Part 2

But the city of Dierick Bouts, of Albert van Ouwater, of Jan Scorel, was at the time of Ostade’s birth, in a condition even more favourable for the production of fine work than it had been in the fifteenth and following centuries. In 1573 occurred the famous siege by the Spaniards. Those who had borne the burden of those terrible days were now growing old; but the young generation received and handed on their heroic memories, unembittered by thoughts of loss, suffering, or defeat. And when, in 1609, peace came, and the United Provinces, acknowledged by Spain, turned to enjoy their victorious repose, there was added the sense of triumph to that of trials endured. It was the great time for Holland. Her soldiers were famed as the finest in Europe. Her navy was the most powerful, the best-manned. Her cities grew, and wealth poured into them. A universal well-being pervaded the country, and a spirit of joy and of expansion, like the glow of health, diffused itself in the citizens.

It was natural that art, too, should feel this new influence. And in Haarlem, where the siege had destroyed so much of the old town, and modern buildings of warm red brick had sprung round the vast surviving monument of the middle ages, the Groote Kerk of St. Bavon; in Haarlem especially, a new spirit, intensely modern, began to possess the rising painters. From art which lavished its parade of dexterity on the old mythological fables, handled without heart or meaning, from the smooth and pallid conventionalities of Cornelis Corneliszoon, and the extravagant cleverness of Goltzius, these men turned to the life that was around them. Among them were artists like Jan de Bray, Esaias van de Velde, Dirk and Frans Hals. It was in the studio of Frans Hals that the young Ostade learnt to paint. Already in 1616, Hals had painted his superb group of the civic guard, and was now in the fulness of his extraordinary power. The exuberant joy and energy, the confident sincerity, the swift and certain touch, intimate with realities, that marked Hals, were typical of the country and the time. Life--that is the

absolute necessity for such an artist: for him everything that has life is a possible subject, a possible realm to conquer. A subject that he cannot feel, as well as conceive, his instinct rejects at once. A great pride of life is what characterises Hals’ pictures human life in all its fulness he accepts: unhindered by the shrinkings of more fastidious natures, he enjoys with a robust enjoyment.

It is the same also with Ostade; but the pupil was too individual an artist to repeat his master. Ostade felt, perhaps, that he could never rival those magnificent portrait-groups, and his own preferences, his own gifts, led him to a different choice of subject.

Perhaps some who have seen Ostade’s pictures and found them coarse and ignoble, have imagined the painter of them to be equally coarse and ignoble-looking as his boors. His portrait shows him a man of somewhat severe, keen countenance, in plain attire; a grave man, one would say, with humour lurking in his gravity, as often happens; it is a portrait that might be taken for that of an Englishman of the Commonwealth. Ostade was, in fact, a well-to-do citizen of the middle class. His collection of pictures, sold at his death in 1685, was, as we know from the _Haarlem Gazette_, extensive; and the fact that it contained two hundred of his own paintings, proves that he was, unlike so many of his compeers, far removed from want.

Of Ostade’s life, apart from his production, we know almost nothing. He was a member of the _Oude Schuts_, the ancient and honourable Company of Arquebusiers. He was married twice; first, in 1636, to Machtelgen Pietersen, who died in 1642; and again to a second wife, whose name is not known, by whom he had a girl, Johanna Maria. This daughter married a surgeon, Dirk van der Stoel, into whose hands Ostade’s etched plates and proofs passed at his death.

In 1647 and 1661 Ostade is mentioned as a member of the government of the Guild. In 1662, he was dean of the Guild. An incident of his earlier years is of interest, as showing his liberal spirit. In 1642 he joined Salomon Ruysdael, at a meeting of the Guild, in protesting against the policy of protection, which inspired Haarlem Guild, like many others, to oppose the importation of works of art from other towns or their sale in Haarlem.

Ostade seems never to have travelled, like many of his countrymen, beyond the borders of Holland, nor ever to have changed his home, except from one street of Haarlem to another.

He died in 1685.

On an early afternoon of May his body was carried from his house in the Kuis-straat to the Groote Kerk, a little company of his friends following.

II

With most of the Dutch artists, etching was a subordinate accomplishment, and their work on copper is but a less interesting reflection of their work on canvas. This cannot be said of Ostade. As with Rembrandt, his etched work is the complement, rather than a supplement merely, of his painting. To the present writer, indeed, his etchings have more interest than his pictures. The latter are numerous; they may be seen in almost all galleries of importance, and the reader is doubtless familiar with their characteristics. Delightful as they often are, they do not rival those of Adriaen Brouwer, who was by four years Ostade’s senior, and who, though born a Fleming, worked mostly in Holland, and entered Hals’ studio at the same time. There are a few plates attributed to Brouwer; but, if genuine, these show that he never thoroughly mastered the technique of etching; none of them approaches the least successful plates of Ostade. Brouwer as a painter, on the other hand, surpasses beyond question all the painters of peasant life, whether of Holland or of Flanders.

Ostade does not manage paint with the freedom of a great master, but his drawing is always superb. The drawing reproduced (Fig. 3) is a characteristic specimen. It is the end of a game of backgammon. The game is won, but the defeated player refuses to accept his defeat without a careful scrutiny. In the attitudes, the gestures of players and onlookers, everything is vital; the moment is admirably caught.

There is an etching also of a game of backgammon, but it does not directly illustrate the drawing.

Ostade did, however, make use of sketches for his etchings. There is in the British Museum a sketch for _The Father of a Family_ (B. 33). A comparison of this with the etched plate is interesting. There is a certain affinity to Rembrandt in the manner of drawing; less summary and swift, but masterful and free. And, like Rembrandt, Ostade does not use his sketch as a finished thing, and copy it faithfully and minutely. His

interest in the subject has not died out; he is alert for a new posture, a fresh touch, a livelier handling of some part of his design, that may improve the whole. In this case the drawing, which is of a different shape from the print and much broader, contains at the left the figure of a man seated and cutting a loaf of bread on his knees. Ostade felt that this figure disturbed the unity of the piece no less than the sense of home seclusion, and he omitted it from his work on the copper. This reveals the born etcher: one who works with directness, swiftness, passion; whose needle takes the impulse of his thought immediately, who never works in cold blood.

III

Let us now consider the etchings themselves. There are just fifty in all, and nine or perhaps ten of the number are dated. The earliest date is 1647, the latest 1678. Arranging the dated plates in order of time, we get the following table. The references are to the numbers in Bartsch, _Peintre-Graveur_, Vol. I.:--

1647.

The Hurdy-Gurdy Player. B. 8. The Barn. B. 23. The Family. B. 46.

1648.

The Father of the Family. B. 33.

1652.

The Wife Spinning. B. 31.

1653.

The Tavern Brawl. B. 18. Saying Grace. B. 34.

1671.

The Cobbler. B. 27.

1678.[1]

The Child and the Doll. B. 16.

To this may possibly be added _The Humpbacked Fiddler_ (B. 44). Neither Bartsch nor Dutuit appears to have noticed a date on this plate; but it seems clear that it is there, following the signature, though obscured by lines. The writer inclines to decipher it as 1631 or 1651; but it is impossible to be positive on the point. These data would doubtless serve many critics with material for constructing a chronological list of the whole of the etchings. But this amusement shall be left to the reader. The etchings, as a matter of fact, do not present any marked variety of treatment. Ostade was not, like Rembrandt, a master of many styles; nor did he develop any particular style by continually surpassing his own successes. We can only say that he seems to have attained his greatest mastery in a middle period, about 1650. _The Wife Spinning_ of 1652 is not followed by any dated piece that at all rivals it. _The Cobbler_ of 1671, for instance, which was a failure in the first biting, betrays also a certain languor of handling, very different from the inexhaustible care and skill bestowed on the earlier plate.

This inference is confirmed by what we know of Ostade’s work on canvas. His first period dates from 1630 to 1635; then follows a middle period in which, influenced by Rembrandt, he adopted a warmer scheme of colour; lastly, in a third period, he began to repeat himself and decline.

Beyond such general deductions it does not seem worth while to go. In Rembrandt’s case the question of chronology is of extreme interest and significance, but in Ostade there is no development to speak of, and to labour after exhibiting it would be waste of time.

Next, as to the various states of the etchings. The reverence for first states and rare states, common to collectors, has from their point of view its own justification; but they are apt perhaps sometimes to confuse the æsthetic value of a print with its market value. Artists, on the other hand, are sometimes prone to dismiss the whole question of states as tedious and absurd. It is, however, of great importance that the etcher should be judged on his own merits and not on the merits, or demerits, of other people. Ostade undoubtedly made alterations in his plates during printing and thus created “states”; but many more states were created after his death by other hands re-working the worn copper.

It is reasonable to suppose that the last state touched by the artist is the one that he would wish to be taken as typical of his perfect work.

But the question arises: Which is the last state touched by the artist?

The work of later hands, added to a plate after the artist’s death, does not concern us; but the development of the etching up to that state when the artist leaves it as a finished thing, must interest us greatly. How are we to decide?

In the case of Ostade, we are helped a little by external data. As we

have seen, the plates were sold at his death in 1685. We know also that they were sold again by their new possessor, Dirk van der Stoel, Ostade’s son-in-law, in 1686; and eight years later again, in 1694. What state they were in then we can only conjecture: but we may infer something from what we know to have been their state in 1710 or a little later.

In the year just mentioned a French engraver, Bernard Picart, arrived in Holland; and some time after his arrival he published a collection of the etched work of Ostade and of his pupil Bega. The book of Ostade’s etchings was bought, perhaps on its publication, by Hans Sloane: and through him it has passed into the possession of the British Museum. Whoever examines it will notice at once the inequality of the plates: some are worn and harshly retouched, some are passable, a few are even good. Something of this is due to the delicately-worked plates, giving out sooner than those more coarsely etched. Probably also some were more in demand than others. Thus, to take a few examples: while _The Painter in His Studio_ (B. 32) is in the tenth and last state, and _Peasant Paying His Reckoning_ (B. 42) is in the seventh or last but one, _The Dance in the Tavern_ (B. 49) is in the fourth out of seven states in all, and _The Empty Jug_ (B. 15) in the fourth out of eight states in all. And several of the smaller plates are still in the second state.

In determining therefore the extent to which later hands have worked on the etchings, each must be considered separately. Only in a few cases, probably, are those in Picart’s edition still in the condition left by the master himself; and most seem to have been retouched more than once. Every one will judge for himself the precise point at which new work comes in: and opinion will always differ on such questions. As Ostade was not always successful in his first biting, the second state is generally the most representative. _Peasant Paying His Reckoning_ is a very different thing in Picart’s edition from the brilliant second state of the same etching.

The student of Ostade will find Dutuit’s book[2] indispensable: it contains all that was known of the etchings and their different impressions up to the year of its publication. And the author’s own collection was perhaps unrivalled. Nevertheless, it is not perfect. The states are described with an extraordinary superfluity of detail, and the one or two differentiating circumstances are buried in a mass of irrelevant description. Verification is therefore a matter of time and labour.

There are also a few states still undescribed. Still, for those who have an appetite for “states,” Dutuit is very satisfying.

IV

Ostade’s etched work is, considered as etching, unequal. Sometimes, as for instance in _The Cobbler_ (B. 27), the first biting was not a success; at other times, as in the _Man Laughing_ (B. 4), the _Saying Grace_ (B. 34), or the _Fiddlers_ (B. 45), the plate has been over-bitten. The plate which Bartsch calls _La Fileuse_ (_The Wife Spinning_. B. 31) [Plate I.], is one which represents very fully some of Ostade’s characteristic excellences as an etcher. It is a fine example of his success in bathing his subject in atmosphere. One feels the quiet afternoon warmth upon the cottage-front, as the woman who spins feels it, as the child feels it, as the two basking pigs feel it. That softness of air, which in our northern climate gives even to the near trees a kind of impalpable look, and which seems to clothe things with itself--that is what Ostade has sought to render with mere etched lines; and he has triumphed over immense difficulties. His figures detach themselves with a wonderful reality, with no hard brilliancy, no superfluous shadows. There is a fine absence of cleverness in such quiet mastery of means.

More remarkable still is the little plate (B. 42) which is reproduced in Fig. 8. The amount of knowledge, of feeling for light and shadow, of subtle and sure draughtsmanship in this small etching is astonishing. The problem of painting daylight as it is diffused in a room through the window, which, of all painters in the world, Jan Vermeer and Pieter de Hooch, and, in a different way, Rembrandt and Ostade himself, have most fully mastered, is here attacked in etching, and with extraordinary success. What seems strange is that a problem so fascinating, one which had evidently a strong seduction for Ostade in his painting, should have been attempted by him so rarely in his etchings. _The Painter in his Studio_ (B. 32) is another success in the same line, while the _Players at Backgammon_ (B. 39) is partly a failure, through the biting having gone wrong. But, as a rule, Ostade prefers out-of-door effects.

None of the etchings quite rivals, in the writer’s judgment at least, this little plate, _Peasant Paying his Reckoning_. But there are several typical small pieces which have a great charm. The _Spectacle-seller_ (B. 22, Fig. 1), for instance, is an admirable composition, and the

etching rich. The _Humpbacked Fiddler_ (B. 44, Fig. 7), and the _Man and Woman Conversing_ (B. 25, Fig. 5), though the needle has been used somewhat differently in each, have similar merit.

But the plates that interest, perhaps, most, are not always those which are etched the best. The chief glory of Ostade is his imaginative draughtsmanship, and akin to this are his vivid human sympathy and his humour. These are not so manifest in the plates we have mentioned as in some others.

But before passing to those pieces which show these qualities at their

best, let us notice one which is unlike any of the others. This is _The Barn_ (B. 28, Fig. 6). Had the execution of this plate matched the feeling it evinces, it would have been a fine achievement. Who does not know the strange, vague impression which such a barn as this produces on the mind? The cool dimness, the mysterious shadow among the rafters, penetrated here and there by soft rays, the atmosphere of the farm, scent of hay, cries of fowls, mingling in a sense of imperturbable antiquity--all exhale an intangible emotion impossible to express in language, but which a painting or an etching could well convey. Ostade has conceived his subject finely; but the acid and the needle have imperfectly seconded his design. Rembrandt would have given us out of such material a memorable plate indeed. But let us not deny Ostade his due. Much in the piece is admirable: note especially the softness with which the light comes through the chinks on to the hay.

In _The Angler_ (B. 26, Fig. 10) the difficulties attempted are less great, and there seems little wanting to entire success. Here Ostade’s human interest is engaged, and whenever this is so, he is great. The stationary posture, the muscular habit of the angler, with lax body but firm wrist, is perfectly given; as is the slackening of the line, the indolent gaze of the boy leaning on the rail, and the sleepy impression of a still summer day without breezes.

It is in such expressive drawing of the human body that Ostade shows himself a master. The delighted eagerness of the baby in Fig. 4; the jerk of its short limbs and crowing of its lips; or in _The Music Party_ (B. 30), the boisterous, maudlin pleasure of the man who sits in the chair, beating time with his hand to the laborious scraping of the fiddler, catching what he can of the score, with what humour and expression are these portrayed! One hears the terrible discord and the cheerful thump of the peasant’s fist accompanying it.

Another piece of imaginative drawing is _The Brawl_ (B. 18). The loose, ineffectual, lurching stroke of the drunken man, the startled effort of the fat man as he springs up from his barrel, the terror of the woman clasping her baby closer, the mingled fear, anger, and surprise of the little man who has provoked the quarrel and prepares to defend himself--all are excellent.

The same qualities pervade Ostade’s largest plate, the _Dance in the Tavern_ (B. 49), which also shows his extraordinary art in composition at its best.

There are people, and perhaps always will be, who find in work such as Ostade’s nothing but vulgarity. And some, who cannot help enjoying his fine drawing, find themselves repelled by his choice of subjects.

It seems difficult to understand this repulsion. For in his etchings, at any rate, Ostade shows no exclusive preference for the coarse and sordid. Mr. Hamerton has accused him of deadness of heart and apathy of intellect, and declares him to be insensitive to all that is best among the poor. But is this quite true?

An accomplished lady some time ago wrote an essay in condemnation of the “vulgarity” of John Leech and Charles Keene in certain of their drawings for _Punch_. Such criticism seems to argue an excessive delicacy or a deficiency of humour. Ostade’s range was limited, compared with that of those two great artists, but as a draughtsman he is in the same order with them; and in the writer’s judgment he is equally free from that dulness which has no sense for the fine or rare in men and things, that acceptance of the common price, the common standard, which are the attributes of real vulgarity.

Look, for instance, at the etching reproduced (Fig. 9). The subject has been the theme of many painters and engravers. It is a subject easily spoiled; a little too much of sentimental piety, a little too much of satirical mockery, and the theme is made trivial or obvious. But Ostade’s feeling is just right. There is no drawing of a trite moral, as, for instance, in the treatment of the same subject by a later engraver, Nicholas van Haeften. Nor is there a hint of mockery at the discrepancy between the “good things” for which Heaven is thanked and the humble pottage on the table. But is there not, besides the wonderful sensitiveness of drawing in the figures, which makes one feel how the toil-hardened, clumsy hands tremble awkwardly as they are clasped, and how the boy, though his back is turned, is shutting his eyes resolutely tight--is there not also a tenderness, a dignity in the whole?

Again, in the little plate, _The Child and Doll_, is there not true feeling, expressed with a fine reticence, in the mother’s face and in the child’s? The careful fondness of the mother is even better expressed in another etching, where she hands a baby down to the eager arms of its elder sister, a child of six or seven, who receives it with joyful pride. The drawing reminds one of some of the exquisitely humorous and exquisitely tender sketches of Leech.

V

It is when we come to the work of his pupils, Bega and Dusart, that we realise best Ostade’s finer qualities.

Cornelis Pietersz Bega was born at Haarlem in 1620, and died there of the plague in 1664, fully twenty years before his master.

According to Houbraken’s story, his real name was Begyn, which he changed to Bega after being turned out of his father’s house for his youthful escapades. The story is not incredible of such a youth as he appears in his portrait, gay and somewhat vain-looking, with long curling locks.

Bega’s etchings are thirty-eight in number, and have a very distinctive air. Certain characteristics seem to indicate that his original bent was towards a decorative treatment of his subject. His drawings show a care for the happy disposition of drapery, remarkable in this school. He has a feeling for large design, combined with great indifference to human character. But such treatment was alien to the Dutch school in general; nor did Dutch peasants lend themselves at all willingly, so it seems, to passive decoration. Certainly a pupil of Ostade’s would have no encouraging influences to help him forward on such lines. So, though Bega adopts in part the themes and general handling of his teacher, the rather flat design which he affects, his frankly artificial chiaroscuro, his use of light and shadow as masses of black and white rather than as opportunities of mystery, contrast strongly with Ostade’s solid modelling, his pervading atmosphere, and his pre-occupying human interest. One perceives that the master’s influence could not altogether swamp the pupil’s natural impulse: but neither wins the day, and the result is an unsatisfying compromise.

_The Tavern_ (Fig. 11) is a very characteristic plate. It is very brilliant, and makes a powerful impression at first sight. But it does not bear close study. There is a want of subtlety in it, and a want of feeling; a certain hardness, combined with a certain cleverness, that repels.

Bega’s two other large plates, also of tavern scenes, reveal just the same qualities, and need not be further particularised.