishman will probably say that if in any one province of life more than in another freedom should be allowed to originality of conception regarding the form as well as the substance, the manner as well as the matter, it is in the province of art, always provided, of course, that the artist is sane and not guilty of indecency. The artist, like the poet, is born not made; you cannot make an artist, you can only make an artisan. The artist, who represents the Creator, the creative faculty, can influence man: man cannot, and should not try to, influence the artist, but can, and should only, offer him the materials for his art, smooth the way for his endeavour, encourage him in it by sympathetic yet candid criticism, and above all, when he can afford it, by buying the result of his endeavour when it is successful.

This should be the att.i.tude of both monarch and Maecenas: it is an att.i.tude of benevolent neutrality. "I know," such a Maecenas might say to the artist,

"that your artistic faculties move in an atmosphere above as well as on the earth, as I know that above the atmosphere of oxygen and hydrogen which envelops the earth there is an ethereal, a rarefied atmosphere, which stretches to worlds of which all we know is that they exist. If your spirit can soar above this earthly atmosphere, well and good. I, for one, shall do nothing to limit or hinder it: I shall only welcome and applaud and reward whatever effort you make to bring our inner being a step, long or short, nearer to the source of celestial light. Consequently, I offer you no instructions and put no fetters on your imagination."

It takes all sorts of art to make an artistic world, as it takes all sorts of people to make the human world: a world with only cla.s.sic art in it would be as uninteresting and unthinkable as a world in which every one was of the same character, occupation, and dress.

But it is time to consider the Emperor a little more in detail in relation to his connexion with the arts. If he were not a first-rate monarch he would probably be a first-rate artist. He said once that if he were to be an artist, he would be a sculptor. But if he is not a professional artist he is a connoisseur, a dilettante in the right sense, a lover of the arts, an art-loving prince. The painter Salzmann tells us how he used to go to the Villa Liegnitz in Potsdam to give Prince William lessons, and how the Empress, then Princess William, used to sit with the pupil and his teacher, discussing technical and art questions. A result of the teaching, in addition to the pictures mentioned elsewhere, was an oil-painting, a sea-fight, which still hangs in the Ravene Gallery in Berlin.

In the spring of 1886 the Prince sent his teacher a sketch for criticism. Salzmann wired his opinion to Potsdam, and a telegram came back, "What does 'wind too anxious' mean? is it so stormily painted that you shuddered at it, or is it not stormy enough?" Salzmann is also authority for the statement that the Prince sent in a sea-piece to the annual Berlin Art Exhibition. It was placed ready to be judged, but suddenly disappeared. The Emperor William, it appeared, had decided that it would not do for a future Emperor to compete with professional artists or run the risk of sarcastic public criticism.

Naturally since he came to the throne the Emperor has never had time to cultivate his talent as a painter, but has always fed his eyes and mind on the best kind of painting, and brings his sense of form and colour to bear on everything he does or has a voice in.

That the Emperor's own taste in painting is of a "cla.s.sical" kind in a very catholic sense was shown by the personal interest he took in getting together and having brought to Berlin the exhibition of old English masters in 1908. At his request the English owners of many of these treasures agreed to lend them for exhibition in Germany, submitting thereby to the risk of loss or damage, displaying an unselfish disposition to aid in elevating the taste of a foreign people, and at the same time giving Germans a better and more tangible idea of the nation which could produce artists of such n.o.bility of feeling and marvellous technical capacity. The Emperor paid several visits to the exhibition and thousands of Berlin folk followed his example, so that the beauty of the works of Gainsborough, Raeburn, Lawrence, Hoppner, and Romney was for months a topic of enthusiastic conversation in the capital.

Encouraged by this success, the Emperor next caused a similar exhibition of French painters to be arranged. The Rococo period was now chosen, many lovely specimens of the art of Watteau, Lancret, David, Vigee, Lebrun, Fragonnard, Greuze, and Bonnat were procured, and again the Berliner was given an opportunity not only of enjoying an artistic treat of a delightful kind, but of comparing the impressions made on him by the art spirits of two other nations. The opening of this French exhibition was made by the Emperor the occasion of emphasizing his conciliatory feelings towards France, for he attended an evening entertainment at the French Emba.s.sy given specially in honour of the occasion.

A third art exhibition followed in 1910--that of two hundred American oil paintings brought to Berlin and shown in the Royal Academy of Arts on the Panser Platz. They included works by Sargent, Whistler, Gari Melchior, Leon Dabo, Joseph Pennell, and many others. The suggestion for this exhibition did not proceed from the Emperor, but in all possible ways he gave the exhibition his personal support. On returning from inspecting it he telegraphed to the American Amba.s.sador in Berlin, Dr. D. J. Hill, to express the pleasure he had derived from what he had seen. Nor was such a mark of admiration surprising. The exhibition was nothing short of a revelation, going far to dissipate the German belief--perhaps the English belief also--that America possesses no body of painters of the first rank.

Again we have recourse to the marine painter, Herr Salzmann. Wired for by the Emperor, the painter got to the palace at 10.15 PM. When he arrived the Emperor cried out, "So, at last! Where have you been hiding yourself? I have had Berlin searched for you." The Emperor and Empress and suite had just returned from the theatre and were standing about the room. It turned out that the Emperor wanted the painter to help him sketch a battles.h.i.+p of a certain design he had in mind, to see how it would look on the water. In the middle of the room an adjutant stood and read out a speech made by a Radical deputy in the Reichstag that day, and the Emperor made occasional remarks about it, though at the same time he was engaged with the s.h.i.+p. The painter does not forget to add that he "was provided with a good gla.s.s of beer."

The Emperor is reported to be a capital "sitter." He had the French painter Borchart staying with him at Potsdam to paint his portrait.

Borchart describes him as an ideal model, so still and patiently did he sit, and this at times for more than two hours. He talked freely during the sittings. "I don't want to be regarded as a devourer of Frenchmen," was a remark made on one of these occasions; on another he praised President Loubet; and on a third he had a good word even for the Socialist Jaures. When Borchart had finished and naively expressed satisfaction with his own work the Emperor said, "Na, na, friend Borchart, not so proud; it is for us to criticize."

As the Emperor is a lover of the "cla.s.sical" in painting and sculpture, it is not strange to find him an admirer of the cla.s.sical in music and recommending it to his people as the best form of musical education. He holds that there is much in common between it and the folk-songs of Germany. At Court he revived cla.s.sical dances like the minuet and the gavotte. He is devoted to opera and never leaves before the end of the performance. Concerts frequently take place in the royal palaces at Potsdam and Berlin, items on the programme for them being often suggested by the Emperor. The programme is then submitted to him and is rarely returned without alteration. Not seldom the concert is preceded by a rehearsal, which the Emperor attends and which itself has been carefully rehea.r.s.ed beforehand, as the Emperor expects everything to run smoothly. At these rehearsals he will often cause an item to be repeated. Bach and Handel are his prime favourites. He is no admirer of Strauss. Wagner he often listens to with pleasure, and especially the "Meistersinger," which is his pet opera. Of Italian operas Verdi's "Aida" and Meyerbeer's "Huguenots"

are those he is most disposed to hear.

He has been laughed at for once attempting musical composition. The "Song to Aegir," which he composed in 1894 at the age of thirty-five (when he should have known better), was, he told the bandmaster of a Hannoverian regiment, suggested to him by the singing of a Hannoverian glee society. It is a song twenty-four lines long, with the inevitable references to the foe, and the sword and s.h.i.+eld, and whales and mermaids, and the G.o.d of the waves, who is called on to quell the storm. The lady-in-waiting who wrote the "Private Lives of the Emperor and His Consort" tells with much detail how the song was really written, not by the Emperor, but almost wholly by a musical adjutant.

It does not greatly matter, but it is likely that the Emperor is responsible for the text if he did not compose the music.

One of the best and most interesting descriptions of his kindly and characteristic way of treating artists is that given by the late Norwegian composer, Eduard Grieg.

"The other day," writes the composer,

I had a chance to meet your Kaiser. He had already expressed a desire last year to meet me, but I was ill at that time.

Now he has renewed his wish, and therefore I could not decline the invitation. I am, as you know, little of a courtier. But I said to myself, 'Remember Aalesund' (for which the Emperor had sent a large sum after a great fire), and my sense of duty conquered. Our first meeting was at breakfast at the German Consul's house. During the meal we spoke much about music. I like his ways, and--oddly enough--our opinions also agreed. Afterwards he came to me and I had the pleasure of talking with him alone for nearly an hour. We spoke about everything in heaven and earth--about poetry, painting, religion, Socialism, and the Lord knows what besides.

"He was fortunately a human being, and not an Emperor. I was therefore permitted to express my opinions openly, though in a discreet manner, of course. Then followed some music. He had brought along an orchestra (!), about forty men. He took two chairs, placed them in front of all the others, sat down on one, and said, 'If you please, first parquet'; and then the music began--Sigurd Jorsalfar, Peer Gynt, and many other things.

"While the music was being played he continually aided me in correcting the _tempi_ and the expression, although as a matter of course I had not wanted to do such a thing. He was very insistent, however, that I should make my intentions clear. Then he ill.u.s.trated the impression made by the music by movements of his head and body. It was wonderful _(gottlich)_ to watch his serpentine movements _a la Orientalin_ while they played Anitra's dance, which quite electrified him.

"Afterwards I had to play for him on the piano, and my wife, who sat nearest him, told me that here too he ill.u.s.trated the impression made on him, especially at the best places.

"I played the minuet from the pianoforte sonata which he found 'very Germanic' and powerfully built: and the 'Wedding Day at Troldhaugen,' which piece he also liked.

"On the following day there was a repet.i.tion of these things on board the _Hohenzollern_, where we were all invited to dinner at eight o'clock. The orchestra played on deck in the most wondrously bright summer night while many hundreds--nay, I believe thousands--of rowboats and small steamers were grouped about us. The crowd applauded constantly and cheered enthusiastically whenever the Kaiser became visible. He treated me like a patient: he gave me his cloak and sent to fetch a rug, with which he covered me carefully.

"I must not forget to relate that he grew so enthusiastic over 'Sigurd Jorsalfar,' the subject of which I explained to him as minutely as possible, that he said to von Hiilsen, the intendant of the royal theatres, who sat next to him: 'We must produce this work! (This was not done, however.)

"I then invited von Hiilsen to come to Christiania to witness a performance of it, and he said he was very eager to so. All in all this meeting was an event and a surprise in the best sense. The Kaiser, certainly, is a very uncommon man, a strange mixture of great energy, great self-reliance, and great kindness of heart. Of children and animals he spoke often and with sympathy, which I regard as a significant thing."

On the New Year's Day following the Emperor sent the composer a telegram reading: "To the northern bard to listen to whose strains has always been a joy to me I send my most sincere wishes for the new year and new creative activity." In 1906, Grieg, having once more been the Emperor's guest, writes to a friend:

"He was greatly pleased with having become once more a grandfather. He called to me across the table (referring to 'Sigurd'), 'Is it agreeable if I call the child Sigurd?' It must be something _Urgermanisch_."

The following anecdote may remind the reader of the amusing scene in Offenbach's "Grand d.u.c.h.esse of Gerolstein," where the Grand d.u.c.h.ess, talking to the guardsman whose athletic proportions she admires, addresses him with a rising scale of "corporal" ... "sergeant" ...

"lieutenant" ... "captain" ... "colonel," and so on, as she talks, only, however, later cruelly to re-descend the scale to the very bottom when her courts.h.i.+p is ineffectual. The Emperor is at an organ recital in the Kaiser William Memorial Church; the recital is over and the Court party are about to go when he greets the organist, Herr Fischer: "My cordial thanks for the great pleasure you have given us, Herr Professor." "Pardon, your Majesty," replies the organist, with commendable presence of mind: "May I venture to thank your Majesty for the great mark of favour?" "What mark of favour?" asks the Emperor, a little puzzled. "The fact is your Majesty has more than once addressed me as 'professor,' although--" "Why, that's good," exclaims the Emperor, with a great laugh, "very good indeed;" and striking his forehead in self-reproach with the palm of his hand: "so forgetful of me! Then you are not professor, after all! Well, no matter; what is not, may be--what I said, I said. Adieu, _Herr Professor_" and goes off smiling. The very same evening--need it be added?--Herr Fischer had his patent as Professor in his pocket.

The Emperor is particularly fond of "my Americans" among his operatic artists. A good deal of jealousy has at times been shown by the German employees of the opera towards the American artists entertained there and a deputy has more than once protested in the Reichstag against the number employed; but the jealousy rarely results in harm, and on the whole harmony--as it should--prevails.

Every year brings hundreds of American girl students to Berlin, Munich, or Dresden to learn singing and perhaps carry off the great prize of a "star" engagement at one or the other of the German royal opera houses. The experiences of some of these students are tragedies on a small scale, and in one or two instances have been known to end in death, dest.i.tution, or dishonour. The explanation is simple. Such students, filled with the high hopes inspired by artistic ambition and the artist's imagination, fail to ask themselves before going abroad if nature has endowed them with the qualities and powers requisite for one of the most laborious and, for a girl, exposed professions in the world; and do not learn until it is too late that they lack the resolute character, the robust health, and the talent which, not singly but all three combined, are essential to success.

Such a girl often starts on her enterprise poorly supplied with means to pay for her board, lodging, clothes, recreation, and instruction; she changes from the dearer sort of _pension_ to the cheaper, finding her company and surroundings at each remove more doubtful and more dangerous; she grows disappointed and disheartened, perhaps physically ill; comes under bad influences, male or female; until finally the curtain falls on a sufferer rescued at the last moment by relatives or friends, or on a young life blasted. Such tragic cases, it should be said, are far from common, but they occur, and the possibility of their occurrence ought to be taken into account at the outset by the intending music or art student.

Happily there is another and brighter side to the picture, and the intending student with money and friends will enjoy and gain advantage from a few years of continental life, even though exceptional strength and genuine talent be wanting. Perhaps this is the experience of the great majority of art students in Germany. Freedom from the restraints and conventions of life at home compensates for the inconveniences arising from narrow means. Novelty of scenery and surroundings has a charm that is constantly recurring. The kindness and helpfulness of fellow-countrymen and countrywomen make the wheels of daily life roll smoothly. The freemasonry of art, its optimism and hope, and the pleasure and interest of its practice, investigation, and discussion wing the hours and spur to effort.