THE MEYER MADONNA AND THE DEPARTURE FOR ENGLAND
Commission from Jakob Meyer for the “Meyer Madonna”—Description of the
picture at Darmstadt—Preliminary studies for the heads—The copy at
Dresden—History of the two pictures—Magdalena Offenburg and the “Lais
Corinthiaca” and “Venus”—Lack of work in Basel owing to the disturbed
state of the city—Holbein’s departure for England.
THE year 1526 was by no means a favourable one for the members of the
Basel guild of painters, although, in all probability, it was in this
very year that Holbein received one of his most important commissions,
the famous altar-piece known as the “Meyer Madonna,” now in the
Grand-ducal palace of Darmstadt, in the possession of the Grand Duke of
Hesse. At this period ecclesiastical dissension had reached its acutest
pitch, and party feeling ran so high that there was little time or
inclination among the leading citizens for the patronage or even the
consideration of the fine arts. The Reformers, then in the ascendant in
the control of public affairs, were strongly opposed to all forms of
pictorial or decorative art for church use, and it was this side of the
painter’s craft which, until then, had been the most lucrative. Times,
indeed, were so bad for them that in January of this year the Painters’
Guild had been forced to petition the Council for permission to remain
in Basel in the pursuit of their art in order that they might obtain
means for the support of their families. Holbein, in spite of his
outstanding merits and the high reputation he had made for himself in
his adopted city, felt the pinch of adverse circumstances almost as
severely as his brother painters. The authorities, unwilling,
apparently, to complete the decorations of the Town Hall, had no
remunerative work to give him. From November 1523, when he received the
last instalment of his money for his wall-paintings in that building,
down to the beginning of 1526 there is no record of any civic payment
made to him. On the 3rd of March, however, in the latter year, he
received the meagre sum of two Basel pounds ten shillings, about equal
to two gulden, for the painting of some shields or coats of arms for the
borough of Waldenburg, a township on the slopes of the Jura within the
jurisdiction of Basel, no doubt for the decoration of the court of
justice or public hall of that place. The entry runs as follows:
“Sampstag nach Reminiscere, 1526: Item ij ll. x sh. geben Holbein dem
moler, für etliche schilt am stettlin Waldenburg vergangener Iaren
zemolen.”[491] Unimportant commissions of this nature cannot have been
of much help in keeping the wolf from the door, and that he was willing
to undertake such mere journeyman’s work, in which his splendid talents
could have little opportunity for their full display, affords proof that
for the time being an artist’s life in Switzerland was a very precarious
one.
[Sidenote: MEYER’S COMMISSION FOR A PICTURE]
Happily for him, at about this time his old patron Jakob Meyer “zum
Hasen” gave him a commission for a votive picture, in which he and the
members of his family were to be represented as kneeling in adoration
under the direct protection of the Virgin Mary, a work in the painting
of which his genius found complete expression.[492] Meyer, who since
1521 had been removed from all public offices, was a thorough-going
adherent of the old religion, and the party to which he belonged was by
this time in the minority; but his sturdy belief remained unshaken, and
in 1529, immediately before the fiercest iconoclastic outburst in the
city, he was at the head of the Catholic party. At the time when the
greater number of his fellow-citizens were beginning to view with
disfavour all sacred paintings, he proved that he had the courage of his
convictions by ordering this picture, in which his faith was very
plainly expressed. It is doubtful whether it was intended to be placed
over an altar in some chapel in one of the Basel churches, or to be hung
in Meyer’s own house, but in either case it was a definite public
profession of his faith.
The figures in the picture (Pl. 71) are about three-quarters of the size
of life. The Virgin is not represented on her throne, but stands amid
the donor’s family as the Mother of Grace, her mantle spread over them
as a sign of her protection. Holbein has placed her in the centre of the
composition in front of a shallow niche with a circular arch, fluted
like a shell, against which her head is relieved. In her arms she clasps
the Infant Christ, whose head rests against her shoulder, his left arm
outstretched over the kneeling suppliants below as though in
benediction. The edge of her cloak falls over the shoulders of Meyer,
who kneels on the left, with hands clasped, gazing upwards in
adoration.[493] In front of him kneels his elder son, a youth of about
sixteen, whose attention is diverted from his prayers by his small
brother, a little naked boy with curly hair, standing upright on the
Turkey carpet which is placed beneath the group, whom he is holding with
both hands. The child stands, with left arm outstretched, gazing at his
open palm. On the right-hand side is a group of three kneeling women,
Meyer’s second wife, Dorothea Kannengiesser von Tann, with her daughter
Anna in front of her, and, next to the Virgin, a third woman who has
been taken to represent either the Burgomaster’s first wife, Magdalena
Baer, who died in 1511, and was a widow when he married her, or her
daughter by her earlier marriage. It has been also suggested that the
figure represents Meyer’s mother, or his mother-in-law, but it is most
probable that it is a portrait of his first wife, for it was by no means
unusual at that time to combine both the living and the dead in such a
votive picture.
VOL. I., PLATE 71.
[Illustration:
THE MEYER MADONNA
DARMSTADT
]
[Sidenote: DESCRIPTION OF THE PICTURE]
This picture is Holbein’s greatest masterpiece of sacred painting, noble
and dignified in feeling and composition, remarkable for the direct and
striking veracity of its portraiture, and the splendour of its rich,
subdued colour. There is extraordinary expression in Meyer’s head, with
its rapt, tense look, in which the depth of his faith is clearly
portrayed. His ruddy complexion and blue shaven chin form a strong
colour contrast with the fresher, paler flesh tints of his two sons, in
whom the likeness to the father can be plainly traced. There is an equal
contrast, too, between the face of the living wife, energetic and
capable, and that of the other woman, seen in profile, whose features
are nearly concealed by the white hood and the chin band she is wearing,
giving almost the appearance of grave-clothes, though it was a
head-dress then in common use, as can be seen from a number of Holbein’s
book illustrations. In the Virgin’s face, with its downcast eyes, there
is a look of heavenly tranquillity. Her complexion is fair, and her
cheeks have a rosy tinge. She wears a golden crown set with pearls and
precious stones, below which her golden hair falls upon her shoulders
and over her mantle, and is painted with all Holbein’s minute care and
complete technical mastery. The pale, delicate flesh tints are continued
in the body of the Infant Christ and in the hands of his mother, the two
heads forming a lovely chord of colour in perfect harmony with the
reddish marble and grey stone of the niche against which they are set.
The Virgin’s dress is dark blue, which has turned almost green with the
passing of time, with under-sleeves of gold, in the painting of which
actual gold has been used, as also in the crown, and in Anna Meyer’s
head-dress and other ornamental parts of the picture. Her girdle is red,
and her mantle a greenish grey. Meyer’s hair is black, and his black
surcoat is lined with light-brown fur. The kneeling boy wears a dress of
light brown trimmed with bands of dark red velvet, and red hose, and
from his belt hangs an elaborate purse with long blue tassels. The
colouring of the group on the spectator’s right is largely black and
white. The two elder women are in black, with plain white head-dresses.
The daughter’s dress is also white, decorated with deep bands of gold
material embroidered with pearls, her head-dress being formed of two
similar bands, with crimson tassels, which almost conceal the brown
braided hair, and a little wreath of white and red flowers on the top.
She gazes across the picture at her little brother, her rosary in her
hands, of which, owing to the long sleeves of her dress, only the tips
of her fingers can be seen. The Turkey carpet, which falls over the low
step upon which the figures are grouped, has an elaborate pattern of
red, green, black, and white on a yellow-brown ground. The monotony of
its geometrical design is broken by a large irregular fold in the
centre, as though the rug had been hastily thrown down and not
straightened out. On either side of the shell-shaped circular niche the
carved pilasters of two low columns are seen above the heads of the
kneeling figures, and the green branches of a vine or fig-tree stand out
against a bright-blue sky.
The picture, like the Solothurn Madonna, is of peculiar shape, the top
of the panel following the lines of the architectural background. It
measures about 4 ft. 8½ in. (1.44 m.) to the top of the circular niche,
and 3 ft. 8½ in. (1.125 m.) to the horizontal edge above the pilasters
at the side, and is nearly 3 ft. 3½ in. (1.01 m.) wide. It is possible
that in its original state it was furnished with a pair of shutters. It
is now generally agreed that its date is about 1525 or 1526, and that it
was the last work of importance painted by Holbein before he left Basel.
Meyer took a second wife in 1513, and their daughter Anna, who
afterwards married Nikolaus Irmi, appears in the picture to be about the
age of twelve, which gives the year 1526 as the one in which Holbein
received the commission. Nothing is known of the two boys, who must have
died young, for Meyer left no male heirs. After his decease his widow
was twice married, and on her death in or about 1549 her heir was her
daughter Anna. The elder boy was perhaps the son of the first wife. The
technical qualities of the painting, too, place it in the years
immediately preceding Holbein’s first visit to England.
VOL. I., PLATE 72.
[Illustration:
JAKOB MEYER
_Drawings in black and coloured chalks_
BASEL GALLERY
]
[Illustration:
DOROTHEA KANNENGIESSER
Studies for the Meyer Madonna
_Drawings in black and coloured chalks_
BASEL GALLERY
]
There are three preliminary studies for the picture in the Basel
Gallery, portrait heads of the ex-burgomaster, his wife, and their
daughter.[494] All three are drawn in his customary manner in black
chalk, with spare use of coloured chalks and water-colour here and
there. The head of Meyer (Pl. 72 (1)),[495] in black and red, is in the
same position as in the picture, and placed against a greenish
background. His wife (Pl. 72 (2))[496] is also taken in the position she
occupies in the finished work, but her head-dress is a different one,
and the chin and the greater part of the mouth are hidden by a linen
band similar to the one worn by the unknown kneeling woman. Red is used
in the face, and brown for the hair, which is seen through the muslin
cap, and for the fur lining to the collar of her gown. The daughter,
Anna,[497] is shown almost at three-quarter length, with the arms and
hands visible. She wears the same dress with embroidered bands as in the
picture, but her hair, instead of being almost hidden by the elaborate
cap, hangs down straightly below her waist. More colour is used in this
drawing than in the others, the face being worked in flesh tints, the
hair of a golden-brown colour, the girdle red, and the ornaments of the
collar in yellow, while the background is washed with pale green. The
effect produced is very delicate and beautiful, and the portrait is
perhaps finer and more natural than in the picture itself. These
drawings closely resemble in style those which Holbein produced shortly
afterwards in England, and approach them very nearly in their complete
mastery of expressive line.
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF THE PICTURES]
For many years the fine early copy of the Meyer Madonna in the Dresden
Gallery[498] was regarded as Holbein’s original work, and one of the
greatest treasures of the collection, and it was not until 1822, when
the Darmstadt picture, purchased in that year by Prince William of
Prussia from a Parisian picture-dealer, was first brought to the notice
of connoisseurs, that any doubt was thrown upon the authenticity of the
better-known example, which was then almost universally regarded as one
of the greatest masterpieces of the German school. A few German critics
of note, among them Dr. Kugler, admitted that the Darmstadt picture was
a genuine work by Holbein, but it was many years before anyone had the
temerity to refuse a like honour to the famous example in Dresden. The
first to do so publicly was Wornum, in his Life of Holbein, published in
1867, and he was followed by Woltmann, A. von Zahn, and others.[499] In
spite of such critics, however, both pictures were still regarded by
most people as from Holbein’s own hand, and it was not until the Holbein
Exhibition, held in Dresden in 1871, when the two panels were placed
side by side, and a close comparison became possible, that the undoubted
genuineness of the Darmstadt painting was admitted by all except the few
who had a personal interest in upholding the prestige of the Dresden
Gallery, and who, therefore, refused to believe that their own picture
was a mere copy, however good. Throughout the autumn of 1871, a fierce
battle raged between the contending parties, and Dresden was split up
into two hostile camps. A manifesto was issued by thirteen of the
leading critics, headed by Woltmann, Thausing, De Lutzow, and A.
Bayersdorfer, affirming their belief that the Darmstadt picture was
indubitably a genuine work by Holbein, with considerable and later
retouches in the heads of the Virgin, the Infant Christ, and the
Burgomaster, and that the Dresden Madonna was a free copy of it, in
which the hand of Holbein was not to be seen in any part. The other
party retaliated with a manifesto of their own, in which they claimed
that the modifications of the design in the Dresden example were so
free, and were such great improvements, particularly in the spacing and
the proportions of the figures, that no one but Holbein could have
accomplished it, and that he alone could have given so lofty an ideality
and beauty of expression to the figure of the Virgin, and that the
picture remained a monument which attested the culminating point of
German art. The Darmstadt picture, on the other hand, they found to be
so badly obscured by dirty varnish and partial repaints that it was
impossible to judge seriously the question of its originality. An
interesting account of the dispute was given in the _Gazette des
Beaux-Arts_[500] by the artist Rudolf Lehmann, who was a staunch
upholder of the genuineness of the better-known picture. He saw in it a
greater beauty, maturity, and nobility, and held that the modifications
were so intelligent as to be in reality corrections of the earlier work,
and therefore only from the hand of the master himself.
The Darmstadt picture had certainly suffered from retouching in many
places, but in 1887 it underwent a careful cleaning at the hands of
Hauser of Munich, by means of which the dirt and the spurious paint were
removed. It was then found to be in a very perfect state of
preservation, with the original splendour of its colour almost undimmed,
and the details as fine and as clear as when Holbein first painted them.
The differences between the two pictures are many, but in colour, in
expression, and in technical achievement the one at Darmstadt is far
superior. The copyist who produced the Dresden picture has apparently
attempted to improve upon the original, by beautifying the face of the
Madonna, which has lost much of its character in the process, and giving
a more graceful form to the rather thickset, stumpy figure of the
original, so characteristic of Holbein. The proportions of the
background have been also changed, with the same idea of improvement.
The copyist appears to have thought that the top of the semicircular
niche pressed too closely upon the Virgin’s head, and he accordingly
raised it, thus relieving what he considered to be a cramped position;
whereas in Holbein’s original arrangement, in which the diameter of the
semicircle cuts across the shoulders of the figure, the spacing is more
effective than in the copy, in which the line passes through the
Virgin’s neck. In the same way the pilasters over the kneeling figures
on either side have been raised well above the heads, so that the upper
parts of the columns become visible. In richness and harmony of colour
the Darmstadt version is far finer. In the Dresden copy the Virgin’s
dress is green, which proves that it was painted at some time
considerably later than the original, when the blue of the latter had
taken on a greenish tint from the discoloration of the varnish. Again,
the extraordinary delicacy and precision of the draughtsmanship of all
the details of dress is far more marked in the original work, in which,
too, there is much greater expression and animation in the faces.
[Sidenote: HISTORY OF THE DARMSTADT PICTURE]
The history of the Darmstadt picture can be traced, with few breaks,
from the day it was painted. On the death of Dorothea Meyer about 1549
it passed into the possession of her daughter Anna and the latter’s
husband, Nikolaus Irmi, or Irmy (1507-52). Anna Irmi, who married, after
Irmi’s death, Wilhelm Hebdenring, and died a widow in 1558, left it to
her daughter Rosa or Rosina, who, in 1576, married, as his third wife,
Remigius Faesch, burgomaster of Basel. Rosa died about 1606, and shortly
afterwards Faesch sold the picture for one hundred golden crowns
(_coronatos aureos solares_) to a certain Lucas Iselin. This information
is contained in a Latin manuscript in the Basel Library, which was
written about the middle of the seventeenth century by a second Remigius
Faesch, grandson of the burgomaster. He was a doctor of laws, and a
collector of pictures, and his manuscript bears the title, “Humanæ
Industriæ Monumenta.” The thirty-fifth folio is concerned with Holbein,
and from it the history of the picture may be taken a step farther.
Faesch says: “In the year 163-, the above-named painter, Le Blond,
bought here of the widow and heirs of Lucas Iselin, of St. Martin’s, a
painting on wood, about three Basel ells in size, the height and width
being the same; in which were represented the foresaid Burgomaster Jakob
Meier, together with his sons on the right side, and on the opposite
side his wife with the daughters, all painted from life, kneeling before
the altar. I possess copies of a son and a daughter, painted in Belgium
from the picture itself by Joh. Ludi. Le Blond paid for the picture 1000
imperials, and sold it afterwards for three times as much to Maria de’
Medici, Queen Dowager of France, mother of King Louis XIII, while she
was residing in Belgium, where she died. Whither it afterwards went, is
uncertain.” A marginal note, added by Faesch, probably at a later date,
further states: “This panel belonged to my grandfather, the Burgomaster
Remigius Faesch, from whom Lucas Iselin gained possession of it,
ostensibly for the ambassador of the King of France, and paid 100 gold
crowns for it about the year 1606.”[501]
Lucas Iselin died in 1626, and his heirs appear to have sold the picture
some years afterwards to Michel Le Blond, the German engraver, who lived
for the greater part of his life in Amsterdam, where he was occupied in
providing engraved plates of ornaments for the use of jewellers, and was
also a picture collector and dealer. He acted as agent to the Court of
Sweden at Amsterdam, and in 1625 he negotiated for the Duke of
Buckingham the purchase of a large collection of works of art from
Rubens. He was a friend of Sandrart, Holbein’s biographer, and travelled
with him in Italy.
Sandrart, in his Life of Holbein, continues the history of the picture,
and in speaking of Le Blond’s collection, says: “This gentleman has long
ago” (_lang vorher_)—he refers to some time before he, Sandrart, was in
Amsterdam, about 1640-45—“sold to the bookkeeper (or banker) Johann
Lössert, at his urgent request for the sum of 3000 gulden, a standing
figure of the Virgin painted on a panel, holding her little Child in her
arms, and under her is a carpet on which some figures are kneeling
before her, taken from life.”[502] Sandrart’s description shows that the
picture in question was undoubtedly the Meyer Madonna, and this is
confirmed by Patin’s account. The latter had access to the Faesch
manuscript, and speaks of it as “A standing Mary on a panel with the
Child on her arm, under her a carpet on which some figures are kneeling
before her, painted from the life.”
[Sidenote: HISTORY OF THE DARMSTADT PICTURE]
Sandrart’s story indicates that Faesch must have been wrong in stating
that Le Blond sold the picture to Maria de’ Medici, then in exile in
Holland; she appears to have been contented with a copy of it. Sandrart
himself took sketches of some of the figures, and others were made,
according to Faesch, by Joh. Ludi. This was Johannes Lüdin, a pupil of
Sarburgh, who has been confused by earlier writers with Giovanni da
Lodi, an obscure painter whose work is to be found in several churches
in Lodi. Wornum thought that Giovanni might have been the author of the
Dresden copy of the picture,[503] but later researches have shown this
to be a mistake. Quite recently (1911), Dr. E. Major has identified it
as a copy made for Queen Maria de’ Medici by Bartholomäus Sarburgh, a
portrait-painter who, in 1634, was living at the Hague, which was about
the time the picture went to Holland. Sarburgh, who was born about 1590,
worked in Basel and in Berne, and may have known the painting in his
youth. It is extremely probable, in Dr. Major’s opinion, that the
Dresden example is identical with the copy known to have been in the
possession of the French Queen.[504] There are numerous copies of
Holbein’s works by Sarburgh still in Basel, and several portraits by him
in the Picture Gallery of that city.
It has also been suggested that Faesch was mistaken in saying that Le
Blond bought the picture from Iselin’s widow in Basel, and that in
reality he obtained it from Iselin himself at some earlier date; for in
1621 there was an important example of Holbein’s work in Amsterdam which
the Earl of Arundel was anxious to obtain. Sir Dudley Carleton, writing
to the Earl from the Hague, 22nd June 1621, says: “Having wayted lately
on y^e K. and Q. of Bohemia to Amsterdam, I there saw y^e picture of
Holben’s yo^r L^p. desires; but cannot yet obtayne it, though my
indeavours wayte on it, as they still shall doe.”[505] Sir Dudley,
however, gives no description of the picture, which he was unable to get
for the Earl, so that it is impossible to say more than that there is
some probability that it may have been the Meyer Madonna.
Sandrart, who was a personal friend of Le Blond, is no doubt correct
when he says that the latter sold it direct to the banker Johann
Lössert; and it remained in the possession of that family for some
seventy or eighty years. It next appears in a sale of the pictures of
Jacob Cromhout and Jasper Loskart, held at Amsterdam on the 7th and 8th
May 1709, the latter evidently a descendant of Johann Lössert. According
to the catalogue, both owners were deceased, and the greater number of
the pictures seem to have belonged to Cromhout, the catalogue-heading
concluding with the words, “and some other fine pictures coming from the
cabinet of the deceased Herr Jasper Loskart.”[506] It is possible that
the two owners were relations, or partners in business, as the coat of
arms of the Cromhouts is on the old frame of the Darmstadt panel,
indicating that at some time or other the picture had been transferred
from the one family to the other.[507] The picture was No. 24 in the
sale, and was described as, “A capital piece, with two doors,
representing Mary with Jesus on her arm, with various kneeling figures
from life, by Hans Holbeen—fl. 2000”; just double the price paid for a
large altar-piece by Rubens in the same sale, and equal to about £160 in
modern money, a large price for a picture in those days. It will be seen
that in 1709 it still had wings, which have since disappeared.
For more than one hundred years after the Cromhout sale all traces of
the picture are missing, though it appears to have been in England for
at least a part of the time, for on the back is written in English: “No.
82, Holy Family, Portraits, A.D.,” the latter initials indicating that
when here it was attributed to Dürer. On the old seventeenth-century
frame there are, in addition to the Cromhout coat of arms, the armorial
bearings of a member of the Von Warberge family and his wife, apparently
indicating yet another ownership. It reappeared in 1822, when it was
purchased by Prince William of Prussia from the Parisian picture-dealer
Delahante, through the latter’s brother-in-law, Spontini, at that time
royal musical director in Berlin, at a cost of 2500 or 2800
thalers—about £420. On the death of the Prince its purchase for the
Berlin Museum was urged by Dr. Waagen, but the authorities were not
willing to consider it. On the division of the Prince’s property, it was
assigned to his daughter, Princess Elizabeth, who married Prince Charles
of Hesse-Darmstadt in 1836; and from that day the picture has remained
in the private apartments of the old palace.
[Sidenote: HISTORY OF THE DRESDEN VERSION]
The first definite information about the Dresden version is that at the
beginning of the eighteenth century it was in Venice, in the possession
of the Delfino family, from whose representative, Giovanni Delfino, it
was purchased by Count Francesco Algarotti on the 4th September 1743,
for Augustus III, Elector of Saxony, for one thousand sequins. A
previous attempt to buy it had been made by the Duke of Orleans in 1723.
It is to be gathered from Algarotti’s correspondence that the picture
had been bequeathed to Delfino’s father by the Venetian banker Avogadro,
and, according to an old servant of the latter’s, named Griffoni, his
master had obtained it in or about the year 1690 in Amsterdam as payment
for a debt of 2000 sequins owing to him by the house of Lössert, which
had recently become bankrupt. Algarotti was of opinion that it was the
very picture mentioned by Sandrart. As, however, the original picture
was still in Amsterdam in 1709 (the date of the Cromhout sale), nearly
twenty years after Avogadro is said to have received it, the version
which went to Venice can only have been a copy, which it is now known to
be. It appears, therefore, that at one time Loskart or Lössert possessed
two versions of the picture; and it may be conjectured that at the time
of the bankruptcy, or perhaps earlier, the original was sold to or taken
over by Cromhout, and the early seventeenth-century copy retained, until
it was given to Avogadro in lieu of the debt. It is not, however,
necessary to suppose that the transaction was an underhand one, and that
a copy was knowingly palmed off on the banker as an original, for very
possibly by that time both pictures were regarded as genuine works by
Holbein.
At the time the Venetian example was purchased for the Elector of
Saxony, it was generally regarded as a portrait-group of the More
family, owing to the similarity of the names Meyer and More. Horace
Walpole, who saw it in Venice, gave it its correct title. He says, when
referring to the various examples existing of the More family group:
“The fifth[508] was in the palace of the Delfino family at Venice, where
it was long on sale, the first price set, 1500_l._ When I saw it there
in 1741 they had sunk it to 400_l._, soon after which the present King
of Poland bought it.... The old man is not only unlike all
representations of Sir Thomas More, but it is certain that he never had
but one son. For the colouring, it is beautiful beyond description, and
the carnations have that enamelled bloom so peculiar to Holbein, who
touched his works till not a touch remained discernible! A drawing of
this picture by Bischop was brought over in 1723, from whence Vertue
doubted both of the subject and the painter; but he never saw the
original! By the description of the family picture of the Consul Mejer,
mentioned above, I have no doubt but this is the very picture—Mejer and
More are names not so unlike but that in process of time they may have
been confounded, and that of More retained, as much better known.”[509]
The cost of the picture was 1000 sequins, or 22,000 livres de
Venise—about £458 in English money—and the expenses in connection with
its purchase, packing, and forwarding to Dresden, came to some £125
more, including a liberal present to the painter Tiepolo, who helped in
the negotiations, and smaller gratuities to various retainers of the
Delfino family. The total cost, therefore, was considerably more than
three times the price paid for the original painting in the Amsterdam
sale.
Although the Meyer Madonna possesses no hidden meaning, and is merely a
customary representation of a donor and his family kneeling in adoration
before the Virgin and Child, yet a number of fanciful interpretations
were given to it in the last century, of which some echoes still remain.
It has been suggested that it is a votive picture to commemorate the
recovery of a sick child, whom the Virgin has taken into her arms,
placing her own child on the ground among the donors. This idea was
carried still farther by others, who saw in the infant on the Madonna’s
breast the soul of a dead child; while a third theory propounded was to
the effect that the little one was merely the soul of the woman kneeling
next the Virgin, supposed to be Meyer’s first wife. These are all
sentimental refinements of nineteenth-century German criticism, first
voiced by such writers as Ludwig Tieck and Friedrich Schlegel, and in
all probability would never have been heard of had the original picture
been in Dresden instead of the copy. In the latter the unknown copyist
has not been so successful in the figure of the infant Christ as in
other portions of the picture. It is far less animated than in the
original, and a little sickly and unhappy in expression, and it was
this, no doubt, which first suggested these over-refinements of meaning.
Ruskin was on the side of the sentimentalists. He says: “The received
tradition respecting the Holbein Madonna is beautiful, and I believe the
interpretation to be true. A father and mother have prayed to her for
the life of their sick child. She appears to them, her own Child in her
arms. She puts down her Christ before them, takes their child into her
arms instead; it lies down upon her bosom, and stretches its hands to
its father and mother, saying farewell.”[510] As a matter of fact, there
is nothing of death or sickness about the work, which tells its story
with the utmost simplicity and mastery of means, without needing such
refined subtleties for its proper explanation.
[Sidenote: HOLBEIN’S MODEL FOR THE VIRGIN]
It is difficult to follow Holbein’s latest English biographer, Mr. G. S.
Davies, in his belief that the influence of Gherardt David can be seen
in this work, and, in particular, to find, as he does, indications of
Holbein’s acquaintance with David’s great picture of the “Madonna with
the Saints and Angels,” now in the Rouen Museum, but in Holbein’s day,
and for three centuries afterwards, in the Carmelite Church in Bruges,
for which it had been painted. “I do not think that any one who
thoroughly knew the Darmstadt Holbein can fail,” he says, “as he looks
at this masterpiece of the Flemish painter, to be at once reminded by
something in the feeling and in the type of Madonna, and even in such
details as the choice of crown and robe, in the outspread mantle, in the
fashion of the robe, in the wavy golden hair lying along the shoulder,
and in the pose of the head as she looks down at the Child, of the
greater German master. Holbein’s is a stronger, more intensely
sympathetic, more real and convincing vision; but the original type
seems to be common to both men.”[511] To render this possible, a visit
to Bruges on Holbein’s part becomes necessary, and Mr. Davies considers
it to be most probable that he did so either on his way to England in
1526 or on his return in 1528, and he states, but without bringing
forward any proofs, that Holbein “spent several months in or about
Antwerp” on the former journey, and that he would not be likely to omit
a visit to so great a centre of art as Bruges. This theory also
necessitates the alteration of the date of the painting of the Meyer
Madonna, whereas everything points to its completion before Holbein left
Basel for England; nor will he find many to agree with him that in this
great picture, so essentially German in feeling, strong traces of
Flemish influence are to be seen. Such alien influence as can be traced
in it is undoubtedly Italian.
For the Meyer Madonna, Holbein’s wife no longer served as the model for
the Virgin, as she had done for the Madonna of Solothurn. Her place was
taken by that lady of somewhat notorious character in Basel, Magdalena
Offenburg. As pointed out in an earlier chapter, she had already twice
served Holbein as a model for his costume studies of Basel ladies,[512]
and she also sat to him for the two pictures of “Venus” and “Laïs
Corinthiaca” in the Basel Gallery, in which the similarity of features
to those of the Virgin in the Darmstadt altar-piece is very marked,
while all three bear an evident likeness to the model of that one of the
costume studies in which the sitter wears a necklace with the recurring
initials “M. O.” Her daughter Dorothea, wife of Joachim von Sultz, who
at one time was considered to be the lady represented in the “Laïs” and
“Venus” pictures,[513] led an equally scandalous life. She was divorced
in 1545, and both she and her husband were imprisoned, and afterwards
expelled the country.
VOL. I., PLATE 73.
[Illustration:
MAGDALENA OFFENBURG AS VENUS
1526
BASEL GALLERY
]
[Illustration:
MAGDALENA OFFENBURG AS LAIS
1526
BASEL GALLERY
]
[Sidenote: THE “LAÏS” AND “VENUS” PICTURES]
These two small, delicately painted portraits of Magdalena Offenberg as
“Laïs” and “Venus,” the former being dated “1526,” were among the last
works produced by Holbein before he left Basel for England. They bear a
very close resemblance to one another, except in the position of the
head, so that one appears to be almost a copy of the other. In the
Amerbach catalogue of 1586 they are described as: “Zwei täfelin doruf
eine Offenburgin conterfehet ist vf eim geschriben Lais Corinthiaca, die
ander hat ein kindlin bÿ sich. H. Holb. beide, mit ölfarben vnd in
ghüsern.” In each the figure is about one-third the size of life, and
the costume is the same, a rich dress of dark red velvet with slashings
showing white silk puffs, each fastened at top and bottom with gold
tags. The wide upper sleeves are of a deep gold hue. In each picture she
is shown at almost three-quarter length, behind a plain stone parapet,
with a dark green curtain as background. In the “Laïs” (No. 322) (Pl. 73
(2))[514] she wears a closely-fitting gold-embroidered head-dress or cap
on her fair hair, and with her left hand grasps the folds of a blue
mantle draped across her knees. On the parapet in front of her—which is
inscribed “Lais Corinthiaca. 1526,” in Roman letters, as though incised
in the stone—is placed a little heap of scattered gold coins, and she is
holding out her right hand, with palm upwards, as though asking for more
of them in payment for her favours. The pose is slightly varied in the
“Venus” (No. 323) (Pl. 73 (1)),[515] which is undated, the head being
bent a little to the right, instead of to the left, and there are small
changes in the costume. The lower sleeves of red slashed velvet are
omitted, and the arms are bare to the elbow, while the head-dress is
black, with a little gold ornamentation. The position of the hands is
almost the same, though the left one is hidden by the head and shoulders
of a small naked, red-haired Cupid, whose right arm rests on the parapet
with two long arrows in his hand. The golden coins are missing, but the
open palm of the lady’s right hand carries the same suggestion as in the
“Laïs.” The old frame still retains the curious and singularly
inappropriate inscription, “Verbum Domini manet in æternum,” which was
upon it when the Amerbach Collection was purchased by the town of Basel
in 1662.
[Sidenote: HOLBEIN AND MAGDALENA OFFENBURG]
The face is a refined one, with a high forehead, long nose, finely cut
lips, and fair complexion, and in the “Laïs” in particular, does not
suggest the supposed character of the sitter as tradition has handed it
down. It is possible that the painter to some extent idealised her
features. The “Venus” is less tender and attractive in expression; so
much so, indeed, that Woltmann[516] suggests that it was painted at an
earlier date, and that the “Laïs” was a renewed and more successful
attempt to represent the same idea. What that idea may have been has
given rise to considerable speculation. Wornum[517] quotes an old legend
to the effect that the artist could not obtain payment for the “Venus”
picture, and so, in revenge, he painted her as the famous courtesan,
Laïs of Corinth, the mistress of the great painter Apelles; but this
explanation is an absurd one. Woltmann’s suggestion is that both
pictures were painted for some lover of the lady, who wished, in the
first instance, to express his love, and then, later on, his contempt.
It is more probable that the pictures were the result of relationships
between the painter himself and Magdalena, though beyond the fact that
she served him more than once as a model, there is no proof of this.
This supposed connection between Holbein and the lady has given rise to
much imaginative writing in recent monographs. In one of them we are
told that “when Holbein inscribed his second portrait of Dorothea with
the words Laïs Corinthiaca, the midsummer madness must have been already
a matter of scorn and wonder to himself. His whole life and the works of
his life are the negation of the groves of Corinth. The paint was not
long dry on the Goddess of Love—at any rate, her dress was not worn
out—before he had seen her in her true colours: the daughter of the
horseleech, crying ‘Give, give.’ And so he painted her in 1526; to
scourge himself, surely, since she was too notoriously infamous to be
affected by it. As if in stern scorn of every beauty, every allure, he
set himself to record them in detail.... Laïs is far more beautiful, and
far more beautifully painted, than Venus. No emotion has hurried the
painter’s hand or confused his eye this time. In vain she wears such
sadness in her eyes, such pensive dignity of attitude, such a wistful
smile on her lips. He knows them, now, for false lights on the wrecker’s
coast. No faltering; no turning back. He can even fit a new head-dress
on the lovely hair, and add the puffed sleeves below the short ones. He
is a painter now; not a lover.... The plague was raging in Basel all
through that spring and summer, but I doubt if Holbein shuddered at its
contact as at the loveliness he painted,”[518] and so on. This is all
very pretty, but the imagination of the writer has run away with her.
What suggestion could be more fantastic than that in painting the Venus,
Holbein’s love for the lady was so great that both hand and eye faltered
in depicting her charms, and that he could only do full justice to her
beauty when his affection was dead and her loveliness made him shudder?
A more recent writer[519] is of opinion that Holbein succumbed to the
charms of Magdalena Offenburg before his marriage, and that she deigned
to honour the young Swabian painter with her favours almost directly
after his return to Basel from Lucerne. Though forced to confess that he
can find no traces of her as Holbein’s model in any of his finished
paintings of the period before Elsbeth Schmidt came into his life, in
his opinion she served him in that capacity not only for the series of
studies of the costumes worn by the Basel ladies, but also for his early
glass designs of the Madonna gazing down at the Infant Christ in her
arms, the St. Barbara of the same set, and the fine design of a wooden
statue of St. Michael, all three of which have been already
described.[520] No doubt the type of face in all these studies is much
the same, but there is a tendency in this search for likenesses to go
too far, and to see Magdalena Offenburg or Elsbeth Schmidt as the only
models used by Holbein at this time. In some instances the likeness is
largely imaginary. His wife, the same writer continues, may not have
been beautiful, but she certainly had charm, as the portrait at the
Hague proves, and Holbein must have loved her when he painted her. For
two years afterwards he remained the devoted husband, using her as the
model for the Solothurn Madonna, the Virgin of the Basel organ doors,
and for the glass design of the Mary in the niche with the cavalier
kneeling before her. Then, after this short period of happiness, her
place in the pictures and designs is again taken by Magdalena. The
impudent creature appears as the St. Ursula of the Karlsruhe painting,
and the “arrows in her hands are those with which in succeeding years
she is to pierce the poor heart of the painter’s wife.” In the Meyer
Madonna, this writer sees in the Virgin nothing but the elegant, banal
visage of the courtesan, and a complete want of all humanity. The “Laïs”
and “Venus” of 1526, he adds, affirm finally and cynically the victory
of the mistress over the legitimate wife, while the last and worst
insult of all was in using his own eldest child as the model for the
Cupid, and placing him in the company of the hateful rival, who in the
end robbed his wife of all her beauty and all her happiness. There may
be some truth in this attempt to reconstruct a few pages of Holbein’s
life-story, but there is little proof to support it. Where proof is
lacking, however, the writer’s imagination fills the gaps; but it is not
fair to condemn the painter upon such evidence as this, or to hold him
guilty of infamous conduct upon the strength of a few supposed
likenesses in his pictures or designs.
Whatever Holbein’s personal relations to Magdalena Offenburg may have
been, she appears to have been a good model, which is in itself quite
sufficient to explain the fact that he painted these two portraits of
her. That he held her in no particular esteem may be gathered from the
name he gives her, just as Niklaus Manuel Deutsch, as noted in a
previous chapter, wrote an offensive remark as to her character on the
drawing he made of her. Her face, as represented by Holbein, is fair,
but devoid of any strong feeling, though Knackfuss holds that “a deep
and quiet sorrow lies in the expression of the refined face;” and that
“the sense of the two paintings is explained by their juxtaposition: the
gold which she desired cannot make the young woman happy; love alone can
do so.”[521] This last-named writer considers that the pictures were not
painted to some one’s order, but for the artist’s own amusement.
A question of much more interest in connection with these two works is
their authorship. They differ from all other portraits by Holbein of the
Basel period, because in them the Milanese influence upon his art is
seen at its strongest, so that more than one writer of repute has
refused to admit that they are his work. Rumohr regarded them as from
the hand of some Netherlandish painter, and Waagen was of opinion that
Holbein painted them under Netherlandish influence. Wornum considered
them to be the work of some Milanese. “The style of the painting,” he
says, “is more Milanese, in colouring and in treatment, than anything
else, exceedingly elaborate, cool in colour, dry in manner, and
altogether unlike any other known work by our painter. In this case I
have not the slightest faith in the Amerbach inventory.... The two
portraits have a decided Milanese character, in the manner of the
scholars of Leonardo da Vinci. A visit to Milan could not have had such
a wonderful influence on Holbein’s taste as is shown in these portraits,
or if such be allowed to be possible, it is just as remarkable that he
should have laid this taste down again without leaving a trace
behind.”[522]
Mr. Davies follows Wornum, but goes still farther in suggesting the name
of the North Italian artist who painted them. He says: “I may say at
once that I am quite unable to see any Netherlandish influence or
probable authorship in the pictures. On the other hand, I see the
strongest evidence of Lombard influence, and that in so direct a fashion
and to such a degree that I believe them to be the work of some Lombard
artist who had come under the influence of the later work of Raphael.
The name of Cesare da Sesto at once occurs to one, and if it were not
for the date 1526 on the Laïs picture, there would be no great
difficulty in accepting it as a work by him which had found its way
across from Milan—possibly even in the pack of Holbein himself.”[523] He
acknowledges the difficulty of the date—Da Sesto was dead in 1526—and
also of the red-haired Cupid in the Venus picture, so evidently both
German and from Holbein’s own hand, and bearing so close a resemblance
to the children in other pictures of his, such as the Meyer Madonna and
the Family Group of 1528; but in spite of this, his final opinion is
that they are most probably the work of Cesare da Sesto. He further
suggests that Holbein, “possessing, or seeing in the possession of
Amerbach, these two small examples, very similar in attitude and
motive,” sought to give them variety, by inserting the figure of Cupid
in the one, and thus giving this Italian lady the character of Venus,
and in the other the gold coins and the title of Laïs, “so as to turn a
somewhat unmeaning picture of a woman into a quasi-classical
personality.” “The Offenburg tradition,” he adds, “I should wholly
reject, nor indeed can I persuade myself that these pictures are
portraits by Holbein either of that shadowy lady or of any other lady
whatever. They appear to me to be pictures, not of some well-marked
personality, but merely Lombard school types.”
[Sidenote: MILANESE INFLUENCE IN THE LAÏS]
It is impossible to follow Mr. Davies in this attribution. Woltmann’s
opinion, with which most modern critics are in agreement, that they are
genuine works by Holbein in which Lombard influence is more strongly
marked than in most of his other Basel paintings, is the correct one.
The two panels are unmistakably the product of a northern painter
working under some southern influence, and just as unmistakably the work
of Holbein himself, as a close comparison with his other work of this
period shows very plainly. This Milanese influence was the result of his
visit to Lombardy, and is to be traced in a greater or lesser degree in
all that he accomplished previously to his first visit to England.
“Their warm, transparent technique and the realistic ungracefulness of
the draperies,” says Mr. C. J. Holmes, speaking of the Laïs and its
companion, “make them characteristic northern works, just as the
Raphaelesque folds and cool opaque pigment of Cesare da Sesto in his
later paintings—the small Madonna in the Brera, for example—are
characteristically southern.”[524] Possibly for once in a way Holbein
was making a conscious attempt to imitate the manner of some artist of
the North Italian school whose work he had seen and admired, perhaps in
Basel itself, so that the Lombard influence is more pronounced than in
those pictures and designs in which he was less evidently making an
experiment based upon what he had seen in Italy, and in which his own
native genius was the predominating force. For the same reason it is
very possible that in the Laïs and the Venus, Holbein, instead of
following his model closely, gave play to his imagination, and
attempted, as the type of face, with downcast eyes, and pensive, almost
melancholy charm of expression suggests, to emulate the Leonardesque
manner, so that at the best they are merely idealised representations of
the notorious Magdalena Offenburg.
There is no doubt that during the summer of 1526, in spite of his
reputation as a painter, he found it increasingly difficult to gain a
living, and that, in consequence, he made up his mind to seek his
fortunes in some other country, and finally decided to visit England. In
those early days of the Reformation in Switzerland, when the
ecclesiastical disputes were assuming so acute a form, and risings of
the peasants and other violent disturbances were growing common, there
was very little opportunity for artists to find remunerative employment,
and Holbein suffered with the rest. The town authorities had no time for
considering such important public works as the completion of the Town
Hall decorations, and all that they could find for him to do was an
ill-paid job or two at long intervals, such as the one already
mentioned,[525] which in happier times would have been hardly worth his
attention. Basel, indeed, no longer offered a means of livelihood to a
painter with a wife, a stepson, and two children of his own to keep.
Throughout this year, too, the plague was raging in the city, and this
may have proved the last straw which definitely turned his thoughts in
the direction of England.
Numerous legends have grown up around this journey of his, which for the
most part have no foundation in fact. The commonest, first voiced by Van
Mander, is to the effect that the Earl of Arundel, when passing through
Basel on his way home from Italy some years previously, was so delighted
with Holbein’s work that he urged him to try his fortunes in England.
Later on, when Holbein had taken his advice, he was asked by Sir Thomas
More, who it was who had suggested this course to him. Holbein replied
that he had forgotten the nobleman’s name, but, taking up a piece of
charcoal, he rapidly sketched a face, which the Chancellor instantly
recognised. Another version gives the Earl of Surrey as Holbein’s
adviser; but the tale is a pure legend, and has been told of more than
one painter.
Another story, which has been often repeated, gives as the reason of his
departure the desire to escape from the constant tempers of an
ill-humoured wife, and that he therefore left Basel surreptitiously,
without obtaining the necessary leave of absence from the Town Council.
His earlier biographers all describe his relationships with his wife as
not very cordial ones, but they merely copied from one another, and this
again may be mere legend. Patin, in particular, whose account of Holbein
is palpably exaggerated and often false, describes him as a drunkard,
who led a disorderly life, and was always so poverty-stricken that
Erasmus and Amerbach had frequently to come to his assistance—a
statement entirely devoid of fact, and sufficiently disproved by
Holbein’s brilliant performances in many branches of art. Patin also,
when speaking of Holbein’s journey to England, makes use of another
favourite story told of numerous artists. He says that on his way he
passed through Strasburg, and called on the principal painter of the
town, but found him out. An unfinished portrait stood on the easel,
whereupon Holbein painted a fly on the forehead, and then left. When the
painter returned he attempted to brush it away, imagining it to be a
real one, and was so impressed by his unknown visitor’s skill, that he
at once sought him out, but found that he had already left the town.
[Sidenote: REASONS FOR LEAVING BASEL]
It is, of course, possible that Holbein’s domestic relations by that
time were not as cordial as in earlier days, and that his supposed
connection with Magdalena Offenburg may have rendered them still less
pleasant, and that this may have had something to do with his departure;
but this again is mere conjecture, of which no actual proof is
forthcoming. Want of work was undoubtedly the chief, and possibly the
only cause of his journey, and no doubt it was largely the advice of
Erasmus which finally decided him to take the step. Erasmus, who had
already sent more than one example of Holbein’s skill as a
portrait-painter to England, had a large circle of friends and patrons
here, to whom he could recommend the artist. To Warham and More, at
least, Holbein’s portrait of Erasmus had already provided an informal
introduction, and they may have been aware, also, though this is less
likely, that it was he who designed the title-page used in the edition
of the _Utopia_ published by Froben in 1518, signed “Hans Holb.” In 1525
a certain Thomas Grey and his youngest son were living with Erasmus in
Basel, according to a letter from the latter to Lupset;[526] and Grey,
too, may have advised Holbein to seek fortune at Henry’s court. “Grey,”
says Erasmus, “reports that there is no disturbance in England,” and
this news may have proved an added inducement to the painter to quit a
country agitated with religious and civil contention for a more peaceful
locality where the arts could flourish in peace.
Before leaving Basel, Holbein made one last attempt, as already
recounted,[527] to obtain from the Antonine Abbey of Isenheim the
painting materials which his father had left there some years
previously. The strongly-worded letter, dated 4th July 1526, which the
Burgomaster of Basel, Heinrich Meltinger, wrote at his request, is
addressed to the “venerable Herr Vicar and preceptor of the Order of St.
Antonius at Isenenn, our dear and gracious Master,” and runs as follows:
“Venerable, gracious, and dear sir, receive our friendly and ready
service. Hans Holbein, painter, our citizen, has proposed to us to paint
an altar-panel, such as his deceased father painted in former years. He
left some implements of an expensive kind, weighing about three hundred
and two cubic measures, with you at Isenheim, which he, Hans Holbein,
repeatedly during the lifetime of his father, and at his desire, and
also after his decease, being his heir, demanded of you, but could never
obtain; for what reasons he knows not. Thus the matter has been delayed
to such an extent that the peasants, he is informed, have wasted these
implements in the last uproar, and when he again desired them of you, as
his father’s heir, you referred him, with his request, to the peasants,
with whom he has nothing to do, and to whom he has intrusted nothing,
and notified to him an appointment on the Saturday after the next Ulrici
(7th July) at Ensisheim. We, having heard his business, and given
credence to it, and being well inclined to further him, have not allowed
him to keep such an appointment, or to make any demand of the peasants
(with whom he, as we have heard, has nothing to do), but have firm
confidence in you, that you will weigh the matter thoroughly, and hand
over to him, as the heir of his deceased father, completely and without
difficulty, the aforementioned implements, or, in case nothing of them
now exists, compensate him for their loss, and so show yourself towards
him in the affair, that he may feel that our intercession has been
advantageous, and that no further steps are necessary. Such behaviour on
your side we wish for him, to whom it is justly due.”[528]
This letter affords proof that Ambrosius Holbein was dead, for in it
Hans is mentioned more than once as his father’s heir, and it also shows
that the Basel Council were not so actively opposed to the painting of
altar-pieces as other incidents of the time suggest. Nothing further is
known of this altar-panel which Holbein proposed to paint for them.
[Sidenote: ERASMUS’ LETTER OF INTRODUCTION]
It is evident that the materials, which would now have been very useful
to him, had been destroyed or dispersed in the peasant rising, and that
he obtained neither colours nor redress. He left Basel for England on or
about August 29, 1526, as appears from a letter of introduction of that
date which he carried with him from Erasmus to his friend Peter Ægidius,
the learned traveller and town-clerk of Antwerp, in which Holbein was
recommended to his notice as the artist who had painted Erasmus. Ægidius
is also asked to introduce him to Quentin Metsys. The part of the letter
which refers to Holbein (though not by name) runs as follows:—
“The bearer of this letter is the man who painted my portrait. I do not
trouble you with any commendation of him, though he is an excellent
artist (_artifex_). If he wants to call on Quentin, and you have not
leisure to introduce him, you can send a servant with him to show him
the house. The arts are freezing in this part of the world, and he is on
his way to England to pick up some angels there (_petit Angliam ut
corrodat aliquot Angelatos_—Erasmus plays upon the words Angles and
Angels). You can send on any letters you like by him.”[529] There is no
reason to suppose that Holbein delayed his departure after receiving
this letter from his patron, who must also have supplied him with
introductions to More, Warham, and other friends in England. It was, no
doubt, necessary for him to arrange with the Town Council for leave of
absence, and this having been done, he must have started not later than
the first days of September, reaching London towards the close of the
same month.
------------------------------------------------------------------------