Albert Durer

T >> T. Sturge Moore >> Albert Durer

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23

Life in nature showeth forth the truth of these things (the words of
difference--i.e., the character of bodily habit to which they refer),
wherefore regard it well, order thyself thereby and depart not from
nature in thine opinions, neither imagine of thyself to invent aught
better, else shalt thou be led astray, for art standeth firmly fixed in
nature, and whoso can rend her forth thence he only possesseth her. If
thou acquirest her, she will remove many faults for thee from thy work.

Neither must the figure be made youthful before and old behind, or
contrariwise; for that unto which nature is opposed is bad. Hence it
followeth that each figure should be of one kind alone throughout,
either young or old, or middle-aged, or lean or fat, or soft or hard.

The more closely thy work abideth by life in its form, so much the
better will it appear; and this is true. Wherefore never more imagine
that thou either canst or shalt make anything better than God hath given
power to His creatures to do. For thy power is weakness compared to
God's creating hand. (_See_ continuation of passage, p. 10.)

Compare also passages quoted (pp. 289-291).

II

In these and other passages Duerer speaks about "nature," and enjoins on
the artist respect for and conformity to "nature" in a manner which
reminds us of that still current in dictums about art. Indeed, it seems
probable that Duerer's use of this term was almost as confused as that of
a modern art-critic. There are two senses in which the word nature is
employed, the confusion of which is ten times more confounded than any
of the others, and deserves, indeed, utter damnation, so prolific of
evil is it. We call the objects of sensory perception "nature"--whatever
is seen, heard, felt, smelt or tasted is a part of nature. And yet we
constantly speak of seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, and tasting
monstrous and unnatural things. And a monstrous and unnatural thing is
not merely one which is rare, but even more decidedly one of which we
disapprove. So that the second use of the term conveys some sense of
exceptionality, but far more of lack of conformity to human desires and
expectations. Now, many things which do not exist are perfectly natural
in this second sense: fairy-lands, heavens, &c. We perfectly understand
what is meant by a natural and an unnatural imagination, we perceive
readily all kind of degrees between the monstrous and the natural in
pure fiction. Now, this second use of the term nature is the only one
which is of any vital importance to our judgments upon works of art; yet
current judgments are more often than not based wholly on the first
sense, which means merely all objects perceived by the senses; and this,
draped in the authority and phrases belonging to judgments based on the
second and really pertinent sense.

Whole schools of painting and criticism have arisen and flourish whose
only reason for existence is the extreme facility with which this
confusion is made in European languages. It sounds so plausible that
some have censured Michael Angelo for bad drawing because men are not
from 9 to 15 or 16 heads high, and have not muscles so developed as the
gods and Titans of his creation. And others have objected to the angels,
the anatomical ambiguity of their wing articulations. To say that a
sketch or picture is out of tone or drawing damns, in many circles
to-day; in spite of the fact that the most famous masterpieces, if
judged by the same standard, would be equally offensive. This absurdity,
even where its grosser developments are avoided, breeds abundant
contradictions and confusion in the mouths of those who plume themselves
on culture and discernment. I hope not to have been too saucy,
therefore, in pointing out this pitfall to my readers in regard to these
sentences which I thought it worth while to quote from Duerer, merely
because if I did not do so I foresaw that they would be quoted
against me.

CHAPTER VI

THE CHOICE OF AN ARTIST

I

In the great earnestness with which the difficulties that beset art and
the artist impressed him, Duerer intended to write a _Vade Mecum_ for
those who should come after him. He has left among his MS. papers many
plans, rough drafts, and notes for some such work, the form of which no
doubt changed from time to time. The one which gives us the most
comprehensive idea of his intentions is perhaps the following.

II

Ihs. Maria

By the grace and help of God I have here set down all that I have learnt
in practice, which is likely to be of use in painting, for the service
of all students who would gladly learn. That, perchance, by my help they
may advance still further in the higher understanding of such art, as he
who seeketh may well do, if he is inclined thereto; for my reason
sufficeth not to lay the foundations of this great, far-reaching,
infinite art of true painting.

Item.--In order that thou mayest thoroughly and rightly comprehend what
is, or is called, an "artistic painter," I will inform thee and recount
to thee. If the world often goeth without an "artistic painter," whilst
for two or three hundred years none such appeareth, it is because those
who might have become such devote not themselves to art. Observe then
the three essential qualities following, which belong to the true artist
in painting. These are the three main points in the whole book.

I. The First Division of the book is the Prologue, and it compriseth
three parts (A, B, and C).

A. The first part of the Prologue telleth us how the lad should be
taught, and how attention should be paid to the tendency of his
temperament. It falleth into six parts:

1. That note should be taken of the birth of the child, in what Sign it
occurreth; with some explanations. (Pray God for a lucky hour!)

2. That his form and stature should be considered; with some
explanations.

3. How he ought to be nurtured in learning from the first; with some
explanations.

4. That the child should be observed, whether he learneth best when
kindly praised or when chidden; with explanations.

5. That the child be kept eager to learn and be not vexed.

6. If the child worketh too hard, so that he might fall under the hand
of melancholy, that he be enticed therefrom by merry music to the
pleasuring of his blood.

B. The second part of the Preface showeth how the lad should be brought
up in the fear of God and in reverence, that so he may attain grace,
whereby he may be much strengthened in intelligent art. It falleth into
six parts:

1. That the lad be brought up in the fear of God and be taught to pray
to God for the grace of quick perception (_ubtilitet_) and to
honour God.

2. That he be kept moderate in eating and drinking, and also in
sleeping.

3. That he dwell in a pleasant house, so that he be distracted by no
manner of hindrance.

4. That he be kept from women and live not loosely with them; that he
not so much as see or touch one; and that he guard himself from all
impurity. Nothing weakens the understanding more than impurity.

5. That he know how to read and write well, and be also instructed in
Latin, so far as to understand certain writings.

6. That such an one have sufficient means to devote himself without
anxiety (to his art), and that his health be attended to with medicines
when needful.

C. The third part of the Prologue teacheth us of the great usefulness,
joy, and delight which spring from painting. It falleth into six parts:

1. It is a useful art when it is of godly sort, and is employed for holy
edification.

2. It is useful, and much evil is thereby avoided, if a man devote
himself thereto who else had wasted his time.

3. It is useful when no one thinks so, for a man will have great joy if
he occupy himself with that which is so rich in joys.

4. It is useful because a man gaineth great and lasting memory thereby
if he applieth it aright.

5. It is useful because God is thereby honoured when it is seen that He
hath bestowed such genius upon one of His creatures in whom is such
art. All men will be gracious unto thee by reason of thine art.

6. The sixth use is that if thou art poor thou mayest by such art come
unto great wealth and riches.

II. The Second Division of the book treateth of Painting itself; it also
is threefold.

A. The first part is of the freedom of painting; in six ways.

B. The second part is of the proportions of men and buildings, and what
is needful for painting; in six ways.[90]

1. Of the proportions of men.
2. Of the proportions of horses.
3. Of the proportions of buildings.
4. Of perspective.
5. Of light and shade.
6. Of colours, how they are to be made to resemble nature.

C. The third part is of all that a man conceives as subject for
painting.

III. The Third Division of the book is the Conclusion; it also hath
three parts.

A. The first part shows in what place such an artist should dwell to
practise his art; in six ways.

B. The second part shows how such a wonderful artist should charge
highly for his art, and that no money is too much for it, seeing that it
is divine and true; in six ways.

The third part speaks of praise and thanksgiving which he should render
unto God for His grace, and which others should render on his behalf;
in six ways.

III

It is in the variety and completeness of his intentions that we perceive
Duerer's kinship with the Renascence; he comprehends the whole of life in
his idea of art training.

In his persuasion of the fundamental necessity of morality he is akin to
the best of the Reformation. It is in the union of these two perceptions
that his resemblance to Michael Angelo lies. There is a rigour, an
austerity which emanates from their work, such as is not found in the
work of Titian or Rembrandt or Leonardo or Rubens or any other mighty
artist of ripe epochs. Yet we find both of them illustrating the
licentious legends of antiquity, turning from the Virgin to Amymone and
Leda, from Christ to Apollo and Hercules. By their action and example
neither joins either the Reformation or the Renascence in so far as
these movements may be considered antagonistic; nor did they find it
inconsistent to acknowledge their debt to Greece and Rome, even while
accepting the gift of Jesus' example as freely as it was offered.

Not only does Duerer insist on the necessity of a certain consonancy
between the surrounding influences and the artist's capacity, which
should be both called forth and relieved by the interchange of rivalry
with instruction, of seclusion with music or society, but the process
which Jesus made the central one of his religion is put forward as
essential; he must form himself on a precedent example. I have already
quoted from Reynolds at length on this point.

I will merely add here some notes from another MS. fragment of Duerer's
bearing on the same points.

He that would be a painter must have a natural turn thereto.

Love and delight therein are better teachers of the Art of Painting than
compulsion is.

If a man is to become a really great painter he must be educated thereto
from his very earliest years. He must copy much of the work of good
artists until he attain a free hand.

To paint is to be able to portray upon a flat surface any visible thing
whatsoever that may be chosen.

It is well for any one first to learn how to divide and reduce, to
measure the human figure, before learning anything else.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 90: The following list comes from another sheet of the MS.
(in. 70), but was dearly intended for this place. It is jotted down on a
thick piece of paper, on which there are also geometrical designs.]

CHAPTER VII

TECHNICAL PRECEPTS

I

If thou wishest to model well in painting, so as to deceive the
eyesight, thou must be right cunning in thy colours, and must know how
to keep them distinct, in painting, one from another. For example, thou
paintest two coats of mantles, one white the other red; thou must deal
differently with them in shading. There is light and shadow on all
things, wherever the surface foldeth or bendeth away from the eye. If
this were not so, everything would look flat, and then one could
distinguish nothing save only a chequerwork of colours.

If then thou art shading the white mantle, it must not be shaded with so
dark a colour as the red, for it would be impossible for a white thing
to yield so dark a shadow as a red. Neither could they be compared one
with another, save that in total absence of daylight everything is
black, seeing that colour cannot be recognised in darkness. Though,
therefore, in such a case, the theory allows one, without blame, to use
pure black for the shadows of a white object, yet this can seldom
come to pass.

Moreover, when thou paintest anything in one colour--be it red, blue,
brown, or any mixed colour--beware lest thou make it so bright in the
lights that it departs from its own kind. For example, an uneducated man
regardeth thy picture wherein is a red coat. "Look, good friend," saith
he, "in one part the coat is of a fair red and in another it is white
or pale in colour." That same is to be blamed, neither hast thou done it
aright. In such a case a red object must be painted red all over and yet
preserve the appearance of solidity; and so with all colours. The same
must be done with the shadows, lest it be said that a fair red is soiled
with black Wherefore be careful that thou shade each colour with a
similar colour. Thus I hold that a yellow, to retain its kind, must be
shaded with a yellow, darker toned than the principal colour. If thou
shade it with green or blue, it remaineth no longer in keeping, and is
no longer yellow, but becometh thereby a shot colour, like the colour of
silk stuffs woven of threads of two colours, as brown and blue, brown
and green, dark yellow and green, chestnut-brown and dark yellow, blue
and seal red, seal red and brown, and the many other colours one sees.
If a man hath such as these to paint, where the surface breaketh and
bendeth away the colours divide themselves so that they can be
distinguished one from another, and thus must thou paint them. But where
the surface lieth flat one colour alone appeareth. Howbeit, if thou art
painting such a silk and shadest it with one colour (as a brown with a
blue) thou must none the less shade the blue with a deeper blue where it
is needful. If often cometh to pass that such silks appear brown in the
shadows, as if one colour stood before the other. If thy model beareth
such a garment, thou must shade the brown with a deeper brown and not
with blue. Howbeit, happen what may, every colour must in shading keep
to its own class.

II

The great genius Hokusai, who has obtained for popular art in Japan a
success comparable to that of the best classic masterpieces of that
country and to the drawings and etchings of Rembrandt, a master of an
altogether kindred nature, wrote a little treatise on the difference of
aim noticeable in European and Japanese art. From the few Dutch pictures
which he had been able to examine, he concluded that European art
attempted to deceive the eye, whereas Japanese art laboured to express
life, to suggest movement, and to harmonise colour. What is meant is
easily grasped when we set before the mind's eye a picture, by Teniers
and a page of Hokusai's "Mangwa." On the other hand, if one chose a
sketch by Rembrandt to represent Dutch art, the difference could no
longer be apparent. If the aim of European art had ever in serious
examples been to deceive the eye, our painting would rank with
legerdemain and Maskelyne's famous box trick; for it is to be doubted if
it could ever so well have attained its end as even a second-rate
conjurer can. I have cited a passage in which Reynolds confronts the
work of great artists with the illusions of the camera obscura (see p.
237). The adept musical performer who reproduces the noises of a
farmyard is the true parallel to the lesser Dutch artists; he deceives
the ear far better than they deceive the eye. For every picture has a
surface which, unless very carefully lighted, must immediately destroy
the illusion, even if it were otherwise perfect. Nevertheless, Duerer in
the foregoing passage seems to accept Hokusai's verdict that the aim of
his painting is to deceive the eye; forgetful of all that he has
elsewhere written about the necessity of beauty, the necessity of
composition, the superiority of rough sketches over finished works.

When a painter has conceived in his heart a vision of beauty, whether he
suggests it with a few strokes of the pen or elaborates it as thoroughly
as Jan Van Eyck did, he wishes it to be taken as a report of something
seen. This is as different from wishing to deceive the eye as for some
one to say "and then a dog barked," instead of imitating the barking of
a dog. A circumstantial description in words and a picture by Van Eyck
or Veronese are equally intended to pass as reports of something
visually conceived or actually seen. Pictures would have to be made
peep-shows of before they could veritably deceive; and Jan Van Beers, a
modern Dutchman, actually turned some of his paintings into peep-shows.
Duerer in the following passage is speaking of the separate details or
objects which go to make up a picture, not of the picture as a whole; he
never tried to make peep-shows; his signature or an inscription is often
used to give the very surface that must destroy the peep-show illusion a
definite decorative value. The rest of his remarks have become
commonplaces; nor has he written at such length as to give them their
true limitations and intersubordination. They will be easily understood
by those who remember that art is concerned with producing the illusion
of a true report of something seen, not that of an actual vision. Such a
report may be slight and brief; it may be stammered by emotion; it may
have been confused or tortured to any degree by the mental condition of
him who delivers it: if it produces the conviction of his sincerity, it
achieves the only illusion with which art is concerned, and its value
will depend on its beauty and the beauty of the means employed to
deliver it.

CHAPTER VIII

IN CONCLUSION

After turning over Duerer prints and drawings, after meditating on his
writings, we feel that we are in the presence of one of those forces
which are constant and equal, which continue and remain like the growth
of the body, the return of seasons, the succession of moods. This is
always among the greatest charms of central characters: they are mild
and even, their action is like that of the tides, not that of storms.
"If only you had my meekness," Duerer wrote to Pirkheimer (set: p. 85),
half in jest doubtless, but with profound truth:--though the word
meekness does not indeed cover the whole of what we feel made Duerer's
most radical advantage over his friend; at other times we might call it
naivety, that sincerity of great and simple natures which can never be
outflanked or surprised. Sometimes it might be called pride, for it has
certainly a great deal of self-assurance behind it, the self-assurance
of trees, of flowers, of dumb animals and little children, who never
dream that an apology for being where and what they are can be expected
of them. Such natures when they come home to us come to stop; we may go
out, we may pay no heed to them, we may forget them, but they abide in
the memory, and some day they take hold of us with all the more force
because this new impression will exactly tally with the former one; we
shall blush for our inconstancy, our indifference, our imbecility, which
have led us to neglect such a pregnant communion. Not only persons but
works of art produce this effect, and they are those with whom it is the
greatest benefit to live.

It is true that, compared with Giotto, Rembrandt, or Michael Angelo,
Duerer does not appear comprehensive enough. It is with him as with
Milton; we wish to add others to his great gifts, above all to take him
out from his surroundings, to free him from the accidents of place and
time. In one sense he is poorer than Milton: we cannot go to him as to a
source of emotional exhilaration. If he ever proves himself able so to
stir us, it is too occasionally to be a reason why we frequent him as it
may be one why we frequent Milton. Nevertheless, the greater characters
of control which are his in an unmatched degree, his constancy, his
resource and deliberate effectiveness, joined to that blandness, that
sunshine, which seems so often to replace emotion and thought in works
of image-shaping art, are of priceless beneficence, and with them we
would abide. Intellectual passion may seem indeed sometimes to dissipate
this sunshine and control without making good their loss. Such cases
enable us to feel that the latter are more essential: and it is these
latter qualities which Duerer possessed in such fulness. In return for
our contemplation, they build up within us the dignity of man and render
it radiant and serene. Those who have felt their influence longest and
most constantly will believe that they may well warrant the modern
prophet who wrote:

The idea of beauty and of human nature perfect on all its sides, which
is the dominant idea of poetry, is a true and invaluable idea, though it
has not yet had the success that the idea of conquering the obvious
faults of our animality and of a human nature perfect on the moral
side--which is the dominant idea of religion--has been enabled to have;
and it is destined, adding to itself the religious idea of a devout
energy, to transform and govern the other.

INDEX

Aachen

Adam (Melchor)

Aeschylus

Albertina

Altdorfer (Albrecht)

Anabaptists

Andreae (Hieronymus)

Angelico (Fra Beato)

Antwerpo

Apelles

Aristotle

Arnold (Matthew)

Augsburg

Balccarres (Lord)

Bamberg (Library)

Barbari (Jacopo dei)

Barberini (Gallery)

Barye (Antoine Louis)

Basle

Baudelaire (Charles)

Bavaria

Beers (Jan van)

Beham (Barthel and Sebald)

Behaim

Bellini (Gentile)

Bellini (Giovanni)

Berlin

Blake (William)

Bologna

Bonnat (Leon)

Borgia (Cesare)

Borgia (Alexander), see Pope

Botticelli

Bremen

Breslau (Bishop of)

Breughel (Peter)

British Museum.

Browning (Robert)

Brussels

Brutus

Burgkmair (Hans)

Butler (Bishop)

Caietan (Cardinal)

Calvin

Camerarius (Kunz Kamerer)

Carpaccio

Celtes (Conrad)

Charles V. (Emperor)

Cicero

Coleridge

Colet (Dean)

Colmar

Cologne (Koeln)

Conway (Sir Martin)

Cook (Sir Francis)

Correggio

Cranach (Lucas)

Dante

Danube

Dodgson (Campbell)

Dolce (Ludovico)

Dresden

Duerer (Albert the Elder)

Duerer (Agnes, nee Frey)

Duerer, Andreas
Brothers and Sisters
Father-in-law, Hans Frey
Forefathers

Duerer, Hans

Duerer's House,

Mother (Barbara Helper)

Duerer (Quotations from),

Duerer's
Books:
Art of Fortification,
Human Proportions,
Measurement with Compass.

Drawings:
Adam's hand,
Christ bearing His Cross,
Dance of monkeys,
Himself,
Lion,
Lucas van Leyden,
Memento Mei,
Mein Angnes,
Mount of Olives,
Nepotis (Florent),
Pfaffroth (Hans),
Plankfelt (Jobst),
Sea-monsters,
Women's Bath,
Walrus.

Engravings on Metal:
Agony in the Garden,
Great Fortune,
Jerome (St.),
Knight (The),
Melancholy,
Passion.

Pictures:
Adam and Eve,
Adoration of Magi,
Avarice,
Christ among Doctors,
Coronation of Virgin,
Crucifixion,
Dresden Altar Piece,
Feast of Bose Garlands,
Hercules,
Lucretia,
Madonna with Iris,
Martyrdom of Ten Thousand,
Paumgartner, Altar Piece,
Preachers (The Pour),
Road to Calvary,
Trinity and All Saints.

Portraits:
Of himself, Leipzig, Madrid, Munich,
Holzschuher (Hieronymus),
Imhof, Hans (?),
Kleeberger (Johannes)
Krel (Oswolt),
Maximilian,
Muffel (Jacob),
Orley (Bernard van),
Unknown (Vienna),
Unknown (Hampton Court),
Unknown (Boston)
Unknown Woman (Berlin),
Unknown Girl (Berlin),
Wolgemut.

Woodcuts:
Apocalypse,
Assumption of Magdalen,
St. Christopher,
Gate of Honour,
Jerome (St.),
Life of the Virgin,
Last Supper,
Little Passion.

Ebner

Eck (Dr.)

Eckenstein (Miss)

Emerson

Erasmus

Euclid

Euripides

Eusebius

Eyck (Jan van)

FLAUBERT (Gustave)

Florentine

Frankfort

Frederick the Wise (Elector of Saxony)

Frey (Hans)

Frey (Felix),

Fronde,

Fugger,

Furtwaengler,

Gainsborough,

Ghent,

Giehlom (Dr. Carl),

Giorgjone,

Giotto,

Goes (Hugo vander)

Goethe,

Gospel of
St. Luke,
St. Matthew,
St. John,

Grapheus (Cornelius),

Greece, Greeks, Greek,

Grien (Baldung),

Heaton (Mrs.),

_Heller (Jacob)_.

Henry VIII,

Hess (Eoban),

Hess (Martin),

Hippocrates,

Hokusai,

Holbein,

Holzselraher,

Homer,

Humanists,

Hungary,

Hutten (Ulrich von),

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23