Van Dyck Part 1

Van Dyck.

by Estelle M. Hurll.

INTRODUCTION

I. ON VAN DYCK'S CHARACTER AS AN ARTIST.

The student of Van Dyck's art naturally cla.s.sifies the painter's works into four groups, corresponding chronologically to the four successive periods of his life. There was first the short period of his youth in Antwerp, when Rubens was the dominating influence upon his work. The portrait of Van der Geest, in the National Gallery, belongs to this time.

Then followed the four years' residence in Italy, when he fell under the spell of t.i.tian. This was the period of the series of splendid portraits of n.o.ble Italian families which are to this day the pride of Genoa. Here too belong those lovely Madonna pictures which brought back for a time the golden age of Venetian art.

Upon his return to Antwerp, the six succeeding years gave him the opportunity to work out his own individuality. Some n.o.ble altar-pieces were produced in these years. Pleasant reminiscences of t.i.tian still appear in such work, as in the often-used motif of baby angels; but in the subjects of the Crucifixion and the Pieta, he stands quite apart.

These works are distinctly his own, and show genuine dramatic power.

During this Flemish period Van Dyck was appointed court painter by the Archd.u.c.h.ess Isabella Clara Eugenia, Spanish Regent of the Netherlands.

In this capacity he painted a notable series of portraits, including some of his most interesting works, which represent many of the most distinguished personages of the time.

The last nine years of Van Dyck's life were pa.s.sed in England, where the family of Charles I. and the brilliant group of persons forming his court were the subjects of his final series of portraits. There were no altar-pieces in this period. At the beginning of his English work Van Dyck produced certain portraits unsurpa.s.sed during his whole life. The well-known Charles I., with an equerry, in the Louvre, is perhaps the best of these. His works after this were uneven in quality. His vitality was drained by social dissipations, and he lost the ambition to grow. Some features of the portraits became stereotyped, especially the hands. Yet from time to time he rose to a high level.

A painter so easily moulded by his environment cannot justly take rank among the world's foremost masters. A great creative mind Van Dyck certainly had not, but, gifted a.s.similator that he was, he developed many delightful qualities of his art. The combined results of his borrowing and his own innate gifts make him a notable and indeed a beloved figure in art history.

The leading note of his style is distinction. His men are all n.o.blemen, his women all great ladies, and his children all princes and princesses. The same qualities of dignity and impressiveness are carried into his best altar-pieces. Sentiment they have also in no insignificant degree.

It is perhaps naming only another phase of distinction to say that his figures are usually characterized by repose. The sense of motion which so many of Reynolds's portraits convey is almost never expressed in Van Dyck's work, nor would it be consistent with his other qualities.

The magic gift of charm none have understood better when the subject offered the proper inspiration. We see this well ill.u.s.trated in many portraits of young n.o.blemen, such as the Duke of Lennox and Richmond and Lord Wharton.

Van Dyck's clever technique has preserved for us the many rich fabrics of his period, and his pictures would be a delight were these details their sole attraction. Heavy velvet, with the light playing deliciously in the creases, l.u.s.trous satins, broken by folds into many tints, delicate laces, elaborate embroideries, gleaming jewels--these are the never-failing accessories of his compositions. Yet while he loved rich draperies, he was also a careful student of the nude.

Examples of his work range from the supple and youthful torso of Icarus to the huge muscular body of the beggar receiving St. Martin's cloak. The modelling of the Saviour's body in the Crucifixion and the Pieta shows both scientific knowledge and artistic handling.

Generally speaking, Van Dyck was little of a psychologist. His patrons belonged to that social cla.s.s in which reserve is a test of breeding and thoughts and emotions are sedulously concealed. To penetrate the mask of the face and interpret the character of his sitter was an office he seldom took upon himself to perform. Yet he was capable of profound character study, especially in the portrayal of men. Even in so early a work as the so-called portrait of Richardot and his son, he revealed decided talent in this direction, while the portrait of Cardinal Bentivoglio, of the Italian period, and the portrait of Wentworth, in the English period, are masterly studies of the men they represent.

A common feature of his portraits is the averted glance of the sitter's eyes. This fact is in itself a barrier to our intimate knowledge of the subject, and also in a measure injures the sense of vitality expressed in the work. It must be confessed that Van Dyck, disciple though he was of Rubens and t.i.tian, fell below these masters in the art of imparting life to a figure.

In certain mechanical elements of his art Van Dyck was conspicuously deficient. He seemed to have no ingenuity in devising poses for his subjects. Sitting or standing, the att.i.tude is usually more or less artificial and constrained. The atmosphere of the studio is painfully evident. Never by any accident did he seem to catch the sitter off guard, so to speak, except in a few children's portraits. Here he expressed a vivacity and charm which seemed impossible to him with adult subjects.

In composition he is at his best in altar-pieces. In portrait groups, as in the pictures of the children of Charles I., he apparently made no effort to bring the separate figures into an harmonious unity. A single figure, or half length, he placed on his canvas with unerring sense of right proportion. Perhaps the best summary of Van Dyck's art has been made by the English critic, Claude Phillips, in these words: His was "not indeed one of the greatest creative individualities that have dominated the world of art, but a talent as exquisite in distinction, as true to itself in every successive phase, a technical accomplishment as surprising of its kind in solidity, brilliancy, and charm, as any that could be pointed to even in the seventeenth century."

II. ON BOOKS OF REFERENCE.

It has been reserved for our own day to produce two superb works by English writers on Van Dyck. The first to appear was that by Ernest Law, "a storehouse of information," on the paintings by Van Dyck in the Royal Collections. The second is the definitive biography by Lionel Cust: "Anthony Van Dyck; An Historical Study of his Life and Works." The author is the director of the English National Portrait Gallery, and has had exceptional opportunities for the examination of Van Dyck's paintings. His work has been done with great thoroughness and care. The volume is richly ill.u.s.trated with photogravures, and contains complete lists of the painter's works arranged by periods.

For brief sketches of Van Dyck's life the student is referred to general histories, of which Kugler's "Hand-book of the German, Flemish, and Dutch School" (revised by Crowe), is of first importance.

Lubke's "History of Painting," and Woltman and Woerman's "History of Painting," contain material on Van Dyck. A volume devoted to Van Dyck is in the series of German monographs edited by H. Knackfuss, and may be had in an English translation.

A critical appreciation of Van Dyck is given by Fromentin in his valuable little book on "The Old Masters of Holland and Belgium."

Critical articles by Claude Phillips have appeared in "The Nineteenth Century," November, 1899, and "The Art Journal" for March, 1900.

III. HISTORICAL DIRECTORY OF THE PICTURES OF THIS COLLECTION.

Frontispiece. _Portrait of Van Dyck._ Detail of a portrait of Van Dyck and John Digby, Earl of Bristol. Painted about 1640. Formerly in the Isabel Farnese Collection in the palace of San Ildefonso; now in the Prado Gallery, Madrid. _Cust_, p. 285.

1. _Portrait of Anna Wake_, inscribed: "aetat suae 22, An 1628." Signed: "Anton Van Dyck fecit." In the Royal Gallery at the Hague. Size: 3 ft.

8-1/2 in. by 3 ft. 2-1/2 in. _Cust_, pp. 58 and 261.

2. _The Rest in Egypt._ Painted in the Italian period for Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange. One of several pictures of the same subject, and generally considered the original, though the authenticity is doubted by Signor Venturi. In the Pitti, Florence.

3. _The so-called Portrait of Richardot and his Son._ The ident.i.ty of the subject not established. Sometimes attributed to Rubens, but accepted as Van Dyck's work by Cust. In the Louvre, Paris. Size: 3 ft.

7 in. by 2 ft. 5-1/2 in. _Cust_, pp. 76 and 134.

4. _The Vision of St. Anthony._ Painted in the Italian period.

Obtained by exchange in 1813 from the Musee National at Paris. In the Brera Gallery, Milan. Size: 6 ft. 1 in. by 5 ft. 1/4 in. _Cust_, pp.

46 and 239.

5. _Madame Andreas Colyns de Nole and her Daughter._ Painted in Antwerp in period from 1626 to 1632. Purchased in 1698 by the Elector Max Emanuel of Bavaria. Munich Gallery. Size: 3 ft. 11-1/2 in. by 2 ft. 11-2/5 in. _Cust_, pp. 79 and 254.

6. _Daedalus and Icarus._ Painted about 1621 (?). Exhibited at Antwerp in 1899. One of several paintings of the same subject. In the collection of the Earl of Spencer, Althorp. _Cust_, pp. 61 and 241.

7. _Portrait of Charles I._ Supposed to be a copy by Sir Peter Lely from the original, which was painted about 1636, and destroyed in the fire at Whitehall in 1697. Not impossibly, however, the original painting itself, given by the king to the Prince Palatine. In the Dresden Gallery. Size: 4 ft. by 3 ft. 2 in. _Cust_, pp. 105 and 264.

8. _The Madonna of St. Rosalia._ Painted in 1629 for the Confraternity of Celibates in the Hall of the Jesuits, Antwerp. On the suppression of the order in 1776 it was purchased by the Empress Maria Theresa.

Now in the Imperial Gallery, Vienna. Size: 9 ft. 1 in. by 6 ft. 11 in.

_Cust_, p. 250.

9. _Charles, Prince of Wales._ Detail of a group of the three children of Charles I., painted in 1635. Probably painted for the queen, and presented by her to her sister Christina of Savoy. In the Royal Gallery, Turin. _Cust_, pp. 110 and 266.

10. _St. Martin dividing his Cloak with a Beggar._ Painted in the Italian period. Presented to the Church of Saventhem by Ferdinand de Boisschot, Seigneur de Saventhem. Taken by the French to Paris in 1806 and returned in 1815. A copy of this picture is in the Imperial Gallery, Vienna, but the original is in the church of Saventhem.

_Cust_, pp. 32 and 240.

11. _The Crucifixion._ Painted in 1628 for the church of St. Augustine at Antwerp. Taken by the French to Paris in 1794 and restored in 1815.

Now in the Antwerp Museum. Size: 3 ft. 5 in. by 2 ft. 4 in. _Cust_, pp. 61 and 248.

12. _James Stuart, Duke of Lennox and Richmond._ Painted about 1633.

Formerly belonged to Lord Methuen at Corsham. Now in the Marquand collection at the Metropolitan Art Museum, New York. Size: 4 ft. 3/4 in. by 6 ft. 11-5/8 in. _Cust_, pp. 117-278.

13. _Christ and the Paralytic. Painted at Genoa._ In Buckingham Palace. Size: 3 ft. 10-1/2 in. by 4 ft. 9 in. _Cust_, pp. 46 and 237.

14. _Philip, Lord Wharton._ Inscribed in the lower left corner with the painter's name; in the lower right corner, "Philip, Lord Wharton, 1632, about y^e age of 19." Purchased from the Duke of Wharton's collection in 1725 by Sir Robert Walpole, and thence it pa.s.sed in 1779 to the collection of Catherine II. of Russia. In the Hermitage Gallery, St. Petersburg. Size: 4 ft. 5 in. by 2 ft. 4 in. _Cust_, pp.

121 and 286.

15. _The Lamentation over Christ._ Painted about 1629 for the church of the Beguinage at Antwerp. Now in the Antwerp Museum. Size: 9 ft. 11 in. by 7 ft. 4 in. _Cust_, pp. 66 and 248.

IV. OUTLINE TABLE OF THE PRINc.i.p.aL EVENTS IN VAN DYCK'S LIFE.