Exhibition’s theme—having another look at the paintings of Petrus Van der Velden

Press, 24 March 1977, Page 17

Exhibition’s theme—having another look at the paintings of Petrus Van der Velden

When the exhibition of paintings and drawings by Petrus Van der Velden was on show in Auckland, an art historian, Michael Dunn, wrote in a review for the “Listener”: “The current exhibition of 100 works toured by the Arts Council provides a good opportunity to re-examine his achievement.”

That was certainly the intention of the exhibition and, equally certainly, a re-evaluation was necessary. Since the dispersal of the artist’s estate in 1914 and 1921 by the Public Trustee in Christchurch, the only major exhibition has been one of 32 works assembled in 1959 by the Auckland City Art Gallery director, then Mr P. A. Tomory.

In line with the taste of his time. Mr Tomory edited out the “sentimental genre pictures.” In all respects the 1959 exhibition and its catalogue were responsible for shaping a persisting image of Van der Velden.

In spite of Mr Tomory’s wholly applaudable contribution to our knowledge of Van der Velden, ignoring the “sentimental” paintings, which were so large a part 'of Van der Velden’s entire output, distorts our understanding of the artist. There is a tendence to see him as exclusively the painter of Otira Gorge. Although this series of paintings is by far the most closely tied to the subsequent tradition of New Zealand landscape painting, it accounts for only about 4 per cent of his’total work.

Fortunately, since 1959 changes in taste have occurred and they allow us to look a little more objectively at this artist. A rise in interest in Victorian painting, and the late nineteenth century symbolists of Germany, has re-established the “sentimental” as an area of legitimate study. In Van der Velden’s native Netherlands, the Romantics and the Hague School, from which he came, have met renewed interest and escalating sale-room prices.

Van der Velden’s art is a combination of New Zealand (especially alpine) landscape and of Dutch naturalistic landscape painted before his emigration. It is that; but it is also much more, as I believe this exhibition demonstrates.

At the end of 1874 Van der Velden moved to The Hague, supposedly invited by the older and respected painter, Jozef Israels (1824-1911). The city had recently blossomed as the centre of art in the Netherlands, and as one of Europe’s more important art meccas of the time — at least according to contemporary taste.

Because of the rise of Impressionism and the concentration upon the Parisian painters, we have forgotten how sought after were the paintings of Hague artists. A huge Anglo-American market

existed for their works in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During the early 1900 s Jacob Maris (1837-99), a contemporary of Van der Velden and an artist much admired by him, could obtain $3OOO and $4OOO for his works at Christies in London. It could, however, if the artist alllowed it, become a debilitating market.

Marius, the contemporary Netherlander art chronicler, wrote of “That degrading market which asks one year for ‘Sheep going to pasture’ and the next for ‘Sheep returning.’ and the year after for something else, much as the height and breadth of our hyacinths is laid down for us by the exigencies of Anglo-American taste.”

Yet, Netherlander artists flocked to The Hague. The 1870 s and 1880 s, the years when Van der Velden was active there, emerge as the period of the Hague School’s greatest attainment. With the exception of Frances Hodgkins’s place in Europe some years later, New Zealand painting has never had a more substnatiai toehold in the contemporary art of Europe. Van der Velden came to us with this Hague background.

He had a little more success there than he is commonly given credit for, and entered New Zealand as a painter of unswerving professionalism and determination. More is the pity that his productivity and quality (except for the Otira series and a number of single works of considerable strength and beauty) declined from his earlier work in the Netherlands.

The Netherland period works are dominated by genre painting. In one series, in particular, Van der Velden rose to heights which rivalled his highly regarded mentor, Jozef Is-

A hundred paintings by Petrus Van der Velden are being exhibited at the Robert McDougall Art Gallery. DR T. L. RODNEY WILSON, an art historian at the University of Canterbury School of Fine Arts, first prepared the exhibition for showing in Auckland. He writes here about the artist and about the purpose of the exhibition selected from a vast output by a painter who greatly influenced New Zealand art from the 1890 s, especially the work of Canterbury painters.

Petrus Van der Velden came to Christchurch from the Netherlands in June, 1890. He was a painter of considerable reputation, brought many of his paintings with him, and continued to paint from his recollections and examples of Dutch scenes. Van der Velden eventually set up a teaching studio in his house on the

corner of Conference and Durham Streets. Although he had many talented pupils — among them Sydney Thompson and Elizabeth and Cecil Kelly — he was never far from poverty and resented his lack of recognition. Yet the imprint of his style and instruction remained for a long time on the

work of New Zealand painters. When he went to Sydney in 1898 he was, at first, financially successful. At the end of 1903 he returned to New Zealand, was in poor health, and produced few paintings. Van der Velden died at Auckland on November 11, 1913, aged 76.

raels, and matched any other contemporary painter of this kind of Romantic Realism. That was the Marken series — a cycle of paintings depicting the lives, labours, even loves of the fisherfolk of the island of Marken in the Zuyder Zee. The pathos and the drama of the most successful, especially the funeral cycle, imprint them upon one’s memory. They are not attractive paintings in the sense that some of the lighter subjects, and some of his landscapes are attractive; but they are powerful and expressive images of a kind that he achieved but seldom. He was able to attain such images only once more, in an extended series — the Otira Gorge works. We are accustomed to a lighter palette, to brighter colour, and it is easy to fall into the trap of the uncharitable critic who terms this aspect of Hague painting, the “gravy palette school.” Johannes Bilders (181190) revealed the prevailing concern with a narrow' tonal palette of greys and greens, such as we observe in Van der Velden’s painting. He w’rote, in 1860: “I am looking for a tone which we call coloured grey, that is a combination of all colours, however strong, harmonised in such a way that they give the impression of a warm and fragrant grey.” A little further on, this painter said: “To preserve the sense of the grey, even in the most powerful green, is amazingly difficult and whoever discovers it will be a happy niortal.’The Hague School can be seen to have contained two distinctly different streams. On the one hand there is the Romantic Realism of Israels and Van der Velden’s genre painting. On the other is the naturalism of Jacob Maris.

This naturalism played a major role in Van der Velden’s development. We come across references to “Jaap” (Jacob) Maris from time to time in his correspondence. In 1893, in a letter from Christchurch to A. C. Loffelt, the art critic for the newspaper the “Vaderland,” he wrote, that Jacob Maris and Israels “belong amongst the greatest men of our time.” As surely as we can recognise Israels in the Marken funerals, it is Jacob Maris that we detect in a work like the grand “Sumner Quarry” painted soon after the artist’s arrival in Christchurch in 1890. It is a •splendid piece of landscape with a bold composition, rich colour and tone, and vigorous handling.

If only all his paintings exhibited this certainty and this strength. But they do not. And the exhibition was designed to show Van der Velden as he is — not as we might like to have him. Works have had to be omitted for various reasons. Some were too delicate to travel and others, such as Dunedin’s magnificent “Otira Gorge” or the McDougall Gallery’s “Dutch Funeral," are simply too large for a travelling exhibition, but showing in Chrsitchurch.

A hundred works have been made to stand for 10 times that number. Good works have obviously been included. Some which I consider to be among his finest are to be found here.

In the catalogue they are: 23, 24, 28, 30, 31, 33, 39, 42, 43, 44, 46, 48, 54, 59, 60, 64, 65, 67, 71 72 93, 94, 96. Others less good have also been included — for instance “Smoking Room Carrington Hospital.” Drawings — and Van der Velden certainly was a fine draughtsman — hang next to oil paintings and watercolours. One can only make a representative choice. We are accustomed to basing our judgment upon a selection of works. Sometimes this is made by the artist himself. Sometimes it is made by another, according to certain critical criteria. The 1959 exhibition was an example of that. This exhibition has also been selected, of course, but the criterion here was to find a truly representative collection. We can judge Van der Velden not only by his good and excellent works, but also by the less good. That he comes through with such strength is testimony, if any were needed, to explain why he holds a position of eminence in our young art history.