Jan Steen depicted peasants revelling on their holidays
or in taverns. Peter de Hoogh was the painter of middle-class life,
and discovered in its circumstances, likewise, abounding romance.
The Dutchman of the seventeenth century loved his house and his garden,
and every inch of the country in which he lived, rescued as it had
been from invasions by armies and the sea. Many painters never left
Holland, and found beauty enough there to fill well-spent lives in
painting its flatness beneath over-arching clear or clouded skies.
Although the earlier Flemings had had a great love of landscape, they
had not conceived it as a subject suitable for a whole picture, but
only for a background. In the sixteenth century the figures gradually
get smaller and less important, and towards the end of the century
disappear. As the song says, 'a very different thing by far' is painting
a landscape background and painting a whole landscape picture. Before
the end of the century Rubens painted some wonderful landscapes, and
he was soon followed by a great number of very fine landscape painters
in Holland.
Pages:
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148