Encyclopaedia Britannica > Volume 21, ROT-Siam

42
RUBENS
influenced the painter of Vincenzo Gonzaga. Vigorous to
the extreme in design, he reminds us of Michelangelo as
much as any of the degenerate masters of the Roman
school, while in decorative skill he seems to be descended
from Titian and in colouring from Giulio Romano.
Equally with this picture the Transfiguration, now in
the museum at Nancy, and the portraits of Vincenzo and
his consort, kneeling before the Trinity, in the library at
Mantua, claim a large share of attention, apart from the
interest awakened by the name of their author.
Two years later we meet a very large altarpiece of the
Circumcision at St Ambrogio at Genoa, the Virgin in a
glory of Angels, and two groups of Saints, painted on the
wall, at both sides of the high altar in the church of
Santa Maria in Valicella, in Rome. Undoubtedly these
works give an impression of grandeur and effectiveness,
but, in the immediate vicinity of the finest productions of
the Italian school, they rank higher as documentary evi¬
dence than in intrinsic value, and remind us of a saying
of Baglione, who was acquainted with Rubens in Italy,
“ Apprese egli buon gusto, e diede in una maniera buona
Italiana.”
While employed at Rome in 1608, Rubens received
most alarming news as to the state of his mother’s health.
The duke of Gonzaga was then absent from Italy, but the
dutiful son, without awaiting his return, at once set out
for the Netherlands, though with the full intention of
shortly resuming his post at court, as we gather from a
letter to Annibale Chieppio, the Mantuan minister.
When he arrived in Antwerp, Maria Pypelincx was no
more. However strong his wish might now be to return
to Italy, his purpose was overruled by the express desire
of his sovereigns, Albert and Isabella, to see him take up
a permanent residence in the Belgian provinces. Scarcely
a year before, the archduke had unsuccessfully attempted
to free the painter from his engagement at Mantua, and
he could not fail to take advantage of the opportunity now
presented for the fulfilment of his wishes. On August 3,
1609, Rubens was named painter in ordinary to their High¬
nesses, with a salary of 500 livres, and “ the rights, honours,
privileges, exemptions,” &c., belonging to persons of the
royal household, not to speak of the gift of a gold chain.
Not least in importance for the painter was his complete
exemption, from all the regulations of the guild of St
Luke, entitling him to engage any scholars or fellow-
workers,. without being obliged to have them enrolled,—a
favour, it must be added, which has been the source of
considerable trouble to the historians of Flemish art.
Although so recently returned to his native land,
Rubens seems to have been, with one accord, accepted by
his countrymen as the head of their school, and the
municipality was foremost in giving him the means of
proving his acquirements. The first in date among the
numerous repetitions of the Adoration of the Magi is a
picture in the Madrid Gallery, measuring 12 feet by 17,
and containing no fewer than eight-and-twenty life size
figures, many in gorgeous attire, warriors in steel armour,
horsemen, slaves, camels, &c. This picture, painted in
Antwerp, at the town’s expense in 1609, had scarcely re¬
mained three years in the town-hall when it went to Spain
as a present to Don Rodrigo Calderon, count of Oliva.
The painter has represented himself among the horsemen,
bareheaded, and wearing his gold chain. Cumberland
speaks of this picture as the standard work of its author,
and certainly it was well calculated to bring Rubens to
the front rank in his profession. From a letter written in
May 1611 we know that more than a hundred young men
were desirous to become his pupils, and that many had,
for several years,’ been waiting with other masters, until
he could admit them to his studio. It was thus from the
beginning regarded as a great favour to be admitted a
pupil of Rubens.
Apart from the success of his works, another powerful
motive had helped to detain the master in Antwerp,—his
marriage with Isabella Brant (October 1609). Many
pictures have made us familiar with the graceful young
woman who was for seventeen years to share the master’s
destinies. We meet her at The Hague, St Petersburg,
Florence, at Grosvenor House, but more especially at
Munich, where Rubens and his wife are depicted at full
length on the same canvass. “ His wife is very hand¬
some,” observes Sir Joshua Reynolds, “and has an agree¬
able countenance ; ” but the picture, he adds, “ is rather
hard in manner.” This, it must be noted, is the case
with all those pictures known to have immediately
followed Rubens’s return, when he was still dependent
on the assistance of painters trained by others than him¬
self. Even in the Raising of the Cross, now in the
Antwerp cathedral, and painted for the church of St
Walburg in 1610, the dryness in outline is very striking.
. According to the taste still at that time prevailing, the
picture is tripartite, but the wings only serve to develop
the central composition, and add to the general effect.
In Witdoeck’s beautiful engraving the partitions even
disappear. Thus, from the first, we see Rubens quite
determined upon having his own way, and it is recorded
that, when he painted the Descent from the Cross, St
Christopher, the subject chosen by the Arquebusiers, was
altered so as to bring the artistic expressions into better
accordance with his views. Although the subject was
frequently repeated by the great painter, this first Descent
from the Cross has not ceased to be looked upon as his
masterpiece. Begun in 1611, the celebrated work was
placed in 1614, and certainly no more striking evidence
could be given of the rapid growth of the author’s abili¬
ties. Rubens received 2400 florins for this picture.
Although it is chance that has brought the Raising of
the Cross and the Descent from the Cross into their
present close juxtaposition, it is not improbable that their
uniformity in size may have been designed. In many
respects, Italian influence remains conspicuous in the
Descent. Rubens had seen Ricciarelli’s fresco at the
Trinita de’ Monti, and was also acquainted with the
grandiose picture of Baroccio in the cathedral of Perugia,
and no one conversant with these works can mistake their
influence. But in Rubens strength of personality could
not be overpowered by reminiscence; and in type, as well
as in colouring, the Descent from the Cross may be termed
thoroughly Flemish and Rubenesque. As Waagen justly
observes : “ the boldness of the composition, the energy in
the characters, the striking attitudes, and the effects of the
grouping, together with the glowing vigorous colouring,
belong to his later style, whereas a few of the heads, par¬
ticularly that of the Virgin, display the careful execution
of his earlier period. The interior of the wings, on which
are painted the Visitation and the Presentation in the
Temple, exhibit, on the other hand, a greater resemblance
to the conjugal picture already alluded to, owing to a
certain repose in action, a more elevated expression of
delicacy and feeling in the characters, and a less glowing
though still admirable colouring.”
Legend, in some way, connects Van Dyck with the
Descent from the Cross, and ascribes to the great portrait
painter an arm and shoulder of Mary Magdalene, which
had been damaged by a pupil’s carelessness. Plain truth
here, once more, seems to contradict romance. ' Van Dyck
was a pupil of Van Balen’s in 1609, and most probably
remained with him several years before coming to Rubens.
If Sir Dudley Carleton could speak of Antwerp in 1616
as “ Magna civitas, magna solitudo,” there was no place