The following list of German painters comprehends those only whose works I had an opportunity of considering, and who appeared to me to possess decided merit. I might easily have extended this catalogue to thrice its length, had I included all those whose names were given to me as being distinguished and celebrated among their own countrymen. From Munich alone I brought a list of two hundred artists, and from other parts of Germany nearly as many more. But in confining myself to those whose productions I saw, I adhere to a principle which, after all, seems to be the best—viz. never to speak but of what we know; and then only of the individual impression: it is necessary to know so many things before we can give, with confidence, an opinion about any one thing!
While the literary intercourse between England and Germany increases every day, and a mutual esteem and understanding is the natural consequence of this approximation of mind, there is a singular and mutual ignorance in all matters appertaining to art, and consequently, a good deal of injustice and prejudice on both sides. The Germans were amazed and incredulous, when I informed them that in England there are many admirers of art, to whom the very names of Schnorr, Overbeck, Rauch, Peter Hess, Wach, Wagenbauer, and even their great Cornelius, are unknown; and I met with very clever, well-informed Germans, who had, by some chance, heard of Sir Thomas Lawrence, and knew something of Wilkie, Turner, and Martin, from the engravings after their works; who thought Sir Joshua Reynolds and his engraver Reynolds one and the same person; and of Callcott, Landseer, Etty, and Hilton, and others of our shining lights, they knew nothing at all. I must say, however, that they have generally a more just idea of English art than we have of German art, and their veneration for Flaxman, like their veneration for Shakspeare, is a sort of enthusiasm all over Germany. Those who have contemplated the actual state of art, and compared the prevalent tastes and feelings in both countries, will allow that much advantage would result from a better mutual understanding. We English accuse the German artists of mannerism, of a formal, hard, and elaborate execution,—a pedantic style of composition and sundry other sins. The Germans accuse us, in return, of excessive coarseness and carelessness, a loose sketchy style of execution, and a general inattention to truth of character.[ 40] "You English have no school of art," was often said to me; I could have replied—if it had not been a solecism in grammar—"You Germans have too much school." The "esprit de secte," which in Germany has broken up their poetry, literature, and philosophy into schisms and schools, descends unhappily to art, and every professor, to use the Highland expression, has his tail.
At the same time, we cannot deny to the Germans the merit of great earnestness of feeling, and that characteristic integrity of purpose which they throw into every thing they undertake or perform. Art with them, is oftener held in honour, and pursued truly for its own sake, than among us: too many of our English artists consider their lofty and noble vocation, simply as the means to an end, be that end fame or gain. Generally speaking, too, the German artists are men of superior cultivation, so that when the creative inspiration falls upon them, the material on which to work is already stored up: "nothing can come of nothing," and the sun-beams descend in vain on the richest soil, where the seed has not been sown.
It is certain that we have not in England any historical painters who have given evidence of their genius on so grand a scale as some of the historical painters of Germany have recently done. We know that it is not the genius, but the opportunity which has been wanting, but we cannot ask foreigners to admit this,—they can only judge from results, and they must either suppose us to be without eminent men in the higher walks of art,—or they must wonder, with their magnificent ideas of the incalculable wealth of our nobles, the prodigal expenditure of our rulers, and the grandeur of our public institutions, that painting has not oftener been summoned in aid of her eldest sister architecture. On the other hand, their school of portraiture and landscape is decidedly inferior to ours. Not only have they no landscape painters who can compare with Callcott and Turner, but they do not appear to have imagined the kind of excellence achieved by these wonderful artists. I should say, generally, that their most beautiful landscapes want atmosphere. I used to feel while looking at them as if I were in the exhausted receiver of an air-pump. Of their portraits I have already spoken; the eye which has rested in delight upon one of Wilkie's or Phillips's fine manly portraits, (not to mention Reynolds, Gainsborough, Romney, and Lawrence,) cannot easily be reconciled to the hard, frittered manner of some of the most admired of the German painters; it is a difference of taste, which I will not call natural but national;—the remains of the old gothic school which, as the study of Italian art becomes more diffused, will be modified or pass away.
HISTORY.
Peter Cornelius, born at Dusseldorf in 1778, was for a considerable time the director (president) of the academy there, and is now the director of the academy of art at Munich: much of his time, however, is spent in Italy. The Germans esteem him their best historical painter. He has invention, expression, and power, but appears to me rather deficient in the feeling of beauty and tenderness. His grand works are the fresco painting in the Glyptothek at Munich, already described.
Friedrich Overbeck, born at Lubeck in 1789: he excels in scriptural subjects, which he treats with infinite grandeur and simplicity of feeling.
Wilhelm Wach, born at Berlin in 1787: first painter to the king of Prussia and professor in the academy of Berlin: esteemed one of the best painters and most accomplished men in Germany. Not having visited Berlin, where his finest works exist, I have as yet seen but one picture by this painter—the head of an angel, at the palace of Peterstein, sublimely conceived, and most admirably painted. In the style of colour, in the singular combination of grand feeling and delicate execution, this picture reminded me of Leonardo da Vinci.