Part 1
MASTERPIECES IN COLOUR EDITED BY - - T. LEMAN HARE
HANS MEMLINC (?) 1425-1494
IN THE SAME SERIES
ARTIST. AUTHOR. VELAZQUEZ. S. L. BENSUSAN. REYNOLDS. S. L. BENSUSAN. TURNER. C. LEWIS HIND. ROMNEY. C. LEWIS HIND. GREUZE. ALYS EYRE MACKLIN. BOTTICELLI. HENRY B. BINNS. ROSSETTI. LUCIEN PISSARRO. BELLINI. GEORGE HAY. FRA ANGELICO. JAMES MASON. REMBRANDT. JOSEF ISRAELS. LEIGHTON. A. LYS BALDRY. RAPHAEL. PAUL G. KONODY. HOLMAN HUNT. MARY E. COLERIDGE. TITIAN. S. L. BENSUSAN. MILLAIS. A. LYS BALDRY. CARLO DOLCI. GEORGE HAY. GAINSBOROUGH. MAX ROTHSCHILD. TINTORETTO. S. L. BENSUSAN. LUINI. JAMES MASON. FRANZ HALS. EDGCUMBE STALEY. VAN DYCK. PERCY M. TURNER. LEONARDO DA VINCI. M. W. BROCKWELL. RUBENS. S. L. BENSUSAN. WHISTLER. T. MARTIN WOOD. HOLBEIN. S. L. BENSUSAN. BURNE-JONES. A. LYS BALDRY. VIGÉE LE BRUN. C. HALDANE MACFALL. CHARDIN. PAUL G. KONODY. FRAGONARD. C. HALDANE MACFALL. MEMLINC. W. H. J. & J. C. WEALE. CONSTABLE. C. LEWIS HIND.
_In Preparation_
J. F. MILLET. PERCY M. TURNER. ALBERT DÜRER. HERBERT FURST. RAEBURN. JAMES L. CAW. BOUCHER. C. HALDANE MACFALL. WATTEAU. C. LEWIS HIND. MURILLO. S. L. BENSUSAN. JOHN S. SARGENT, R.A. T. MARTIN WOOD.
AND OTHERS.
MEMLINC
BY W. H. J. & J. C. WEALE
ILLUSTRATED WITH EIGHT REPRODUCTIONS IN COLOUR
LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK NEW YORK: FREDERICK A. STOKES CO.
CONTENTS
Chap. Page
I. Hans Memlinc 11 II. Early Days and Training 19 III. Earliest Works 25 IV. Characteristics of His Early Works 31 V. The Maturity of His Art 36 VI. Masterpieces and Death 53 VII. Effacement and Vindication of His Types 66
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Plate Page
I. Our Lady and Child, 1487 Frontispiece (Saint John’s Hospital, Bruges)
II. Adoration of the Magi, 1479 14 (Saint John’s Hospital, Bruges)
III. Saints Christopher, Maurus, and Giles, 1484 24 (Town Museum, Bruges)
IV. Portrait of Nicholas di Forzore Spinelli, holding a medal 34 (Antwerp Museum)
V. Portrait of Martin van Nieuwenhove, 1487 (companion to I.) 40 (Saint John’s Hospital, Bruges)
VI. One Panel of the Shrine of Saint Ursula, 1489 50 (Saint John’s Hospital, Bruges)
VII. Portrait of an Old Lady 60 (Louvre, Paris)
VIII. The Blessed Virgin and Child, with Saint George and the Donor 70 (National Gallery, London, No. 686)
MEMLINC
I
HANS MEMLINC
Already, before the advent of the House of Burgundy, Bruges had attained the height of her prosperity. From a small military outpost of civilisation, built to stay the advance of the ravaging Northmen, she had developed through four short centuries of a strenuous existence into one of the three leading cities of northern Europe. Born to battle, fighting had been her abiding lot with but scant intervals of peace, and as it had been under the rule of her long line of Flemish counts, so it continued with increased vehemence during the century of French domination that followed, the incessant warring of suzerain and vassal being further complicated and embittered by internecine strife with the rival town of Ghent. But she emerged from the ordeal with her vitality unsapped, her industrial capabilities unabated, her commercial supremacy unshaken. Her population had reached the high total of a hundred and fifty thousand; she overlorded an outport with a further thirty thousand inhabitants, a seaport, and a number of subordinate townships. The staple of wool was established at her centre, and she was the chief emporium of the cities of the Hanseatic League. Vessels from all quarters of the globe crowded her harbours, her basins, and canals, as many as one hundred and fifty being entered inwards in the twenty-four hours. Factories of merchants from seventeen kingdoms were settled there as agents, and twenty foreign consuls had palatial residences within her walls. Her industrial life was a marvel of organisation, where fifty-four incorporated associations or guilds with a membership of many thousands found constant employment.
The artistic temperament of the people had necessarily developed on the ruder lines, in the architectural embellishment of the city, the beautifying of its squares and streets, its churches and chapels, its municipal buildings and guild halls, its markets and canal embankments. “The squares,” we are told, “were adorned with fountains, its bridges with statues in bronze, the public buildings and many of the private houses with statuary and carved work, the beauty of which was heightened and brought out by polychrome and gilding; the windows were rich with storied glass, and the walls of the interiors adorned with paintings in distemper, or hung with gorgeous tapestry.” But of the highest forms of Art--of literature, of music, and of painting--there was slender token. The atmosphere in which the Flemings had pursued their destinies was little calculated to develop any other than the harder and more matter-of-fact side of their nature. True, here as elsewhere, and from the earliest period of her history the great monastic institutions which dotted the country had done much for the cultivation of Art, as the remains of wood sculpture, mural paintings, and numerous illuminated manuscripts amply testify. But no great school of painting had arisen or was even possible, so true is it that the development of the artistic instincts of the community require the contemplative repose and fostering inspiration of peace. In the truest sense of the term the Flemings were not a cultured artistic race: they had certainly a high standard of taste, but their artistic sense was appreciative rather than creative--even so, a notable advance for a nation of warriors and merchants.
With the succession of the House of Burgundy to the French domination an entirely new era was ushered in. If the ambition of this new line of princes was unbounded, equally so was the success which attended its pursuit; their authority increased by leaps and bounds, and soon their court had become the wealthiest and most powerful in Europe. The high notions they entertained of their own dignity brooked no compeer in the pomp and glitter of their state. The display the guild and merchant princes and foreign representatives were capable of they should outdo: the splendour of their sovereignty should blur the brilliancy of mere civic ostentation. But while they revelled in the outward show of their supremacy, they viewed with jealous eye the great wealth and large measure of liberties enjoyed by their subjects. Their needs were great, the resources of the people commensurate; and in the alternate confiscation and resale of these liberties they found a remunerative source of revenue. But if the dukes were arrogant and unscrupulous, their subjects were no cravens, and civic shrewdness often proved more than a match for ducal craft. A fine sense of humour, however, suggested the policy of keeping these lusty burghers fully diverted the while they were not being bled or chastened: hence the constant recurrence of pacifications and triumphal entries, of regal processions and gorgeous tournaments, of public banquets and bewildering revels. It was an era of pomp and pageantry unparalleled in history, the success of which required the services of the highest talents of the day--the foremost artists to enhance its magnificence, the leading writers to chronicle its marvels.
It was Duke Philip III. who requisitioned the services of John van Eyck and showered on him bounty and patronage, and if his reign had proved as uneventful as it was the reverse, Philip’s name would still survive in the reflected glory of this prince of painting. The declining days of the great duke, stricken with imbecility, certainly offered no inducement to foreign artists on the lookout for court patronage. But with his death, on the 15th of June 1467, the entire prospect was changed. Charles the Bold now succeeded to the dukedom: his solemn entry into the Flemish capital took place on Palm Sunday of the year following--an occasion marked by brilliant jousts and tournaments--and his home-coming with his bride, Margaret of York, some three months later. These events, the marriage festivities notably, called for a great array of talent, and among the leading artists engaged in planning and executing the magnificent decorations indulged in we find Peter Coustain and John Hennequart, the ducal painters; James Daret and Philip Truffin of Tournay; Francis Stoc and Livin van Lathem of Brussels; Daniel De Rycke and Hugo Van der Goes of Ghent; Govart of Antwerp; and John Du Château of Ypres. And here Hans Memlinc enters on the scene, already then a master-painter and accomplished artist, but of whom no previous record, of whose lifework no earlier trace, has been discovered.
II
EARLY DAYS AND TRAINING
As to where and when Memlinc was born, where he served his apprenticeship, and with whom he worked as a journeyman no documentary evidence has yet been discovered, and no one can confidently assert; but there exists a sufficiency of presumptive evidence to warrant certain conclusions with the help of which to construct a working biography. It appears probable that the family came from Memelynck, near Alkmaar, in north Holland, and settled at Deutichem, in Guelderland; and, on the strength of an entry copied from the diary kept by an ecclesiastical notary and clerk of the Chapter of Saint Donatian at Bruges during the years 1491 to 1498, that they subsequently removed to the ecclesiastical principality of Mainz. The subject of this monograph is likely to have been born, at some date between 1425 and 1435, either at some place within that principality, or at Deutichem previous to his parents’ removal. From our knowledge of the guild system which obtained in the middle ages throughout the north of Europe with but slight variation in the conditions of training and apprenticeship, and taking into consideration besides the typical characteristics of Memlinc’s work, it appears probable that he served his apprenticeship at Mainz, and afterwards worked at Cöln as a journeyman, and this opinion is confirmed by the outstanding fact that in all the wealth of architectural embellishment in which his pictures abound the only town outside Bruges whose buildings are faithfully reproduced is this noted centre of art. That he should have travelled thither for the especial purpose of securing an accurate background for the first, fifth, and sixth panels of the Shrine of Saint Ursula, and not have cared to obtain as faithful settings for the incidents of the second and fourth panels ascribed to Basel, or for that of the third panel located at Rome, will scarcely stand the test of criticism. A study of these panels evidences an intimate acquaintance with the architectural beauties of Cöln, a knowledge obviously acquired at first hand during a period of his life devoted to Art. The master under whom he worked was in all probability the Suabian, Stephen Löthener, of Mersburg, near Constance, who had settled in Cöln before 1442, and died there in 1452. It is presumable that Memlinc may not have completed his studies at the time of that painter’s death. In the circumstances one can but conjecture as to where he completed the necessary training before attaining to the rank of a master-painter. Vasari and Guicciardini both assert that Memlinc was at some time or other a pupil of Roger De la Pasture (Van der Weyden), and, as this master returned from Italy in 1450, he may have come across Memlinc at Cöln and engaged him as an assistant. It is, however, quite possible that Memlinc stayed on at Cöln until Löthener’s death in 1452 and then went to Brussels, doubtless passing by Louvain and possibly working for a time under Dirk Bouts. Certain it is, judging from the many points of similarity in their work, that Memlinc came under Roger’s influence for a space sufficiently long to leave a strong impress of that master’s methods on his art. Memlinc’s contemporary, Rumwold De Doppere, has left it on record that he was “then considered to be the most skilful and excellent painter in the whole of Christendom”; and if Memlinc had left nothing to perpetuate his fame but such gems as the Shrine of Saint Ursula, at Bruges, the “Passion of Our Lord,” in the Royal Museum at Turin, that remarkable altarpiece, “Christ the Light of the World,” in the Royal Gallery at Munich, or even, as Fromentin suggests, only those two figures of Saint Barbara and Saint Katherine in the large altarpiece at Bruges, he would need nothing of the reflected glory of his alleged master to enhance his renown. Always assuming Memlinc to have stood in this relation to De la Pasture, Sir Martin Conway came to a happy conclusion when he wrote that Roger’s greatest glory is that he produced such a pupil--“that Memlinc the artist was Roger’s greatest work.”
III
EARLIEST WORKS
The first painting to bespeak his industry is now supposed to have been the famous triptych of the Last Judgment in the Church of Saint Mary at Danzig, commenced after 1465 and finished in 1472 or early in 1473.
Few pictures have evoked more controversy or been coupled with the names of more artists than the Danzig triptych. The entry in a local church register of 1616 which asserts that it was painted in Brabant by John and George van Eichen, an ascription varied at a subsequent period by substituting the name of James for John, carries no more weight than usually attaches to popular traditions, and was generally disregarded by the connoisseurs and experts who have debated the question for more than a hundred years. The names of Albert van Ouwater, Michael Wohlgemuth, Hugh Van der Goes, Hubert and John van Eyck, Roger De la Pasture, and Dirk Bouts have all been canvassed with more or less assurance. Memlinc’s name was first associated with the work in 1843, by Hotho, whose opinion met with wide acceptance, a notable convert to his view being Dr. Waagen, who in 1860 declared the triptych to be “not only the most important work by Memlinc that has come down to our time, but also one of the masterpieces of the whole school, being far richer and better composed than the picture of the same subject by Roger De la Pasture at Beaune, though that master’s influence is still perceptible,” though two years later he recognised in the figures the influence of Dirk Bouts; and in 1899 Kämmerer as emphatically declared that “no one who is acquainted with Memlinc’s authentic works can possibly doubt that this picture is the work of his hand.” In the absence of contemporary documentary evidence, and with the donors of the picture still unidentified, confronted moreover with the fact that in its composition the Danzig triptych differs altogether from Memlinc’s authenticated paintings, many experienced judges still hesitated to admit the claim put forward in his behalf. But the recent discoveries made by Dr. A. Warburg leave little room for doubt. In the fifteenth century there was a considerable Italian colony at Bruges, and the powerful Florentine firm of the Medici, whose ramifications extended over all Europe, had a branch establishment there in the name of Piero and Giovanni de’ Medici, the acting manager of which from 1455 to 1466 was Angelo di Jacopo Tani, who, after serving as bookkeeper of the firm’s agency in London, had been transferred to Bruges in 1450. Tani may have taken Memlinc into his household with a view to the production of the triptych under his own eye. The absence of Memlinc’s name from the guild registers of the period lends probability to the theory that he was employed by Charles the Bold, for ducal service exempted painters settling in Bruges from the obligation of purchasing the right of citizenship, and of becoming members of the local guild. It is presumed that Tani engaged Memlinc’s services at some date after 1465 to paint or, if the work had been commenced by some other painter, to complete this picture. While the dexter shutter, representing the reception of the elect by Saint Peter at the gate of Heaven, can only have been designed by a pupil of Löthener, it is equally certain that the upper portion of the central panel must have been designed by some one who had worked under Bouts or De la Pasture. In 1466 Tani visited Florence, and there married Katherine, daughter of William Tanagli. As their portraits and arms are on the exterior of the shutters, these cannot have been commenced before they were both in Bruges, some time in 1467, the date inscribed on the slab covering a tomb on which a woman is seated. The technique and colouring of the entire work are Netherlandish, and in the opinion of the most trustworthy critics are certainly the work of Memlinc. The painting completed, it was, at the commencement of 1473, despatched by sea to Florence, but the vessel bearing it was captured by freebooters, and the picture as part of the prize carried off to Danzig.
The patronage of the agent of the Medici was of course of incalculable advantage to a rising artist, and doubtless it served to secure for Memlinc the interest of Spinelli of Arezzo--whose portrait, now in the van Ertborn collection at the Antwerp Museum, he painted in the latter half of 1467 or the beginning of 1468, when this Italian medallist was in the service of Charles the Bold as seal engraver--and to bring his growing reputation to the notice of the ducal court. The negotiations for the hand of Margaret of York, begun in December 1466, and unduly protracted owing no doubt to the mental incapacity of Duke Philip III., were of course resumed at the expiration of the period of court mourning after his death on 15th June 1467. Following the example of his father, Charles may have commissioned Memlinc to accompany his ambassadors to the English court for the purpose of securing an up-to-date portrait of his intended consort. In the circumstances Memlinc would certainly have made the acquaintance of Sir John Donne, for the Donnes were ardent Yorkists high in the royal favour, and moreover the brother of Sir John’s wife, William, first Lord Hastings, filled the office of Lord Chamberlain to the king. But the triptych in the Chatsworth collection, though the outcome of this meeting, could not have been executed at the time, as the period of Memlinc’s visit would have been restricted to carrying out the ducal instructions. An opportunity for the necessary sittings was afforded later, when Sir John Donne, accompanied by his wife and daughter, journeyed to Bruges in the suite of the princess to assist at the wedding celebrations in July 1468. The omission of the sons from the family group in the triptych is sufficiently accounted for by the fact that they were in Wales at the time.
IV
CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS EARLY WORKS
To the art student these earliest of Memlinc’s paintings--the Donne triptych in particular--are replete with interest. In the first place, they attest the powers then already at the painter’s command as an exponent of his art, and they further serve as a standard of comparison by which to judge his afterwork. Memlinc was pre-eminently a religious artist, deeply imbued with Scriptural lore and well versed in hagiography, a fund of knowledge sublimated in the beautiful mysticism of the school of Cöln which had early subjugated his poetic temperament. His conception of the Madonna, based on a fervent appreciation of the purity, the tenderness, and the majesty of her nature was deeply rooted, and it led him to evolve the definite type which he presents to us in the Chatsworth picture, to which he faithfully adheres henceforth, at times enhancing its beauty--as witness the triptych in the Louvre and the altarpiece of Saint John’s Hospital at Bruges--until his ideal culminates in that marvellous embodiment of her supreme attributes preserved to us in the Van Nieuwenhove diptych. The Divine Infant, it is true, may not appeal to one in the same way as do the charming pictures of infant life in which the southern artists excelled. Whatever may be said of the fine men and intellectual women of the race, the northern type of babyhood cannot by any stretch of courtesy, apart from a mother’s loving weakness, be described as graceful. Still Memlinc’s conceptions of the Infant Saviour rank high in point of intellectuality, of expressiveness of eye, of grace of movement and charm of expression. The Donne triptych besides, from the point of view from which we are now considering it, is a valuable asset for the study of the impersonations of saints whom we find constantly recurring in his paintings: to wit, Saint Katherine and Saint Barbara--(Fromentin’s enthusiastic appreciation of these figures in the large altarpiece at Bruges has already been quoted)--Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist, and Saint Christopher. The same may be said of his angels. Taken from another standpoint, these early paintings of Memlinc are invaluable testimony of his rare gift for portraiture. It was a gift which may almost be taken as the specific appanage of the fifteenth century painters of the Netherlandish school. Some, like John van Eyck, used it with scrupulous exactitude, scorning to veil the palpable truth that at the moment and usually obtruded itself on his painstaking eye; others, and Memlinc prominently of their number, loved rather to seize on the fitful manifestation of the inner man and to idealise him. Both artists, taking them as types, were honest and true to their art, notwithstanding that the resulting truth in each case is deceiving, except we have very particular information regarding the individual portrayed. In any event, the Tani and Spinelli portraits are fine examples of the class, though perhaps Sir John Donne’s appeals to us more because of the fuller knowledge we have of the man. And finally, both the Antwerp and the Chatsworth paintings afford us beautiful examples of Memlinc’s art as a landscape painter, and in this respect certainly it may be safely asserted that he never produced better work.