Like him he wrote treatises on fortifications, human proportions,
geometry, and perspective, and filled his sketchbooks with studies
of plants, animals, and natural scenery. His eager mind employed itself
with the whys and wherefores of things, not satisfied with the simple
pleasure that sight bestows. In his engravings, even more than in his
pictures, we ponder the hidden meanings; we are not content to look
and rejoice in beauty, though there is much to charm the eye. His
problems were the problems of life as well as the problems of art.
The other great artist of Germany, Hans Holbein the younger, was the
son of Hans Holbein the elder, a much esteemed painter in Augsburg.
This town was on the principal trade route between Northern Italy and
the North Sea, so that Venetians and Milanese were constantly passing
through and bringing to it much wealth and news of the luxury of their
own southern life. As a result the citizens of Augsburg dressed more
expensively and decorated their houses more lavishly than did the
citizens of any other town in Germany. After a boyhood and youth spent
at Augsburg, Holbein removed to Basle.
Pages:
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119