ART AND ARTISTS. A TRIBUTE TO HOLBEIN.

Otago Witness, Issue 2650, 28 December 1904, Page 73

ART AND ARTISTS. A TRIBUTE TO HOLBEIN.

Mrs G. JTorf escue makes an iirEerelsting ' addition -to that -admirable series, '^Xrittls , .Books on Art." The name of her book ' is "Holbein," and it refer' 3to -Sans Hotbein -the Younger. „ I quote the author's, fin© appreciation of Jiis genius :— j "But as they ran, ithose sands had'"measured more, than -'-a great X portrait painter.' They had measured Greatness — greatriess ! which is not to be dslimite'd by the wanton outrages" of -man or the -accidents of time. Both have had their share in -the /judgments of gene-rations that "have lost all his greatest and nearly all his imaginative creations. ) And what the Spoiler has spared, "the selfstyled Restorer has too often ruined. Selflove, _on the other hand, and family pride have been engaged to preserve those portraits by wl}ie.h it is now the fashion to mulct him'of bis far larger dues." Of his mysticism.) of the symbolism in which his '^Journal Infcime" is written in his own Srin cipher, this little book is not the place to speak; tlKmgh for those ! who have once come to know the time " Eolbeiif these have a spell, ' a etern, mexliaustible e-nehantment all their own. ,* ■ — His Penetration. — But study the few fortunate survivals of ihis imaginatiye. works, study even more the wrecks and skeletons of his loftier con- . oeptions, and .asksyoursejf if it could b& only - with a quick eye and, a- clever irand (and lie had both, assuredly) that Holbein ,caught \ip . the dying etnber of ' the '"Van -'Eyck's "torchand fanned if by his "swn originality, Vhls' fancy, his -winged realism, until its light* lit up the dim. rays of Man, with ' a clair- '\ "voyance • far beyond theirs.. ■ This eye, -this ' mind, flung its gleaming^ penetration into ' every covert of -in* tsoulj -,'aiid deep, deep,--deep into the most shrouded/ the most shud- , Bering secrets Gf mortality. l I "Was it by mere portrait-painter's poweis ! that the son of Augsburg Bohemian came f to lay his finger upon the' very core and composition of perhaps the haughtiest, the subtlest, the "most dread despot since tfie" Caesar's, H«niy--Vlll, and -Fisher ; th-e ILais' Gorinthiacar, the -Duchess of Milan, his 'brooding wife ;' dancing children, and dancing. Death"; Clmst on the Cress, Christ in th© Grave, Christ Arisen; lambs in the- fields, •woods, and hills, 'gaping peasants, wild battle— put them side ll by side, the poor j ghosts of them left to us, and compute j the range of ffrt — "the majestic /range" that framed them all. - , — Justice for Holbein. — : Lse-t- us bo just. Let us forget for a moment the chirp of the family housekeeper over her gods. Let us gather up . the broken fragments that are more than • the meal, -aad humbly own the miracle that created them. It is idle to argue with the intelligence that can see "a want of imagination" in Holbein. Ihit we can find proof and to spare that it is not so; that his so-called "liniitatioas" — apart from method", which is a matter of Epoch — are due to a oreed ws may or may not agree with, -but surely must respect. Th© creed that Beauty is the framework, the ornament, rather than the substanco of things; the pleasure-, not th© purpose of "this mortal" ; and that the sweetest Sower that blows is but an exquisite moment of transfigured clay. H© smells tbe mould of the rose ; y&t •how he draft's the rose ! The lirazen arrogajice of pomp, the pearl on a woman's neck, the shimmer of a breaking bubble, the wrinkles in a baby's foot, th© beauty of life, the pathos of life, the irony and the lust of life — he has painted them all, as he saw them all, in the phantasmagoric Procession of Being betwixt garret and throne. ' He- has painted each, too, with that genius for seizing the essential quality ■which is the thing that never forsook him from Augsburg to Saint Andrew's Undershaft; that singular, vivid, original genius •which can well afford to let his grave he forgotten, whose works build for him, ' AS Hans Holbein: j Oiie of ti.e few, tlie immortal names ' ISa&t wore not horn 'to die. — T. P.'s Weekly. THE YEAR'S ART SALES (1903-4). Tbe year 1903 was an exceptionally feotable one for its picture sales, and, theretare, the season .which closed in July last,

though excellent in its way, appears less so when compared with iis predecessor. No sala produced a total to approach the £1,05,845 obtained at the sale of the "Vaile collection, the liighest total this year being £65, 000, made at the sale of the collection j of pictures of Mr James Orrock. Other important sales included the pictures of the late Duke of Cambridge, which produced £33,112, those of the late Mr Huth accounted for £16,842, and the Seal© Hayne collection realised 4)10,150. In addition to these there was the sale of the Townshend heirlooms, which extended over several days, making over £41,C00. Thirty-one pictures realised 1500 guineas -or more, the OTrodk sale contributing seven, the Cambridge collection five, and the Huth sale- "the same number. -Ono particularly noticeable 'feature is the number ,of works of 'the- British school included in the list, no less than 23 items baing superb' examples of British art. Gainsborough ' heads the list with eight, and Reynolds and Romney are each represented by four pictures. I If for >no «ther reason, the sale of th© Gainsboroug-h portrait of f'Maria Walpole. Countess Waldegrave," At Christie's Rooms : on June 11, for 12,100 guineas, will make 'the past «Bason a memorable ope in the annals of picture sales. In addition to it , Iseing the sum ever paid for a , picture at these -rooms, it also represents ; a record price for -a half;length portrait in this , country, Hoppner's - portrait of "Lojiisa, Lady Manners," sold at Messrs Robinson and ' Fisher's three years ago for ; 14-,oso'guineas, -being -a three-quarter length. 1 An esainple of the ri&s in the value of works by Gainsborough is" instancd by the , twelfth on the- list. This portrait of "Fredrick, Diike of York," was sold at ' the BickneH sale in 1863 for 66 guineas. j Up to" July this year the record for a, picture by 'George Morland was 1250 guineas, "paid for the "Post Boy's Return" in 1898, ' bjut this was surpassed by the •5600 guineas ' given for the set" of six pictures illustrating j the "Story of L-retitia" at Christie's on July ; & last. j Lestf year living artists were represented | by fotir pictures in., the list — -two -by Alma- I "Tarlema, a-nd one each by Mr J. C. Hook/| and Sir P-eter Graham. This year, how- j *ever, the highest sum obtained for an : example from the brush of a living painter is 1050 guineas for the latter's 1887 Academy picture, "The Fowler's Crag-.'" — The Connoisseur for October. I