A Popular Handbook to the National Gallery, Volume I, Foreign Schools: Including by Special Permission Notes Collected from the Works of John Ruskin
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A Popular Handbook to the National Gallery, Volume I, Foreign Schools: Including by Special Permission Notes Collected from the Works of John Ruskin
National Gallery (Great Britain); Painting -- England -- London -- Catalogs
favourite effect, 'sun rising through vapour,' for many a weary
year. But this was not enough for him. He must paint the sun in
his strength, the sun rising _not_ through vapour. If you turn
to the Apollo in the 'Ulysses and Polyphemus' (508), his horses
are rising beyond the horizon--you see he is not 'rising
through vapour,' but above it;--gaining somewhat of a victory
over vapour, it appears. The old Dutch brewer,[84] with his
yellow mist, was a great man and a good guide, but he was not
Apollo. He and his dray-horses led the way through the flats
cheerily, for a little time; we have other horses now flaming
out 'beyond the mighty sea'" (_Modern Painters_, vol. i. pt.
ii. sec. ii. ch. i. § 19; vol. v. pt. ix. ch. xi. §§ 3, 4).
Admirers of Cuyp should make a point of visiting the Dulwich
Gallery, which is peculiarly rich in works by this master. In
the British Museum are several of his drawings and studies.
An interesting study in what is called "truth of tone" may be made with
this picture--by which is meant the "exact relation and fitness of
shadow and light, and of the hues of all objects under them; and more
especially that precious quality of each colour laid on which makes it
appear a quiet colour illuminated, not a bright colour in shade." Now
with regard to this Ruskin says, "I much doubt if there be a single
_bright_ Cuyp in the world, which, taken as a whole, does not present
many glaring solecisms in tone. I have not seen many fine pictures
of his which were not utterly spoiled by the vermilion dress of some
principal figure--a vermilion totally unaffected and unwarmed by the
golden hue of the rest of the picture; and, what is worse, with little
distinction between its own illumined and shaded parts, so that it
appears altogether out of sunshine--the colour of a bright vermilion
in dead, cold daylight.... And these failing parts, though they often
escape the eye when we are near the picture and able to dwell upon what
is beautiful in it, yet so injure its whole effect that I question if
there be many Cuyps in which vivid colours occur, which will not lose
their effect and become cold and flat at a distance of ten or twelve
paces, retaining their influence only when the eye is close enough
to rest on the right parts without including the whole. Take, for
instance, the large one in our National Gallery. (Seen at a distance)
the black cow appears a great deal nearer than the dogs, and the golden
tones of the distance look like a sepia drawing rather than like
sunshine, owing chiefly to the utter want of aerial greys indicated
through them" (_Modern Painters_, vol. i. pt. ii. sec. ii. ch. i. §§
11, 19).
54. A WOMAN BATHING.
_Rembrandt_ (Dutch: 1606-1669). _See_ 45.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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