Book: The Old Masters and Their Pictures

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Lucas Van Leyden was born in 1494 and died in 1533. He painted both
scriptural subjects and everyday scenes, being a man of varied powers.
He worked admirably for his time, and added to his art that of an
engraver. He followed the Van Eycks, but lowered their treatment of
sacred subjects. In incidents taken from common life he showed himself
full of observation, and possessed of some humour. His pictures are
rare. A 'Last Judgment,' in the Town House, Leyden, is a striking but
unpleasant example of Lucas Van Leyden's work.

Paul Van Somer was born at Antwerp in 1570, and died in 1624. He worked
for many years in England, where his best works--portraits--remain. He
was truthful, a good colourist, and finished carefully. His portraits of
Lord Bacon at Panshanger and of the Earl and Countess of Arundel at
Arundel Castle are well known.

Frans Snyders was born in 1579, and died, at Antwerp in 1657. After
Rubens, Snyders was the greatest Flemish animal painter. He painted
along with Rubens often, Snyders supplying the animals and Rubens the
figures. Frans Snyders paid a visit to Italy and Rome, from which he
seems to have profited, judging by his skill in arrangement. This skill
he displayed also in his kitchen-pieces (magnificent shows of fruit,
vegetables, game, fish, etc.), which, like his animal pictures, are
numerous. In one of these kitchen-pieces in the Dresden Gallery, Rubens
and his second wife are said to figure as the cooks. Princes and nobles
bade for Snyders' pictures. There is a famous 'Boar Hunt' in the Louvre,
in Munich 'Lionesses Pursuing a Roebuck,' in Vienna 'Boar attacked by
Nine Dogs.' Snyders' animal pictures are full of energetic action and
fierce passion. To these qualities is frequently added hideous realism
in detail. There are many Snyders in English galleries.

Gerard Honthorst was born at Utrecht in 1592, and died in 1662. He was a
follower of Caravaggio. He visited Italy and found favour in Rome, where
he got from his night-pieces Correggio's name, 'Della Notte.' Honthorst
was summoned to England by Charles I., for whom he painted several
pictures. He entered the service of Prince Frederick Henry of Orange,
and painted also for the King of Denmark. He left an extraordinary
number of works, sacred, mythological, historical, and latterly many
portraits. He drew well and painted powerfully, but was coarsely
realistic in his treatment. At Hampton Court there are two of his best
portraits, those of the unfortunate Queen of Bohemia and the Duke of
Buckingham and his family. Gerard Honthorst's younger brother, William,
was a portrait painter not unlike the elder brother in style.

Jan Steen was born at Leyden in 1626, and died in 1679. He was great as
a _genre_ painter. He is said to have been, after Rembrandt, the most
humorous of Dutch painters, full of animal spirits and fun. At his best,
composition, colouring, and execution were all in excellent keeping. At
his worst, he was vulgar and repulsive in his heads, and careless and
faulty in his work. He was very rarely either kindly or reverent in his
subjects, though, in spite of what is known to have been his riotous
life, he is comparatively free from the grossness which is often the
shame of Flemish and Dutch art. Jan Steen succeeded his father as a
brewer and tavern-keeper at Delft. He renounced the brewery, in which he
did not succeed, and joined the Painters' Guild, Haarlem; but his
position as a tavern-keeper is reflected in his pictures, of which
eating and drinking, card-playing, etc., are frequently the _motifs_.
His family relations were not conducive to higher principles and tastes.
He is said to have been so lost to common feeling as to have painted his
first wife when she was in a state of intoxication.[52] His second wife
may have been a worthier woman, but she was drawn from the lowest class,
and had been accustomed to sell sheeps' heads and trotters in the
butchers' market. Without doubt Jan Steen had extraordinary genius
coexisting with his coarse, careless nature and jovial habits, and he
must have worked with great facility, since, in spite of his idleness
and comparatively early death, he left as many as two hundred pictures,
rendered him extremely popular. Besides his favourite subjects, such as
'The Family Jollification,' 'The Feast of the Bean King,' 'Game of
Skittles,' he has pictures in a slightly higher atmosphere, such as 'A
Pastor Visiting a Young Girl,' 'The Parrot,' 'Schoolmaster with
Unmanageable Boys,' 'The Pursuit of Alchemy.' Among the latter a good
example is 'The Music Master' in the National Gallery.

Gerard Dow was born in 1613 and died in 1680. He was a _genre_ painter
of great merit. He belonged to Leyden, and was a pupil of Rembrandt. He
began with portraiture, often painting his own face, and went on to
scenes from low and middle-class life, but rarely attempted to represent
high society. Compared to Jan Steen, however, he is refined. He had a
curious fondness for painting hermits. The lighting of his pictures is
frequently by lantern or candle. They are mostly small, and without
animated action, but are full of picturesqueness. He was a good
colourist, 'with a rare truth to nature and a marvellous distinctness of
eye and precision of hand.' Minute as his execution was, his touch was
'free and soft.' His best pictures are 'like nature's self seen through
the camera obscura.' An instance often given of his exquisite finish is
that of a broom in the corner of one of his pictures. Some contemporary
had remarked how careful and elaborate was the labour bestowed on it,
when the painter answered that he was still to give it several hours'
work. He must have been exceedingly industrious as well as painstaking,
since he left two hundred pictures as his contribution to Dutch art.
Among his finer pictures are 'An Old Woman reading the Bible to her
Husband,' in the Louvre; 'The Poulterer's Shop,' in the National
Gallery. His _chef d'oeuvre_, 'The Woman Sick of the Dropsy,' is in the
Louvre. His candlelight is the finest rendered by any master. There is a
good example of it in 'The Evening School,' in the Amsterdam Gallery.

Peter de Hooch--spelt often, De Hooge--was the _genre_ painter of full,
clear sunlight. The dates of his birth and death can only be guessed by
those of his pictures, which extend from 1656 to 1670. His groups are
generally playing cards, smoking, drinking, or engaged in domestic
occupations--almost always in the open air. No other _genre_ painter can
compare with him in reproducing the effects of sunlight. His prevailing
colour is red, varied and repeated with great delicacy. English lovers
of art brought De Hooch into favour, and many of his pictures are in
England. There are fine examples--'The Court of a Dutch House' and 'A
Courtyard'--in the National Gallery.

Adrian van Ostade was born at Haarlem in 1610 and died in his native
town in 1685. He has been called 'the Rembrandt of _genre_ painters,'
and, like Rembrandt, he was without the sense of human beauty and grace,
for even his children are ugly; yet it is the purer, happier side of
national life which he constantly represents, and he had great feeling
for nature, with picturesqueness and harmony of design and colouring, as
well as mastery of the technique of his art. He suffered many hardships
in his youth, and grew up a quiet, industrious, family man. He left a
very large number of pictures, nearly four hundred, many of them good,
and not a few in England. 'The Alchemist'[53] is in the National
Gallery.

Maas, born in 1632, died in 1693, is a much-prized _genre_ painter,
whose pictures are rare. He was a pupil of Rembrandt. He is said to have
treated 'very simple subjects with naive homeliness and kindly humour.'
His pictures are 'well lit, with deep warm harmony, and a vigorous
touch.' 'The Idle Servant-maid,' in the National Gallery, is a
masterpiece.

Metzu, like Terburg, is _par excellence_ one of the two painters of
Dutch high life. Metzu was born in 1615, and is known to have been alive
in 1667. He painted both on a large and a small scale, and occasionally
departed from his peculiar province to represent market-scenes, etc. He
is the most refined and picturesque of _genre_ painters on a small
scale. Among his _chefs d'oeuvre_ are a 'Lady holding a Glass of Wine and
receiving an Officer,' in the Louvre; and a 'Girl writing, a Gentleman
leaning on her chair and another girl opposite playing the Lute,' in the
Hague Gallery. The fine 'Duet,' and the 'Music Lesson' are both in the
National Gallery.

Gerard Terburg was born at Zwol, in 1608, and died in 1681. He visited
Germany and Italy in his youth. His small groups and single figures,
taken from the wealthier classes, with their luxurious surroundings, are
'given with exquisite delicacy and refinement.' Included in his
masterpieces are a 'Girl in white satin (a texture which he rendered
marvellously) washing her hands in a basin held before her by a
maid-servant,' in the Dresden Gallery; an 'Officer in confidential talk
with a Young Girl, and a Trumpeter who has brought him a Letter,' in the
Hague Gallery; a 'Young Lady in white satin sitting playing the Lute,'
in the Chateau of Wilhelmshoee, at Cassell. There are twenty-three
Terburgs in England and Scotland.

Caspar Netcher, born in 1639, died in 1684. He formed himself upon Metzu
and Terburg. He is the great Dutch painter of childhood. His finest
works are in the Dresden Gallery. In the National Gallery is his
'Children blowing Bubbles.'

Ferdinand Bol was born at Dordrecht in 1611, and died at Amsterdam in
1680. He was a student of Rembrandt's, and distinguished himself in
sacred and historical pictures, and especially in portraits. He followed
his master in his youth, fell off in his art in middle life, but became
again excellent in his later years. Among his fine pictures are 'David's
Charge to Solomon,' in the Dublin National Gallery; and 'Joseph
presenting his father Jacob to Pharaoh,' in the Dresden Gallery. His
last portraits are considered very fine. They are taken in the fullest
light, and have a surprising amount of animation. Such a portrait,
called 'The Astronomer,' is in the National Gallery.[54]

Jacob Ruysdael was born in 1625(?) at Haarlem. In 1668 he was in
Amsterdam, and acted as witness to the marriage of Hobbema, whose lack
of worldly prosperity Ruysdael shared. He himself was unmarried, and
maintained his father in his old age. In the prime of life Jacob
Ruysdael in turn fell into extreme poverty, and died an inmate of the
Haarlem Almshouse in 1682--a sad record of Holland's greatest landscape
painter, for 'beyond dispute' Ruysdael is the first of the famous Dutch
landscape painters.

'In no other is there the feeling for the poetry of Northern nature
united with perfect execution, admirable drawing, great knowledge of
chiaroscuro, powerful colouring, and a mastery of the brush which ranged
from the minutest touch to broad, free execution.' His prevailing tone
of colour is a full, decided green, though age has given many of his
pictures a brown tone. A considerable number of his pictures are in a
greyish, clear, cool tone (good examples of the last are to be seen in
the Dresden Gallery). He generally painted the flat Dutch country in
tranquil repose. He dealt usually in heavy clouded skies which told of
showers past and coming, and dark sheets of water overshadowed by
trees, lending a melancholy sentiment to the picture. He was fond of
wide expanses of land and water, fond also of introducing the spires of
his native Haarlem, touching the horizon line. He has left a few
sea-pieces, always with cloudy heavens and heaving or raging seas;[55]
where he has given sketches of sea, and shore, the aerial perspective is
rendered in tender gradations 'full of pathos.' He has other pictures
representing hilly, even mountainous, landscapes. In these foaming
waterfalls form a prominent feature. Ruysdael was weak in his drawing of
men and animals, in which he was occasionally assisted by
fellow-artists, such as Berchem and Van de Velde. Among his finest
pictures are 'A View of the Country round Haarlem,' in the Museum of the
Hague; 'A flat country, with a road leading to a village and fields with
wheat sheaves,' in the Dresden Gallery; 'A hilly bare country through
which a river runs; the horseman and beggar on a bridge, by
Wouvermans,' in the Louvre. His most remarkable waterfall is in the
Hague Museum. In the Dresden Gallery there is 'A Jewish Cemetery,' 'full
of melancholy.' Three of Ruysdael's fine waterfalls are in the National
Gallery. Of two very grand storms which he painted one is in the Louvre,
the other in the collection of the Marquis of Lansdowne at Bowood. There
are many of Ruysdael's pictures in England. In the great landscape
painter, as in the other renowned Dutch artists of the seventeenth
century, the influence of Rembrandt is marked.

Meindert Hobbema was born in 1638, married in 1638, and died in poverty
at Amsterdam in 1709. His works, which were neglected in his lifetime,
now fetch much more than their weight in gold. Sums as large as four
thousand pounds have been paid more than once for a Hobbema, yet his
name was not found in any dictionary of art or artists for more than a
century after his death. The English were the first to acknowledge
Hobbema's merit, and nine-tenths of his works are in England, where he
is the most popular Dutch landscape painter. But he is said by judges to
have less invention and less poetic sensibility than his contemporary
and friend Ruysdael. Hobbema's subjects are usually villages surrounded
by trees like those in Guelderland, water-mills, a slightly broken
country, with groups of trees, wheatfields, meadows, and small pools,
more rarely portions of towns, and still more seldom old castles and
stately mansions.[56] He has all the lifelike truthfulness of the Dutch
artists. In tone he is as warm and golden as Ruysdael is cool in his
greens. In the National Gallery there are excellent specimens of
Hobbema, such as 'The Avenue Middelharnis' and 'A Landscape in Showery
Weather.'

Nicolas Berchem, often spelt Berghem, was born at Haarlem in 1620, and
died at Amsterdam in 1683. He was an excellent Dutch landscape painter.
He had evidently visited Italy, and displayed great fondness for
Italian subjects. His pictures show 'varied composition, good drawing,
fine aerial effects, freedom, playfulness, and spirit.' As a colourist he
was unequal, being often warm and harmonious, but at other times heavy
and cold. It is clear that he was no student of life, from the monotony
of his shepherds and shepherdesses and the sameness of his animals. He
was naturally industrious, and was spurred on, as a still greater artist
is said to have been, by the greed of his wife. He painted upwards of
four hundred pictures, besides doing figures and animals for other
painters. The great northern European galleries are rich in his works.
One of his best pictures, 'A Shepherdess driving her cattle through a
ford in a rocky landscape,' where the cool tone of the landscape is
contrasted with the golden tone of the cattle, is in the Louvre. Another
fine picture, 'Crossing the Ford,' is in the National Gallery.

Jan Both, born in 1610 (?), died in 1650 (?), was another Dutch
landscape painter still more spellbound by Italy,[57] which he visited,
and where he fell under the influence of Claude Lorraine. Both devoted
himself thenceforth to Italian landscape to a greater degree than was
practised by any other Dutch painter. He was excellent in drawing and
skilful in rendering the golden glories of Italian sunsets. He painted
freely and with solidity. The figures of men and animals in his pictures
were often introduced by his brother Andreas. Jan Both excelled both in
large and small pictures, but he was most uninterestingly uniform in
design. He had generally a foreground of lofty trees, and for a
background a range of mountains rising step by step, with a wide plain
at their feet. Sometimes he introduced a waterfall or a lake. He rarely
painted particular points in a landscape. His life was not a long one,
so that his pictures do not number more than a hundred and fifty.
Occasionally his warm tone of colouring degenerates to a foxy red. One
of Both's best pictures--a landscape in which the fresh light of
morning is apparent--is in the National Gallery.

Karil du Jardin, born in 1625, died in 1678, is a third great Dutch
landscape painter, whose fancy Italy laid hold of, so that he settled in
the country, dying at Venice. He was, it is said, a pupil of Berchem's,
from whom he may have first drawn his Italian proclivities. He has more
truth and feeling for animated nature than Berchem. Indeed, in this
respect Du Jardin followed Paul Potter. According to contemporary
accounts, Du Jardin, who had his share of the national humour, wasted
his time in the pursuit of pleasure, and did not leave more pictures
behind him than Both left. Du Jardin's best works are in the Louvre, but
there are also many of his pictures in England. Among his masterpieces,
'Cattle of all kinds in a meadow surrounded by rocks, and watered by a
cascade; a horseman giving alms to a peasant boy;' and his celebrated
'Charlatan,' full of observation and humour, are in the Louvre. A fine
picture, 'Figures of Animals under the shade of a Tree,' is in the
National Gallery.

Adrian Van de Velde, born in 1639, died in 1672, the younger brother of
a great marine painter, ranks almost as high as Paul Potter in cattle
painting. If 'inferior in modelling and solidity' to his rival, Adrian
Van de Velde is superior in variety, taste, and feeling. Like the great
English animal painter, Landseer, Van de Velde was a distinguished
artist when a mere boy of fourteen. Like his compatriot, Paul Potter,
Van de Velde died young, at the age of thirty-two. He generally disposed
of his cattle among broken ground with trees and pools of water.
Sometimes he has a herdsman or a shepherdess, sometimes there is a
hunting party passing. His scenery is reckoned masterly. It is mostly
taken from the coast of Scheveningen. He often painted in men, horses,
and dogs for other painters. He must have been very industrious, with
great facility in his work, since, in spite of his premature death, he
had painted nearly two hundred pictures. 'A brown cow grazing and a
grey cow resting,' which is in the Berlin Museum, was done at the age of
sixteen, yet it is full of observation, delicacy, and execution. 'Cattle
grazing before a peasant's cottage,' which is in the Dresden Gallery, is
considered very fine. A fine 'Winter Landscape,' and a 'Farm Cottage,'
are in the National Gallery. Some of Adrian Van de Velde's best work, as
well as his brother's, is in England.

Jan Van der Heyden, 'the Gerard Dow of architectural painters,' was born
in 1637 and died in 1712. He combined an unspeakable minuteness of
detail with the closest observation of nature. His subjects, which he
selected with great taste, were chiefly well-known buildings, palaces,
churches, and canal banks in Holland and Belgium. He painted in a warm
transparent tone, with close application of the laws of perspective. The
figures in his pictures, in excellent keeping, were often introduced by
Adrian Van de Velde. Van der Heyden's productiveness as a painter was
lessened by the circumstance that his mechanical talent led him to make
an invention by which the construction of the fire-engines of his day
was greatly improved. In consequence he was placed by the magistrates of
Amsterdam at the head of their fire-engine establishment, which had thus
many claims on his time. A beautiful 'Street in Cologne' is in the
National Gallery.

Emanuel De Witte, born in 1607, died in 1692, was great in architectural
interiors, especially in churches of Italian architecture. He stood to
this branch of Dutch art in the same relation that Ruysdael did to
landscape and William Van de Velde to seascape.

Aart Van der Neer was born in 1619(?), died in 1683. He is famous for
his canal banks by moonlight, and fine disposal of broad masses of
shadow. After his moonlights come his sunsets, conflagrations, and
winter scenes. He rarely painted full daylight. He sometimes painted on
the same Van der Neer in the National Gallery. Many of his works are in
England.

William Van de Velde the younger, the elder brother of Adrian Van de
Velde, the cattle painter, was born at Amsterdam in 1633, and died at
Greenwich in 1707. His early life was spent in Holland. He followed his
father, William Van de Velde, a painter also, to England, where, under
the patronage of Charles II, and James II., William the younger painted
the naval victories of the English over the Dutch, just as in Holland he
had already painted the naval victories of the Dutch over the English.
He was a greater and more consistent artist than he was a patriot.
Without question he is the first marine painter of the Dutch School. He
was untiring in his study of nature, so that his perfect knowledge of
perspective and the incomparable mastery of technical qualities which he
inherited from his school, enabled him to render sea and sky under every
aspect. His vessels 'were drawn with a knowledge which extended to every
rope.' He has been an exceedingly popular painter both with the Dutch
and the English. Of upwards of three hundred pictures left by him many
are in Holland and still more in England, where in his lifetime he was
largely employed by the English nobility and gentry. William Van de
Velde has a great picture in the Amsterdam Museum, where the English
flag-ship, the _Princess Royal_, is represented as striking her colours
to the Dutch fleet in 1666. In the companion picture, also by Van de
Velde, 'Four English men-of-war brought in as prizes,' the painter
introduces himself in the small boat from which he witnessed the fight.
William Van de Velde's triumphs in calm seas are seen especially in his
pictures at the Hague and in Munich. Some of Van de Velde's best works
are in the National Gallery.

Backhuysen born in 1631, died at Amsterdam in 1708, was another
admirable marine painter. He did not study painting till he had followed
a trade up to the age of eighteen years; he then gave himself with
ardour to art, making many studies of skies, coasts, and vessels. He was
inferior to William Van de Velde in his colouring, which was heavy, with
a cold effect. But he had in full a Dutch painter's truthfulness, while
his 'stormy waves and rent clouds' are given with poetic feeling. He was
an industrious and successful man, painting nearly two hundred pictures,
and receiving many commissions from the King of Prussia, Grand Duke of
Tuscany, etc. One of his finest works, 'A View of the River from the
Landing-place called the Mosselsteiger,' is in Amsterdam Museum. In the
Louvre is 'A view of the Mouth of the Texel, with ten Men-of-war Sailing
before a Fresh Wind.' 'Dutch Shipping' is in the National Gallery.

Van de Capella is another capital marine painter, though little is known
of him. He was a native of Amsterdam about 1653. His favourite subject
is a quiet sea in sunny weather. His work bears some resemblance to that
of Cuyp. His best pictures are in England. 'A Calm at Low Water' is in
the National Gallery.

Melchior de Hondecoeter, born in 1636, died in 1695, chose the feathered
tribe for his subjects. He has been called 'the Raphael of bird
painters.' He painted especially poultry, peacocks, turkeys, and
pigeons, which he usually represented alive, and treated with great
truthfulness and picturesque feeling. Among his best pictures are 'The
Floating Feather,' a feather given with singular lightness drifting in a
pool, with different birds on the water and the shore--a pelican
prominent--in Amsterdam Museum, and 'A Hen defending her Chickens
against the attacks of a Pea-hen, with a Peacock, a Pigeon, a Cassowary,
and a Crane,' also in Amsterdam.

Jan Weenix, born in 1644, died in 1719. He was a painter of 'still
life,' and was especially famous for his dead hares, 'which in form and
colour, down to the rendering of every hair, are marvels of execution.'
He painted sometimes, though rarely, a living dog in his pieces. A fine
Weenix sometimes painted flower pieces.[58]

Pater Segers, so called because he was a Father in a Jesuit convent,
which he entered at twenty-four years of age. He was born in 1590, and
died in the Jesuit convent, Antwerp, 1661. He was a famous flower
painter, but did not paint flowers by themselves; he painted them in
conjunction with the historical and sacred subjects of other painters.
He added many a wreath to the Virgin and Child. He worked in this
fashion with Rubens, but painted more frequently along with painters of
a lower rank in art. Pater Segers' flowers are finely drawn and
tastefully arranged. The red of his roses has remained unchanged by
years, while the roses of other painters have become violet or faded
altogether. He had endless royal commissions. There are six of his
pictures of much merit in the Dresden Gallery.

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