DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.62134#0104
96
AN ART-STUDENT IN MUNICH.
others; Israel vanMeckenem; Jan de Mehlem; Quintin
Matseys, of whom every body has heard; Lucas van Leyden,
that extraordinary man, a painter at twelve years of age,
the admired friend and rival of Albert Diirer, and who died,
it is said, of poison, administered to him by a less generous
rival whom he had entertained upon his artistic and almost
princely progress through the Netherlands; and so we
come to Mabuse and Van Orley, and the Italianizers, and
to the death of early Christian art in the Netherlands. Yes,
it is a beautiful chapter in the history of art, is this early
German and Flemish school, especially connecting it also
with Albert Diirer and his school.
And to me one of the pleasantest passages in this chapter
is the thought of the intense joy which must have trans-
ported the Boisseree brothers as one after another these
gems of art were drawn forth into the light, and old names
and legends assumed the dignity of history, and this noble
gallery was finally brought to its resting-place in this
beautiful Pinakothek, purchased by King Ludwig as one
of the greatest treasures of his kingdom, and preserved here
as a noble monument to all—to the old painters themselves
—to the zealous brothers Boisseree—and to the Art-King
Ludwig.
But why do we linger at the threshold of these Cabinets ?
Let us enter and bathe our spirit in the poetry of these old
pictures; let us listen to their teachings as though sweet
antique legends were read to us in some quaint tongue out
of an old missal ! What a glitter of golden grounds blazes
upon our vision in those pictures of Master Stephen and
Master Willi elm. Solemn, gorgeously robed saints are
there leaning upon their attributes of martyrdom, their
swords, their crosses, their wheels; they are old men all of
them, yet in a green old age, and stand erect and statue-
like, within golden niches of richest Gothic tracery.
AN ART-STUDENT IN MUNICH.
others; Israel vanMeckenem; Jan de Mehlem; Quintin
Matseys, of whom every body has heard; Lucas van Leyden,
that extraordinary man, a painter at twelve years of age,
the admired friend and rival of Albert Diirer, and who died,
it is said, of poison, administered to him by a less generous
rival whom he had entertained upon his artistic and almost
princely progress through the Netherlands; and so we
come to Mabuse and Van Orley, and the Italianizers, and
to the death of early Christian art in the Netherlands. Yes,
it is a beautiful chapter in the history of art, is this early
German and Flemish school, especially connecting it also
with Albert Diirer and his school.
And to me one of the pleasantest passages in this chapter
is the thought of the intense joy which must have trans-
ported the Boisseree brothers as one after another these
gems of art were drawn forth into the light, and old names
and legends assumed the dignity of history, and this noble
gallery was finally brought to its resting-place in this
beautiful Pinakothek, purchased by King Ludwig as one
of the greatest treasures of his kingdom, and preserved here
as a noble monument to all—to the old painters themselves
—to the zealous brothers Boisseree—and to the Art-King
Ludwig.
But why do we linger at the threshold of these Cabinets ?
Let us enter and bathe our spirit in the poetry of these old
pictures; let us listen to their teachings as though sweet
antique legends were read to us in some quaint tongue out
of an old missal ! What a glitter of golden grounds blazes
upon our vision in those pictures of Master Stephen and
Master Willi elm. Solemn, gorgeously robed saints are
there leaning upon their attributes of martyrdom, their
swords, their crosses, their wheels; they are old men all of
them, yet in a green old age, and stand erect and statue-
like, within golden niches of richest Gothic tracery.