Philips Angel. Praise of Painting. Translated by Michael Hoyle, with an introduction and commentary by Hessel Miedema

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Philips Angel
Praise of Painting
Translated by Michael Hoyle, with an introduction and commentary by Hessel Miedema

Published in
Simiolus
Netherlands quarterly for the history of art
Volume 24 1996 pages 227-258

Review by Giovanni Mazzaferro

The frontispiece of Philips Angelìs Praise of Painting
Source: http://www.johannesvermeer.info/verm/house/p-angel00intro1.htm

I have often written that even Die Kunstliteratur, the masterpiece on art literature by Julius von Schlosser, proved inadequate, when he wrote on the history of art sources outside Italy. The author himself, in fact, stated that his attention was focusing on the texts of our country: "Also on this book, one could say that it has Italy as the centre and that initially I wanted to focus only on it" (p VII). This is evident when the Viennese art historian liquidated in a few lines only the case of the Low Countries and the Netherlands, in the section dedicated to the Art theory of the Baroque in other regions: apart from real mishaps (the Inleyding tot de hooge schoole der schilderkonst - Introduction to the noble art of painting, the work of Samuel van Hoogstraten is reported as published in 1641, when the author was only fourteen years old), Schlosser relied in his judgment on not very telling generalizations: "We are very acutely missing the direct manifestations of the artists from this milieu; in their extreme sobriety - think of the few letters by Rembrandt – they were so sharply dissimilar from the abundance not only the southerners, but also of Rubens. These artists painted diligently in their studios, but they did not speak and were one thousand miles away from literary aspirations" (p. 559). In this context, it is no wonder that the great Viennese art historian merely cited the Praise of painting (the original title is Lof der Schilderkonst), published by the artist Philips Angel in 1642, assessing it as "not much significant".

Schlosser probably saw that the Praise began with a series of arguments about the nobility and antiquity of the painting, which led him to classify the writing as a repetition not only of Italian works, but also of previous northern European texts.

The problem is that Schlosser’s judgment has affected a large part of the study of the Dutch art sources in Italy. However, it is not true that the artists of those regions had no literary ambitions. Simply, we know nothing of their works. For instance, there are (to my knowledge) no Italian translations of Dutch sources with the exception of the Lives of Dutch and German painters (only a part of the Schilder-boeck) by Karel van Mander (1604 and 1618).

Frans van Mieris the Elder, Allegory of Painting, 1661, Los Angeles , Getty Center
Source: Google Art Project via Wikimedia Commons

Of course, a possible methodological approach for the examination of these sources (which are today accessible, at least in part, in English or French) is to see whether they effectively said anything new. Ultimately, this is what has been done with the Spanish art literature, concluding that the treaties of the Iberian golden age were repetitions of the Italian ones. The same result, using the same methodology, would be expected for the Dutch texts. But that method is wrong. Obviously, all (or almost all) art treaties repeated topics (such as the comparison between the arts, the nobility of painting, the antiquity of his practice, and the function of art itself) that had already been touched by someone else before. I am surprised of this way of doing. When we are put in front of a work of art, one of the first things we are ending up saying is that the author had taken inspiration from another work, which he saw at a particular place and during a particular journey. In the absence of archival data, in most cases, we are ending up to identify connections through influences and references: no one would invent anything, but only change things in a characteristic way. And yet, coming to art sources, we would like to see only and always new 'topics'. Something which is, of course, impossible.

The real yardstick in evaluating texts of art literature - in my opinion - is to understand to what extent they contribute to the spread of certain ideas. What matters, then, it is the transmission of knowledge and culture. At the same time, one must understand whether the specific text also presents peculiarities which are specific to the author who composed it and to the environment in which he lived.

Gerrit Dou, Scholar sharpening a quill pen, 1630-1635, Private collection
Source: http://www.museumkijker.nl/gerrit-dou-terug-uit-vs-leiden-rijker-dan-leermeester-rembrandt/ via Wikimedia Commons

The Praise of Painting

This is what we will do with the Praise by Philips Angel (1618 - after 1664), an artist of Leiden (that is the birthplace of Rembrandt), and a painter who has left us no paintings. We do not know much about him. His life was divided in two parts: he was an artist until 1643. On that date (only a year after the drafting of the small text that is the subject of this review) he decided to leave the profession and began working for the Dutch East India Company (we are aware of his travels in Arabia and Persia). Following a number of financial scandals, he was forced to return home around 1656, where he held administrative positions, and confronted again with allegations of misappropriation. We do not know anything about him after 1664.

According to the text, the Praise was delivered in front of colleague painters on the occasion of the feast of St. Luke (the patron saint of the same) on October 31, 1641 and published swiftly by Willem Christiaens in Leiden (the cover letter to the publisher is dated February 26, 1462) "to forestall the most evil intentions of some money-grubbing booksellers, who [...] have dared, without my knowledge and awareness, to copy that which I, with my diligent and hard labor, had endeavored to make known to my beloved fatherland and to the devotees" (p. 231). Angel also said that the Praise was nothing but the 'central' core of a larger work, at which he was working and that he intended to publish in the near future. We do not know anything, in fact, neither of any pirate editions or of subsequent works by Angel who, as mentioned, began to work for the East India Company the year after.

Gerrit Dou, A Woman playing a Clavichord, about 1665, London, Dulwich Picture Gallery
Source: Google Art Project via Wikimedia Commons

Angel as an expression of the Fijnschilders?

As part of the Dutch art literature, the Praise has been attributed an important role. First of all, it was already said that is the only text written by a non-classicist artist. Several features have framed Angel among the Leiden Fijnschilders, or the painting school of Leyden, whose main representative was Gerrit Dou (a pupil of Rembrandt): the repeated references to Gerrit Dou himself and the need to carefully imitate the nature (without any reference to a selective reproduction of the same), the definitely not very high cultural background, and last but not least the attention to clearly commercial aspects (the praise of painters who know how to delight the eyes of potential customers, thus getting very high prices for their paintings). The Fijnschilders specialised in genre paintings of a small format and in tiny representations of reality. The beautiful English translation of Michel Hoyle, accompanied by the commentary by Hessel Miedema (I would say, the Dutch equivalent of Paola Barocchi in Italy; Miedema authored among others a monumental critical edition of van Mander’s Schilder-Boeck, of which is available an English version only on the section on Dutch and German painters) also allows the foreign reader to try to understand more. Miedema was unconvinced that the Praise should be considered tout-court as a document reflecting the artistic ideas of the Leyden school. As a matter of fact, for example, it is clear that the text did not dwell with genre painting in small format as a different or 'separate' genre from painting of history; and, certainly, it did not deny the usefulness and necessity of the latter, to which it gave plenty of space. 

Gerrit Dou, The moneylender, about 1664, Paris, Louvre Museum
Source: Web Gallery of Art via Wikimedia Commons

The Praise as a literary work

The most striking aspect, in the Praise, is that the author tried to make use of classical literary canons to present the reasons why painting should be fully taken into consideration. Therefore, the text belongs to a specific genre, but at the same time reveals a taste that we might call today sketchy. The work opened with a dedication by the author to Johan Overbeck, the son of a great collector of Leiden, and continued, as normal for the time, with three poems. We would expect, of course, to talk about the chief world systems, while the third poem (signed PP) was simply an invitation to the painters in the city to stop celebrating the feast of St. Luke spending the day in the tavern and drinking beer; they should instead listen to Angel's words [1]. Certainly, the audience to which the Praise was intended was not an assembly of fine orators, nor an aristocratic elite of collectors and patrons. When the author advised painters not to make the mistake of adding anything improper to the works of the others, thereby engaging in a kind of imitation which is of general damage for painting, he told the reader the case of a monkey hiding its mangy backside while sitting on a mantelpiece, but making it visible as soon as it begins to climb it. I sincerely doubt that Bellori would speak in these terms, to phrase a concept. Very often, similarly, Angel tended to exemplify recommendations on the qualities of which a painter must be equipped; however, he did not always fully grasp the spirit of the works from which he was borrowing. An obvious case is that of Jacob Cats (1577-1660, cited as "our Homer": he was a Dutch poet of great fame in those days). Angel loved to include Cats’s lyrics within his Praise. Also here, he did not invent anything. However, to support the idea that painting is superior to poetry because it ensures far more substantial gains to those who practice it (by itself a rather odd argument in the context of a Praise) he cited a poem by Cats in which the beautiful Rhodope had seven suitors, each of whom practicing a different profession, and each of whom magnifying the benefits of his activities to get the courted to choose him. As soon as you read the text, it becomes clear that the poem had an absolutely ironic meaning (the painter is in fact a poser), while Angel did not see it at all, and once again took it with the utmost seriousness.

Frans vam Mieris the Elder, Duet, 1658, Staatliches Museum Schwerin
Source: Web Gallery of Art via Wikimedia Commons

The shared classic routes in a religiously divided Europe

For all the above reasons, I have come to the conclusion that the Praise was not a text on genre painting or on 'low' painting, depending on how you want to call it, but a low-quality literary work on painting. I would like to point out right away that this is not a hostile judgment. If anything, it multiplies the interest for the work, because in fact, in the history of art literature, we do not know anything similar. We do not know in fact other cases of a medium-low culture painter who turn to colleagues also lacking an adequate cultural background. And yet, if we accept this hypothesis, we can understand how important the Praise was to provide an 'elevated' input (with messages such as the nobility of painting, the invention, the composition) to a 'popular' public. In this sense, I want to focus on the first part of the work. We find there arguments that Angel drew from the Schilder-boeck from van Mander or from the De Pictura Veterum (On the painting of the antiques) by Junius. When referring to antiquity, in fact anecdotes from the Historia naturalis of Pliny are mentioned. One might say that we know them well; perhaps a group of drunken painters in Leiden could ignore them. It is also through texts like these that the Europe of the painters shared messages of a classical origin which, if anything, were declined differently from place to place. I would like to give an example, speaking about the power of images. Let us consider three writers who wrote about it between 1582 and 1642:

• Cardinal Paleotti, in his famous Discourse on Sacred and Profane images (1582) quoted various sources (he forgot Aristotle, but called into question Plutarch and Pliny) according to which a white woman could give birth to a black child (an "Ethiopian") simply because a coloured statue stood next to her bed; likewise, the husband who wanted to get a beautiful son gave his wife a portrait of a charming little child [2]. The real creative power of fine arts was declined according to a totally counter-reformed approach, and not surprisingly in the context of a chapter which was titled 'Different effects produced by pious and devout images’. However, it included the ability of pictures or statues to intervene directly on generating a son. Of course, Paleotti admitted only images which were absolutely faithful to the Roman Catholic doctrine;
• around 1620, Giulio Mancini, the Pope's physician, wrote the Considerations on painting, which never got printed, but experienced - as we know - a lively circulation of manuscripts. He made reference to the same founding principle (i.e. the power supplied by the image) to justify the defence of paintings with lecherous subject, which were totally condemned by Paleotti. Mancini, as a doctor, argued that, if placed in the places in which husband and wife were lying together, the lascivious images would "excite them to make beautiful, healthy, and strong children";
• in 1642 in Leiden, a man like Angel, who had certainly not a theological knowledge like Paleotti or the refinement of art collector like Mancini, and who also lived in a region, the Netherlands, where the worship of images was forbidden according to the principles of the Calvinist reform, exposed the same concept to his colleagues (who were perhaps also his companions of drinking), quoting a poem of the usual Cats, in which the chastity of a woman was questioned until it turned out that she was sleeping next to a statue of a beautiful child.

Europe was divided, people were fighting in the name of different religions, but the roots of art were common and dated back to the world of classical antiquity. One should not overlook the role of 'minor works' like that of Angel in spreading these concepts.

Frans van Mieris the Elder, Brothel Scene, 1658, The Hague, Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis
Source: Web Gallery of Art via Wikimedia Commons

Specific aspects of the Praise

In the second part of his work, Angel tried to outline the qualities which a great painter should have. I am transcribing, translating from the English edition of Hoyle: "he has sound judgment, a sure and reliable hand for drawing, a rich talent in the natural arrangement of objects, an ingenious invention of pleasing abundance, the proper arrangement of the lights and shades, wuth a good observation of distinctive natural things, a well-versed understanding of perspective, and equal experience in the knowledge of histories accompanied by profound and essential reflections based upon wide reading and study. He would also have some grasp of mathematical principles. This painter would possess a thorough understanding of anatomy, seek to imitate nature rather than another master's manner, know how to mix paint in fleshy colours, distinguish between all woollen fabrics, linen and silk, and have a nimble but smoothly flowing brush" (p. 242). By itself, none of these requirements is new. In some cases, the subsequent explanations are so elementary (it is the case, for example, for the prospective) to border on the nature of an information given to people who are fully inexperienced of painting. In other cases, they seem to configure, indeed, some of the typical prerogatives of the Leyden school. This is the case, starting from the end, of the flowing but gentle brush, which was typical of Dou and his disciples; and, again, it fits with the particular attention with which the painter has reproduce the worth of the tissues and the differences between them. This last point seems to recall the mimetic and analytical reproduction of reality. And, in fact, talking about 'good observation of the peculiarities of nature' Angel wrote: "many might find it strange that I insert the link of the observation of real, natural things in the chain of the art of painting [editor's note: for Angel, painting was a chain composed of many rings that are held together], but I do not doubt that the explanations I will lay before you to clarify my reasons will satisfy you and will make you agree with me that they are serviceable. I have [...] often noted a very grave error committed both by (I say it with respect) the greatest and most revered masters and by the least. The simple reason for it is that they do not observe real, natural objects closely" (p. 244). The premise would let predict what knows, but in essence it simply led to the observation that painters may portray galloping horses which are towing wagons, while their wheels are immobile. Out of this specific example, a second was dealt with, aimed at those who painted the places to watch the soldiers. The recommendation was to include in their paintings a figure smoking tobacco, someone who is putting on the armour, and even people sitting, throwing dices or playing cards. What does all this mean? It is enough to say that Angel defended genre painting in small format, taking side for imitated nature without retouching or idealizations? I am sharing the concerns of Miedema on the subject, although it is clear that some aspects, some words seem to point in that direction. More than a 'ideological' choice, the text seems instead to signal that Angel was more comfortable with paintings which were more rapid to accomplish and easier to sell, especially when the artist was able to arouse in the buyer that kind of enchantment that, in fact, marked the huge revaluation of that genre in Europe since the nineteenth century.

NOTES

[1] Miedema points out (p. 251) that the festivity had to be now a 'secular celebration'. The Guild of St. Luke had probably lost its vitality after the Calvinist Reform. Painters could only respect the tradition by allowing themselves to drink more abundantly than usual. I am not completely clear whether Miedema intended to say that the festivity of the guild was suppressed because it was named after a saint, or whether the iconoclastic choice of Calvinism played a role.

[2] Gabriele Paleotti, Discorso intorno alle immagini sacre e profane (Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images) (1582), Libreria Editrice Vaticana, p. 81.