The other work I would particularize is, "The Salutation of the Virgin," in the collection of the Marquis of Westminster. This picture, though of small dimensions, yet exemplifies the peculiarity of Rembrandt's mode of treatment. Being less decided in the chiaro-scuro and tone of colour than the Wise Men's Offering, it is more difficult to describe; this also arises from the exquisite weaving in of the hot and cold colours. Having had it under my eye for a couple of months, I can easily recall it on the least effort of the memory; but to bring it before the spectator who has not seen it, and by no other art than the medium of words, is as difficult as it would be to bring an harmonious arrangement of music by a different means—one must be seen and the other heard to render an explanation evident, which even then can only be understood by connoisseurs in painting and music. I must therefore avail myself of technicalities, which may seem out of place, where we are investigating the general hue of the picture. It is divided into hot and cold colours, which are brought in contact in the centre—Elizabeth being clothed in red and yellow, the Virgin in blue, white, and cool grey. The hot colour is carried across by the red sleeve of Elizabeth, and part of her yellow shawl, and descends to the petticoat of a Negress who is removing the grey mantle from the Virgin, and is further extended by a few warm-coloured stones and touches in the pavement. The cool colour is carried past the warm tone of Zacharias and the porch above him by means of a grey green pillar, a peacock, and a few touches of cool colour on a bush at one corner of the warm side of the picture. The general tone of the work is of a low, deep hue, so that even the cool tints are not cold or raw, but a deep-toned brightness pervades the whole. Through the dark grey sky, that seems to descend to overshadow the group, a gleam of light darts upon the scene, as a connecting link between heaven and earth, and giving force and truth to the expression of Elizabeth, when she pronounces the words, "Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." The light that shoots through the gloom has roused a pea-hen and chicks, who shake off their sleep as if it was the dawn of day.
This is a very imperfect description, but will, nevertheless, serve to show the fine feeling and deep intent of the genius of Rembrandt. To extend this investigation further would be perhaps superfluous, did we not know that, even in our own time, doubts are entertained of the proper introduction of pictorial arrangements of chiaro-scuro and colour; but the grand style, like all other modes of portraying a work, must be made subservient to affecting the feelings of the spectator. I shall only bring two pictures in contrast to elucidate this principle still further—"The Burning of the Books at Ephesus," by Sebastian Bourdon; and "The Martyrdom of St. Lawrence," by Titian. As Bourdon has been considered the French Raffaelle, it is but fair that he should be taken as a follower of that school, devoted to composition and correct drawing, to the absence of all inferior qualities; the consequence is, he has represented the scene in mid-day, where the flames are red without extending their influence to surrounding objects; consequently, they are not luminous, nor conveying the idea of destruction. Titian, on the contrary, has chosen the darkness of night to represent the horrors of the martyrdom—the red burning light of the living coal conveys a tenfold force to the torments of the saint, and the very reality of the colour gives a corresponding truth to the scene, which takes it completely out of the regions of apocrypha, and stamps it with the character of Holy Writ. The descent of the cool light from heaven upon the scorching body of St. Lawrence is like a rush of water to counteract his sufferings, and give him a confidence in his future reward, which the spectator fully enters into. These are the triumphs that appropriate chiaro-scuro and colour achieve for their introduction into historical works.
That we may more clearly perceive the rank which Rembrandt holds as a colourist, I shall endeavour to investigate the peculiar qualities that characterise the several manners of Titian, Rembrandt, and Reynolds—the one living before, the other after our artist, and of course confining the investigation to portraiture alone. I have selected Titian in preference to Vandyke, not that I consider him, in this branch, superior; on the contrary, I agree with Sir Joshua, in mentioning Vandyke as the greatest portrait painter that ever existed, all things considered—but I wish to confine myself exclusively to colour, and in this branch it is evident that these three great artists are more similar in their works than any other painters; but Titian, by the concurrent testimony of his contemporaries and all succeeding judges upon the subject, is the highest authority on the great leading principles of colour. Besides, his works are in many instances uninjured by the rough usage of uneducated men. With regard to the works of Rembrandt, which are in comparison as of yesterday, many of them remain in the same frames and on the same walls on which they were first hung. The works of Reynolds, though of a more recent date, have suffered more, not from the ruthless hand of the picture-cleaner, but from his making use of more perishable materials. Still, from the variety of his vehicles, changed from an anxiety to get a nearer approach to the look and appearance of nature, many of his pictures are sufficiently perfect to build an investigation upon. Previous to the appearance of Giorgione and Titian, this branch of the art differed but little from the treatment the several heads received in historical pictures generally; only with this exception, that when introduced as the component parts of a work where a story had to be told, they were imbued with action and expression; but when treated as simple portraiture, the higher qualities were left out, and a quiet map of the face, to use a familiar expression, was all that was desired to be transferred to the canvas. Neither did the head receive that superiority over every other subordinate part of the work which science and a long line of celebrated examples seem now so imperatively to demand.
In drawing a comparison between the three great portrait painters, it is necessary, in the first instance, to refer to the several characters of their models, or sitters. The nobility of Venice were, at the time of Titian, men of long descent, dignified, and holding high rank in a city at that time the emporium of the merchandize of the East, and distributors of rich manufactures to the whole of civilized Europe; hence that "senatorial dignity" which characterises his works, and the style and richness of costume so necessary to grandeur, and the historical air in his portraits. His sitters also possessed countenance and figure well calculated to engender and support the noblest character of painting. The sitters of Reynolds, notwithstanding the pomatumed pyramids of the female hair, or the stiff, formal curls of the male, which set every attempt to beautify the features at defiance, either by extension of the forms or harmonizing the several parts of the countenance, (serious obstacles to pictorial beauty,) were still in possession of that bland and fascinating look which distinguishes people of high breeding. In contrast with these we have to array the models of Rembrandt's painting-room—fat burgomasters, florid in complexion and common in feature; Jews and attornies; shipbuilders, and hard harsh-featured master mechanics. Independent of the models themselves, there is a congenial feeling created in the artist who associates with and has to represent them; we imperceptibly imbibe the manners of those we are in contact with, either advantageously or injuriously. From these few remarks we may perceive that the dignified attitude, the broad general tone of the countenance, though deep, yet rendered bright and luminous by the jetty blackness of the hair and beard, were all conducive to the creation of the style of Titian—a style that swallows up the varieties of minute tints in a general breadth. So in Reynolds, the absence of everything strong in expression or harsh in colour gave a refinement to the heads of his men, and a beauty to the faces of his females; and to this treatment all his sitters were subjected—so that even those heads, however deficient in the originals, came off his easel ladies and gentlemen. A subdued delicacy of expression and colour removes them from the common look of familiar life. Now, on the contrary, the very character and colour of Rembrandt's heads are pronounced with the strong stamp of flesh and blood—an exact representation of nature in an unsophisticated state. His handling, his manner of leaving the various tints, and the marking of minute parts, all conspire to give his works that appearance of truth unfettered with the attempt to elevate the general character at the expense of individuality.
The peculiarity of Titian's portraits, independent of the high character and simple and dignified attitude of the figure, is a careful and distinct modelling of the features, with the half-shadows, though not dark, yet never slurred over—which in other hands would produce heaviness; but Titian counteracts this by the intense darkness of his dresses and backgrounds, so that the features, often modelled with the firmness of sculpture, are rendered comparatively gentle by the treatment of the other parts of the picture. The portraits of Sir Joshua have this peculiarity, that however loaded and enriched in every part of the work, the head is kept smooth, and often thinly painted. The whole-length of "The Marquis of Granby," and "The Portrait of Mrs. Siddons," two of his finest pictures, are examples of this mode of treating the head. This has given rise to an anecdote, that Mrs. Siddons, looking at the picture when unfinished, begged Sir Joshua not to touch the head any more—and having promised her, he refrained, notwithstanding the richness and depth of the fearless glazings would seem to demand a corresponding force in the head. The truth is, that Reynolds seems always to have depended upon the small dark shadows to give solidity to his heads, without clogging them with colour or dark half-tints. The importance of thus refining upon the head may be perceived in the portrait of himself, painted con amore, and presented to the Dilettante Society, of which he was a member. The features, and, indeed, the whole head, depend upon the extreme darks; the judicious arrangement of these shadows not only gives a pictorial dignity to the work, from the stamp of science, but also, where the features in nature are either blunt or mean in themselves, draws off the attention of the spectator to higher qualities. Shadows are never mean, but are the stamps of truth rendered beautiful by taste and feeling. Independent of the advantage of dark touches giving delicacy to the features that produce them, there is a motion and life given by the vivacity and freedom of the handling, which cannot with safety be taken with the features themselves. This quality seems very early to have been Sir Joshua's greatest anxiety to acquire. In a remark respecting the pictures of a rival, John Stephen Liotard, whose only merit was a strong likeness, with great neatness of finish, Reynolds says—"The high-finished manner of painting would be chosen if it were possible with it to have that spirit and expression which infallibly fly off when the artist labours; but there are transient beauties which last less than a moment, and must be painted in as little time; besides, in poring long the imagination is fatigued, and loses its vigour. You will find nature in the first manner—but it will be nature stupid, and without action. The portraits of Holbein are of this high-finished manner; and for colouring and similitude what was ever beyond them? But then you see fixed countenances, and all the features seem to remain immoveable."
Northcote observes, "Of mere likeness in portraiture Reynolds thought very little, and used to say that he could instruct any boy that chance might throw in his way to paint a likeness in a portrait in half a year's time; but to give an impressive and a just expression and character to a picture, or paint it like Velasquez, was another thing. What we are all," he said, "attempting to do with great labour, he does at once."
Barry, speaking of Reynolds as a portrait painter, mentions the wretched state the art was in before his time, and how elevated it became from the manner Sir Joshua treated it. In continuation, he says—"In many of Titian's portraits the head and hands are mere staring, lightish spots, unconnected with either the drapery or background, which are sometimes too dark, and mere obscure nothings; and in Lely, and even in Vandyke, we sometimes meet with the other extreme of too little solidity, too much flickering and washiness. Sir Joshua's object appears to have been to obtain the vigour and solidity of the one, with the bustle and spirit of the other, without the excess of either; and in by far the greatest number of his portraits he has admirably succeeded. His portrait of Mrs. Siddons is, both for the ideal and the executive, the finest portrait of the kind perhaps in the world; indeed, it is something more than a portrait, and may serve to give an excellent idea of what an enthusiastic mind is apt to conceive of those pictures of confined history for which Apelles was so celebrated by the ancient writers. But this picture of 'Mrs. Siddons, or the Tragic Muse,' was painted not long since, when much of his attention had been turned to history; and it is highly probable that the picture of Lord Heathfield, the glorious defender of Gibraltar, would have been of equal importance, had it been a whole length; but even as it is—only a bust—there is great animation and spirit, happily adapted to the indications of the tremendous scene around him; and to the admirable circumstance of the key of the fortress, firmly grasped in his hand, than which imagination cannot conceive anything more ingenious and heroically characteristic. It is, perhaps, owing to the Academy, and to his situation in it, to the discourses which he biennially made to the pupils upon the great principles of historical art, and the generous ardour of his own mind to realize what he advised, that we are indebted for a few expansive efforts of colouring and chiaro-scuro which would do honour to the first names in the records of art." And speaking of the large historical work he painted for the Empress of Russia, he adds—"Nothing can exceed the brilliancy of light—the force and vigorous effect of his picture of 'The Infant Hercules strangling the Serpent;' it possesses all that we look for and are accustomed to admire in the works of Rembrandt, united to beautiful forms and an elevation of mind to which Rembrandt had no pretensions. The prophetical agitation of Tiresias and Juno, enveloped in clouds, hanging over the scene like a black pestilence, can never be too much admired, and are, indeed, truly sublime."
After such commendations, and from so high an authority, we might feel a diffidence in bringing forward the great founder of the Dutch school in competition with such artists as Titian and Reynolds, did we not know that the qualities of the chiaro-scuro and colour of Reynolds are founded on the deep tones of Rembrandt, who, as a colourist, takes his proper place between the two heads of the Venetian and English schools. How far Rembrandt was indebted for his principles of colour to the works of Titian, it is impossible to say; but many of his pictures bear a greater affinity to the last style of this great colourist than to any other painter. We perceive by the catalogue of his effects, that folios containing drawings by Titian, also prints after him, were in his possession. The luminous, rich tones of his flesh are more like Titian than Rubens or Vandyke, whose works he must have been familiar with; and while his backgrounds are less black and inky than those in the portraits of Titian and Tintoret, they are also more broken, both in colour and execution, which prevents heaviness. His handling—which conveys from its dexterity and touch so lifelike an appearance—is not unlike that of Frank Hals, of whom Reynolds speaks so highly:—"In the works of Frank Hals, the portrait painter may observe the composition of a face, the features well put together, as the painters express it, from whence proceeds that strong, marked character of individual nature, which is so remarkable in his portraits, and is not found in an equal degree in any other painter. If he had joined to this most difficult part of the art a patience in finishing what he so correctly planned, he might justly have claimed the place which Vandyke, all things considered, so justly holds, as the first of portrait painters." There is, however, this difference in their works—independent of the flesh of Rembrandt's being much richer in tone, it is produced by glazing and fresh touches of transparent colour, whereas the tints of Hals seem to have been mixed in the first instance on his palette; hence that undisturbed dexterity of handling which gives so much the appearance of life in his best works. The distinctive characteristics between a portrait painter and a historical painter, is "that the one paints man in general, the other a particular man;" hence, to ennoble the work, it is necessary to make it conform, as much as can be done with safety to the likeness, to the great principles that guide the highest branches of the art—that is, by softening down those features that overstep the boundary of general nature, and assisting those parts that fall short, or are defective. Therefore, when Lawrence painted Mrs. Siddons, the Duke of Wellington, or Lord Brougham, he chose a front view of the face, that their peculiarities might not be too apparent. Now Sir Joshua carried these generalizing principles to so great an extent at times that his sitters did not recognise the striking likeness that some people look for as paramount to all other considerations, which made his pupil, Northcote, remark that there was a class of sitters who would not be content "unless the house-dog barked at it as a sign of recognition." Rembrandt, on the contrary, did not generalize enough; therefore, many portraits were left on his hands, as it is said they were left on Reynolds's. But see the result, those very pictures from the easel of both painters bring higher prices than the more favoured of their likenesses, from being intrinsically fine works of art. The number of portraits Rembrandt painted of himself is a proof of the little encouragement he received in painting the portraits of others. From Sir Joshua's hand we have but two or three, while from Rembrandt's we have nearly fifty. Yet, with all the deficiencies in the art of making up a beautiful face, Rembrandt frequently produced portraits of great feminine beauty: witness "The Lady with the Fan," in the collection of the Marquis of Westminster, and "The Lady," in the Royal Collection. Had he got the same models of female beauty that Titian and Reynolds had, he would, in all probability, have transferred them to the canvas with the same truth and intenseness of feeling that guided his pencil in other matters. Rembrandt's style was that which would have suited Oliver Cromwell, who, when he sat for his portrait, made it a sine qua non that the painter should leave out neither warts nor wrinkles. The same truth and verisimilitude that regulated his forms, guided his eye with respect to colour. In his earlier pictures, such as "The Ship Builder," in the Royal Collection, there is a greater degree of hardness and solidity of pigment than in his later works, which possess more the suppleness of flesh. This is also to be observed in the later works of Titian, Velasquez, and Reynolds, and in the later works of our Scottish Velasquez—Raeburn. The portraits of Gainsborough possess this in a high degree. What has been said with regard to Rembrandt laying on his colours with the palette-knife, is very much exaggerated. Many of his heads are as smooth as Reynolds's, and finished with great delicacy and precision; in fact, the versatility of his genius, and the wonderful command over his materials, from indefatigable practice, have given both his pictures and prints that character of having been done in the best style suited to accomplish his object. I have mentioned that Titian keeps his backgrounds often dark, for the purpose of giving a delicacy to his strong shadows in the face; both Vandyke and Rembrandt do this by making the colour of the background amalgamate with the colour of the hair, or dark shades of the head. Rubens, Reynolds, and Lawrence often used a red curtain in contact with their flesh, to produce the same result. The luminous character of the head is certainly better preserved by its giving out rays or similarity of tone to the surrounding background. It has been remarked that the luminous and transparent character of the flesh is enhanced, as in several of Vandyke's portraits, by bringing it in contact with an earthy, dull tint. Vandyke, indeed, when his ground would not permit him, introduced over the shoulders of his females a scarf of this colour. Rembrandt often plunges from the dark shadows of his head into his ground, and thus gives both a breadth and unity. This practice, where the shadows of the face are produced by the same colour as the contiguous background, is certainly the foundation of simplicity.
I think the money value of Rembrandt's portraits may be taken as a criterion of their intrinsic worth as works of art; other masters' decline in producing high prices, Rembrandt's increase—witness the portrait sold the other day at the Duke of Buckingham's, at Stowe;—though the half-length of a burgomaster whom few people ever heard of, it realized seven hundred guineas and upwards. No nameless portrait by Reynolds, under the same disadvantages, would produce an equivalent sum. Sir Joshua's portraits are either branches of our aristocracy, or celebrated public characters. As a knowledge of art advances, works fall naturally into their proper stations. When Reynolds's sister asked Sir Joshua the reason that we never see any of the portraits by Jervas now, he replied, "Because, my dear, they are all up in the garret." Yet this man drove his chariot and four, and received the praises of Pope in verse. Sir Godfrey Kneller would sometimes receive a sum of money and a couple of portraits by Vandyke as payment; but now, a single portrait of the great founder of the Dutch school would outweigh in true value a large number of Kneller's collected talent: yet Rembrandt died insolvent, and Sir Godfrey accumulated a large fortune. And such will be the fate of those who paint for posterity, "and look beyond the ignorant present." The true statement of this change, which of necessity takes place, is, that the man of genius paints according to the high impulse that has been given him, as paramount to every other consideration; the other panders to the caprice and ignorance of those who employ him. This it was that made Reynolds's master, Hudson, exclaim, after Sir Joshua's return from Italy, "Why, Joshua, you don't paint so well as you did before you went abroad!" When men of genius and high talent fall upon favourable times, the result is the reverse, and the fine arts are esteemed, and their professors rewarded according to their excellence. The age in which Titian lived was famous for literary men, who had made the republic of Venice known and honoured through the whole of Italy. The praises of Michael Angelo bestowed on the works of the great Venetian, had adorned the name of Titian with a halo of supernatural brightness; so much so, that whilst painting the portrait of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, happening to drop one of his pencils, Charles stooped and picked it up, observing, "that a genius like Titian deserved to be waited on by emperors." Of Reynolds we know that all the beauty and talent of the land flocked to his painting-room, conscious of being handed down to posterity with all the advantages that pictorial science could achieve. The grace of Coreggio was grafted by this great master on the strong stem of Rembrandt's colouring. In opposition to those advantages, we have to remark that the people with whom Rembrandt came in contact were not only of an inferior character, when measured by the standard of grace and dignity, but the troubles of the times militated in a high degree against that encouragement so necessary to the perfection of the art. In spite of these inauspicious circumstances, the genius of Rembrandt has produced works fraught with the highest principles of colour and pictorial effect, and to his want of encouragement in the department of mere common portraiture, we are indebted for many of the most pictorial and splendid specimens of strong individual character in familiar life.
Of all the works by Rembrandt, perhaps no picture has attracted so much attention and observation as his "Night Watch," now in the Museum of Amsterdam. As its dimensions are thirteen feet by fourteen, it secures attention by its size; its effect, also, is striking in a high degree, though Reynolds, in his "Tour to Holland and Flanders," says it disappointed him, having heard so much respecting it. He remarks that it had more of the appearance of Ferdinand Bol, from a prevalence of a yellow, sickly colour. On the other hand, Wilkie says, "Had it been a subject such as 'The Christ before Pilate,' which he has etched, it would have been his finest and grandest work." Though painted in 1642, it possesses all the force and high principles of colour to be found in his later works. Nothing can exceed the firmness and truth of the two figures advancing to the spectator—especially the officer in the light dress—it is modelled with all the force of nature, and the background figures being steeped in the deepest hues of subdued colour, give a strength and richness which nothing can surpass. Of course, there is a want of interest in the story, which is merely an assemblage of the Militia of Amsterdam, on occasion of the expected visit of the Prince of Orange and the daughter of Charles the First, whom he had espoused. The principal pictures by other great masters receive a greater notoriety from the interest of the subject—such as "The Transfiguration," by Raffaelle; "The Peter Martyr," by Titian; "The Miracle of St. Mark," by Tintoret; "The Martyrdom of St. George," by Paul Veronese; and "The St. Jerome," by Coreggio. Nevertheless, "The Night Watch," by Rembrandt, may safely be classed with the choicest productions of the great painters of Italy and Venice. When we consider that his pictures extend to upwards of six hundred and fifty, the reader will appreciate the difficulty I have felt in describing the peculiar merit which has so indelibly stamped most of them with the passport to posterity.