towers loftily over all his pupils, Gerard Dow, Ferdinand Bol, Van Eckhout, Govaert Flinck, &c., as well as over his imitators and contemporaries—Abraham Bloemaert, Gerard Honthorst, Adrian Brauwer, Seghers, &c.
When the Van Eycks made their appearance, German art—which, under the impulse of Stephan of Cologne, had appeared as if destined to direct the movement—allowed itself to be led away and influenced by the Flemish school, without, however, entirely divesting itself of the individual characteristics which are, to some extent, inherent in the region wherein it flourished. In Alsatia, we see the style peculiar to the school of Bruges showing itself in Martin Schön (1460); in Suabia, it had as its interpreter Frederick Herlen (1467); at Augsburg, it was old Holbein; at Nuremberg, it was first Michael Wohlgemuth, and after him Albert Dürer (1471), whose vigorous individuality did not fail to reflect the temperament of the Van Eycks.
“The works of Albert Dürer present a singular combination of the fantastic and the real ([Fig. 253]). The principal tendencies peculiar to the character of the northern mind are always to be found in them. The thoughts of the artist are always transporting him into a world of abstraction and chimeras; but the ever-present consciousness of the difficulties of life under the cold northern sky always draws him back to the details of existence. On the one hand, therefore, he seems to love philosophical, and even supernatural subjects; but, on the other, the minute details of his execution bind him down to earth. His models, his action, his positions, the muscular development of his nude subjects, the innumerable folds of his draperies, the expression which he gives to joy, grief, and hatred, all seem to bear a manifest character of exaggeration. Added to this, he is deficient in grace; a rudeness entirely northern in its character closes the path to any of the softer qualities of art. The panels of Albert Dürer all seem to have a touch of the antique barbarism of the Germanic hordes. He himself was in the habit of wearing his hair long, like the ancient German kings. Upon the whole, however, his beautiful colouring, the skilful firmness of his drawing, his grand characteristics, his depth of thought, the poetry, often terrible, of his composition, place him in the first rank of masters” (Michiels).
While Albert Dürer was endeavouring to combine in his works every type of the strangest character, Lucas van Cranach made it his study
Fig. 253.—“Jesus Crowned with Thorns,” painted on Wood by Albert Dürer; a Fac-simile traced from the original of the same size. (In the Collection of M. de Quedeville.)
to represent with no less success pleasant legends or the most charming realities. He is the painter of artless youths, aerially veiled, and of sportive and enchanting virgins; and if some antique scene is created by his delicate and original pencil, it seem, to be metamorphosed by a happy facility into something that appears to have the character of a German reminiscence ([Fig. 254]).
Fig. 254.—“Princess Sibylla of Saxony,” by Lucas van Cranach. (Suermondt Collection.)