GERMANY 



3507 



GERMANY 



ART. Though Teutonic art in its 

 origin and for long afterwards 

 lacked both spontaneity and vol- 

 ume, the earliest artists were never- 

 theless also the greatest. The art in- 

 stinct of the people went out, co- 

 piously and gloriously, towards the 

 material and tangible, and in the 

 design of cathedrals, town halls, and 

 private houses, and the carving of 

 wood and stone, showed consum- 

 mate skill. But the opulent burgo- 

 masters and merchants, by no 

 means averse from pomp and osten- 

 tation, had neither the knowledge 

 nor the taste to encourage painters, 

 who had to look for patronage in 

 the main to the Church, as at Co- 

 logne, and to the wise munificence 

 of an occasional emperor. Purely 

 native effort soon spent itself and 

 the painters, to some extent dis- 

 trustful of themselves, had the 

 sense willingly to submit to the 

 formative influence of foreign 

 schools, first of the Netherlands, 

 next of Venice and Italy, and then 

 (in our own day) of France. 



In the beginning their work was 

 violent in colour and faulty in 

 drawing, while their composition 

 tended towards exaggeration and 

 anti-climax and their realism was 

 apt to be overdone and coarse. In 

 portraits and single figures and 

 limited groups they were quick 

 to seize character, but regarded 

 strength rather than beauty, and 

 the dominant note was marked in- 

 dividuality. The men of genius 

 were rare and their achievement 

 but served to illuminate the com- 

 parative sterility of their fellows. 

 Indeed, it is significant that, 

 throughout the period ending with 

 Adam Elsheimer (1578-1628),when 

 Italian influence became predomi- 

 nant for a century, only two names 

 can be said to be household words, 

 Albert Diirer and Hans Holbein 

 the Younger. 



Barer and Holbein 



Diirer was a man of almost as 

 universal accomplishment as was 

 Leonardo da Vinci, though he 

 missed the latter's suavity, refine- 

 ment, and sense of colour. Still, his 

 portraits of himself (Munich Gal- 

 lery) and Hieronymus Holtzschucr 

 (Berlin Museum) are marvels of 

 technique, while his drawings for 

 wood and metal are the theme of 

 undiminished admiration. Hol- 

 bein's power ran on more gracious 

 lines and has been preserved in 

 such pictures as the Madonna 

 painted for Jacob Meyer, burgo- 

 master of Basel (Grand Ducal Pal- 

 ace, Darmstadt), and his portraits 

 of George Gisze, a merchant of the 

 London Steelyard (Berlin Museum), 

 and of Christina Sforza, Duchess of 

 Milan, which was purchased in!909 

 for 72,000 and presented to the 



nation (National Gallery, London) 

 by the National Art Collections 

 Fund. To these it will suffice to add 

 the Madonna with the Violet, by 

 Stephen Lochner (c. 1400-1450), 

 the first truly tender and charming 

 figure painted in Germany (Archi- 

 episcopal Museum, Cologne), and 

 the Holy Family at the Fountain 

 (Berlin Museum), by Albert Alt- 

 dorfer (c. 1480-1538), greatest of 

 the " Little Masters." Where the 

 sculptors were many and distin- 

 guished it is not easy and may be 

 unfair to particularise, but the 

 work of AdamKrafft (c. 1455-1507) 

 and Peter Vischer (1455-1529) may 

 be mentioned as of exceptional 

 prominence. 



Influence of Classic Ait 

 Italian influence the influence 

 of an Italy, too, whose prime was 

 past was established early in the 

 17th century. The incompatibility 

 of the southern and northern tem- 

 perament foredoomed their projec- 

 ted union to failure, but another and 

 overwhelming disaster befell Ger- 

 man art, which was paralysed for 

 generations by the ruin, misery, and 

 demoralisation consequent on the 

 Thirty Years' War (1618^8) and 

 the Seven Years' War (1756-63). 



However, in spite of the appalling 

 results of the political turmoil and 

 dynastic squabbles, the friends of 

 the Italo-Teutonic alliance main- 

 tained their foolish advocacy. John 

 James Winckelmann's laudation of 

 the art of the ancients (1764) was so 

 far mischievous that it led to blind 

 faith in the classical as art's be-all 

 and end-all, and those who like 

 Asmus Carstens (1754-98) and An- 

 thony Raphael Mengs (1728-79) 

 espoused his teaching diverted 

 German artists from thoughts of 

 the present and, more especially, 

 the future. Lessing continued the 

 parable, and landscape and genre 

 were for a time despised. Beauty 

 was everything, Nature nothing. 

 Even Goethe joined the reaction- 

 aries. " Art," he said, " had been 

 written in Greek, not in German." 

 But to all save its devotees 

 classicism was as sawdust. It 

 suffered a natural death, giving 

 place to the monkery and ascetic- 

 ism of the Nazarenes a nickname 

 of reproach which they proudly 

 adopted as a happy designation 

 of their coterie whose prophet 

 was William Henry Wackenroder 

 (1773-98), whose cult was that of 

 the Madonna, and to whom a 

 picture-gallery was as a temple of 

 Christian worship, the very gate of 

 Heaven. The leading exponents of 

 their art creed were Peter Cornelius, 

 Frederick Overbeck, William Scha- 

 dow, Philip Veit, Julius Schnorr, 

 and Edward Steinle. 



They gave themselves away as 

 artists when they relinquished 

 drawing from the model as an 

 injury to idealism and from the 

 nude as a menace to modesty. For 

 the rest, the art-loving public grew 

 weary of anaemic scriptural pic- 

 tures and didactic or namby- 

 pamby anecdotes excellent in 

 design, but poor in colour and 

 wholly destitute of vigour and 

 with avidity went after the strange 

 gods to the west of the Rhine. Nor 

 did the Romanticists, who sought 

 inspiration from the Old Testa- 

 ment, Shakespeare and the poets, 

 fare better. The promise that 

 underlay the monumentalism of 

 Alfred Rethel (1816-59), who had 

 studied at Diisseldorf , was cut short 

 by madness, and though Moritz 

 Schwind (1804-71) got more out of 

 legend and fairy tale, which he saw 

 with the eye of a modern, than all 

 the other Romanticists combined, 

 that way salvation did not lie. 



If the art of sentimental 

 Germany lacked essential truth 

 because it was non-human, the 

 art of the Germany of blood and 

 iron, by which it was succeeded, 

 developed remarkable technical 

 qualities, and several painters of 

 the first rank, who had the courage 

 to rend the shackles which had 

 bound their fathers and colleagues, 

 frankly went to the ateliers of 

 Paris for what the Frenchmen 

 could teach and they learn. Con- 

 cerning the Exposition of 1855 

 Edmond About had said truly and 

 wittily, " If you meet with a good 

 German painter you can compli- 

 ment him in French." 



20th Century Portraiture 



Among the men who led the 

 anti - sentimental revolution were 

 Anselm Feuerbach (1828-80), 

 Charles Piloty (1826-86), whose 

 technique was rendered the more 

 conspicuous by a feeling for colour 

 which his compatriots of the pre- 

 ceding generation had disdained, 

 and Gabriel Max (b. 1840), whose 

 pictures possess a personal hand- 

 ling that removes them somewhat 

 from the school with which nation- 

 ality associates him. But Adolph 

 Menzel (1815-1905), own. brother 

 to the French Meissonier, was the 

 painter of most distinctive force 

 and versatility, who owed least to 

 anyone, who was virtually self- 

 taught, and shone equally in 

 colour and black-and-white. 



In modern portraiture, which is 

 the measure of the greatest in 

 figure painting, Francis Lenbach 

 (1836-1904) proved that he could 

 hold his own with the ablest, 

 whether of the 17th or the 19th 

 century. Of the realists, none has a 

 better claim to mention than the 

 greatest painter modern Germany 



