Böcklin : German school
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Böcklin : German school (1906) is a book on the art of Arnold Böcklin by Richard Muther in the series Masters in Art: A Series of Illustrated Monographs.
It is a copy from the section on Böcklin in The History of Painting.
Full text[1]
Bocklin, Arnold Bocklin
ND
588
B6AM
1906
C.I
ROBA
IARCH, 1906 BOCKLIN PRICE, 15 CENTS
BOCKLIN
PART 75 VOLUME 7
>toa
1
MASTERS I N AR'
A SERIES OF ILLUSTRATE MONOGRAPHS: ISSUED MONTHL
PART
75
MARCH,
19O6
VOLUM
o r ftl i tt
CONTENTS
National Gallery, . OwmedH>y Frau Schbn-Rcnz, V\ New Pinakothek, Me Schack Gallery, Me Schack Gallery, ML Owned by Herr Emil Olbermann, Col Museum, I Schack Gallery, Mv Museum F
Plate I. The Hermit
Plate II. The Island of Death
Plate III. The Sport of the Waves
Plate IV. The Rocky Gorge
Plate V. The Villa by the Sea
Plate VI. The Island of Life
Plate VII. Vita Somnium Breve
Plate VIII. Pan Frightening a Goatherd
Plate IX. The Sacred Grove
Plate X. Naiads at Play Muse
Portrait of Bocklin by Himself : National Gallery, Berlin
The Life of Bocklin
The Art of Bocklin
Criticisn-.s by Muther, Brintoo. Lemmermayer, Meiianer
The Works of Bocklin : Descriptions of the Plates and a List of Paintings Bocklin Bibliography
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A ttmflitt Indixftr frtvimi numbtn will kt ft*4 In thi Utadir' i GuUi If Ptn,dt:.il l.itirm-uri, whlik mtf unit.lt,.
PUBLISHERS' ANNOUNCEMENTS
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MASTERS IN ART
ong the artists to be considered during the current, 1906,
ne may be mentioned, Constable, Bouguereau, Goya,
ngres. The numbers of ' Masters in Art' which have already
red in 1906 are :
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j75, MARCH BOCKLIN
f R T 7 6 , THE ISSUE FOR
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- Sculpture ^Painting
VOL. 4.
PART 37, ROMNEY [HjfcRUGINO PART 38, FRA ANGELICO
ftLBEINg PART 39, WATTEAU
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LETTERS LETTERING
Illustrated Treatise by FRANK CHOU- TEAU BROWN, containing two hundred and ten Examples. A complete and varied collection of Alphabets of Standard and Mod- ern Forms, so arranged as to be most practi- cally and conveniently useful to Designers, Architects, Craftsmen, and all who have to draw letter-forms.
WHAT THOSE WHO USE IT HAVE TO SAY
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It is comprehensive and at the same time concise, and well adapted as a reference book. I find it the most complete book on the subject that I have examined.
MARY KETCHAM, Inst. College of Fine Arts, Syracuse Univ.
The very best I have seen. I have handled many, both Foreign and Domestic, but never found one that gives so much good information and usefulness for the price of $2.00. BERNHARD BENSON,
Art Industrial Works, Jamestown, N. Y.
I have used the work as a reference book when de- signing the lettering for bronze tablets of every descrip- tion, and find the method of constructing the Roman letters very satisfactory. A. M. LONG, Chicago, 111.
I find it a great help to me in my work. The most valuable part in the book is the Roman capital letters, also the construction of Roman small letters and the spacing of Roman capitals.
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It is the best book I have seen on the subject. I wished it especially for the Gothic and Black Letter Alphabets, and consider them the best things in it, es- pecially Mr. Goodhue's Alphabet.
Miss RUTH S. BROOKE, Gambier, O.
The most complete of any treatise on letters and lettering I have ever seen. The artist who wishes to make letter designing a study, to become proficient, cannot well afford to be without it.
C. J. BOYD, McCune, Kan.
In my work of designing I find myself constantly referring to it for standard forms. I believe that any one who is called upon to letter will find it to be of lasting value in saving time and getting results.
WALTER L. BURT, El Paso, Tex.
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|NLY practice will make an accomplished pen- draughtsman; but this little treatise teaches whatever can be taught of the art; namely, how to practise, what "style" is, and how to attain it, what pens, inks, and papers have been found most serviceable, how to use line and hatch, how to produce textures and to represent various surfaces, val- ues and colors, how to depict and treat details, in a word, imparts a knowledge of all the ways, means, and processes that experience has proved useful. The key- note of the book is practicality. Each of the 72 illus- trations is a specific example of some important method. It is written interestingly and clearly. With this treatise at his elbow the draughtsman can make most valuable use of his spare minutes.
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jr
MASTERS IN ART
Uocfcltn
GERMAN SCHOOL
MASTEHS IN AHT PLATE I
PHOTOGRAVURE BY THE PHOTOGRAPHIC UNION, MUNICH
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BOCKLIN
THE HEBMIT
NATIONAL GALLEHT, BEBLIN
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7
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MA STEMS IN AHT PLATE IV
PHOTOGRAVURE BY THE PHOTOGRAPHIC UNION, MUN
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IIUC.K I,IN
THK HOCKY GOHGE SCHACK GALLEHT, MUKICH
MASTERS IX AHT PLATE VII
rMOTOGKAVUKE BY THE PHOTOGRAPHIC UNION, MUNICH [99]
BOCK LIN
VITA SOMNIUM BREVE MUSEUM, BASLE
MASTEHS IN AKT PLATE VIII
rHOTOGKAVUHE V THE fMOTOGHAPHIC UNION. MUNM
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BOCKLIN
PAN FBIGHTENING A GOATHERD SCHACK GALLEHT, MUNICH
POHTHAIT OK BuCKLIN BY HIMSELF NATIONAL i; A I.I.KK V , HKItl.I \
Although romantic in conception and idealized, this famous portrait of Bocklin is one of the most masterly and the most striking of those which he painted of him- self. He wears a black velvet jacket and holds his brush and palette laid with fresh paint. Pausing in his work he turns to listen, intently, wonderingly, to sounds com- ing from some unseen source. For, invisible to his eyes, though close behind him, is the spectral form of Death, playing on a fiddle a motive suggested by the works of Holbein and other early German artists. The portrait was painted in Munich in 1872, when Bocklin was forty-five years old.
[ioe]
MASTERS IN ART
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BORN 1827 : DIED 1901 GERMAN SCHOOL
ARNOLD BOCKLIN 1 was born on October 16, 1827, in Basle, Switzer- land. His father was at that time a cloth merchant of small means, who, not being successful in that line of business, and after an equally unsuccessful venture as joint proprietor of a ribbon factory, obtained a position as overseer of a similar establishment, earning thereby barely enough to support his large family. He managed, however, to have his children well educated, and in addition to the regular course of study in the college of the town his sons at- tended the Drawing Academy of Basle, where they received an excellent training in the art in which Arnold early gave signs of exceptional talent.
At that day but little interest in matters pertaining to art was taken by the worthy and practical burghers of Basle. The town possessed no public art gallery, but in a dingy room of the university library was preserved the price- less collection of Holbein's works, now housed in the Basle Museum. In this room Arnold Bocklin, when a boy, spent many hours, and there can be no doubt that a study of Holbein's inimitable creations did much towards awak- ening in him an earnest desire to devote his life to art.
In his rambles about the picturesque country surrounding his native town his imagination was still further quickened, and his love of the beautiful fos- tered. In these walks his fertile fancy peopled the woods and streams with the fabulous creatures made familiar to him by the classic legends which, in his school days, had charmed his imagination. His earliest artistic efforts were landscapes landscapes in which sometimes a weird effect was produced by moonlight and contrasting shadows, sometimes stormy skies and ruined, desolate castles were portrayed, but always they were of a nature to appeal to the emotions. Art and music and poetry filled the boy's soul, but above all did painting, that special form of art which responded to his intuitive love of color, grow to be his absorbing passion
To his wish to become a painter, however, his father was seriously opposed. In the elder Bocklin's estimation, there were already too many struggling
'It is impossible to give in English a phonetic spelling of the name Bocklin. The pronunciation of the S in German is similar to the sound of en in the French words feu, jcu, bleu, etc. If, therefore, this pro- nunciation be observed, a fairly correct phonetic spelling of the artist's name may be said to be Beuk/lin.
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24 MASTERS IN ART
artists who would never attain success, and he was in no way minded that his son should increase their number. But the boy's mother, believing more firmly in his genius, did all in her power to enable him to carry out his desire, and finally, with the assistance of a friend who recognized the lad's talent, a reluctant consent was wrung from the father, and Arnold, then eighteen years old, was sent to Diisseldorf to begin his studies in the Academy there.
Under the landscape-painter Johann Wilhelm Schirmer he proved himself a diligent pupil; but Schirmer, who soon saw how unusual were the young man's talents, and realized that the vitiated romanticism of Diisseldorf had little to offer such a fresh and original genius, advised him to go to Brussels, where he would find a greater stimulus to his art. Accordingly, after about two years in Diisseldorf, Bocklin went to Belgium, and in Brussels and Ant- werp learned much from his study of the coloring of the early Flem sh painters, and of the glowing canvases of the later master of that school Rubens.
From Belgium he journeyed to Geneva in order to pursue his studies with Alexandre Calame, but after only a few weeks in the Swiss landscape-painter's studio he again turned his steps northward, this time to Paris. There the works of Delacroix, of Couture, and, above all, of Corot, impressed him; but far deeper than that produced by any painted picture was the impression left upon his mind by the bloody scenes which filled the city's streets when the February Revolution of 1848 broke forth. Bocklin never forgot the sights he witnessed then, and even in after years it was with the recollection of them still fresh in his memory that he painted some of his scenes of combat.
The young painter's stay in Paris was of short duration. He had not yet found what his soul craved, and after a few months spent in his native town for the purpose of fulfilling his military duties by serving for a prescribed length of time in the regular army, he wandered farther south, to the Mecca of all young artists of that day Italy.
In Rome Bocklin found many congenial spirits in the little colony of Ger- man and Swiss painters and poets; Dreber, Feuerbach, Begas, Von SchefFel, Paul Heyse, and others, became his warm friends, and in the strangely poetic beauty of the Roman Campagna he found at last a fulfilment of his artistic yearnings. Here in Italy was the scenery his brush could paint with loving sympathy; here were the rich colors he loved; here could he find the fit setting for those nymphs and fauns and satyrs, those fabulous monsters, those gods and goddesses, with which his fancy teemed. Long hours spent in wandering about the Campagna, absorbed in dreams while his companions sedulously sketched this or that bit of rock or tree or picturesque group of peasants, re- sulted in some ideal landscape painted later in his studio from memory, in which with marvelous effect the spirit of the scene was rendered.
What were days of poverty to one so rich in fancy and so happy in his crea- tive power as this young and unknown Swiss painter! And to add to his happi- ness, but by no means to alleviate his poverty, he must needs fall romantically in love, after only a few days' acquaintance, with a young Roman orphan girl, Angelina Pascucci by name, whose radiant classic beauty was her only mar- riage portion, but who became to Bocklin a lifelong inspiration. The mar-
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BOCKLIN 25
riage took place in the summer of 1853, and in spite of the difference in nation- ality, in religion, language, and customs, to say nothing of the wearing trials of extreme poverty, it was and always continued to be an absolutely happy one. Frau Bocklin's more practical nature saved her husband from many a diffi- culty, and her loving, watchful care of him in times of sorrow or of discourage- ment was untiring.
Bocklin's early married life was full of hardship, for with a young wife and an increasing family of children he found it no easy task to make both ends meet. Now and then his friends were able to help him to sell a picture, but purchasers were few, and he was often reduced to sore straits to earn the money necessary for the support of his family. When his picture of ' Pan pursuing a Nymph' was bought by a Viennese lady, and a second version of the subject was ordered by Herr Wedekind, the German consul at Palermo, the future began to look brighter; but the money which the sale of these two canvases brought in, went but a little way towards the relief of his circumstances, and finally, discouraged and sick at heart, he resolved to leave Rome and re- turn with his young wife and two little children to his father's house in Basle.
No better fortune, however, awaited him there. A landscape which he sent to an exhibition in his native town was greeted with derision by the matter-of-fact citizens of Basle, who were wholly unaccustomed to such ideal scenes and startling colors.
It was just at that time that Bocklin received from Herr Wedekind, his former patron, a commission to decorate in fresco the walls of the consul's dining-room in Hanover, and being discouraged by the reception his land- scape had been accorded by his fellow-citizens, he gladly agreed to undertake the task. In the early spring of 1858 he removed with his family to Hanover, and at once set to work upon a scheme of decoration illustrating in five great frescos, rich in imaginative quality and able in composition and execution, the relation of man to fire.
With the exception of a small sketch for the first picture, no preparatory drawings were made, but, having clearly in his mind what he wished to repre- sent, the artist painted his subjects, without model of any kind, directly upon the walls. In four months the work was completed, but unfortunately it did not find favor in the eyes of Herr Wedekind; a temporary misunderstanding occurred between him and the artist, and Bocklin, who had in the first place agreed to undertake the work for comparatively slight remuneration, found it difficult to obtain the stipulated reward for his labors. . . .
In March, 1859, there appeared, in the exhibition of the Society of Artists in Munich, a large picture, entitled ' Pan among the Reeds,' which aroused great interest, attracting the notice of all by the singular originality of its subject and treatment. It was said that the artist, whose name was unknown in Munich, was one Arnold Bocklin, a Swiss painter, who with a beautiful young Italian wife and a family of children had recently come to the city, and at that very moment, poor and in the utmost need, he and two of his children were lying ill with typhoid fever.
Relief came to Bocklin through his great picture of Pan. This work, a
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26 MASTERS IN ART
large version of a subject he had previously painted in Rome, was bought for the New Pinakothek the gallery of modern paintings in Munich, and from that moment the tide turned. Bocklin's strong constitution enabled him to recover from the treacherous fever, but one of his children died from its effects, and the blow was a crushing one to the painter, who found it hard, now that success seemed about to crown his efforts, to respond to the cordial welcome extended him by the artist community in Munich. Through his friend of old Roman days, the poet and writer Paul Heyse, he was brought to the notice of Baron, afterwards Count, von Schack, in whom he found so munificent a patron that to-day the Schack Gallery in Munich contains one of the most valuable collections of the artist's works.
In the autumn of 1860 Bocklin was offered a professorship, as also were Begas and Lenbach, in the newly established Academy of Arts in Weimar. He accepted the position, but the atmosphere of the little scholastic town, im- pregnated as it was with literary memories, had nothing to offer to the artistic aspirations of the young professors, who found their more modern ideas op- posed by those of the conservative school. One by one they shook the dust of Weimar from their feet and sought other and more stimulating fields.
For Bocklin's art this was an unproductive period. 'Diana Hunting' and 'Pan frightening a Goatherd' were the principal pictures painted during his two years' stay in Weimar, where much time was devoted to an indulgence of his taste for science and mathematics in the construction of a flying-machine. His interest in aeronautics amounted to a passion at times almost as absorbing to him as his art, and although his efforts to solve the problem of a flying- machine were never crowned with success, to the end of his life he did not abandon hope of accomplishing his aim.
Upon leaving Weimar, Italy was again Bocklin's objective point. This time he visited Naples, Capri, and Pompeii, fascinated by the colors of the Mediterranean, and falling anew under the spell of those classic stories with which its shores are replete. Pompeii possessed for him a deep interest, and Naples aroused a feeling scarcely less intense.
The year 1862 found Bocklin once more in Rome. During the four follow- ing years he worked industriously, and among his patrons had the gratifica- tion to count several from his native town. In the hope of receiving there still further commissions, he returned with his family to Basle in the early autumn of 1866. His hopes were not disappointed. Soon after his arrival he was asked to paint in fresco the walls of the garden house of his friend Herr Sarasin, and, a far more important work, was commissioned by the munici- pality of Basle to decorate the walls of the stairway of the newly erected Art Museum of the city. In addition to these two monumental tasks Bocklin painted many masterpieces during his stay in Basle, among which may be mentioned ' The Road to Emmaus,' ' The Rocky Gorge,' ' The Ride of Death,' 'Furies pursuing a Murderer,' all now in the Schack Gallery in Munich, and many more equally original in conception, as well as a number of portraits. In addition to these works he gave proof of his skill in plastic art, in which he was almost as gifted as in painting, by modeling for the garden facade of the
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BOCK LIN 27
Kunsthalle six masks caricaturing with the most grotesque humor the alder- men of Basle, whose stubborn narrow-mindedness had so often opposed itself to his artistic ideas.
To Munich the painter next turned his steps, and between July, 1871, and the autumn of 1874, made that city his home. These three years were pro- ductive of many paintings marked by marvelous creative power: 'The Battle of the Centaurs,' recalling Rubens in its energy and force, 'Triton and Nereid,' a ' Pieta,' ' Pan Fishing,' the portraitofhimself with Death, and numerous Other works feemingwifh'an apparentIy~lliudiUU;>l.iblc imagination.
Munich, hoWeverTwas not satisfying to Bocklin's nature, and accordingly to Italy he once more returned, this time fixing his abode in Florence, where eleven happy years passed before his restless spirit again urged him on.
This Florentine period realized the highest attainment of his art. The in- fluence of the Renaissance masters of Italy is felt in the deep poetic meaning of the pictures painted at this time. The colors, sometimes rich and glowing, sometimes light and almost startling in their bright, vivid hues, again deep and somber, reflect his varying moods. The composition is more balanced, the technique more finished, and, as always, the creative power marvelous in its unending variety. 'The Sleeping Diana/ 'Springtime,' 'The Regions of the Blessed,' 'The Island of Death,' 'Prometheus,' 'Sport of the Waves,' 'The Sacred Grove,' 'Autumn Thoughts,' 'The Silence of the Forest,' are among his most famous works of these years.
The hardest struggles of Bocklin's life now seemed ended. His days of storm and stress were over. Recognition of his genius, in quarters where rec- ognition was of value, had come at last, and (although his works were still in- comprehensible to the general public', which continued to shake its head over the extraordinary subjects and the strong colors of the canvases which from time to time he sent to the various exhibitions in Germany, they were no longer greeted with derision, but were sufficiently in demand to bring prices which enabled the artist to live in comparative comfort. In his home in Florence he was surrounded by a host of friends, among whom were many of the best- known German writers, painters, poets, and sculptors of the day.
It was in 1885, when Bocklin was approaching his sixtieth year, that he re- crossed the Alps to his own country, and, for the sake of his children's educa- tion, settled in Zurich. During his sojourn there he was the recipient of many public honors. At the International Exhibition of 1888 he was given a first- class medal; in the following year he was named honorary doctor of philosophy in the University of Zurich, and in 1890 the right of citizenship was bestowed upon him by the town.
His artistic influence became more and more wide-spread, and at the time of the Munich Exhibition of 1890 he was recognized as one of the foremost of modern German painters, not only in artistic circles, but was accepted as such by the public at large. It was at this triumphant period of his career, and when he was in the full strength of his powers, that the startling news was spread abroad that the master had been stricken by apoplexy. This was in May, 1892.
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28 MASTERS IN ART
His recovery from the attack was very slow. When he was strong enough to bear the journey he was taken to the land he loved best, and there, in a villa in Fiesole, near Florence, gradually regained his health, and once more re- sumed his work. The pictures painted at this time show no diminution of power; the 'Polyphemus,' the 'Venus Genetrjx,' and a portrait of himself at >! his easel are as original in conception, as fresh in color, and technically as fine as his earlier or his later achievements.
In 1895 Bocklin became the owner of a villa in San Domenico between Florence and Fiesole, and there in that picturesque spot overlooking the beau- tiful valley of the Arno, surrounded by those he loved, the evening of his life was spent. To the last he devoted himself to his art, and to that other art, music, which he also dearly loved, and in which, without any scientific train- ing, he was unusually skilled, playing delightfully upon various instruments. In his quiet home reports reached him from the outer world of honors showered upon him, and of the great festivals held all over Germany, as well as in his native Basle, upon the occasion of his seventieth birthday; but with these flattering testimonies to his genius, as with the neglect he had previously and for so many years endured without complaint, he seemed in no way concerned. Art was for him something above, beyond, apart from all that the expres- ' sion of his deepest feeling, his highest aspiration
Arnold Bocklin has been described by those who knew him as a man of few words, reserved and somewhat diffident with strangers, but frank and in- genuous with his friends. Warm-hearted and generous in disposition, he was the very soul of honor, never stooping to a meanness of any kind. Frugal, in- dustrious, and simple in his tastes, he despised all outward show, cared nothing for the conventionalities of life, and was wholly indifferent to the extravagant praises heaped upon his name when, finally, fame and glory such as fall to the lot of few men during lifetime, were awarded him.
In person he was tall and powerfully built. His shoulders were broad and his carriage erect. His physical strength was unusual. Even at fifty he found it no tax to paint for eight consecutive hours, and then not only when at his easel, but also when engaged upon wall frescos, in a position necessarily more strained. His head was finely shaped, his eyes were blue and clear, and his expression kindly. When a young man he had the air of a typical painter or poet, but as he grew older this look completely disappeared, and in middle life there was nothing in his decidedly military appearance to suggest either the one or the other. In his dress he was always scrupulously particular; in short, nothing in the outer man gave token of the intensity and passion of his artistic nature.
In his beautiful villa in San Domenico, Bocklin's closing years passed peace- fully. He worked almost to the last, the canvases entitled ' Melancholy,' ' War,' and 'The Plague' being painted the year before his death. His wife and chil- dren and grandchildren were with him as life drew near its end, and his son, Carlo, an architect and later a painter, was his father's right hand in all prac- tical affairs. Repeated apoplectic strokes gradually shattered his strength and rendered him more and more helpless; finally, an attack of pneumonia ha-
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B 6 C K L I N 29
stened his death, which occurred on January 1 6, 1901. He was buried two days later, with simple but touching services, in the Campo Santo degli Allori, just outside one of the gates of Florence.
Cije art of Bbcfclm
RICHARD MUTHER 'THE HISTORY OF MODERN PAINTING'
ARNOLD BOCKLIN is a landscape-painter in his very essence, and he is \ moreover the greatest landscape-painter of the nineteenth century, be- side whom even the Fontainebleau group seem one-sided specialists. Every one of the latter had a peculiar type of landscape, and a special hour in the day which appealed to his feelings more distinctly than any other. One loved spring and dewy morning, another the clear cold day, another the threatening majesty of the storm, the flashing effects of sportive sunbeams, or the evening, after sunset, when colors fade from view. But Bocklin is as inexhaustible as infinite nature itself. In one place he celebrates the festival of spring with its burden of beauty. In another, nature shines, and blooms, and breathes her balnrtrfaTl the colors of summer. And besides such lovely idyls, he has painted , with puissant sublimity as many complaining elegies and tempestuous trag- edies. Here the somber autumnal landscapes, with their tall black cypresses, 'i are lashed by the rain and the howling storm. There, lonely islands or grave, half-ruined towers, tangled with creepers, rise dreamily from a lake, mourn- fully hearkening to the repining murmur of the waves. Bocklin has painted everything: the graceful and heroic, the solitude and the waste, the solemnly sublime and the darkly tragic, passionate agitation and demoniacal fancy, the strife of foaming waves and the eternal rest of rigid masses of rock, the wild uproar of the sky and the still peace of flowery fields. The compass of his moods is as much greater than that of the French classicists as Italy is greater than Fontainebleau.
For Italy is Bocklin's home as a landscape-painter, and the moods of nature there are more in number than Poussin ever painted. Grave and sad and grandiose is the Roman Campagna, with the ruins of the street of sepu chers. . Hidden like the Sleeping Beauty lie the Roman villas in his pictures, in their sad combination of splendor and decay, of life and death, of youth and age. Behind weather-beaten grotto-wells and dark green nooks of yew, white busts * and statues gleam like phantoms. Huge cypresses ot the growth of centuries stand gravely in the air, tossing their heads mournfully when the wind blows. Then at a bound we are at Tivoli, and the whole scenery is changed. Great fantastic rocks rise straight into the air, luxuriantly mantled by ivy and para- sitic growths. Trees and shrubs take root in the clefts. And the floods of the Anio plunge headforemost into the depths with a roar of sound like a legion of demons thunder-stricken by some higher power. Then comes Naples, with its glory of flowers and its moods of evening glowing in deep ruby. Farther away
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he paints the Homeric world of Sicily, with its crags caressed or storm-beaten by the wave, its blue grottos, and its deep, glowing splendors of changing color. . . .
Bocklin has no more rendered an exact portrait of the scenery of Italy than the classic masters of France sought to represent in a photographic way dis- tricts in the forest of Fontainebleau. His whole life, like theirs, was a renewed and perpetual wooing of nature. As a boy he looked down from his attic in Basle upon the heaving waters of the Rhine. When he was in Rome he wan- dered daily in the Campagna to feast his eyes upon its grave lines and colors. And the moods with which he was inspired by nature and the phenomena he observed were stored in his mind as though in a great emporium. Then his imagination went through another stage. That "organic union of figures and landscape" which the representatives of "heroic landscape" had surmised and endeavored to attain by a reasoned method through the illustration of passages in poetry, took place in Bocklin by the force of intuitive conception. ;The mood excited in him by a landscape is translated into an intuition of life. In his pic- tures nature laughs with those who are glad, mourns with those who weep, sheds her light upon the joyful, and envelops tortured spirits in storm and the terror of thunder. . . .
In Bocklin's earlier pictures the accessory figures are placed in close rela- tion with the landscape in a manner entirely similar. But his great creations reach a higher level. Having begun by extending the lyrical mood of a land- scape to his figures, he finally succeeded in populating nature with beings which seem the final condensation of the life of nature itself, the tangible em- bodiment of that spirit of nature whose cosmic action in the water, the earth, and the air he had glorified in one of his youthful works, the frescos of the Basle Museum. In such pictures he has no forerunners whatever in the more recent history of art. His principle of creation rests, it might be said, upon the same overwhelming feeling for nature which brought forth the figures of Greek myth. When the ancient Greek stood before a waterfall he gave human form to what he saw. His eye beheld the outlines of beautiful nude women, nymphs of the spot, in the descending volume of the cascade; its foam was their flutter- ing hair, and in the rippling of the water he heard their splashing and their laughter.
The beings which live in Bocklin's pictures owe their origin to a similar ac- tion of the spirit. He hears trees, rivers, mountains, and universal nature whisper as with human speech. Every flower, every bush, every flame, the rocks, the waves, and the meadows, dead and without feeling as they are to the ordinary eye, have to his mind a vivid existence of their own. In his im- agination every impression of nature condenses itself into figures that may be seen. As a dragon issues from his lair to terrify travelers in the gloom of a mountain ravine, and as the avenging Furies rise in the waste before a mur- derer, so in the still, brooding noon, when a shrill tone is heard suddenly and without a cause, the Grecian Pan lives once again for Bocklin Pan who startles the goatherd from his dream by an eerie shout, and then whinnies in mockery of the terrified fugitive. The cool, wayward, splashing element of
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water takes shape as a graceful nymph; the fine mists which rise from the water-source become embodied as a row of merry children whose vaporous figures float lazily through the shining clouds of spring. And the secret voices that live amid the silence of the wood press round him, and the phantom born of the excited scenesTxicomes a ghostly unicorn advancing with noiseless step, and bearing upon his back a maiden of legendary story. The form ^f Death stumbling past cloven trees in rain and tempest, as he rides his pale horse, ap- pears to him in a waste and chill autumnal region, where stands a ruined castle in lurid illumination. A sacred grove, lying in insular seclusion and fringed with venerable old trees that rise straight into the air, rustling as they bend their heads towards each other, is peopled, as at a word of enchantment, with grave priestly figures robed in white, which approach in solemn proces- sion and fling themselves down in prayer before the sacrificial fire. The lonely waste of the seajs not brought home to him with sufficient force tylTwide fldoTofwaves, with gulls indolently flying beneath a low and leaden sky; so he paints a flat crag emerging from the waves, and upon its crest, over which the billows sweep, the shy dwellers of the sea bathe in the light. Naiads and tritons assembled for a gamesome ride over the sea typify the fleeing hide-and- seek of the waves. Yet there is nothing forced, nothing merely ingenious, nothing literary, in these inventions. The figjures are not placed in nature with deliberate calculation; they are an embodied mood of nature; they are children of the landscape and no mere accessories.
Bocklin's power of creating types in embodying these beings of his imagina- tion is a thing unheard of in the whole history of art. /He has represented his centaurs and satyrs and fauns and sirens so vividly and impressively that they have become ideas as currently acceptable as if they were simple incomposite beings."? He has seen the awfulness of the sea at moments when the secret be- ings of^the deep emerge, and he kllows a glimpse into the fabulous reality of their as yet unexplored existence; For all beings which hover swarming in the atmosphere around, have their dwellings in the trees, or their haunts in rocky deserts, he has found new and convincing figures. Everything which was created in this field before his time the works of Diirer, Mantegna, and Salvator Rosa not excepted was an adroit sport with forms already estab- lished by the Greeks, and a transposition of Greek statues into a pictorial medium. With B6cklin,who, instead of illustrating mythology, himself creates it, a new power of inventing myths was introduced. His creations are not the distant issue of nature, but corporeal beings, full of ebullient energy, individ- ualized through and through, and stout, lusty, and natural.
And only a slight alteration in the truths of nature has sufficed him for the creation of such chimerical beings. As a landscape-painter he stands with all his fibers rooted in the earth, although he seems quite alienated from this world of ours, and his fabulous creatures make the same convincing impres- sion because they have been created with all the inner logical congruity of nature, and delineated under close relationship to actual fact with the same numerous details as the real animals of the earth. For his tritons, sirens, and mermaids, with their prominent eyes and their awkward bodies covered with
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bristly hair, he may have made studies from seals and walruses. His obese and short-winded tritons, with shining red faces and flaxen hair dripping with moisture, are good-humored old men with a quantity of warm blood in their veins, who love and laugh and drink new wine. His fauns may be met with amongst the shepherds of the Campagna, swarthy, strapping fellows dressed in goatskin after the fashion of Pan. It is chiefly the color lavished upon them which turns them into children of an unearthly world, where other suns are shining, and other stars.
In the matter of color, also, the endeavors of the nineteenth century reach a climax in Bocklin. He was the first in Germany who revealed the marvelous power in color for rendering moods of feeling and its inner depth of musical sentiment. Even in those years when the brown tone of the galleries pre- vailed everywhere, color was allowed in his pictures to have its own independ- ent existence, apart from its office of being a merely subordinate characteristic of forjn. For him green was thoroughly green, blue was divinely blue, and red was jubilantly red. At the very time when Richard Wagner lured the colors of sound from music, with a glow and light such as no master had kindled before, Bocklin's symphonies of color streamed forth like a crashing orchestra. The whole scale, from the most somber depth to the most chromatic light, was at his command. In his pictures of spring the color laughs, rejoices, and exults. In 'The Island, of Death ' itjegms as though a veil of crape were spread over the sea, the sky, and the trees. His splendid sea-green, his transparent blue sky, his sunset flush tinged with violet haze, his yellow-brown rocks, his gleam- ing red sea-mosses, and the white bodies of his maidens are always arranged in new, glowing, sensuous harmonies. Many of his pictures have such an en- snaring brilliancy that the eye is never weary of feasting upon their floating splendor. Indeed, later generations will probably do him honor as the greatest colqr-poerXof the century.
CHRISTIAN BRINTON T H S- ( C RIT 1C ' 1901
AINOLD BOCKLIN was a posthumous expression of Teutonic- roman- ticisjn^ He flashed forth, as it were, after the lights had simmered out, bringing into being a new, disturbing beauty, a poetry hitherto undivined, and personal endowments riper than any since the Renaissance. Quietly, without pose or parade, he accomplished for German art what Goethe had already done for German poetry and Wagner for German music. Through the me- dium of a rich-set palette he revealed to Germans -and to the world the Germanic soul. . . .
While in essence Bocklin's art is romantic, it is free from the routine faults of romanticism. His sense of form is Grecian and his color entirely modern in its breadth and brilliancy. The persuasive charm of his classic scenes is chiefly due to the anti-classic and often frankly humorous, dionysian manner in which they are presented. Although there is often sharp contrast between the theme and its treatment, the whole is conceived with such intensity and is so vividly realized that effect never fails. To the cherished quality of dealing unfettered with the past, Bocklin added a definite, detailed interpretation of the present.
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With few exceptions his works involve a combination, on even terms, of land- scape or marine with figure, and in this province he is unrivaled. An intimate accord between these two elements is always preserved; nowhere is there the slightest loss of poise. Though he turned, through affinity, towards the south across the Alps the conventional Italianism of Poussin, Claude, or the early Corot finds no echo or even equivalent in Bocklin's art. With no sacrifice of ideality he gives each subject a fresh, engaging actuality, an individual, verid- ical setting which is its own vindication. By a species of localization which is never slavish and always full of suggestion, always tempered by the essential beauty of the scene, he succeeds in making romance real and reality romantic.
The formula of Bocklin's art consists of peopling the sea or sky, shore or wood, with creatures of tradition or of sheer imagination. Its animus is a pan- tbeistische Naturpoesie, illustrating the kinghip of maqjmdjiature, a cpncep- tion both Hellenic and Germanic, which arose from a blending: of that which his spirit caught at in the world about him and that which came through the gates of fancy and of fable. . . .
Whafawes the neophyte and remains the cardinal glory of Bocklin's canvases is the depth and splendor of their coloration. First and last Bocklin was a colorist. He chose by instinct only the most alluring hues, the pure radiance of far stars, the vivid grotto-blue of the sea, the copper- brown of a faun's skin, or the viridescence of water serpent. No man studied nature more closely or surprised so many of her secrets. The Campagna, the clear vistas of the Oberland, foam-lashed rocks along the Tuscan coast, here a dark stretch of wood, there a splash of light, all produced an accumulation of stimuli which, coupled with an indelible memory and remarkable powers of visualization, made Bocklin one of the few really sovereign colorists. While his sense of form was not so acutely developed his-drawing of the nude be- ing the reverse of academic it is impossible not to feel that the sum-total may have gained rather than suffered through this fact, for, as it is, nothing seems to reach beyond or fall below an irreproachable ensemble.
FRITZ LEMMERMAYER 'UNSERE ZEIT' 1888
BOCKLIN is preeminently a modern painter. Not that he records the passing events of the day, nor expends himself on the representation of trifling genre pictures, nor does he concern himself with that homely style which aims at a truthful portrayal of some household scene a mother sur- rounded by her little ones, or a lady occupied with her embroidery. Nothing of this nature is to be found in Bocklin's work, but instead, the wings of his far-reaching fancy transport him to distant lands to Greece, to Italy and there in rich and glowing colors he paints whatever most deepjy stirs his soul. It is not, indeed, what he paints that is modern, but bow he paints it.
Landscapes gloomy and impassioned like Salvator Rosa's or Poussin s, or enchanting in their exuberant colors like the scenery of Italy, or ^ark and mysterious, as i haunted by invisible spirits, or stormy and tempestuous and filled with fabulous monsters, with nymphs, with naiads, centaurs, and satyrs such are the subjects Bocklin conjures upon his canvas, not always care-
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fully nor technically correct, not wholly free from defects in drawing, but in- variably powerful and imaginative, ideal in color, extraordinary in conception, rich in feeling, and unquestionably inspired. . . .
The irresistible attraction in Bocklin's works, that wherein above all else the great charm of his painting lies, is his manner of imparting life to nature, of giving her individuality and investing her with a soul. It seems as if his landscapes were not painted for their own sakes alone, but as if the artist had been attracted by the ruling power of the spirits of nature, and to them he gives material form, or in some mysterious way suggests their presence. His understanding of nature is profound and comprehensive. To him she is not only the beneficent mother rich in blessings, bringing joy and gladness and pouring her gifts upon the world with lavish hand from her never-failing horn of plenty, but he sees in her as well a demoniac Fury who with fiendish exulta- tion diffuses terror and suffering, and whose cruel pleasure it sometimes is to visit the world with misery, death, and destruction. Nature in her gentle moods he paints with delicate and loving touch; when she is sad or when she is violent he renders her with impassioned power. . . .
Bocklin is the painter of the woods, the painter of sacred groves and grottos, of smiling scenes and of desolate places, of the storm and of the sea. To the young life that stirs in nature, and to the mighty death which devastates her, his brush has given sublime immortality. But unique and ideal though he be as a landscape-painter, it. would be but an incomplete picture of the man to portray him in this light alone, for as a figure-painter he is a master no less marvelous. His canvases in which figures alone are depicted are limited in number, but those that he has painted show that he had the power of appealing to the most varied emotions. In his landscapes figures are almost always in- troduced sometimes human, more often fabulous. Their presence never seems accidental; they are organic parts of the whole design; never meaning- less accessories, but symbolic forms emanating naturally and harmoniously from the spirit of the scene in a word, the actual embodiment, the allegor- ical expression, of the scene itself. ABRIDGED FROM THE GERMAN
FRANZ-HERMANN MEISSNER 'GAZETTE DES BEAUX-ARTS' 1893
ARNOLD BOCKLIN is one of the strongest personalities one of the most singular and most remarkable in the whole history of art. Al- though neither in his method nor in the choice of his subjects, taken for the most part from Greek mythology, does he belong to the German romanticists, he is nevertheless fundamentally a_ romantic painter romantic in all the essential characteristics of his genius, in^He~mrens1ty, the marvelous depth of his feeling, in his power of individualizing, in his strong vein of humor, in his anti-classic, wholly mythological and dionysian manner of interpreting classic subjects. His romanticism then may be said to be a combination of the Teu- tonic and the Hellenic; the Greek spirit and the German spirit are the two governing impulses of his genius. . . .
Bocklin's originality was manifested very early in his career quite as clearly by his inventive power as by his technique. With few exceptions it is only in his youthful works that any trace can be found of outside influences. These
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influences are chiefly those of his master Schirmer, of Corot, whose early works he saw and admired when in Paris, and, above all, of Poussin, who throughout Bocklin's youth was his model for the calm and simple grandeur of his lines and for his coloring. But Bocklin soon freed himself from all these influences and struck out upon his own path. So pronounced did his originality become, that if we would find any painter with whom to compare him we should have to go back to Giorgione. In more than one respect, indeed, he recalls that great Venetian master: in the glowing brilliancy and delicate harmony of his colors, for example, and in his wonderful power of imparting life to his figures.
Like.Giorgioneynd all the old masters, Bocklin attaches primary importance jto composition. His own is indeed truly magistral, and, so far as I have seen, faultless. He has a perfect understanding of the necessity of subordinating all details Jo the main theme. And he is as well a born_colorist, a veritable mu- sician in color, as skilful in producing an effect by lovely harmonies as by the boldest contrasts. His color seems to be the needful clothing for his massive sculpturesque figures of man and of beast, those strange forms which look as if they belonged to some prehistoric world.
To impart to his creations the quality of life, in whatsoever demoniac a form, Bocklin made use of a method of his own invention. This consisted in a peculiar use of distemper in the early stages, followed by an application of varnish. He thus obtained a depth, a brilliancy, and a relief such as are und in the works of the old masters, but are never met with in those of the~painters of to-day.
It would seem as if the effect produced by the use of this method of Bocklin's were another demonstration of his intimately uniting the romanti- cism of Germany with the beauty of the antique. Such a union was only pos- sible on the sole ground on which romanticism and antiquity could come to- gether on the ground of natural myths; and it was to these old myths that Boeklin invariably turned by choice; they alone could satisfy both his Ger- manic fondness for fantastic legends and his love of classic pantheism. His types of men, of demigods, of animals, were, generally speaking, conceived independently of all tradition; they are wholly the products of arijdeaLworld, made up of elements the most fantastic, the most uncouth, and the most poetic of the world of reality, and they are endowed with such beauty, a beauty so directly the outcome of the pure Hellenic inspiration, that even subjects of the most trifling nature at once attain the proportions of monumental and classic works. . . .
For the greater part of his life Bocklin met with opposition from his con- temporaries, but from year to year, with ever-increasing power, his strong in- dividuality asserted itself. His style is so markedly the product of his own personal temperament that it hardly seems as if he could have continuators. And in truth, it cannot be said that he founded any school in the strict sense of the word, although numerous painters have imitated him more or less closely. But his influence has extended so far beyond all imitations that in addition to his personal originality Bocklin will undoubtedly prove to have been one of the leaders of modern German art. ABRIDGED FROM THE FRENCH
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Cije Works of
DESCRIPTIONS OF THE PLATES THE HERMIT* PLATE I
THIS picture is, perhaps, the most popular of Bocklin's works. The story that it tells is simple, the spirit that it breathes poetic and full of tender charm. In the light of early morning an aged hermit is playing on his violin a hymn of praise before the image of the Virgin, which stands within a niche in the wall of his cell. And as he plays, three little angels, attracted by the melody, have come down from heaven, and, all unseen, cluster around the hermit's humble dwelling. Two have perched upon the broad rim of a wooden partition, absorbed in enjoyment of the music. The third, a slen- der little fellow with rainbow-colored wings, stands on tiptoe outside, peep- ing curiously through the window at the scene within.
The color-scheme increases the poetic effect. The sky is illumined with the soft violet light of early dawn, which shines upon the Virgin's image and upon the white head of the old hermit bending over his violin. The general tone of the picture is quiet, almost subdued, but a few bright spots of color the blue of the Virgin's mantle, the wings of the standing angel, and the green of he bit of turf prevent all monotony.
The picture is on wood, and measures about three feet high by two feet three inches wide. It was painted in Florence in 1882, and three years later was bought by the National Gallery of Berlin, where it now hangs.
THE ISLAND OF DEATH' PLATE II
' TN the spring of 1880," writes Baron von Ostini, "Bocklin completed that JL work which contains the very essence of his art, and with which his name is so indissolubly linked that when we hear him spoken of we at once think of his great ' Island of Death.' No other painted landscape is so profoundly irrv- pr^ssi vp ; nr> other is so original in its conception, nor so moving in ite strange) jbeauty^_
T"0warcfthe shores of a lonely island a boat draws near. Across its bow rests a coffio_decked with flowers r beside which stands the white-robed figure of the dead "A few more strokes of the oars and the goal will be reached the rocky islancTwith its dark cypress-trees. Within the steep sides of thelx>ck are many chambers of the dead. He who now approaches will not be alone, for even as he is not the first, so will he not be the last to be rowed across the still waters to the island of death."
^_least six different versions of this subject exist, Different not only in de- tails of composition, but in the scheme of color. Some are gray and somber, while others are light in tone. In the one here reproduced, belonging to Frau Schon-Renz, Worms, Germany, the rocks are of varied hues, the water is deep greenish-blue, almost black in the shadows, and the sky, dark and ominous at the sides of the picture, is luminous in the center with a lurid light ranging from pale orange to flame-color.
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'THE SPORT OF THE WAVES' PLATE III
OF all Bocklin's representations of the sea, the one here reproduced is the most celebrated. The marvelous effect of moving water, the colors both above and beneath its ever-changing surface, the strange half-human quality of these sea-creatures, and the boisterous humor of the scene all combine in making it one of the most marvelous of the artist's creations.
M. Jules Laforgue has said of this picture: "'The Sport of the Waves' pro- duces a vivid and realistic sense of mid-ocean, with the restless waves, blue and green in color, reflecting their swaying shadows. An agile little mermaid, not very graceful in form, whose feet with their fin-like attachments are lifted high in the air, plunges into the deep green water. Astounded by the sight, a monstrous centaur, with bloodshot eyes, streaming hair, and huge paunch shining like a copper kettle, pauses in his pursuit, his arms outstretched as he beats the water with his great hoofs. In the foreground swims a faun-like creature with pointed ears and yellow beard. His breast is shaggy with that kind of soapy moss which covers stones in stagnant waters, his seaweed hair is crowned with white flowers, and his flushed and gleaming face is distorted with wanton laughter as he gleefully drags along a fair young mermaid whose white body ends in a fish's tail with scales of gold and emerald and mother-of- pearl. Her silvery locks are wreathed with crimson seaweed, her eyes are of the hue that changes from green to sapphire blue, and on her face is an expres- sion of fear and anguish. In the upper part of the picture is another siren swimming on her back, and in the center is seen a head which looks like a ball of copper with fins at the nape of its neck, puffing and blowing as it emerges from the waves."
Bocklin, as the writer says further, may be criticized for his drawing which is not always faultless. For the effect of his pictures he depends almost as much upon his daring and often fantastic color-schemes as upon his surprising and original conceptions. "But after all," adds M. Laforgue, "technical skill is possessed by many, but there is only one Bocklin in the world, and it is to describe just such natures as his that the word genius was invented."
'The Sport of the Waves' (Das Spiel der Wellen) was painted in Florence in 1883. The canvas, which measures about six feet high by nearly eight feet wide, is now in the New Pinakothek, Munich.
THE ROCKY GORGE* PLATE IV
ONCE when Bocklin was crossing the St. Gotthard Pass at nightfall he found himself enveloped in so dense a fog that it was with difficulty the path was kept. All sorts of weird fancies filled his brain, and Goethe's well- known words from 'Mignon's Song' came at once to his mind:
"Know'st thou the mountain where, hidden in clouds, The mule seeks the path which the vapor enshrouds? Where horrible dragons in caves rear their broods, And rocks are uprooted by storms and by floods?"
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With the recollection of his gruesome experience in mind, the artist painted this picture (Die Felsenschlucht), in which we are shown a ravine in the Alps, where a party of travelers with their well-laden mules are overtaken by approaching night. Suddenly, to their horror, a monstrous dragon appears, craning his long neck towards them as he crawls slowly forth through the mist from his rocky den.
The picture is strongly and realistically painted, and offers a striking ex- ample of the artist's imaginative powers. It was executed in Basle in 1870, and is now in the Schack Gallery, Munich.
'THE VILLA BY THE SEA' PLATE v
- ' I ^HE Villa by the Sea,' painted in Rome in 1864, after Bocklin's visit to
A Naples and Capri, is one of the artist's most beautiful renderings of nature in a minor key. Upon a rocky shore stands an old Italian villa, its marble walls and the statues which once adorned its garden almost hidden by dark cypress-trees whose tops are swayed by the wind. Lower down, upon the beach, stands a woman clad from head to foot in mourning garments, leaning against the rocks as she gazes sorrowfully over the water which breaks in waves at her feet. A leaden sky enhances the indescribable sadness which per- vades the picture and imparts itself to the spectator.
"In the measured beating of the waves upon the shore," writes Henri Mendelsohn, "we seem to hear the swan-song of a mighty past. May not this mourning woman be some Iphigenia yearning for the lost land of Greece ? Such a thought was in the artist's mind, for he says that in this melancholy figure he wished to represent the last survivor of a vanished race."
Bocklin painted no fewer than five versions of this subject, no two of which are alike. The one here reproduced is the second, and, together with the first version, is now in the Schack Gallery, Munich. It measures about four feet high by five feet eight inches wide.
THE ISLAND OF LIFE' PLATE VI
BOCKLIN painted this picture, called in German 'Das Lebensinsel,' in Zurich in 1888, partly as a variant of his work entitled 'The Regions of the Blessed' (Die Gefilde der Seligen), and partly as a companion to his ' Island of Death.'
Upon a fairy isle crowned with slender poplars and tropical palms, happy mortals are seen dancing hand in hand upon the green turf. A summer sky smiles above them, and in the clear water beneath, their forms reflected in its glassy surface, strange beings from some imaginary realm swim gracefully around the rocky shores, while swans float leisurely upon the tranquil sea. All is light and sunshine in this happy spot which forms a striking contrast to the mysterious sadness, the solemn peace, of 'The Island of Death.'
The picture is owned by Herr Emil Olbermann, Cologne.
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<VITA SOMNIUM BREVE' PLATE VII
"TN this picture," writes Baron von Ostini, "Bocklin may be said to have A reached the highest point of his achievement. After much thought and numerous experiments, the composition as it now stands finally took shape, assuredly one of the most original and significant of the countless representa- tions of the four ages of man which either modern or ancient art has pro- duced."
From a sphinx head in a marble framework bearing the motto VITA SOMNIUM BREVE (Life is a brief dream) flows the stream of life. Its deep blue waters wind through a green meadow bright with dandelions and daisies, and on the borders of the stream two little children are playing. One with pale golden hair is pressing a handful of flowers against his breast as he casts them one by one upon the clear water; the other, a charming little fellow with reddish curls, rests his chubby hands upon the ground as he bends forward to watch a daisy borne away by the current of the stream. In the center of the picture, on the right of the fountain, stands a young woman clasping flowers in her upraised hands as she gazes dreamily into the distance. Her gauzy drapery of deep blue sprinkled with gold stars contrasts with the beautiful flesh-tones of her nude body and the rich red of her hair. Farther back, upon the left, beneath a group of trees, a helmeted knight, clad in red and with his lance in hand, rides forth upon his steed into the unknown world beyond. In the distance, his bent form in its long brown robe silhouetted against the cloud-flecked blue sky, is seated an old man, unconscious that behind him, Death, with club upraised, stands even at that very moment ready to strike the fatal blow.
The picture was painted in Zurich in 1 888, and is now in the Basle Museum. It is on wood, and measures about five feet nine inches high by three feet eight inches wide.
'PAN FRIGHTENING A GOATHERD' PLATE VIII
DURING Bb'cklin's two years' sojourn in Weimar (1860-62), he finished this picture which had been begun in Munich. It is midday, and among the rocks a goatherd has been watching his flock of long-haired goats, when suddenly the silence is broken by the sound of a falling stone. A shrill cry is heard, and to the man's only half-awakened senses the sound seems un- earthly, and at once suggests that the great god Pan is there among the rocks, with his mocking faun's face. Seized with unreasoning fear, the goatherd runs as fast as his feet can carry him, nor once turns to cast a backward glance. His arms are flung over his head, his mantle floats behind him in the breeze, while the gourd used as a flask for his daily quota of wine, and now held by a string in one of his upraised hands, swings back and forth, pendulum-wise, in his hasty descent of the hillside, while from his rocky seat above, Pan laughs aloud in malicious glee to see how man and beast fly from his uncanny pres- ence. It has been said that in this picture Bocklin accomplished that which established his place in the history of art: "the imparting of life to nature, and the rehabilitation of old myths."
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'Pan erschrekt einen Hirten,' to call the painting by its German title, is now in the Schack Gallery, Munich. It measures four feet four inches high by about three and a half feet wide.
THE SACRED GROVE' PLATE IX
BOCKLIN'S celebrated picture entitled 'The Sacred Grove' (Der heilige Hain) was painted in Florence in 1883. In the depth of a dark grove of trees the columns of a marble temple are dimly discernible, while from this sacred edifice white-robed priests advance with slow and stately step towards a sacrificial fire before which two worshipers prostrate themselves in prayer. The composition is balanced, and the colors, chiefly black, white, and green, form a scheme that is highly decorative in its effect. A group of delicately painted birch-trees on the left, their white trunks reflected in the pool beneath, form a marked contrast to the clusters of massive dark-leaved oaks on the right. No other work of Bocklin's, with the exception of his ' Island of Death,' produces an impression of such deep s^bnmity^mdpeace.^^
The canvas is now in the Basle Museum. It measures about three and a half feet high by nearly five feet wide.
NAIADS AT PLAY' PLATE X
BOCKLIN'S picture of 'Naiads at Play' was painted in Zurich in 1886, and is now in the Basle Museum. In describing this work Henri Men- delsohn writes: "It fairly bubbles over with fun and merriment. The scene represents a rock in the ocean, over which the waves dash in foam, tossing white spray high into the air. Clinging fast to the wet rock are the gleaming forms of naiads, their tails shining like jewels in the seething waters, and, as the waves dash one on top of another, so do these creatures of the sea chase each other in their frolic, darting here and diving there, and tumbling heels over head from the rock into the ocean beneath, whose roar almost drowns their shrill laughter. All is life and movement. The sputtering triton and the luckless baby, holding in his convulsive clasp the prize he has captured, a lit- tle fish, rank among the inimitable creations of Bocklin's art."
In speaking of the somewhat startling effect of the colors in this picture, the Comte de Montesquieu says: "This is the most astonishing of all Bocklin's representations of the sea. The water gleams with hues as violent as those reflected by the Faraglioni, the red rocks which, seen from Capri, mirror their purple shadows in the blue waves. One of the naiads, with her back turned to us, seems to set the water on fire with the brilliancy of her orange-colored hair, while all the naiads' tails, wet and glistening, glow with the gorgeous hues of butterflies' wings or the petals of brilliant flowers."
The picture is on canvas, and measures nearly five feet high by five feet eight inches wide,
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BOCK LIN 41
A LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL PAINTINGS BY BOCKLIN IN PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
FOR more complete lists pf Bocklin' s works than it is possible to give in the present limited space, the reader is referred to the publication entitled 'Arnold Bocklin. Eine Auswahl seiner hervorragendsten Werke,' etc. (Photographische Union, Munich, 1893- 1901), and to Henri Mendelsohn's monograph on the artist (Berlin, 1901). Many of Bocklin's paintings, indeed the greater number, are in private possession, principally in Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. The following list includes only those which are in col- lections accessible to the public.
AUSTRIA. VIENNA, MODERN GALLERY: An Idyl of the Sea; Portrait of Lenbach JL GERMANY. BERLIN NATIONAL GALLERY: The Regions of the Blessed; The Hermit (Plate i); Pieta; The Descent from the Cross; Surf of the Sea; A Spring Day; Centaur and Nymph; Portrait of Wallenreiter; Portrait of Bocklin (Page 106); Portrait of Fr. Dr. Fiedler BREMEN, KUNSTHALLE: The Adventurer BRESLAU, SILESIAN MU- SEUM: Lute-player; Sanctuary of Hercules; Castle attacked by Pirates CARLSRUHE, MU- SEUM: Poverty and Care COLOGNE, MUSEUM: Castle attacked by Pirates DRESDEN, ROYAL GALLERY: Syrinx fleeing from Pan; Family of Fauns; War; A Summer Day; Springtime FRANKFORT, STADEL INSTITUTE: Villa by the Sea HAMBURG, KUNST- HALLE: Silence of the Forest; Portrait of Bocklin; Portrait of Augusto Fratelli LEIPSIC, MUSEUM: The Island of Death; A Spring Song MAGDEBURG, MUSEUM: Family of Tritons MUNICH, NEW PINAKOTHEK: Pan among the Reeds; Sport of the Waves (Plate in) MUNICH, SCHACK GALLERY: Ideal Landscape; The Anchorite; Pan fright- ening a Goatherd (Plate vin); The Villa by the Sea (Plate v); The Villa by the Sea; The Shepherd's Lament; Murderer pursued by Furies; The Rocky Gorge (Plate iv); A Shep- herdess and her Flock; Ideal Spring Landscape; The Road to Emmaus; A Sacred Grove; Old Roman Tavern in Spring; The Ride of Death; Italian Villain Spring; Nereid and Triton STUTTGART GALLERY: Villa by the Sea; Roman Landscape SWITZERLAND. AARAU, SOCIETY OF ART: Muse of Anacreon BASLE, MUSEUM: [STAIRCASE] (frescos) Birth of Gaa; Flora with her Children; Apollo; Medusa; [PICTURE GALLERY] Naiads at Play (Plate x); Vita Somnium Breve (Plate vn); Portrait of the Artist in his Studio; Melancholy; Diana Hunting; Viola; Mary Magdalene weeping over the Body of Christ; Battle of Centaurs; Odysseus and Calypso; Petrarch; The Sacred Grove (Plate ix); The Plague (unfinished); Portrait of Luise Schmidt; Portrait of Prof. Jacob Mahly; Head of a Roman; Two Landscapes; Two Mountain Scenes BASLE, SOCIETY OF ARTISTS: Portrait of Frau Bocklin as a Muse BERNE, MUSEUM: The Silence of the Ocean LUCERNE, MUSEUM: Landscape with Moors ZURICH, SOCIETY OF ARTISTS: The Awakening of Spring; In the Arbor.
Bockltn
A LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL BOOKS AND MAGAZINE ARTICLES DEALING WITH BOCKLIN
ARNOLD BOCKLIN. Eine Auswahl seiner hervorragendsten Werke in Photogravure mit einer Biographic des Kiinstlers von Prof. H. A. Schmid. Munich, 1893-1901 BERGGRUEN, O. Auserlesene Gemalde der Galerie Schack. Vienna, 1886 COOK, C. C. Art and Artists of Our Time. New York [1888] FENDLER, A. Fiinfzehn Holzschnitte nach Gemalde von Bocklin. Leipsic [1898] FLOERKE, G. Zehn Jahre mit Bocklin. Munich, 1901 FREY, A. Arnold Bocklin, nach den Erinnerungen seiner Zurcher Freunde. Stuttgart, 1903 GRIMM, H. Zehn ausgewahlte Essays. Berlin, 1883
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42 MASTERS IN ART
GRIMM, H. Fragmente. Berlin, 1900 HAACK, F. Die Kunst des xix Jahrhunderts. Stuttgart, 1905 HAENDTKE, B. Bocklin in seiner historischen und kunstlerischen Ent- wicklung. Hamburg, 1890 HANSSON, O. SeherundDeuter. Berlin, 1894 LASIUS, O. Arnold Bocklin. Berlin, 1903 LEHRS, M. Arnold Bocklin, ein Leitfaden zum Verstandniss seiner Kunst. Munich, 1897 LICHTWARK, A. DieSeeleund das Kunstwerk. Berlin, 1900
MANSKOPF, J. Bocklin' s Kunst und die Religion. Munich, 1905 MEIER-GRAEFE, J. Entwickelungsgeschichte der modernen Kunst. Stuttgart, 1904 MEISSNER, F. H. Arnold Bocklin. Berlin, 1898 MENDELSOHN, H. Bocklin. Berlin,i9oi MUTHER, R. The History of Modern Painting. London, 1895 OSTINI, F. VON. Arnold Bocklin. Leipsic, 1904 PECHT, F. Deutsche Kiinstler des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts. Nordlingen,
1887 RITTER, W. Arnold Bocklin. Ghent, 1893 SCHACK, GRAF v. Meine Gemaldesammlung. Stuttgart, 1881 SEIDEL, P. Die Werke Bocklins in der Schack- galerie zu Miinchen. Munich, 1902 TSCHUDI, H. v. Die Werke Bocklins in der Kgl. Nationalgalerie in Berlin. Munich, 1901.
MAGAZINE ARTICLES
ARCHITECTURAL RECORD, 1903: H. Lespinasse; Bocklin as a Sculptor of the XA. Grotesque L'ARTE, 1901: A. Colasanti; La mostra Bocklin. 1901: W. von Seidlitz; Notizie di Germania ARTIST, 1901: S. C. de Soissons; Arnold Bocklin ART JOURNAL, 1888: H. Zimmern; Arnold Bocklin. 1904: A. MacMahon; Arnold Bocklin BASLER JAHRBUCH, 1902: A. von Salis; Erinnerungen an Bocklin CON- TEMPORARY REVIEW, 1905: S. C. de Soissons; Arnold Bocklin CRAFTSMAN, 1905: A. von Ende ; Arnold Bocklin CRITIC, 1901: C. Brinton ; Arnold Bocklin DEUTSCHE REVUE, 1895: J. Mahly; Aus Bocklin' s Lehrjahren GAZETTE DES BEAUX- ARTS, 1883: J. Laforgue; Le Salon de Berlin. 1893: F. H. Meissner; Arnold Bocklin
GEGENWART, 1890: H. Kaatz; Der Realismus Bocklins. 1890: C. Sterne; Bocklin's Kabelwesen im Lichte der org^nischen Formenlehre DIE KUNST, 1900: P.Schumann; Arnold Bocklin. 1901 : H. von Tschudi; Arnold Bocklin. 1902: Gustav Floerke; Wie urteilte Bocklin uber moderne Malerei? 1902: G. Floerke; Zur kunstlerischen Charakter- istik Bocklins. 1902: H. von Tschudi; Die Werke Arnold Bocklins in der Kgl. Na- tionalgalerit zu Berlin. 1902: G. Winkler; Graf Schack und Bocklin. 1902: H. Wolfflin; Arnold Bocklin. 1905^. Manskopf; Bocklin's Kindergestalten. 1905: H. A. Schmid; Meier-Graefe contra Bocklin KUNST FUR ALLE, 1886: H. Helferich; Schweizer Reisebuch. 1887: F. Pecht; Zu Bocklin's sechzigstem Geburtstag. 1894: C. Gurlitt; Arnold Bocklin KUNST UNSERER ZEiT,i894: F. H. Meissner; Arnold Bocklin. 1904: F. von Ostini; Arnold Bocklin MAGAZINE OF ART, 1885: C. Phillips; Arnold Bocklin
NATION, 1898: K. Francke; Arnold Bocklin NOUVELLE REVUE, 1897: R. comte de Montesquieu; Arnold Bocklin PAN, 1897: H. A. Schmid; Arnold Bocklin. 1898: F. Laban; Der Musaget Bocklins.. 1898: A. Lichtwark; Die Bocklin Ausstellung in Berlin und Hamburg. 1898: H. A. Schmid; Bocklins Skizzen. 1898: R. Schick; Tagebuch-Aufzeichi.ungen uber Arnold Bocklin, herausgegeben von H. von Tschudi PREUSSISCHE JAHRBUCHER, 1893: K. Neumann; Arnold Bocklin. 1898: C. Broicher; Von den Ausstellungen in Basel und Berlin REVUE DES DEUX-MONDES, 1897: E. Rod; Le Jubile d'un artiste Balois SEWANEE REVIEW, 1902: G. B. Rose; Arnold Bocklin STUDIO, 1896: H. Singer; On the Work of Bocklin UBER LAND UND MEER, 1897: C. Bocklin; Arnold Bocklin UNSERE ZEIT, 1888: Fritz Lemmermayer; Arnold Bocklin
VOM FELS ZUM MEER, 1884: E. Koppel; Arnold Bocklin WESTERMANNS MONATS- HEFTE, 1884: O. Baisch; Arnold Bocklin ZEITSCHRIFT FUR BILDENDE KUNST, 1897- 98: F. Haack; Arnold Bocklin zu seinem 70 Geburtstage.
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