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Rembrandt
by
Lastman had spent four years in Italy, and had come back full to overflowing with classic ideas. His family was one of the most aristocratic in Amsterdam, and whatever he said concerning art was quoted as final. He was the court of last appeal. His rooms were filled with classic fragments, and on his public days visitors flocked to hear what he might have to say about the wonders of Venice, Florence and Rome. For in those days men seldom traveled out of their own countries, and those who did had strange tales to tell the eager listeners when they returned.
Lastman was handsome, dashing, popular. His pictures were in demand, principally because they were Lastman’s. Proud ladies came from afar and begged the privilege of sitting as his model. In Italy, Lastman had found that many painters employed ‘prentice talent. The great man would sketch out the pictures, and the boys would fill in the color. Lastman would go off about his business, and perhaps drop in occasionally during the day to see how the boys got on, adding a few touches here and there, and gently rebuking those who showed too much genius. Lastman believed in genius, of course; but only his own genius filled his ideal. As a consequence all of Lastman’s pictures are alike–they are all equally bad. They represent neither the Italian school nor the Dutch, being hybrids: Italian skies and Holland backgrounds; Dutchmen dressed as dagoes.
Lastman was putting money in his purse. He closely studied public tastes, and conformed thereto. He was popular, and there is in America today a countryman of his, of like temperament, who is making much moneys out of literature by similar methods.
Into Lastman’s keeping came the young man, Rembrandt Harmens. Lastman received him cordially, and set him to work.
But the boy proved hard to manage: he had his own ideas about how portraits should be painted.
Lastman tried to unlearn him. The master was patient, and endeavored hard to make the young man paint as he should–that is, as Lastman did; but the result was not a success. The Lastman intellect felt sure that Rembrandt had no talent worth encouraging.
Lastman produced a great number of pictures, and his name can be found in the catalogs of the galleries of Amsterdam, Munich, Berlin and Antwerp; and his canvases are in many of the old castles and palaces of Germany. In recent years they have been enjoying a vogue, simply because it was possible that Rembrandt had worked on them. All the “Lastmans” have been gotten out and thoroughly dusted by the connoisseurs, in a frantic search for earmarks.
The perfect willingness of Lastman to paint a picture on any desired subject, and have it ready Saturday night, all in the colors the patron desired, with a guarantee that it would give satisfaction, filled the heart of Rembrandt with loathing.
At the end of six months, when he signified a wish to leave, it was a glad relief to the master. Lastman had tried to correct Rembrandt’s vagaries as to chiaroscuro, but without success. So he wrote an ambiguous letter certifying to the pupil’s “having all his future before him,” gave him a present of ten florins in jingling silver, and sent him back to his folks.
* * * * *
Rembrandt had been disillusioned by his stay in the fashionable art-world of Amsterdam. Some of his idols had crumbled, and there came into his spirit a goodly dash of pessimism. His father was disappointed and suggested that he get a place as illustrator at the bookmakers, before some one else stepped in and got the job.
But Rembrandt was not ambitious. He decided he would not give up painting, at least not yet–he would keep at it and he would paint as he pleased. He had lost faith in teachers. He moped around the town, and made the acquaintance of the painter Engelbrechtsz and his talented pupil, Lucas van Leyden. Their work impressed him greatly, and he studied out every detail on the canvases until he had absorbed the very spirit of the artist. Then, when he painted, he very naturally took their designs, and treated them in his own way. Indeed, the paucity in invention of those early days must ever impress the student of art.