Studio: international art (18.1900)

Jacob Maris

Jacob Maris was married and had a family, and there were but few bibelots, but the walls were
life during the Siege was as hard to him as to adorned with richly-coloured antique gold leather,
many others. He could not possibly leave his that harmonised finely with the deep and powerful
home and belongings, so he determined to remain colours of the unfinished pictures upon which
in Paris and share the privations of his fellow- Maris worked in turn. Here, after a short morn-
artists, ing stroll, the artist worked until dusk, often con-

The year before, his brother Matthew had also tinuing his assiduous labour till late in the evening
arrived in Paris, and during the war he was enrolled by gaslight. Perhaps he did not then paint in the
in the Civic Guard, and was exposed to consider- exac sense of the word, but balanced his masses
able danger from the Communists and the Ver- of light and shade, seeking after that elaborate
sailles troops. composition I have already mentioned.

After these stirring and distressful times he Here were created those incomparable figure-
determined to return with his family to Holland subjects, old nurses with babies on their knees,
once more. He made
his home at The Hague,
and, as the Dutch scenery
of the suburbs fascinated
him, he continued to live
there with his wife and chil-
dren, surrounded by a circle
of distinguished fellow-
artists who appreciated him
at his true worth.

An artist's life in Holland
is quite different from that
in Paris or in London. In
such great capitals much of
an artist's time is taken up
by worldly pleasures and
conventional visits, which
impair his intellectual
ability, while in Holland a
quiet provincial life pre-
serves the freshness of his
spirits, and helps him to
concentrate his thoughts on
his work.

Instead of having vast
halls for studios, as many
artists have in Paris and
London, Dutch painters,
faithful to the traditions and
usages of their great fore-
fathers of the seventeenth
century, paint in plain suit-
able rooms like those in
which Rembrandt produced
his immortal masterpieces.

So the studio of Jacob
Maris, in his comfortable
home at The Hague, was

an ordinary room with two HHHHHHSH^^HHIIIII^Hi S

windows each with a west-

' . "GIRL PLAYING THE PIANO" FROM A WATER-COLOUR BY JACOB MARIS

erly aspect. In this room ( By permission of M. Taco Mesaag)

237