How to Study Pictures.
By Charles H. Caffin.
A series of articles for the older girls and boys who read “St, Nicholas.”
Second Paper
Comparing Da Vinci with Dürer, and Raphael with Wohlocemuth.
I.
As we look at the two masterpieces pictured on pages 130 and 130,—Dürer’s “Adoration of the Magi” and Leonardo’s “Virgin of the Rocks,”—how differently they arouse our interest! In a general way, the difference consists in this: that the one is full of mystery; the other, of clear picturing. Leonardo has given us a painting which appeals to our imagination; Dürer presents one that delights the eye. The former’s picture we feel to be an imaginary scene; the latter’s, a wonderfully natural representation of an actual incident. In brief, while Dürer has tried to make everything plain to our eyes and mind, Leonardo has evidently used all his effort to make us forget the facts and realize the picture.
This contrast alone would make it worth while to compare the two paintings; but there are other reasons. These two men lived at the same time—the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth century. Dürer was the greatest of German artists; Leonardo was in many ways the most remarkable of the Italian artists of his day. It has been said of him that “he is the most thoughtful of all painters, unless it be Albrecht Dürer.”
Leonardo's early years were spent in Florence, his middle age in Milan, and the last three years of his life in France. Dürer, except for a visit of two years to Venice and of one year to the Netherlands, remained faithful to Nuremberg, the city of his birth. Leonardo’s teacher was Verrocchio—first a goldsmith, then a painter and sculptor; Dürer received his first lessons from his father, who was a master goldsmith, and his training as an apprentice in the studio-workshop of Michael Wohlgemuth, a celebrated painter of Nuremberg. Both Leonardo and Dürer were fine-looking men, of great charm of manner and conversation and mental accomplishments,—being well grounded in the sciences and mathematics of the day,—while Leonardo was, also, a gifted musician. The skill of each as a draftsman was extraordinary. Leonardo left numerous drawings and comparatively few paintings, while Dürer is even more celebrated for his engravings on wood and copper than for his paintings.
Now, Dürer was born a German; Leonardo an Italian. This sums up much of the difference between their work as painters. The Italian race, under its sunny skies, has an inborn love of beauty. The Germans, in a sterner climate, retain, to this day, the energy that carved its way through the vast forests of their country.
Many of you have read something of the life of Martin Luther, the great German Reformer. Dürer was a great admirer of Luther; in his own work, as in Luther’s, there was a great love of truth. It is very serious and sincere, and addressed to the hearts and understandings of the masses of the people.
It is quite possible, however, for pictures to be simple, precise, and direct, yet very commonplace, Dürer’s work was never commonplace; he contrived to make it homely and natural, and yet always of an extremely high artistic quality.
That he did not possess, as well, the gift of ideal beauty is due partly to his having lived north of the Alps, for the feeling for ideal grace and beauty is fostered by the study of the human form, and this has always flourished best in southern countries, such as Greece and Italy, where the climate favors a free, open-air life.128
