DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.68796#0335
chap, in The Practice of Rubens 315
pends on the skill of hand by which the solid pigment is
partly sunk into the glaze at the shadow side, while it
comes out drier and stronger in the lights, and as this must
be done rightly at once or not at all, the process under a
hand like that of Rubens is a singularly rapid one. Ex-
quisite are the effects thus gained when the under tint is
allowed to peep through here and there, blending so with
the solid touches to produce the subtlest effects of tone
and colour.
The most striking illustration, however, of this use of
full-bodied colours struck into and over transparent rub-
bings, is to be found in some of the work of Frans Hals.
Houbraken has left on record the following : ‘ It is said
that he had the custom of laying in his portraits with oily
and softly blending colours (zyn Pourtretten vet, en zacht-
smeltende aan te leggen) and then afterwards to put in the
brush-strokes, saying, “ Now we must have the handwriting
of the master into it.” ’1 Such ‘ handwriting,’ virile, dis-
tinct, we read in characteristic pieces of his work, nowhere
more clearly than in the picture called ‘Junker Ramp and
his Sweetheart,’ exhibited in Paris in 1883. Here the
heads are painted in with thin glazy colours and much
medium in simple warm flesh tints of low tone, while the
opaque pigments—greys, yellow flesh lights, cherry reds-
are struck in with firm touches that can be counted, while
the original liquid tints, showing the texture of the canvas
through, are in places left entirely untouched.
§ 182. The place of Technique in Modern Painting.
In their use of these various methods of oil-painting the
great masters as a rule exhibit a reserve and a sober tact
not always maintained by their modern followers. For
1 Groote Schouburgh, etc., ’s Gravenhage, 1753, i. p. 92.
pends on the skill of hand by which the solid pigment is
partly sunk into the glaze at the shadow side, while it
comes out drier and stronger in the lights, and as this must
be done rightly at once or not at all, the process under a
hand like that of Rubens is a singularly rapid one. Ex-
quisite are the effects thus gained when the under tint is
allowed to peep through here and there, blending so with
the solid touches to produce the subtlest effects of tone
and colour.
The most striking illustration, however, of this use of
full-bodied colours struck into and over transparent rub-
bings, is to be found in some of the work of Frans Hals.
Houbraken has left on record the following : ‘ It is said
that he had the custom of laying in his portraits with oily
and softly blending colours (zyn Pourtretten vet, en zacht-
smeltende aan te leggen) and then afterwards to put in the
brush-strokes, saying, “ Now we must have the handwriting
of the master into it.” ’1 Such ‘ handwriting,’ virile, dis-
tinct, we read in characteristic pieces of his work, nowhere
more clearly than in the picture called ‘Junker Ramp and
his Sweetheart,’ exhibited in Paris in 1883. Here the
heads are painted in with thin glazy colours and much
medium in simple warm flesh tints of low tone, while the
opaque pigments—greys, yellow flesh lights, cherry reds-
are struck in with firm touches that can be counted, while
the original liquid tints, showing the texture of the canvas
through, are in places left entirely untouched.
§ 182. The place of Technique in Modern Painting.
In their use of these various methods of oil-painting the
great masters as a rule exhibit a reserve and a sober tact
not always maintained by their modern followers. For
1 Groote Schouburgh, etc., ’s Gravenhage, 1753, i. p. 92.