Old world masters in new world collections

Painting reached its greatest development in Germany from the middle of the Fifteenth to the middle of the Sixteenth Century during the Renaissance and the Reformation. The dominating personalities were Albrecht Dürer and Hans Holbein the Younger.

The early German painters devoted their talents almost exclusively to altar-pieces. The chief centres of activity were Cologne, Colmar, Ulm, Nuremberg, and Augsburg. Cologne was the most important and had much influence upon the neighboring Flemings. As early as the Thirteenth Century Wolfram van Eschenbach, describing his handsome Knight in Parsifal, declares that

The first important Cologne painter is Meister Wilhelm, first half of the Fourteenth Century, followed by Meister Stephan Lochner (active 1430–1451), possibly his pupil, painter of the great altar-piece in the Cologne Cathedral, the “Dom-bild”, which every painter tried to see. Albrecht Dürer, for instance, wrote in his Journal: “Item. I have paid two silver pennies to have the picture opened, which Meister Stephan painted at Cologne.”

Heine, many years later, sang of the wondrous eyes of the Madonna in that picture in the Cologne Cathedral that reminded him of his beloved; and the idea is most beautifully emphasized in the musical setting of that little song by Robert Franz, who expresses in his accompaniment all of the emotion aroused by the painting.

The Cologne painters were much influenced by Roger van der Weyden, who seems to have visited Cologne in 1450. Certainly Martin Schöngauer (about 1445–1491) was a follower of Roger, if not a personal pupil. Schöngauer is remarkable among other things for the weird and fantastic creatures he frequently introduced into his pictures. Martin Schöngauer, regarded as the precursor of Dürer, was much admired by the Italian painters, who called him “Il bel Martino.” Michelangelo is said to have copied in oils his celebrated print of Saint Anthony tormented by Demons and he was a friend of Perugino and exchanged drawings with him. The two Germans of next importance were Bartholomäus Zeitblom of Ulm (1450?–1521), who, like Martin, belongs to the Swabian School, and Michael Wohlgemut (1434?–1519?), the leading spirit of the Franconian School, who worked especially in the Nuremberg churches.

In the picturesque town of Nuremberg, with its peaked gables, overhanging balconies, and quaint façades, town of wood-carvers, goldsmiths, and toy-makers, town of Hans Sachs and the Meistersinger, the house of Dürer is still shown to tourists.

Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528), one of the giants in art, was supreme master in wood-cuts, etchings, and drawings as well as in paintings. Dürer, too, is one of the greatest portrait-painters (see page 237).

In Augsburg, the leading commercial city of Southern Germany, there were many wealthy art-lovers, such as the Fuggers, famous merchant-princes of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries. The leading painter was Hans Holbein the Elder (1470?–1524), much influenced by Martin Schöngauer and also by the Italians. He trained his gifted son, Hans Holbein the Younger (1497–1543), who completely overshadowed him. The latter went to Basle and eventually to London, where he became Court-Painter to Henry VIII (see page 240).

Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472–1553), leader of the Saxon School, was a contemporary of Dürer and Holbein, pupil of his father, and, in common with most German artists, excelled as an engraver on wood and copper and designer, as well as a painter. Cranach was Court-Painter to three Saxon Electors (see page 251).

Lucas Cranach the Younger (1515–1586) was a pupil of his father, but was far below him in talent and performance.

PORTRAIT OF A MAN.

We should like to know—but we never shall—the name of the man who looks so keenly from this picture (12¾ × 15⅝ inches). All that is known of it is that it belonged to the Collection of Count Bonde, of Stockholm, before it found its present home.

Albrecht Dürer was a great painter of portraits. He began early. Indeed the first authentic drawing by him is a portrait of himself at the age of thirteen, which is preserved in the Albertina, Vienna.

At all periods of his life, Dürer painted and drew portraits. To the early Nuremberg period belongs Frederic the Wise, tempera on linen (Berlin), and he painted a Portrait of his Father in 1497 (of which there are several versions). Then there is Oswald Krell in the Munich Gallery and a Portrait of Himself, a Portrait of a Young Man at Hampton Court Palace and the very famous Hieronymus Holtzschuher in Berlin.

Dürer’s one idea was to give as exact a representation of the sitter as possible; and if he painted character as well as the features, it was because his penetrating eye saw directly through the person. There was no conscious analysis or deep ponderings of any kind. Dürer simply saw the person and painted him; and he painted him so well that we see him, too, just the man he was. Dürer was like a camera; he depicted every wrinkle and every hair with an amazing effect of reality and he caught the personality as well. Nothing seems to have been hidden from his eyesight and nothing seems to have been beyond the power of his brush.

Albrecht Dürer was the son of a goldsmith of Hungarian origin who had spent some time in the Netherlands. In 1455 he settled in Nuremberg, where Albrecht was born in 1471, the third of eleven children. His father intended him for a goldsmith, but, seeing his talent, apprenticed him to Michael Wolgemuth to serve three years. Of this period Dürer wrote: “God gave me diligence so that I learned well. And when I had served my time, my father sent me away and I was absent four years until my father needed me again; and I set out in 1490 after Easter, so I returned in 1494 after Whitsuntide. And when I returned home Hans Frey treated with my father and gave me his daughter, Agnes, and he gave me with her two hundred florins; and the marriage was celebrated on the Monday before St. Margaret’s Day in the year 1494.”

The story that Dürer’s wife was a shrew who led him an unhappy life is now exploded.

In 1505 Dürer went to Italy and spent some time in Venice, where he painted for the Guild of German merchants and their Fondaco dei Tedeschi, The Feast of the Rosary, which is now in the monastery of Strahow near Prague.

Returning to Nuremberg in 1507 Dürer painted some of his finest altar-pieces. In 1511 he began his fine sets of wood-cuts and etchings—the Apocalypse, the Great Passion, the Little Passion, the Life of the Virgin and St. Jerome in his Study. To this period belongs the large altar-piece Adoration of the Trinity, in the Belvedere at Vienna. In 1518 Dürer was in Augsburg and in 1520–1521 he travelled in the Low Countries. Once back in Nuremberg, he seems to have worked quietly and industriously until his death in 1528.

In forming any estimate of Dürer it is essential to remember that Dürer was a great expression and a great flowering of the German race. Mrs. Heaton has well summed up his characteristics: “We do not find,” she says, “in Dürer’s art the classic ideal of the perfection of man’s physical nature, nor the spiritual ideal of the early religious painters, nor the calm dignity and rich sensuous beauty of the great masters of the Italian Renaissance, but in it we find a noble expression of the German mind, with its high intellectual powers, its daring speculative philosophy, its deep-seated reverence, its patient laboriousness, and above all its strange love for the weird and grotesque. Dürer was the companion of some of the most learned and thoughtful men of his day. Luther and Melancthon were among the number of his friends, and there is no doubt but the reforming spirit of the age was powerfully at work within him, affecting his thought and art. Melancthon bears testimony to his rare worth as a man by saying: ‘his least merit was his art.’”

PRINCE EDWARD OF ENGLAND.

This portrait is one of the finest that Holbein ever painted. The artist had every reason to do his best, for the picture was intended as a New Year’s Gift to Henry VIII of his little son, the Prince of Wales, who was nearly two years old. The King was so delighted with the picture that he presented Holbein with a magnificent gold standing-cup with cover. Prince Edward (who became Edward VI) was the son of Jane Seymour, the third wife of Henry VIII, who only lived twelve days after Prince Edward’s birth at Hampton Court Palace on October 12, 1537. By the Peace Treaty of Scotland in 1543, it was arranged that Prince Edward should marry Mary, Queen of Scots, at that time but a few months old; but this came to nothing, owing to “the grasping greed” of Henry VIII, whose ambition was to absorb the Crown of Scotland and whose purpose was discovered by the patriotic Scotch. On the death of Henry VIII in January 1547, the Prince of Wales succeeded to the throne and was crowned on February 20, 1547, as Edward VI. Edward, on the point of death, bequeathed the Crown in 1553 to Lady Jane Grey, daughter of his cousin, Frances Grey, eldest daughter of Mary, the daughter of Henry VII, and who was married to the son of the Duke of Northumberland. On July 6, 1553, the young King Edward VI died and was buried the next day in Henry VII’s Chapel, Westminster Abbey.

The portrait in oil on a panel (21¾ × 17 inches) was painted in 1538. The little prince is wearing a red and gold costume and red and gold hat with white feather. The background is gold.

His hands are marvellously painted, particularly the right, which is a triumph of foreshortening. The left hand holds a silver rattle.

The Latin inscription painted at the base was written by Sir Richard Morysin (who became English Ambassador to the Hanse towns in 1646 and to the Court of the Emperor Charles V in 1550). The eulogy is addressed to Henry VIII, through the child; and it is well for Edward VI that he did not live to learn the verdict that time has passed upon this Bluebeard of History. Translated it reads:

“Little one, imitate thy father and be the heir of his virtue, the world contains nothing greater. Heaven and Nature could scarcely give a son whose glory should surpass that of such a father. Do thou but equal the deeds of thy parent: the desires of man cannot go beyond this. Surpass him and thou hast surpassed all the kings the world has ever worshipped and none will ever surpass thee.”

Can flattery go beyond this?

For many years this portrait hung in the Royal Picture Gallery at Hanover in Germany, probably taken there by one of the Georges, all of whom preferred their Hanoverian Court to that of England. In late years the picture belonged to the Duke of Cumberland, whose father was King of Hanover until Prussia absorbed that kingdom in 1866.

Hans Holbein, born in Augsburg in 1497, was taught by his father, Hans Holbein the Elder, as was also his elder brother, Ambrose. About 1515 these two young Holbeins went to Basle, where there was plenty of work for artists, for Basle had long been a centre of intellectual and artistic life. Holbein’s talents won recognition; and among other kinds of work he drew designs for title-pages and various decorations for books. Some marginal drawings for The Praise of Folly by Erasmus, led to a friendship with that distinguished personage, which was destined eventually to change his entire life. Holbein also painted in fresco the council chamber of the new Rathaus in Basle and also the famous votive picture The Meier Madonna, representing the Burgomaster, Jacob Meier of Basle, kneeling with his family before the Virgin. He also painted several portraits of Erasmus. In 1526 Holbein decided to visit England, taking a letter of introduction from Erasmus to Sir Thomas More and stopping on the way at Antwerp to visit Quentin Massys. Holbein remained in London two years, returned to his family in Basle in 1528, bought a house, designed for goldsmiths, worked again on his unfinished frescoes in the Rathaus, made another portrait of Erasmus and painted the faces of clocks. In 1532 Holbein decided to return to London, where, after a period of working in the German colony, he became Court-Painter to Henry VIII with a salary of thirty pounds a year and rooms in the Palace. From that time onward Holbein painted everybody of importance in Tudor England. He also aided in the street decorations for Anne Boleyn’s Coronation procession and festivities. Holbein was also sent on various missions by Henry VIII to paint portraits; also in 1538 to Brussels, to paint the portrait of the young widow, Christina of Denmark, Duchess of Milan; and in 1539, to Cleves, to paint Anne, sister of the Duke.

These two portraits were ordered by the King with a view to matrimony, in case they met with his favor. The first portrait (now in the National Gallery, London) representing, in her mourning garb of black satin, Christina the young widow of Francesco Sforza, brother of Maximilian Sforza (see page 148) and who was, moreover, niece of the Emperor Charles V, in every way, therefore, a distinguished and desirable bride, pleased Henry VIII so well that he offered his royal hand on seeing it. But the wise young Duchess, declining the hand replied sarcastically “that unfortunately she had only one head; if she had two, one would be at His Majesty’s service.” The other portrait of Anne of Cleves (now in the Louvre), in purple velvet flashing with jewels, standing full face, with beautifully painted hands laden with rings and clasped gracefully, gained for this lady the Royal Bluebeard; but only for a short time. The portrait was too flattering of the “Flanders Mare”, as Henry VIII called her, and the fourth wife was soon divorced.

In 1538 Holbein went to Basle on a mission for the King, visited his wife and children and, refusing liberal offers from the municipality of Basle to remain there, returned to London. Back again in his English quarters, he continued his painting until he died in 1543, supposedly of the Plague, which was then raging.

SIR THOMAS MORE.

This was one of the first portraits that Holbein painted in England and was done in 1526–1527, while Holbein was a guest in Sir Thomas’s delightful home at Chelsea. It is a life-size, half-length portrait on panel (23¼ × 29¼ inches), representing Sir Thomas in a dark-green coat with purple velvet sleeves, fur collar, and large hat. The conspicuous and heavy double S-chain of gold with a double rose pendant, significant of the union of the Red and White Roses of Lancaster and York, was only permitted to Knights. His right hand holds a paper and the arm rests on a table, on which the date is inscribed.

This portrait was painted before Sir Thomas More became Lord Chancellor in 1529.

“His face,” says Dr. Alfred Woltman, “shows that calm repose which indicated the utmost harmony of nature and inward peace; but the expression is one of the deepest seriousness, though gentleness is linked with it. The finely-cut lips are firmly closed; there is something almost visionary in the bright and penetrating glance, though otherwise the features betoken clear judgment, combined with moral strictness and nobility of feeling. In looking at the picture the words occur to us with which Erasmus in another passage concisely sums up More’s characteristics: ‘He possessed that beautiful ease of mind, or, still better, that piety and prudence with which he joyfully adapts himself to everything that comes, as though it were the best that could come.’”

Sir Thomas More was born in 1478 in Cheapside, London, the son of Sir John More, and was beheaded in 1535 for refusing to support the Act of Supremacy. More was one of the most intellectual and highly cultured men of his time. He wrote one of the most famous of books, Utopia. Sir Thomas was also a fine critic of painting. He was knighted in 1521.

Erasmus gives a picture of Sir Thomas and his home in a letter to Ulrich von Hutten, written from Chelsea. He says:

“More has built near London upon the Thames a modest but commodious house. There he lives surrounded by his large family—his wife, his son, his son’s wife, his three daughters and their husbands with eleven grand-children. There is not any man living so affectionate to his children as he, and he loveth his old wife as if she were a girl of fifteen. Such is the goodness of his nature that whatsoever cometh about which cannot be helped he is as cheerful and well satisfied as if the best had happened. In More’s house you would say that the Academy of Plato lived again save that whereas in the Academy the conversation turned upon geometry and the power of numbers, the house at Chelsea is a true school of Christian religion. In it is no one, man or woman, but studdieth the liberal arts, yet above all piety is their care. There is never any seen idle; the head of the house governs it, not by lofty demeanor and frequent rebukes, but by gentle and lovable manners. Everyone is busy in his place doing his business with diligence; nor is sober mirth absent.”

DIRK BERCK OF COLOGNE.

When Holbein returned to England on his second trip in 1532, his friend and patron, Sir Thomas More, was out of favor. However, he found a cordial welcome among his compatriots—the German merchants of the Steelyard. These German merchants had formed themselves into an association of real power: indeed, they had made a little city of their own, which went by the name of Stahlhof, where they managed all their business, kept their stores, had their counting-houses, their Bourse, their Guildhall, and their homes; and, being Germans, of course they had a festival-hall and spacious gardens on the bank of the Thames, where they could enjoy themselves. The company, forming a part of the great Hanseatic League, was opulent and dealt largely in iron and precious metals.

Consequently, among the group were skilled goldsmiths, watch-makers, armorers, and many other prosperous artisans as well as bankers. The brilliant painter had no difficulty in getting orders for portraits; and we may be very sure that after he had produced such a masterly likeness as that of Georg Gisze (now in the Berlin Museum), he must have been in even greater demand, as the numbers of “steelyard portraits” scattered in various galleries attest.

This particular portrait in oils on panel (21 × 16¾ inches) was painted in 1536, as we learn from the right hand corner, which bears the date and the sitter’s age, “An 1536 Aeta. 30.” Dirk Berck of Cologne appears at half-length facing us full face from a background of blue relieved by a green curtain with red strings. Dirk Berck is dressed in a heavy, black, and lustrous silk cloak with a wide collar, an embroidered shirt showing at the opening at the neck, a flat cap (something like a biretta) at a slight angle on his head, with his hair cut in a fringe (or “bobbed”) that nearly covers his ears. He has a slight moustache and a full square-cut beard, which makes him appear older than his thirty years. His small eyes are dark blue and intelligent, his brows are black, his cheek bones are prominent, and his general expression is serious and rather kindly. His hands rest one upon the other, the right one on top, while the left, placed on the table, holds a letter addressed to himself: “Dem Ersame ’U (N) d fromen Derick berk i. London upt. Stalhof” with the trademark of his house and the motto, “besad dz end” (consider the end). A small piece of paper lying on the red-covered table bears this Latin sentence from Virgil: “Olim meminisse juvabit” (Hereafter I shall be remembered) which speaks well for Dirk Berck’s estimation of Holbein and his intelligent forecast of ours.

The portrait came from the Collection of Lord Leconfield, Petworth, Sussex, and was formerly in the Collection of Colonel Egremont Wyndham, also of Petworth, Sussex, and the Earls of Egremont.

JEAN DE DINTEVILLE.

This gentleman in black costume with black cap and white shirt sits at a table covered with a red cloth (one of Holbein’s favorite arrangements), and in front of an apple-green curtain. Around his neck he wears a fine gold chain and a black ribbon, to which is attached a little case of gold studded with jewels. His eyes are very blue but rather cold, giving one the idea that Jean de Dinteville is something of a dreamer. His hands, beautifully drawn and painted, gain additional grace from the fine ruffles at his wrists. In his right hand he holds a roll of paper (most likely a musical composition), and the left fingers close around the neck of a lute. On the table before him two books are lying—one shut and one open—and both books are supplied with green book-marks, that draw the rest of the picture into harmony with the green curtain at the back.

This portrait, in oils on panel (17½ × 17½ inches), is supposed to be the same one listed in the inventory of Alethea, Countess of Arundel, in 1654 as Ritratto d’un Musico.

It was in the Collection of Ralph Bernal, London, and sold at Christie’s in 1855 to Mr. Morant for 100 guineas; subsequently, the picture was in the Collection of Sir John Ramsden, Bart., Bulstrode Park, Buckinghamshire, having been purchased by him at an auction in Scotland in 1860.

Jean de Dinteville, Lord of Polisy and Bailly of Troyes, was born in 1504 and died in 1555. After having served as a diplomat in the Court of Francis I, he was sent as Ambassador to England in 1553, in which year Holbein painted him with George de Selve in the large picture known as The Ambassadors, now in the National Gallery, London. In this picture Jean de Dinteville stands on the left, wearing a black kilted costume, which includes a cloak lined with white fur. Around his neck is a heavy gold chain with the French Order of Saint Michel, at his side is a dagger with gold hilt and sheath, and his black cap is ornamented with a silver skull set in gold. A lute, a case of flutes, and a music-book near him proclaim the musician. This picture is dated 1553.

CARDINAL ALBRECHT AS SAINT HIERONYMUS.

This picture (49 × 35¼ inches), came into possession of the present owner from Baron Viehweg of Hanover, in whose family it had been since the time of Cranach.

All of Cranach’s delightful characteristics are represented here. It is interesting to compare this painting with Dürer’s print of St. Jerome in his Study, the latter so serious and the one represented here so merry. Cranach’s St. Jerome reminds us of a jolly old German folksong. In this perfectly Teutonic setting with characteristic German furniture and the favorite “antler” chandelier, nothing has been forgotten; and St. Jerome in his red Cardinal’s robe and biretta sits propped up before his reading-desk truly monarch of all he surveys. His crucifix and devotional books are placed conveniently on his table and he has just looked up for a moment from his task of translating the Scriptures.

His big red Cardinal’s hat, too, is placed in the foreground, so that we cannot miss it and the picture of the Madonna and Child on the wall is purposely turned out of proper perspective so that we cannot lose any of its “beauties.” St. Jerome takes good heed of time; for on the wall, at his left, an hour-glass trickles away the minutes. It is to be hoped that he feeds his birds and animals regularly! And how deliciously these little friends are painted. Every member of St. Jerome’s menagerie looks happy except the lion. There is still the “call of the wild” in his eye and he seems to be trying to control himself; but if St. Jerome does not watch his hour-glass and should happen to delay the dinner-hour, it looks as if things might go very badly for the pheasant family.

There were three traditional ways of representing St. Jerome: St. Jerome as Penitent in the Desert; St. Jerome as Patron Saint and Doctor of the church; and St. Jerome as Translator and Commentator of the Scriptures. When St. Jerome is seen translating the Bible, the lion is so frequently present that he seems to be an editorial necessity; and almost invariably the Cardinal’s hat is lying somewhere near St. Jerome.

There is no authority for making St. Jerome a Cardinal; because Cardinals were not ordained until three centuries after St. Jerome’s death.

Lucas Cranach the Elder was born in Kronach in Franconia in 1472 and died in Weimar in 1553. Cranach was the first painter of importance of the Saxon School and took his name from his native town. He was a pupil of his father and has as important a reputation for his engravings on wood and copper as for his paintings. Cranach seems to have lived in Vienna, Innsbrück, Augsburg, Wittenberg, and Weimar; and it is said that he visited the Holy Land in 1493, with the Elector Frederic the Wise. In 1504 he settled permanently in Wittenberg as Court-Painter to the Elector Frederic the Wise; and he continued as Court-Painter to the three succeeding Electors. In 1509 he was sent by the Elector on an embassy to the Emperor Maximilian; and on this visit he painted the portrait of his son, the Archduke Philip (father of Charles V). Cranach was evidently of importance in Wittenberg, for he was Burgomaster in 1537 and 1540. He had an art-studio, a book-printing business, and an apothecary-shop. His house, called the “Adler,” was burned down in 1871.

Cranach was an intimate friend of Luther and Melancthon and, consequently, was greatly affected by the Reformation. He painted Luther many times. Cranach always painted with oils on panels of wood and his coloring is warm and rich. His drawing is somewhat archaic; but often very amusing. His cheerful fancy led him to introduce birds and animals into his pictures. Cranach excelled in portraiture and always gives a realistic and somewhat gay presentation of the German people of his day.