366 



FINE ARTS 1885. (ANTWERP. BERLIN. AMSTERDAM. UNITED STATES.) 



purchased at the Hamilton sale for 4,900 guin- 

 eas, was bought back by the Duke of Hamilton 

 for 2,100. Venusti's " Christ driving out the 

 Money-Changers," which cost Mr. Denison .!,- 

 680, was sold for 640; and Rubens's " Birth 

 of Venus," or u Acis and Galatea," for which 

 he paid 1,600 guineas, for 640 guineas, both 

 being acquired by the National Gallery. Bron- 

 zino's interesting "Portrait of Don Garcia de 

 Medici" was sold for 945, Turner's " Depart- 

 ure of Adonis for the Chase " for 1,522, and 

 Vandyke's " Duchess of Richmond and Son " 

 (cost 1,950 guineas) for 842 guineas. 



The most notable sale of the year was that 

 of the "Three Graces," by Raphael, from the 

 Earl Dudley collection to the Due d'Aumale, 

 for 25,000, a price which, taking into con- 

 sideration the size of the picture (6f inches 

 high by 4| wide), is even greater than that 

 paid by the English Government for the "An- 

 sidee" Madonna." It is one of Raphael's early 

 works, having been painted at Perugia, in 

 1504-'5, and was probably suggested by the 

 antique marble group in the Opera del Duomo, 

 Siena. It will henceforth find a home with 

 the due's magnificent collection at Chantilly. 



Antwerp Exposition. The International Exhi- 

 bition at Antwerp, opened in May, 1885, had 

 a fine art collection, to which artists of all 

 countries were invited to contribute. The 

 works exhibited were classified as follows : 

 Belgium, 689 ; France, 681 ; Italy, 287 ; Ger- 

 many, 274; Netherlands, 244; Austria, 195; 

 England, 116; Norway, 100; Russia, 36; Switz- 

 erland, 29; Spain, 23; Sweden, 20. An ex- 

 traordinary medal of honor for painting was 

 awarded to Alfred Stevens ; medals of honor 

 to Sir Frederick Leighton, Leon Bonnat, Luc 

 Olivier Merson, and Le"on Comerre ; first-class 

 medals to George F. Watts, and MM. Glaize, 

 Leblant, and Schommer ; and second - class 

 medals to Georges Bertrand, Lucien Gros, and 

 Philip R. Morris. 



Berlin Mnsenm. The Berlin Museum has ac- 

 quired the so-called Holzschuher Diirer, a por- 

 trait of Dtirer's friend Jerom Holzschuher, 

 one of the septemvirs of Nuremberg, from the 

 Germanisches Museum at Nuremberg, to which 

 it was lent by the descendants of Holzschuher 

 himself. It is on panel, is in good preserva- 

 tion, and is still in its original frame or case, 

 with the arms of Holzschuher on the lid. 

 Painted in 1526, it is probably the last picture 

 on which Diirer worked. The price originally 

 announced, a million marks, is now said to 

 have been 350,000 marks ($85,000), certainly a 

 liberal sum to expend on a small panel, even if 

 by Albrecht Durer ; but it is said that larger 

 offers from private collectors were refused. 

 Another acquisition of the Berlin Museum is 

 the famous " Last Judgment " of Fra Angelico, 

 formerly in the Fesch Gallery, and long in the 

 collection of the Earl of Dudley. For this work, 

 of which there are several replicas, 30,500 is 

 said to have been paid. The Berlin Museum 

 is also reported to have acquired from the 



Blenheim collection the celebrated " Forna- 

 rina " of Sebastian del Piombo, and the " Per- 

 seus and Andromeda " and " Triumph of Sile- 

 nus " of Rubens. 



Amsterdam Museum. One of the most impor- 

 tant art events of the year was the opening at 

 Amsterdam, on July 13, of the Dutch National 

 Museum of Fine Arts, in which a permanent 

 home has been provided for all the precious 

 art treasures of the Netherlands, hitherto scat- 

 tered in many collections. The building itself, 

 a splendid example of Flemish Renaissance 

 style, the work of the well-known architect 

 Josef Cuypers, was begun in 1876, and has 

 cost about two million guilders. Independent 

 of its art treasures, the extreme beauty of this 

 building, especially of its internal decorations, 

 places it in advance of all other European art 

 galleries. 



Within its walls are united many rare col- 

 lections, among them those of the Hotel de 

 Ville of Amsterdam, the Van der Hoop Muse- 

 um, the Netherlands Museum at the Hague, 

 the Haarlem Pavilion, and the Royal Cabinet 

 of Drawings. All schools are represented, and 

 the decorations of the salons are in each case 

 of the same period as the pictures hung on 

 the walls. Many of the masterpieces of the 

 Dutch and Flemish schools are here collected 

 for the first time, among the Rembrandts be- 

 ing the famous " Sortie of the Banning Cock 

 Company," commonly miscalled the "Night 

 Watch," and the scarcely less celebrated "Les- 

 son in Anatomy." In addition to the great 

 public collections, many private collections 

 have also been gathered into this incompara- 

 ble museum, their owners having had the pub- 

 lic spirit to place their treasures at the dis- 

 posal of the state. The new catalogue comprises 

 773 old and 231 modern pictures. 



The museum is not intended to be simply a 

 place for the exhibition of pictures and statu- 

 ary, but is to embrace also schools of the in- 

 dustrial arts and of drawing, in many respects 

 like those of the South Kensington Museum in 

 London. These departments are to be under 

 the management of Director M. Obreen. Its 

 fine-art library, one of the best in Europe, is 

 the property of Dr. Alferdingk Thym, Pro- 

 fessor of ^Esthetics in the Royal Academy of 

 Fine Arts, who has united with others to make 

 this repository of art and culture one of the 

 finest, if not the finest, in the world. 



United States : Exhibitions, etc. The great art 

 museums of the United States are all of recent 

 origin. Three the Corcoran Gallery in Wash- 

 ington, the Metropolitan Museum in New York, 

 and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston were 

 chartered in 1870; the Pennsylvania Museum, 

 in Philadelphia, was incorporated in 1876, the 

 Museum of Fine Arts in St. Louis in 1881, the 

 Cincinnati and the Milwaukee Art Museums in 

 1882, and the Detroit Art Museum in 1885. In : 

 1885 H. B. Hurlburt, of Cleveland, 0., left by 

 will his art collection to the city, together with 

 money to build an art museum. 



