Fine prints

by Sir Frederick Wedmore

I have said, for one of my two groups, Landscape. I justify it by the indisputable pre-eminence which Rembrandt’s etched landscapes enjoy. Even in the dignified and tasteful work of Claude there are only two or three pieces which hold their own in fascination when the memory is charged with the achievements of the Dutchman—a magical effect won out of material intractable, or at the best simple; for that, at most, was Rembrandt’s scenery. The landscape etchings of Rembrandt’s compatriots, when they come to be measured by his own, assert only topographical accuracy, or faithful persevering study, or, it may be, a little manual dexterity, or their possession of a sense of prettiness which they share even with the work of the amateur. Most of the finest landscape etching of later days not only bears some signs of Rembrandt’s influence, but would have been essentially other than it now is if Rembrandt’s had not existed. The Dutchman’s mark is laid, strong and indelible, even upon individualities so potent and distinguished as Seymour Haden and Andrew Geddes. Whistler, exquisite and peculiar as his genius is, with the figure, and with Thames-side London subjects and subjects of Venice, would, had he treated landscape proper, have either reminded us of Rembrandt, or have etched in some wrong way. He would not have etched in some wrong way—we may take that for granted; he would have reminded us of Rembrandt, with a little of himself besides.

I have shown, I think, how clearly, from the artistic point of view, the new collector is led to love and seek for Rembrandt landscapes. But there is one objection, though it is perhaps not a fatal one, to concentrating his attention upon them. Little of Rembrandt’s work, except a few oddities of crazy value, like the First State of the Hundred Guilder, is rarer or more costly than his landscapes. Or, to be more explicit, more absolutely and literally correct, it is rather in this way: that, while for a good example of Rembrandt in any other department of his labours, it is possible of course to be obliged to give much, but likewise (Heaven be praised!) quite possible not to be obliged to give much, you will never without an outlay of a certain importance be possessed of any one of his landscapes in desirable condition. An outlay of £30 may conceivably endow you with a good impression of one of the most desirable of the minor landscapes. That sum may get you, and without your having to wait a quite indefinite time for the acquisition, a View of Amsterdam or a Cottage with White Palings. It may even get you a rarer, finer thing, the Landscape with the Obelisk, or that much slighter landscape piece—that summary, though of course in its own way very learned, little performance known as Six’s Bridge; the plate which tradition says (probably not untruly) was etched by Rembrandt while the servant of his friend, Jan Six, who had forgotten the mustard, went (somewhere beyond the pantry, however; I should even think that it was outside the house) in rapid search of that condiment.

But there, as far as Landscape is concerned, if £30 or thereabouts is to be the limit of your disbursement upon a single piece, there your collecting stops. If you want a Cottage with Dutch Hay-Barn—very fine indeed, but not of extreme rarity—sixty, eighty, or a hundred pounds, or more, must be the ransom of it. You want a Landscape with a Ruined Tower—the print which, for well-considered breadth and maintained unity of effect (not so much for dainty finish) is the “last word” of landscape art, the perfect splendid phrase which nothing can appropriately follow, after which there is of necessity declension, if not collapse—it will be a mere accident if fifty guineas gets it for you. It may cost you a couple of hundred. And when? Why, only when a fine collection comes into the market: such a collection as Mr Holford’s, three or four years ago, or one at least not at all points inferior to it. And that happens not many times in the life of any one of us.

Rembrandt: Landscape, with the Obelisk.

Again, there is the Goldweigher’s Field, a bird’s-eye view of a plain near the Zuyder Zee; a summary, learned memorandum of the estate and country-house, with all its appurtenances, of Uytenbogaert, the Receiver-General, of whom there is a representation amongst the Rembrandt portraits. If you can afford it, and if fortune smiles upon you by bestowing opportunity of acquisition, you will want not only the less costly portrait of the Goldweigher, but the landscape of the Goldweigher’s Field. There are rarer things than that in Rembrandt’s work—not much that is more desirable. £44 was paid for an impression, probably not quite of the first order, at the Firmin-Didot sale, £54 at the Liphart, £72 at the Holford. The landscapes yet more difficult to find, command, of course, even higher prices, and this somewhat independently of their artistic interest, which only in a very few cases—and then with very exceptional impressions—equals that of the prints I have already named.

Of these yet rarer landscapes, as well as the other ones, Mr Holford’s collection was certainly the finest dispersed in recent times. His sale took place at Christie’s in July 1893; and at it, for the View of Omval—an exceptionally splendid impression of a somewhat favourite yet not extraordinarily rare subject—£320 was paid by M. Bouillon. The subject, though in impressions of very different quality, had been sold in the Sir Abraham Hume sale for £47, and in the Duke of Buccleuch’s for £44. £170 was paid for the Three Trees, the one Rembrandt landscape which has a touch of the sensational, which adds to its real merit the obvious and immediate attractiveness of the dramatic effect. Herr Meder, the dealer of Berlin, bought the First State of The Three Cottages for £275. The sum of £210 was the ransom of the First State of the slightly arched print A Village with the Square Tower. The impression, which was from the Aylesford collection, was of unparalleled brilliance, and the State is of extraordinary rarity, though M. Dutuit notes its presence at Amsterdam and at the British Museum. To M. Bouillon was knocked down for £260 a faultless impression of The Canal, a print which at the Galichon sale had passed under the hammer for £80, and even at the Buccleuch for £120. Messrs Colnaghi bought for £145 a most sparkling impression of the rare First State of the broadly treated Landscape with a Ruined Tower, more properly called by the French cataloguers Paysage à la Tour, for in this First State there is no sign of “ruin.” Doubtless when the title by which it is known in England was first applied to it, the amateur was unfamiliar with this rarest State, in which the dome of the tower is intact. In the Second State it has disappeared, and in the Third there are other minor changes. The reader will remember that already, two or three pages back, I have referred to this print as a masterpiece, than which none is more desirable or more representative. A perfect impression of the Landscape with a Flock of Sheep (from the John Barnard collection) sold for £245; the First State of the Landscape with an Obelisk for £185; an Orchard with a Barn (the early State, before the plate was cut at either end) for £170; and the First State of the Landscape with a Boat—an impression extraordinarily full of “bur”—for £200. Altogether, the Rembrandts in the Holford sale—and I shall have to refer to some of them again before I finish the chapter—sold for £16,000. Richard Fisher’s Rembrandts had fetched about £1500; Sir Abraham Hume’s, £4000; Sir Seymour Haden’s, £4700; the Duke of Buccleuch’s, something over £10,000. The last is a figure which was never expected to be surpassed—hardly, perhaps, to be equalled. Yet it was surpassed very much.

But now it is high time I said a little about the desirableness of Rembrandt portraits and about their money value. No engraved portraiture in all the world, not even the mezzotints after Sir Joshua, present with so much power so great a range of varied character. For an artistic treatment of Humanity equally sterling and austere, you must go back to Holbein’s drawings. For a variety as engaging, a vividness and flexibility as sure of their effect, only the pastels by La Tour in the Museum of St Quentin rival these Rembrandt records of Jew and Gentile, old and young, and rich and poor in Amsterdam.

As in painting, so in etching, Rembrandt was himself one of his best models. In no less than thirty-four of his prints—according to the Catalogue of Wilson—do we find he has portrayed, at different ages, his homely, striking, penetrating face. Sometimes he is a youth; sometimes the burden of experience is visibly laid on him; sometimes he is engrossed with work, as in the superb Rembrandt Drawing; sometimes, as in the Rembrandt with a Sabre, masquerading; sometimes he is depicted with great fulness of record; sometimes, as in the admirable little rarity, Wilson 364 (not catalogued amongst the Rembrandt portraits, because the plate has other heads as well), a few lines, chosen with the alacrity and certainty of genius, bring him before us, sturdy, sagacious, and with mind bent upon a problem he is sure to solve. The Rembrandt with a Sabre, at the Holford sale—a thing almost unique—fell to the bid of M. Deprez of £2000, and has joined now the other extraordinary possessions of Baron Edmond De Rothschild. At the Holford sale, the Rembrandt with a Turned-up Hat and Embroidered Mantle—an almost unique First State, drawn on by Rembrandt, but none the better on that account—fetched £420. Of the Rembrandt Drawing there were two impressions. One of them, which Mr Middleton-Wake assures us is the First, and which Wilson justly describes as at all events “the finest,” sold for £280 to Herr Meder. The impression was of unmatched brilliancy and vigour, the whole thing as spontaneous and impulsive as anything in Rembrandt’s work. The second impression sold—an impression to which the honours of a true Second State are now assigned—fetched £82, and was borne away by Mr Gutekunst of Stuttgart.

That famous Holford sale, in which, as I have said already, the Rembrandt with the Sabre sold for a couple of thousand, and in which the “Hundred Guilder” (Christ Healing the Sick) beat at least its own record, and was sold for £1750, contained among the portraits an impression of the elaborate Ephraim Bonus, “with the black ring,” the only one with this singular and somewhat petty distinction which could ever come into the market; the remaining impressions being tied up permanently at the British Museum and the Bibliothèque Nationale. M. Danlos took it across the Channel, having paid £1950 for the opportunity of doing so. The Burgomaster Six, an almost mezzotint-like portrait in general effect—highly wrought, and with an obvious delicacy—always fetches a high price. At the Holford sale an impression called “Second State” fell to Colnaghi’s bid of £380. At the Seymour Haden, one called a “Third”—a very exquisite impression—reached £390. It came from the collection of Sir Abraham Hume, and Sir Seymour, in the Preface to his sale catalogue, properly pointed out that with the Six, as with the Ephraim Bonus, what are practically trial-proofs have been erected into “States.” The Third State of the Old Haaring, a portrait of a venerable, kindly, perhaps ceremonious gentleman, who practised the profession of an auctioneer, is scarcely less rare than the rest. When found among the Holford treasures, it sold for £190.