ROME--THE GERMAN BROTHERHOOD.
The biographies of artists, proverbially picturesque, present few scenes
more pleasant to look on than the early years in Rome of the Brotherhood
of German Painters, of whom Overbeck and his friend Cornelius were the
leaders. Exiles in some sort from their native land, they entered Italy
as pilgrims, and were not far from suffering as martyrs. They were
devout, hard-working, and withal poor. They had been drawn from distant
cities to Rome as a common focus, and there they severed themselves from
ignoble present times, and abiding quietly amid ancient monuments and
sacred shrines, sought to make the days of old live anew. So congenial
did Rome prove to Overbeck, that he could hardly be induced to sever
himself from the city or its neighbourhood over a space of more than
fifty years. The task he assigned to himself was arduous: how he went to
work and accomplished his mission I shall try to show.
Overbeck, in company with his brother artists, Pforr, Vogel and
Hottinger, having in Vienna cast off all fetters, entered Rome as
freemen in 1810. A year later Cornelius, as a young Hercules, came upon
the scene; he had fought his way from Düsseldorf; like Overbeck, he had
found the Academy a burden and a snare, and he betook himself to Italy
for deliverance. Then began that closest friendship between the two
painters which, lasting for more than half a century, was severed only
by death. Cornelius, writing to his friend Mosler, describes the German
Brotherhood in Rome, and adds: "Overbeck from Lübeck is the one who by
the gentleness and nobility of his soul draws all around him; he
inspires them to everything true and beautiful. May be he is the
greatest artist now living: you would be astonished if you could see him
at his work. Yet he is the most humble and retiring of men." If Overbeck
were as a lamb, surely Cornelius was a lion, each indeed supplied what
was lacking in the other. Cornelius in after years said to Rudolf
Lehmann, "I am the man, he is the woman." And it may strike the mind as
a singular coincidence, or rather as a benignant disposition of
Providence, that at sundry turning-points in the world's history, two
men the opposites the one of the other have been conjoined, as if for
the better accomplishment of the work to be done. We may recall, in art,
Raphael and Michelangelo; in religion, St. John and St. Peter,
Melanchthon and Luther; and in philosophy, Plato and Aristotle. At the
risk of pushing the analogy too far, it may be added that Cornelius was
positive as Aristotle, impetuous as St. Peter and Luther, defiant as
Michelangelo; while in contrast, Overbeck shared with Plato idealism,
with St. John love, with Melanchthon gentleness, and with Raphael grace.
The German colony of pre-Raphaelite painters in Rome grew, and in after
years came accessions almost unintermittingly.[1] Within the first
twelve months were gathered together, as we have seen, Overbeck,
Cornelius, Pforr, Vogel and Hottinger. Soon followed the brothers
Wilhelm and Rudolf Schadow: to these must be added Koch, Wintergerst,
Sutter, Mosler, Veit, Schnorr, Eggers, Platner, and others. Later came
Joseph Führich, who literally worshipped the ground on which Overbeck
stood. Edward Steinle, of a younger generation, was also a bosom friend
of the painter. Later still arrived young zealots from Düsseldorf, where
Schadow had established the renowned school of religious art. The best
known of these disciples are Ernst Deger, Franz Ittenbach, and the
brothers Andreas and Carl Müller. After sitting at the feet of Overbeck
in Rome, it was their privilege to paint the chapel at Remagen on the
Rhine: these frescoes are accepted as among the most beauteous
manifestations of the master's teachings. This brief epitome anticipates
the story of years. In the course of a long life it was the good fortune
of Overbeck to witness the growth into a large tree of the grain of
mustard-seed he had cast into the earth.
The Brethren found congenial habitation in the old Franciscan convent of
Sant' Isidoro on the Pincian Hill. The picturesque monks having been
turned out by Napoleon, the German colony became tenants at a yearly
rental, and held in quietude the dormitories, also larger rooms which
served as studios, until the fall of the First Empire, when the
monastery once more reverted to the Mendicant Friars, by whom it is
still occupied. A few years since, the Superior of the Order politely
showed the present writer over the ecclesiastical establishment, now, as
formerly, devoted to charitable works. Time has brought little change in
the cells, the refectory, or in the large hall used for religious
teaching. Other rooms, great and small, are ranged round a cloister
enclosing a garden still fragrant with orange-blossoms as in the days of
Overbeck and Cornelius. Here, amid sacred associations and venerable
monuments, did these devoted students build up the new art, and when the
day's work was ended, they mounted at eventide the lofty Belvedere,
commanding a panorama of which, even in Rome, are few equals. From
neighbouring campanili, vesper bells sound a chorus in the bright
Italian sky, and beneath the eye stretches, as a prairie of the old
world, the wide Campagna, spanned by broken viaducts and bounded by the
blue Alban hills. Through the panorama winds the golden Tiber, guarded
by the Castle of St. Angelo and St. Peter's, and around and below lie
Monte Mario, the pine-clad Pincian, the Villa Medici, and the ilex
groves of the Ludovisi. The scene was inspiring, yet not without shadow
of melancholy; the Capitol had fallen into the hands of the stranger,
but the spirit of Dante fired the dauntless young men; they turned from
the present to the past, "imagination restored the empire that had been
lost," and though "calamity afflicted the country, they believed that
God had not forsaken the people."
Overbeck is known to have been deeply penetrated by the beauties of the
Italian sky and landscape. After sufferance of the rigours of northern
winters, mind and body expanded under the sun of the genial south. In
spring-time came days serene as his own spirit, giving to nature the
re-birth he sought for art; the clear horizon carried thought to a world
beyond; and in the deep blue above floated such clouds as had served the
old pre-Raphaelites with the thrones and footstools of saints and
angels. Overbeck did not, as the masters of the decadence, shroud his
compositions in backgrounds of impenetrable darkness, but flooded the
canvas with the light of the Italian heavens, and like the early
painters, placed holy people in the midst of such beauties of nature as
tranquillise and elevate the mind. And his sympathetic eye was not only
open to scenes which served as distances, he watched in the gardens of
the Roman villas the springing flowers, and made careful studies of
mossy, jewelled foregrounds which served as carpeting for the feet of
his Madonnas. Having turned his back on the Fatherland, his pictures
bear no memories of black forests or frowning Harzburg mountains, and he
became so thoroughly Italianised that he seated Holy Families on the
borders of the Thrasymene Lake, and placed saints within sight of Mount
Soracte! Like all true artists, he painted what he saw; as his
predecessors, he gathered in daily walks the accessories he needed. Fra
Angelico had painted at Fiesole, Francia at Bologna, Perugino at
Perugia, Pinturicchio at Spello and Siena, and each in turn, like
Overbeck, made the surrounding scenery serve as accompaniments to figure
compositions. Nature was to all these painters a great teacher; her
presences were healing powers, and they left out all the storms and
discords, and like our poet Wordsworth, brought her forms and aspects
into harmony with tranquil living. Yet the Brethren from their monastic
abode in Sant' Isidoro looked upon the outer world with sympathies as
diverse as their individual characters. When Cornelius took his walks
abroad, he crossed the Tiber to visit the _Last Judgment_ of
Michelangelo. Overbeck's steps lay in an opposite direction; he passed
by the church of Sta. Maria Maggiore, looked in for the sake of the old
mosaics, and then wended his solitary way to Sta. Croce in Gerusalemme,
to pay his devotions before the frescoes commemorative of the discovery
by St. Helena of the true Cross. Here, in lovely surroundings, nature
blended in unison with art, he looked on the blue hills and the calm
sky, and thanked God Italy was his home.
The mode of living adopted within the cells and refectory of Sant'
Isidoro naturally savoured of the monastic: it combined appropriately
society with solitude. The habit of the Brethren was to take meals
together at a common table, and to work separately each in his private
painting-room. The refectory served as a common hall for study and for
drawing from the model. The rule obtained in the establishment that the
provisioning and housekeeping should be taken in rotation by each, one
week at a time, and it is said that Overbeck had so far a sense of
creature comforts that he complained that one of the Brothers was
accustomed to put too much water into the broth! On Sundays the work
relaxed or ceased wholly, and the wholesome practice prevailed of
bringing together the products of the week for criticism with the end to
mutual improvement: many grave observations and lively pleasantries
passed from one to the other, Overbeck usually in his modest way acting
the part of mentor. "No one," writes Schadow, "who saw or heard him
speak, could question his purity of motive, his deep insight and
abounding knowledge: he is a treasury of art and poetry and a saintly
man." Overbeck had stoutly defended the adopted course of study which
others condemned. "What," he asked, "has been our crime? It is in great
measure that we have striven after a severe outline, in opposition to
the loose, cloudy, washed-out manner of the day. Is not this an
endeavour after truth?" But such studies, while filling portfolios,
brought no grist to the mill. And the historian Niebuhr, an anxious
friend, confesses that these devoted men "were hard put to it for their
daily bread," yet never has a confraternity of artists more nearly
approached an ideal. No vow was actually taken, the bond was simply
voluntary; thus Overbeck expressly states, "with the greatest concord
among us as to the fundamental principles of art, each goes on his own
way."
The attitude assumed almost of necessity provoked opposition, even
ridicule. The assumption was made of superiority, the tone grew even
assailant; Correggio, Guido, Guercino, and Domenichino, with all
post-Raphaelites, were denounced, and not only was it declared, "We are
right," but it was added, "You are wrong." The Brethren personally laid
themselves open to attack; they were not free from the affectations of
youth, they made themselves conspicuous by long hair and strange
costume, and through their exclusiveness and sanctity won as their
nickname the epithet of "Nazarites." Other designations were less
characteristic; simply descriptive are such terms as "pre-Raphaelites,"
"the new-old School," "the German-Roman artists," "the Church-Romantic
painters," "the German patriotic and religious painters." But all
trivial imputations weigh lightly when set in the balance against solid
work and holy living. The earnest devotees in the long run silenced evil
tongues and won respect and a good name. Niebuhr, ambassador and
historian, by no means a blind apologist, describing the art society of
the day, writes: "The painters in Rome are divided by a broad line of
demarcation into two parties--the one consisting of our friends and
their adherents, the other of the united phalanx of those who are of the
world, a set who intrigue and lie and backbite; they intend there shall
not be light, come what will. The former are exemplary in their lives;
the latter display the old licentiousness which characterised the German
artists in Rome thirty years ago. Happily, at the present moment, the
more talented of the newcomers are ranged on the side of our friends. It
is a hopeful sign that some foreigners, and even Italians, are beginning
to pay attention to their works." Overbeck and his more immediate
associates were indeed, in the best sense of the term, "purists" and
"pietists," and held vitally to the maxim that they who would know of a
doctrine must live out the doctrine. On no other conditions was it
possible to accomplish their mission--the regeneration of art. The
schools around them had fallen in great measure through lack of
sincerity and truth; they in contrast believed as our English Bishop
Butler taught, that conscience is the ruling faculty in the human mind.
The style of art dominant in Rome during Overbeck's early residence did
not materially differ from that which he had left behind him in Vienna.
The Director, in fact, of the Viennese Academy had in youth won the
prize of Rome, and there became the representative of the prevailing
decadence. Among the Italians, Battoni, following in the footsteps of
Carlo Maratti, was not without the grace and the beauty of Correggio and
Guido. Descending a generation later, Overbeck found among his
contemporaries Pietro Benvenuto, one of the most distinguished adherents
of the school of David: whose masterpiece in Arezzo Cathedral has justly
been designated "one of the finest productions of modern art." These
were not men to be wholly despised. Furthermore it is to be remembered,
as before indicated, that the Germans, in a generation only just passed
away, had here in Rome formed a learned school based on the antique;
Lessing, in his treatise, the 'Laocoon,' and Winckelmann, by his
criticisms on the marbles of the Vatican, had induced a new Classic
Renaissance. The painter Raphael Mengs, thus guided, appropriately
executed in the Villa Albani the famous fresco of _Apollo and the Nine
Muses on Mount Parnassus_. Again, here are men and manifestations not to
be disdained. But for such art Overbeck, as we have seen, cherished
inveterate antipathy: whether he was absolutely right, impartial
critics, founding a judgment on a wide historic basis, will hesitate to
determine. The correct verdict probably is that each school is good of
its kind, that the one possesses merits distinctive of the other, and
that it is well for the world that every mode of thought should in turn
obtain the fullest and highest manifestation. But Overbeck's vision was
too intently focussed on one point to perceive that his sphere was but a
segment, a part, though by no means an unimportant part, of the greater
whole. The classic movement, against which he set his face steadily, was
not to be easily annihilated; it survived in Rome in such illustrious
representatives as Canova, Thorwaldsen and Gibson. But Overbeck grew
more and more the recluse; he shortly became a proselyte to the Romish
Church, shut himself out from other associations, and thus after a time
devoted his pencil exclusively to Christian Art.
The early pictures and drawings executed in Rome carry out the painter's
resolve. To this first period belong: _The Adoration of the Kings_
(1811), _Jesus in the House of Martha and Mary_ (1812), _The Preaching
of St. John_, _The Raising of Lazarus_, _The Entombment_, _Christ
Blessing Little Children_, _The Holy Family_, _Ave Maria, Blessed art
thou among Women_, also a portrait of Vittoria Caldoni.[2] The first
commission received by the struggling painter came from Queen Caroline
of Bavaria for _The Adoration of the Kings_, in oils. The Queen had
written to Rome saying that she wished for a picture by the young
artist; that as to the price, a hard bargain need not be driven, for
when one gains a beautiful work, the cost cannot be regretted. Overbeck,
on receiving the good news, writes, December 16, 1811, "I was so
overpowered with joy that I could not bring out a syllable. The affair
moves me all the more because I had not dreamt of it. What can be the
cause of my good fortune? Happy day! I shall think of it as long as I
live: to the Lord be the praise." Four days later he writes to
Lübeck:--"What joy! I can now relieve my parents from further burden.
This is the moment so long wished for. Henceforth and for ever I am a
man and an independent artist in the workshop, free as a king over the
boundless domain of fantasy to create a beautiful world."
The maxim that correct drawing lies at the foundation of all true art
was maintained by the Brotherhood through both precept and example.
Overbeck first mastered form, he trained his hand to outline; next he
learnt the principles of composition, that is the power of combining
separate parts into a connected whole; lastly, he added colour, but
rather as an accessory than an essential. Hence his water-colours and
even his oil-pictures are often little more than tinted drawings. In the
first Roman period, that is up to about the year 1820, when the age of
thirty had been reached, we find the artist in full possession of the
faculty of expressing his ideas at the point of his pencil. Of this
happy facility many examples have come before me: one especially, at
Stift Neuburg, _The Raising of Jairus's Daughter_ (1814); another,
almost a replica of the last, delicately washed with colour, in the
private collection of Herr Malss, of the Städel Institute, Frankfort. I
note with admiration the precision and subtlety of the form, especially
in the hands and feet. The work, though small in scale (1 ft. 3 in. by
1 ft.), is large in manner, the treatment being that of the Great
Masters as distinguished from the Small Masters. Overbeck, who was on
intimate terms with the family of Director Malss, said that he wished
they should have a work as perfect as he could make it: verily he
realised his endeavour. Belonging to the same period, I find in another
private collection in Frankfort a portrait in delicate pencilling of a
young girl of about eighteen; the hair is in close curls all round the
head, the necklace is marked with utmost detail. Perhaps I have not laid
sufficient stress on the truth and rectitude of Overbeck's work, as
seen, for instance, in the _Head of an Old Monk_ among the drawings of
the National Gallery, Berlin. This is so close to nature that a
deformity in one ear has been conscientiously registered. The handling
here is masterly, the touch firm and strong; the play of lines in the
hatchings proves a free hand and a facile turn of the wrist. Also may be
mentioned, for incidents taken from the life, a remarkable composition
at Stift Neuburg, _The Feeding of the Hungry_. Close to nature are these
transcripts of the poor, the needy, and aged, one advancing on crutches
to receive bounty; and over all presides the spirit of beauty and
charity. Also in the same collection is a triptych, wherein angels and
cherubs appear: this is among the earliest examples of the intervention
of the supernatural. Overbeck was not the man to rush in where angels
fear to tread. Likewise among Biblical subjects, I find in the National
Gallery, Berlin, _The Creation of Adam and Eve_, and _The Expulsion from
Paradise_. Here the delineation of the undraped figure proves absolute
knowledge, and shows, as before said, that the usual course of drawing
from the nude had been gone through. The point indeed need not be
discussed further, as Schadow expressly states that Overbeck's drawings
from the nude as well as from the draped figure were, for subtlety and
truth to nature, the admiration of every one. The _Creation_ and
_Expulsion_ are of exceptional value, because the artist for once
borrows from Michelangelo: also it will be seen that Overbeck gave
himself from the outset to the illustration of the Biblical narrative,
and thus fondly trod in the footsteps of Giotto and Fra Angelico.
An Exhibition of the works of the German painters in Rome was held in
1819, in a room of the Palazzo Caffarelli, which, as the official
residence of Niebuhr and Bunsen, had often been a spot of kindly meeting
and hospitality. The collection Frederick Schlegel pronounced
unsurpassed in richness, variety, and intrinsic value. Public interest
was awakened, and attention centred round the contributions of Overbeck,
Schadow, Veit and Cornelius. Overbeck sent a _Madonna_ and a _Flight
into Egypt_; and Schlegel specially names the cartoon of _Jerusalem
Delivered_, for the frescoes then in progress at the Villa Massimo, as
proof of the artist's power of expression and faculty of invention. He
adds: "The struggle of the German artists in Rome daily excites more and
more observation, and their progress is watched with cordial sympathy by
men of all nations."
A very serious topic must now be considered. Overbeck in 1813
relinquished the Protestant faith of his forefathers and joined the
Roman Catholic Church. Obviously in these pages polemics are out of
place, and the step which the conscientious painter thought fit to take
has to be here noted so far only as it serves as an index to character
and as an interpretation of art. Rightly to judge the case, it were well
correctly to estimate Overbeck as a man: his strength lay within his
art, outside which he had infirmities; his bodily health was feeble, his
mind to the extreme refined and to the last degree sensitive; he shrank
from the conflict of life; common people he could not associate with;
for the ordinary world he was wholly unfit, and sought refuge in some
ideal not yet reached. Niebuhr truly reads the character when he writes:
"Overbeck is an enthusiast and quite illiberal; he is a very amiable man
and endowed with a magnificent imagination, but incapable by nature of
standing alone, and by no means so clear-headed as he is poetical. He
bends easily and naturally under the yoke of the Catholic faith."
Overbeck doubtless felt all the more need of safe anchorage from the sea
of troubles on which many minds were cast through the controversy and
scepticism which agitated Protestant Europe. In Lübeck, as we have seen,
the phases of faith were philosophic and æsthetic, and the divinities of
Olympus and Parnassus shared equal favour with the saints of the Church.
The young painter was cast in a severer mould, and needed that the
infinite and eternal should be circumscribed by definite form. It is
reported of a certain German philosopher that, when addressing his
class, he ended with the words:--"In the next lecture we shall proceed
to construct God!" Overbeck preferred to such speculation the authority
of the Church. The painter Joseph Führich puts the case strongly:[3] he
declares that his friend had to take the choice between Pantheism and
Catholicism. Overbeck felt that art was a religious question, and he
determined that all his work should be a protest against the
indifferentism and latitudinarianism which account all religions equal.
He conceded that secular writings and mundane arts were not without
their value and charm; in the arts may be permitted divers
manifestations, such as landscape, animal, and flower painting. The
Church is tolerant of all that is good, but on the highest pinnacle
stands the Christian painter. Over these matters he had pondered long,
and was accustomed to say to himself, "Let not my Christ be ever robbed
of my love; the true home of art is within the soul before the altar of
the Church; the tabernacle of art has its foundations in the worship of
God."
Early Christian Art naturally drew Overbeck towards the Roman Catholic
Church. Frederick Schlegel, Rio, Pugin severally fell under the same
spell. The old mosaics, frescoes, and easel pictures which came down
through unbroken ecclesiastical descent, were for the Christian artist
of the nineteenth century means of grace, and served as revelations of
the Divine. Fra Angelico was taken as a pattern; through living and
loving, watching and praying, believing and working, the High Priesthood
of Art was to be established. And the actual experiences of modern Rome
brought no disillusion; the frivolity and the hollowness which so often
disgust newcomers were either not seen or were turned aside from. The
painter was too pure and childlike to realise the evil, he turned only
to the good: for him the world shone as a land of light; from art he
would exorcise the passions; the true art-life blended heaven with
earth, the ideal could be attained only through the Church: her
teachings were the education of humanity.
The decisive step ultimately taken is recorded as follows: "Overbeck at
Whitsuntide in the year 1813 joined the Catholic Faith, and with joy
entered into the family of the world's Church. His spiritual guide and
confessor was Professor, afterwards Cardinal, Ostini; and the poet
Zacharias Werner, of Königsberg, as a fellow-countryman from the shores
of the northern sea, acted as godfather at the ceremony. The poet, in
writing at the time to the Prince Primate of Dalberg, said that he
recognised in the young painter 'a true seraphic character of the
Fatherland.'"[4]
A veritable mental epidemic seized on the German artists, and when one
after another of Overbeck's friends followed his example, Niebuhr took
alarm, and bethought himself of what measures could be taken. It appears
that a pamphlet had been published intended expressly for the conversion
of the young Germans, and Niebuhr, feeling the emergency of the
situation, requested a friend to bring or send Luther's works with other
writings against Popery. He adds: "It cannot be expressed how disgusting
these proceedings become the more you see of them. At this moment the
proselytes have Schadow, one of the ablest of the young artists, on
their bait." At a later date he writes: "I like Overbeck and the two
Schadows much, and they are estimable both as artists and as men; but
the Catholicism of Overbeck and one of the Schadows excludes entirely
many topics of conversation." Overbeck is elsewhere described as of
"very prepossessing physiognomy, taciturn and melancholy," with a
"proselyting spirit." Bunsen, who no less than Niebuhr deplored these
conversions, writes in 1817 that Overbeck had been for a fortnight in
August a welcome guest at Frascati, that he had finished a water-colour
drawing--a very lovely Madonna with the infant Jesus--"of which he
permitted a copy to be taken, still extant, and valued as a record of
the time and of the short-lived intimacy with the gentle and
heavenly-minded artist, who soon after this period withdrew from all
companions of a different religious persuasion from that which he had
adopted." Among the chief converts are numbered the brothers Schadow,
Veit, Platner, and the critic Frederick Schlegel. Cornelius is not
included, because he was born into Catholicism. He is described as of
"an open and powerful intellect, free from all limitations," "with
habits and convictions rooted as the facts of his existence." He thus
looked on coolly while the new converts were at fever-heat. Yet it is
pleasant to know that these controversies were, in the main, preserved
from personal bitterness, and that whatever might be the difference in
creeds, the broad union of religion and humanity was never torn asunder.
Thus in 1817 Niebuhr, a Protestant and possibly something more, was able
to write: "I associate chiefly, indeed almost exclusively, with the
artists who belong to the religious party, because those who are
decidedly pious, or who strive after piety, are by far the noblest and
best men, and also the most intellectual, and this gives me an
opportunity of hearing a good deal on faith and its true nature." And
the faith of these men we know to have brought forth good works; as were
their belief and their practice, such were their pictures, and it is
scarcely here the place to discuss whether larger views might have given
to their art wider extension.
By a curious coincidence, about the time when these conversions to Roman
Catholicism were going on in Rome the third jubilee of the Reformation
was celebrated at Lübeck. The pietist father of the painter made himself
champion of the cause, and delivered a speech at a meeting of the Bible
Society, wherein he proclaimed Luther the great witness of truth.
"Luther," he declared, "spoke, wrote, thundered, and the power of
darkness was overturned; thus conscience became free, doctrines were
purified, and the precious Bible, as a heavenly treasure, was given back
to the people."[5] It has been assigned as a reason why Overbeck never
returned home, that he could not bear to see the city of Lübeck with her
old walls thrown down; but a less fanciful cause was that other walls
than those of brick and mortar had been set up, dividing kindred and
friends.
Let us now turn from polemics to the pleasing descriptions given by
Niebuhr and Bunsen of the daily lives of the German Brotherhood. It is
not always that archæologists and literary men are the soundest
counsellors of artists; they place overmuch stress on the inward
conception and motive; they lay down, like Coleridge, the axiom that "a
picture is an intermediate something between a thought and a thing," and
in exalting the "thought" they subordinate the "thing." This was the
last teaching that Overbeck needed. He and his fellows were already only
too prone to ignore technique, to neglect colour, chiaroscuro, texture.
They deemed it all-sufficient to perfect form as the language of
thought; consequently while their works instruct and elevate, they fail
to please or to gain wide popularity.
Nevertheless, taken for all in all, Overbeck and Cornelius must be
accounted most fortunate in their intellectual companionship. The habit
was, when gathered socially together at the Embassy in the Palazzo
Caffarelli, to read books, talk of pictures, and to consort together
generally for the furtherance of the great art revival in which Niebuhr
and Bunsen believed fervently. The attachment became mutual, the
intercourse was prized on both sides. Niebuhr writes of Cornelius and
his wife: "They are, strictly speaking, intimate family friends;" and
again he says: "The society of Cornelius and Overbeck gives an inspiring
variety to the day's occupations, and one or other of these intellectual
companions seldom fails to join our evening walks." In another letter we
read: "Cornelius of Düsseldorf, Platner from Leipzig, Koch from the
Tyrol, Overbeck from Lübeck, Mosler from Coblentz, and William Schadow
from Berlin, were assembled at Bunsen's in the apartments of the painter
Brandis: in different ways and degrees we are attached to them all, and
we think them men of talent. Their society is the only pleasure we
derive from human beings in Rome." The young artists are found to be
wholly without worldly wisdom, a charge to which at least Overbeck might
readily plead guilty. Niebuhr further declares: "I confidently believe
we are on the eve of a new era of Art in Germany, similar to the sudden
bloom of our literature in the eighteenth century." He discerned in the
movement an unaccustomed spiritual phenomenon--one of those
manifestations of the national mind from time to time found in the
history of humanity. He felt once more an outburst of the intellectual
life of Germany, a rising again of the force of genius which had
impelled Lessing, Kant, and Goethe, which had given birth to profound
philosophy and science, and had animated a whole people with patriotism
and a spirit of self-sacrifice to do battle amid national songs and
hymns, even to the death, in the cause of the King and the Fatherland.
Bunsen testifies how Niebuhr showed his affection and care for the
Prussian and German disciples of art; he considered it an agreeable part
of his duty and vocation to render them assistance, to encourage them in
their studies, to give them the time of which he was so sparing to men
of mere show and fashion, also to render them pecuniary assistance when
necessary. To Niebuhr belongs the honour of having been the first to
recognise the new school at the moment when it was "despised, derided,
and vituperated." He befriended the men who had to fight their way
against shallowness and wickedness, against the low and false taste of
connoisseurs and patrons, till the day came when the martyrs of an
exalted aspiration gained the attention and admiration of the world.
Nor in numbering friends must be forgotten Frederick Schlegel, the
avowed champion of the new school. The critic was not without connecting
links and antecedents; he had made himself son-in-law of the Jewish
philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, and stepfather of the painter Philip
Veit; and he further qualified himself for his critical duties by
joining the Roman Catholic Church. Overbeck and this rhapsodist on
Christian Art were naturally close allies; each was of use to the other,
and gave and received in turns. The artist strove, it is said, to embody
in pictorial form his friend's teachings; the two, in fact, moved in
parallel lines. Schlegel urged that the new style must be emulative and
aspiring, ever possessed of lofty ideas. Believe not, he writes, that
the glory of art has passed away. The hope is not vain that there comes
a rekindling of former fires; art uprising from the dark night breaks as
the morning's dawn; "a new life can spring only from the depths of a new
love." Let us hold that Art like Nature renews her youth. The soul alone
can comprehend the truly beautiful; the eye gazes but on the material
veil--the union of the inner soul with the outward form constitutes the
noblest art. Nowhere are to be found more eloquent utterances on "the
Bond between Art and the Church," but in all is overlooked the simple
fact that "the Celestial light" cannot be made appreciable to mortal eye
otherwise than through the medium of matter, and according to the laws
of vision. And to such oversight is greatly to be ascribed the
infirmities of Overbeck and his school. It is forgotten that the most
holy of motives cannot save a picture which is not good as a picture.
Schlegel discusses the question, What is needed by the Christian
painter? The following phrenzy, though wordy, is worth reading:--
"The answer is that the beautiful truths of the Christian faith should
not be received into the mind as merely lifeless forms, in passive
acquiescence to the teaching of others: they must be embraced with an
earnest conviction of their truth and reality, and bound up with each
individual feeling of the painter's soul. Still even the influence of
devotion is not alone sufficient; for however entirely religion may be
felt to compensate for all that is wanting to our earthly happiness,
much more is required to form a painter. I know not how better to
designate that other element, without which mere technical skill, and
even correct ideas, will be unavailing, than by calling it the inborn
light of inspiration. It is something quite distinct from fertility of
invention, or magic of colouring, rare and valuable as is the latter
quality in painting. It is no less distinct from skill in the
technicalities of design and from the natural feeling for beauty
inherent in some susceptible minds. The poet and the musician should
also be inspired, but their inspiration is more the offspring of human
emotion; the painter's inspiration must be an emanation of celestial
light: his very soul must, so to speak, become itself illumined, a
glowing centre of holy radiance, in whose bright beams every material
object should be reflected; and even his inmost conceptions and daily
thoughts must be interpenetrated by its brightness and remodelled by its
power. This indwelling light of the soul should be recognised in every
creation of his pencil, expressive as a spoken word; and in this lies
the peculiar vitality of Christian beauty, and the cause of the
remarkable difference between Classic and Christian art." "Physical
beauty is employed by the Christian painter but as a material veil, from
beneath which the hidden divinity of the soul shines forth, illuminating
all mortal life with the higher spirituality of love."
A kindly and timely commission came to the masters of the German
Brotherhood--Overbeck, Cornelius, Veit, and Schadow--from the Prussian
Consul, Bartholdi. Personal relations, with the desire of giving the
untried painters an opportunity of proving what good was in them,
prompted the charge to decorate with frescoes a room in the Casa
Bartholdi, situated on the brow of the Pincian Hill.[6] The Prussian
Consul was in a roundabout way connected with Philip Veit and Frederick
Schlegel, whose mutual relationship has been already recounted; his wife
was sister of the philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, and aunt of the
illustrious musician, and sundry intermarriages had made, as it were, a
compact in literature and art between the families of Bartholdi,
Mendelssohn, Veit, and Schlegel.[7] The chosen sphere of operations was
comparatively narrow; the small room in an upper story, now of historic
interest, is not more than twenty-four feet square. The situation is
inviting; the beauties of nature are usually found proximate with the
beauties of art, and here the windows command a panorama sweeping from
the Pincian to the Tiber, and embracing St. Peter's, the Vatican, St.
Angelo, and the Capitol. The topic chosen for these wall pictures was
the _Story of Joseph and his Brethren_--a theme conveniently
accommodating to any existing diversities in creeds or styles. The
technical process adopted was fresco, a monumental art, the revival of
which formed part of the mission of the German fraternity. The arduous
undertaking was commenced and carried out in strict accordance with
historic precedents. Preliminary studies were made, and well-matured
cartoons on the scale of the ultimate pictures were perfected. To the
lot of Overbeck fell _Joseph sold by his Brethren_,[8] and _The Seven
Years of Famine_.
It has been my pleasure to visit and revisit these wall-paintings over a
period of a quarter of a century, and growing experience does but
enhance my admiration. They fulfil the first requirements of wall
decoration: the story is told lucidly and concisely; the style is
simple, noble; accidents are held subordinate to essentials; the
compositions are distributed symmetrically; the colour, though a little
crude, is brought into somewhat agreeable unity; the light and shade are
not focussed at one point, but carried evenly over the whole surface;
and the treatment inclines sufficiently to the flat to keep the
compositions down on the wall. The finished pictures of the four masters
vary in dimensions. The lengths range from eight to seventeen feet, the
height is mostly about eight feet; the figures do not exceed five feet.
The lines bounding the figures and draperies are firm and incisive.
Accordant with the practice of the old fresco-painters, each day's work
is marked and discernible by the joinings in the plaster, and the
junctions between the dry plaster of one day and the wet plaster of the
next are appropriately fixed at the points where the subject breaks off
readily and can be resumed most easily. The technique is thoroughly
mastered, and, barring some surface cracks, the paintings are in as
perfect condition as when they came from the artists' hands. The chief
defect is a somewhat crude opacity of pigments, a characteristic
belonging to the debased period of wall-painting rather than to the
"_fresco buono et puro_" of Giotto, Luini, and Pinturicchio.
Another point to be remarked is that the frescoes in the Casa Bartholdi
show that the four painters--Overbeck, Cornelius, Veit, and
Schadow--worked here at the outset of their career in remarkable unison.
In the course of years they diverged widely, but as yet the school
collectively dominates over the artist individually. The Brethren had
formed themselves equally on the same originals, and had scarcely found
time to take their several departures from nature. Indeed, the actual
presence of nature comes almost as a surprise in these compositions.
Overbeck's figures are manifestly more or less studied from the life,
only, according to his habitual practice, he has taken pains to
eliminate from his models any individual accidents which marred the
generic form, softening down angularity and ruggedness into pervading
grace and beauty. Here and there are traces of affectation, together
with a feebleness incident to the painter's weak physique which stands
in utmost contrast with the force of Cornelius. Overbeck mostly shunned
action and dramatic intensity, and here the figures in their movements
depart but slightly from the equilibrium of repose. As a religious
artist, the New Testament was more within his sphere than the Old. Thus
the outrage committed against Joseph by his brethren is toned down into
a calm, orderly transaction; placidity reigns throughout; all is brought
into keeping with the painter's spirit of gentleness.
The Casa Bartholdi frescoes,[9] when finished, produced a most
favourable impression in Rome; the cause of the Germans was greatly
strengthened, and the opposite party felt the defeat. The Italians, too,
were taken by surprise to find themselves beaten by foreigners on their
own ground. A natural consequence of the success was further
commissions, and the fortune no less than the fame of the revivalists
was made. Singularly enough the modern Romans came forward as the next
patrons. Niebuhr, writing from Rome in 1817, says: "It is a significant
fact that some foreigners, even Italians, are beginning to pay attention
to the works of our friends." It is well known that the Romans had been
addicted for centuries to mural painting in palaces, villas and
garden-houses: Raphael was employed to decorate the Farnesina; Guido and
Annibale Carracci painted the ceilings of the Farnese and of the
Rospigliosi Palaces. Emulating these illustrious examples, Prince
Massimo commissioned Overbeck, Cornelius, Veit, and Schnorr to cover the
walls and ceilings of his Garden Pavilion near St. John Lateran with
frescoes illustrative of Tasso, Dante, and Ariosto. Not only the themes,
but the local surroundings were inspiring. The Villa Massimo is a site
only possible in Rome. When the artists in the morning came to work,
before their view opened a panorama embracing the Claudian Aqueduct, St.
John Lateran, the Church of Sta. Croce in Gerusalemme, the old Walls of
Rome, with cypresses and stone pines around, and the Alban Hills beyond.
The Pavilion assigned to the painters stands in the Villa garden, with
the accustomed growth and fragrance of orange-trees, magnolias, azaleas,
roses, and violets. Overbeck entered on the work with poetic ardour.
The Massimo Pavilion is little more than three rooms standing on the
ground; the first, indeed, is an Entrance Hall, and therein Schnorr
painted copiously from Ariosto. On the left a door leads to the room
assigned to Cornelius for the illustration of Dante: the ceiling fell to
the lot of Veit. On the right another door opens to a corresponding room
of like dimensions, set apart to Overbeck and Tasso's _Jerusalem
Delivered_.[10] This small interior is not more than fifteen feet
square, and the wall-spaces are much broken up by doors and windows, so
that only one of the four sides remained disencumbered. The compositions
are eleven in number, and are unequal alike in size and merit. The
largest and most noteworthy is fifteen feet long by ten feet high,
representing the _Meeting of Godfrey de Bouillon and Peter the Hermit_.
The narrative is lucidly told, the picture well put together, and the
successive planes of distance are duly marked. Altogether the
fundamental principles of wall-decoration are clearly understood in this
the most complex composition yet attempted by the painter. Another
thoroughly studied design is _Sophronio and Olindo on the Funeral Pyre
delivered by Clorinda_.[11] The action has more than usual force and
movement, and the undraped figures are drawn with severe exactitude.
Presiding over the whole series, in the middle of the ceiling, is an
allegorical figure of _Jerusalem Delivered_.[12] An angel on either side
unlooses the fetters of an innocent placid maiden crowned with thorns.
These frescoes, notwithstanding their situation in a cold, damp
garden-house, remained, when I saw them last, in January, 1878, in sound
condition: thus once more we find Overbeck, equally with Cornelius, to
have been solidly grounded in the method of wall-painting.
I must confess that I have always been disappointed with this Tasso
Room.[13] One reason is that the carrying out of the original designs
was delegated to an inferior brush. Overbeck was not in strong health;
he worked slowly, and when other commissions came in, some more to his
liking, such as that for the church picture at Assisi, he felt
overburdened, and wished to be released from a task that had grown
wearisome. The work, began about 1817, had dragged on for ten years,
till at last Overbeck made a deliberate call on good and friendly Joseph
Führich, and requested that he would complete the unfinished frescoes.
The proposal, naturally felt as an honour, was gratefully acceded to.
After this distance of time it becomes difficult to determine how far
this worthy substitute must be held responsible for much that is to be
regretted on these walls. For some of the compositions the master had
made nothing more than sketches or indications, and at least three must
be laid to the charge of the scholar. Führich was for Overbeck what
Giulio Romano had been for Raphael, and the Tasso Room suffered the same
degradation as the latest stanza in the Vatican.
The Tasso Room may be taken as a measure of Overbeck's capacity. This
"cyclus," or series, shows the painter's power of sustained thought and
faculty of invention. Much, doubtless, is compilation, yet something
remains of originality. The best passages are those not borrowed from
old pictures, but taken from life, which makes the regret all the
greater that here and in the sequel nature was not trusted more
implicitly. On the whole, these compositions leave the impression that
Overbeck had not mental force or physical stamina sufficient for the
task. It is true that the presence of a lyrical spirit is felt; but
scenes of Romance need more fire and passion; the deeds of Chivalry were
not enacted in a cloister. Perhaps self-knowledge wisely counselled
Overbeck to quit the regions of creative imagination. With greater peace
of mind he trod in the future, the safer paths of Christian Art, wherein
precedent and authority served as his guide and support.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: See among other authorities: 'Die Deutsche Kunst in
unserem Jahrhundert, von Dr. Hagen,' vol. ix. Berlin, 1857.]
[Footnote 2: The above compositions suggest the following observations.
Overbeck was in the habit of making over many years replicas with
variations and improvements of favourite themes, and the dates of the
successive stages are not always easily determined. Of the _Preaching of
St. John_, the Düsseldorf Academy possesses an example dated 1831. Also
in the same collection is a mature and almost faultless drawing, fit
companion for Raphael, of _The Raising of Lazarus_; the figure of Christ
is 9 inches high. Overbeck made several renderings of the
universally-beloved composition, _Christ Blessing Little Children_: the
most deliberate is that given in these pages. The replica in the Meyer
Collection, Hamburg, is of the last decade of the artist's life, and
betrays infirmity of hand. _The Entombment_, classed above among works
of the first Roman period, is probably that now in the choice collection
at Stift Neuburg, near Heidelberg, dated 1814, and obviously suggested
by Raphael's _Entombment_ in the Borghese Palace. No drawings have
better pedigree than those in this old family mansion: a predecessor of
the present possessor was the artist's personal friend. The version of
_The Bearing to the Sepulchre_ given in these pages is from one of the
forty well-known drawings of the Gospels, and dates 1844. At Stift
Neuburg I also saw in the autumn of 1880, by the courtesy of the owner,
Graf von Bernus, the drawing for the _Holy Family_, chosen as an
illustration to this volume; it is of utmost delicacy and beauty--the
motive has evidently been borrowed from Raphael; the measurement is 1
foot 3 inches by 1 foot 8 inches.]
[Footnote 3: See 'Autobiography of Joseph Führich,' published in Vienna
and Pesth, 1875.]
[Footnote 4: See 'Historisch-Politische Blätter für das Katholische
Deutschland,' vol. lvi., part 8. Munich, 1870.]
[Footnote 5: See 'Erinnerung an Christian Adolph Overbeck;' Lübeck,
1830.]
[Footnote 6: The Casa Bartholdi has for some years been let as lodgings
to a superior class of travellers, and is much favoured by the English.
The rooms are not always accessible; the servants have been known to
name, as the most convenient time for seeing the frescoes, Sunday
mornings, when the tenants are attending the English Church. The Painted
Chamber is suitably furnished for daily uses; _The History of Joseph_,
which covers the walls, is not too serious a theme to mingle with the
common avocations of domestic life: fresco-painting, in fact, is not
only a national and an ecclesiastic, but likewise a domestic art.]
[Footnote 7: The Royal Academy Exhibition, Berlin, 1880, contained a
large coloured design for the decoration of the ceiling of the Villa
Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. Thus the joint names over a period of more than
half a century stand conspicuous among art-patrons.]
[Footnote 8: Overbeck's cartoon in charcoal on paper of _Joseph sold by
his Brethren_ is carefully preserved under glass in the Städel
Institute, Frankfort, where I examined it in 1880: the width is 11 feet,
the height 8 feet, the figures are about 5 feet. The outlines are firmly
accentuated; the details sufficient without being elaborate; the figure,
as proved specially in the arms, hands, legs, and feet, is perfectly
understood; the draperies are cast simply and broadly; the heads of
noble type are impressed with thought. Not a false touch appears
throughout; the crayon is guided by knowledge; evidently preliminary
studies and tentative drawings must have preceded this consummated
product. No wonder that this cartoon made a deep impression; nothing had
been seen at all like it in Rome for very many years.]
[Footnote 9: Many are the authors who have written on the Casa Bartholdi
frescoes, the chief authorities are Hagen, Förster, Reber, and Riegel.]
[Footnote 10: See among authorities before named, 'Geschichte des
Wiederauflebens der deutschen Kunst zu Ende des 18. und Anfang des 19.
Jahrhunderts, von Hermann Riegel.' Hannover, 1876.]
[Footnote 11: The cartoon for this fresco is in the Leipzig Museum,
where I examined it in 1880. It is in chalk on whity-brown paper, in
squares and mounted on canvas; length 15 feet by 7 feet. As a mature
study of form and composition it is just what a cartoon should be, but
the touch is feeble and poor. Like most of Overbeck's designs, it has
received the tribute of engraving.]
[Footnote 12: The cartoon was acquired for the National Gallery, Berlin,
in 1878, at the price of 37_l_. 10_s_. 0_d_.; measurement 6 feet by 4
feet: it has been engraved.]
[Footnote 13: Persistent difficulties are placed in the way of even
students who desire to visit these frescoes; the public are
systematically excluded from the Villa Massimo, and on two occasions,
when after much trouble I gained orders for admission, the attendant, in
accordance with instructions, forbade the taking of notes.]