Karel van Mander
Le vite degli illustri pittori fiamminghi, olandesi e tedeschi [The Lives of the Illustrious Flamish, Dutch and German Painters]
Edited by Ricardo de Mambro Santos
2000, Apeiron, Rome
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| Hugo ven der Goes. Detail from the Portinari Triptych (1477-78, Florence, Uffizi) Source: Hugo van Der Goes Livre Les dessous des chefs-d’œuvre : un regard neuf sur les maîtres anciens, de Rose-Marie & Rainer Hagen, Köln, Taschen, 2000 |
About Karel van Mander see in this blog: Karel
van Mander
Principles and Foundations of the Noble and Free Art of Painting,
Edited by Jan Willem Noldus; Karel van Mander, The Lives of the Illustrious Flamish, Dutch and German Painters, Edited by Ricardo de Mambro Santos
Principles and Foundations of the Noble and Free Art of Painting,
Edited by Jan Willem Noldus; Karel van Mander, The Lives of the Illustrious Flamish, Dutch and German Painters, Edited by Ricardo de Mambro Santos
[1] Published in Haarlem in 1604, the Schilder-Boeck is divided into six parts or sections. The first part - Den Grondt der Edel Vry Schilder-Const - is a didactic poem which deals with the fundamental principles of painting; the second one converses on ancient art, drawing from and sometimes criticising the information received by Pliny the Elder; the third one refers to Italian painters and uses largely the narrative of Vasari; the fourth one, here translated into Italian, is by far the most interesting and, in any case, the most studied by art historians (describing the life of the "illustrious Flemish, Dutch and German painters"); the fifth one is a commentary on Ovid's Metamorphoses, then consider a sort of "Bible of Painters" (the definition by Schlosser in Letteratura artistica – Literature on art, p. 356); the last part, namely the sixth one, focuses on the representation of the figure and how the ancient pagans represented their gods. This necessity to create a repertoire of forms and features pertaining to mythological characters suggested to Germain Bazin (in Storia della storia dell’arte - History of Art History, p. 69) that van Mander approximated the Iconologia (Iconology) by Cesare Ripa.
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| Jan van Eyck. The Arnolfini Portrait (1434), Londra, National Gallery |
"An indispensable source for the study of Northern figurative art at the turn between Renaissance and Mannerism, the writing by Karel van Mander is the first systematic attempt to describe and examine art developments beyond the Alps. Biographies, anecdotes and acute critical observations make up a surprising narrative mosaic of a historical and together theoretical reach. This edition provides the Italian reader with the first full version of the Treaty of van Mander [...].
Born in Meulebeke, in southern Flanders, after an initial literary and pictorial training, in the workshops of Lucas de Heere and Pieter Vlerick, van Mander takes on an important business trip in Italy between 1573 and 1577, in direct contact with the circle of Bartholomeus Spranger. After a short stay in Austria at the service of the Emperor Rudolf II of Habsburg, van Mander returns in Flanders and moves to the Netherlands in 1583, where publishes the Book of Painting in 1604. His theoretical reflection, combined with the artistic production of Hendrick Goltzius, Cornelis van Haarlem and Cornelis Ketel, stands as one of the greatest achievements of transalpine Mannerism."
[4] It is displayed below the text of the review signed by Marco Carminati, appeared in the Sunday insert of the Italian daily Sole 24 Ore on 10 June 2001 (the article is taken from the Biblioteca Multimediale del Sole 24 Ore – Cd Rom Domenica 1983-2003 Vent’anni di idee - Multimedia Library of Sole 24 Ore - Cd Rom of the Sunday insert 1983-2003 Twenty years of ideas).
SUNDAY – Sources
Masters immortalized by the Vasari of the North
The Firs Edition of the “Lives of the Illustrious Flemish, Dutch and German Artists" by Karel van Mander
by Marco Carminati
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| Karel van Mander, The continence of Scipio, 1600 (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) |
Het Schilder-Boeck waerin Voor eerst de Leerlustige-Jeught den Grondt der Edele Vrye Schilderkonst in verscheyden Deelen wort voor-gedrangen. Daer na in drij deelen t’ leven der Vermaerde Doorluchtighe Schilders des Ouden ende Nieuwen Tydts.
[n.d.t. English translation: A book on painting which in its various parts explains for the first time the noble art of painting to an eagerly-to-learn youth; in addition, it cover in three parts the life of famous painters of both ancient and modern times. (Courtesy of Frank Dierick)]
For whoever knows a bit of archaic Flemish it should not be a problem to quickly understand the phrase quoted in the preceding paragraph. But I am afraid that a large part of the mankind is immediately excluded from the joy of understanding. And it is a shame, because the passage quoted belongs to the most important text which has reached us on the figurative Renaissance and Mannerism in Northern Europe, comparable to what the Vite (Lives) by Giorgio Vasari are in the history of Italian painting.
We speak of the ‘Book of painting’ by Karel van Mander, published for the first time in the Netherlands in 1604 by the publisher Passchier van Westbusch in Haarlem and containing, among other things, the biographies of all the most important masters of Flanders (van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden, Hugo van der Goes, etc.), and of the greatest masters of the German Renaissance, for instance Dürer and Holbein. The work was written with prominently pedagogical intentions for the use of young apprentices in workshops, to make sure not only that they would get a complete image of painters active in Europe from the fifteenth to the end of the sixteenth century, but that they would master aesthetic ideas, concepts and theories which are usually the realm of the most learned theorists.
The ‘Book of painting’ is an articulated body, split into multiple parts. It is opened by a long didactic poem in verse, in which the author exposes "the theoretical foundations of the noble and liberal art of painting" in a markedly Mannerist key. The poem is followed by three historical books: the first deals with the history of ancient art and is an eloquent example of the reception of the tradition of Pliny in Northern Europe; the second discusses Italian painters along the lines of Vasari's Lives, but with significant additions of news, especially on painters that van Mander had known personally in Rome around 1575. The third book [note of the editor, actually the fourth part, counting the initial didactic poem] - very important, the true glory and merit of van Mander - discusses the lives of Flemish, Dutch and German, starting from van Eyck up to the masters of his time. Complete the work an exposure of the "bible of painters", i.e. Ovid's Metamorphoses (an inexhaustible source for all the profane stories of the paintings), and a summary of ancient art and mythology.
As Vasari, Karel van Mander alternated the activity of artist and theorist. Born in Flanders in 1548, he had the good fortune of a multifaceted training: he studied philosophy and literature, knew Latin by heart and it seems it was very much appreciated as an actor. At twenty he thought to devote himself to painting, joining first the workshop of Luca de Heere at Ghent, and then the one by Pieter Vlerick in Tournai. He soon gained some notoriety as the author of small squares of a religious nature. However, stimulated by his own masters, in 1573 he broke the cordon and undertook a study tour in Italy, following a convoy of Flemish nobles. It was a hard-working travel: during his Italian stay, he created a cycle of frescoes of pure Vasari style in the Palazzo Spada in Terni, admired astonished the works of Vasari in Florence's Duomo and spent the year of Jubilee in Rome (1575), binding himself closely to the circle of painters of Bartholomeus Sprangher and other Nordic painters in Rome. Thanks to Sprangher, he had the honour of being invited to Vienna by the Emperor Rudolf II of Habsburg in 1577.
In 1578 he returned to Flanders, but shortly thereafter, for religious reasons, he went to take refuge in Holland. He started here a long intellectual career, translating and printing the Latin classics, composing theoretical works, participating in rhetoric competitions, acting in theatre. He complemented all of this with a prolific painting activity, fully inspired by Italian models and marked by the habit of signing his paintings in Latin: "CV Mandere fecit". Of course, he also had the time to write the Schilder-Boeck (his masterpiece) and see it published (1604). It seems paradoxical that such an important book, linked in many ways to Italy and Italian historiographical models, and - most importantly - full of news about famous artists such as Van Eyck, Dürer and Holbein, had never known to date any translation into Italian. Moreover, it seems paradoxical that this translation has not been conceived by a major publishing house but a tiny publishing reality as the Apeiron in Sant'Oreste, in the province of Rome. Paradox by paradox, we will say finally that the translator of the irksome text was not an Italian with a passion for Flanders, nor a Flemish with a passion for Italy, but a promising young scholar in Brazil, Ricardo Mambro de Santos, who in spite of the language barrier was able to convert the terrifying language of van Mander in an elegant Italian music. For now, Mambro de Santos has faced the most significant part of the translation of the Book of painting, namely the one dedicated to the lives of Flemish, Dutch and German painters. Italian readers have available, for the first time, the complete edition of a truly indispensable source for the study of Nordic figurative culture, as well as for the understanding of the development of Mannerist painting in Europe. Following Vasari, van Mander drafts medallion-biographies and divides the material into living and dead painters. He stuffs the narration of juicy anecdotes but also of concepts and acute critical observations, many of which need to be explained and contextualized to be fully understood. Very useful, in this sense, are the critical apparatuses prepared by de Santos Mambro as an introduction to the volume. And for the next year, the editor announces the release of the part dedicated to the Ancient and Italian Painters. The archaic Flemish is no longer a problem [Note of the editor: Unfortunately, the promise was not kept, and to date, we are still (impatiently) waiting for the volume.]
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