THE PHILOSOPHY OF ART IN
THE NETHERLANDS.
During the last three years I have explained to
you the history of painting in Italy; this year I
propose to set before you the history of painting in
the Netherlands.
Two groups of mankind have been, and still are,
the principal factors of modern civilization; on the
one hand, the Latin or Latinized people—the Italians,
French, Spanish and Portuguese, and on the other,
the Germanic people—the Belgians, Dutch, Germans,
Danes, Swedes, Norwegians, English, Scotch and
Americans. In the Latin group the Italians are undeniably
the best artists; in the Germanic group they
are indisputably the Flemings and the Dutch. In
studying, accordingly, the history of art along with
these two races, we are studying the history of modern
art with its greatest and most opposite representatives.
A product so vast and varied, an art enduring
nearly four hundred years, an art enumerating so
many masterpieces and imprinting on all its works
an original and common character, is a national product;
it is consequently intimately associated with
the national life, and is rooted in the national character
itself. It is a flowering long and deeply matured
through a development of vitality conformably to the
acquired structure and primitive organization of the
plant. According to our method we shall first study
the innate and preliminary history which explains
the outward and final history. I shall first show you
the seed, that is to say the race, with its fundamental
and indelible qualities, those that persist through all
circumstances and in all climates; and next the plant,
that is to say the people itself, with its original qualities
expanded or contracted, in any case grafted on
and transformed by its surroundings and its history;
and finally the flower, that is to say the art,
and especially painting, in which this development
culminates.
