Word: rembrandt
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...they would use a little more drapery. The Dutch have more drapery than the French, though they are deficient in other respects. I cannot bear the sight of those Dutch girls with hats something less than the circumference of the earth, and with market baskets in their hands. No, Rembrandt, we cannot follow you; you loved nature, but it was a vulgar nature. The English are bad also, especially Turner; he is too landscapy. If I had only a head to paint, I might take the Florentines as masters, but I must give Antigone the rest of herself as well...
...engraving. With what light steps did I attend the next lectures in my favorite elective! But "put not your trust in professors." What is this that I hear? Do my ears deceive me? Alas, no! The note-book has it in black and white. "A few etchings of Rembrandt are good, but none of the modern etchings; and the magazine edited by Mr. Hamerton (alas! my own cherished Portfolio) is the refuge of ignorance and bungling...
Having found some fault with Rembrandt, no fuller reparation can be made than by turning our attention to the world-renowned Hundred Guilder piece. Here Rembrandt makes himself immortal, and uses his chiaro-oscuro in a most effective manner. Professor Lubke has called Rembrandt, as compared with Vandyck or Rubens, a demagogue. This may be admitted, unless the bad sense of demagogue is too much insisted upon. It was most natural for Rembrandt, who lived and died in Holland, to depict what he had before him, and that was a government by the people. In this truly superb impression...
...contrast to all this woe, we have, at the extreme right, a group of well to-do Pharisees, one of whom has a particularly malicious and mocking smile. On the right next Christ we see Socrates. It is possible that Rembrandt, through his "cult of the ugly," might have developed the head of Socrates from his inner consciousness, but it is sure that he did not, since he owned a bust of Socrates, which is mentioned in the inventory of his art treasures which were sold for his debts...
...more beautiful than those who surround him; for though issued from the people, he is still of David's race; his features are at once real and noble." The truth is, that you are surprised, but not for the reasons M. Blanc gives, - just the reverse. Rembrandt's Christ has features that may be called real, but no one ought to call them noble. In spite of this defect, the Hundred Guilder piece is a truly powerful composition, and no one who studies it with attention can escape its influence. The deep velvety black which sets forth the central group...