Page:An Elementary History of Art.djvu/528

 VII. Painting in the Netherlands in the SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES. In a previous chapter we spoke of the decline of Flemish and Dutch art in the sixteenth century, in consequence of a mistaken attempt to imitate the great masters of Italy. It is now necessary to notice a revival of painting in the seventeenth century, both in Flanders and Holland, cha- racterized by a return to the realism of the Van Eycks, combined with something of Venetian breadth, great har- mony of colouring, and general balance of tone. 1. The Antwerp School, (a) Rubens and his Cotemporaries. In Flanders, the leader of the new movement was Peter Paul Rubens (1577 — 1640), a native of Siegen in West- phalia, who brought about a complete reform in Flemish painting. Gifted with a powerful original genius, Rubens threw into his works something of the fire and energy we have noticed in those of Michelangelo : his mastery of colouring, his brilliant execution, fertility of imagination, and vitality of expression, are acknowledged by all — although it is impossible to deny that his figures are some- times coarse, and that he betrayed a want of feeling for spiritual beauty, especially noticeable in his sacred subjects. He first studied under one Tobias Verhaeght and Adam von Noort; he then, in 1596, entered the atelier of Othon van Veen, with whom he remained four years. In 1597 he entered the Guild of Painters of Antwerp;