_Joseph Israels_ (Dutch: 1824-1911).
Joseph Israels, the head of the modern Dutch School and a
painter of world-wide reputation, has been called "The Dutch
Millet," and "a modern Rembrandt"; and the phrases serve to
indicate his characteristics, and his place in the development
of modern art. He essayed to do what Rembrandt had done
triumphantly two centuries before: to paint "not accidents,
but life itself." He made in Dutch art the same departure that
Millet made in French: he turned from conventional themes and
motives to the life around him. Like Millet, Israels made a
false start in art. He went to Paris in 1845, entered the
École des Beaux-Arts, showing "Achilles and Patroclus" as his
probationary drawing, and on his return to Amsterdam in 1848
began to paint, as Delaroche had taught him, "historical"
scenes, Calabrian brigands, and other subjects in "the grand
style." His health broke down, and he was ordered change of
scene. At Zandvoort, a small fishing village near Haarlem,
he found his Barbizon. "He lodged with a ship's carpenter,
took part in all the usages of his house-mates, and began to
perceive amid these new surroundings that the events of the
present are capable of being painted, that the sorrows of the
poor are as deep as the tragical fate of ancient heroes, that
everyday life is as poetic as any historical subject, and that
nothing suggests richer moods of feeling than the interior of a
fishing-hut, bathed in tender light and harmonious in colour.
This residence of several months in a distant little village
led him to discover his calling, and determined his future
career" (Muther). He was a devoted Jew, with a deep interest
in the life and character of those of his race who abound in
Holland. Among them, and among the Dutch toilers of the sea, he
found his vocation, in painting the tragedy, the pathos, or the
simple domestic joys of humble working folk. He did this with a
technical mastery and with rare insight. His power of pathetic
expression is remarkable; and over his work a spirit of soft
tenderness is suffused. Many, perhaps most, of his pictures
are sombre, but he had an eye for youth and hope, as well as
age and sorrow, and few artists have painted children with so
much sympathy. His method is broad and simple; his pictures
having unity of effect, and telling their own story with great
directness.
Joseph Israels was born at Gröningen, in the north of Holland,
and for a time was occupied in his father's business as a
money-changer, but he was encouraged to draw. In 1844 he went
to Amsterdam, and entered the studio of Jan Kruseman. Then, as
already related, came his student-years in Paris, and his false
start as an historical painter. In 1855 he was represented at
the Paris Exhibition by an historical picture of the Prince
of Orange. In 1857 he showed at the Salon "Children by the
Sea" and "Evening on the Beach." This change of subject marks
the true start in an artistic career which was continuously
successful, and which was prolonged into extreme old age. In
1862 his picture of "The Shipwrecked Mariner" (see below,
2732) created a sensation at the International Exhibition in
London. In 1863 he married and settled down in a house midway
between The Hague and Scheveningen, facing the canal. "Here the
boats with their loads of herrings pass slowly along, so that
the painter has only to look out of the front windows of his
house in order to see the very men and women, the boats and
towing-ropes, that figure in his canvases. His work is done
in a studio in his garden; here he has a glass house, in which
he paints his open-air figures, and has likewise fitted up a
corner of an old Dutch cottage, so that open-air scenes and
interiors may be as lifelike as it is possible for an artist to
render them. As you enter this studio, you perceive a little
old gentleman at work, dressed in a brown velvet coat. His hair
is silvery white, and his somewhat pale face is lit up with the
kindliest of smiles. He speaks five or six languages in the
pleasantest voice imaginable, and English is one of them."
Personally, Israels was one of the most breezy of men, full of
life and vigour, genial and accessible: "as fresh in mind as a
youngster in his teens, as versatile as he is amiable, able and
always ready to talk on every conceivable subject of interest,
ever contributing some caustic and pointed comment, yet never
assuming the dictatorial and self-opinionated manner which
genius often considers itself privileged to adopt. His modesty,
his unfailing amiability to all, young and old, distinguished
and insignificant, have served to endear Joseph Israels to all
who come in contact with him. He does not care to talk much
about his own achievements, but he is less reticent about those
of his son Isaac, who, he declares, is a greater artist than
himself." These _personalia_ are quoted from notices which
appeared in connection with the artist's 75th birthday (in
the _Daily News_ and in _Israel_). He had still twelve years
of life; and "his was the rare satisfaction of the man who,
beginning in advance of his time, creates his own public, and
sees it growing stronger, larger, and more devoted as he passes
from youth to middle life and thence to extreme old age. He
was not consciously the founder of a school, but he had many
close followers, and the modern Dutch painters, who are now so
fashionable, owe their fundamental ideas to him" (_Times_, Aug.
15, 1911).
There are passages in Browning's _Grammarian's Funeral_ which will
suggest themselves to many readers as they study this picture of an
old student writing by the light of a single candle. The picture
may be compared with an earlier Dutch one of a like subject--"The
Philosopher," by Bega (1481).