Tag: Goltzius

The Four Seasons

The Four Seasons

Spring is in the air! I wrote about Winter in Art not so long ago. The pictures in that story were all about keeping ourselves warm in the cold season. It made me so much longing for Spring and Summer, even Autumn would be fine. Can the dark winter days be gone please, and will we soon see some spring flowers and sunshine! To get in the mood for the warmer weather, here are two series of the Four Seasons, both starting with Spring: a cute series of paintings by David Teniers (made around 1644) with seasonal activities, and four prints by Hendrick Goltzius (from 1601) with the seasons represented by children growing up and falling in love. These pictures are all to get you in the mood for the warmer seasons. Stay warm for now and enjoy!

Four Seasons by David Teniers (1610 – 1690)

The series of four small paintings by David Teniers is an allegory of the seasons where Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter have been given human forms that embody the essence of each. Teniers placed his characters, of an appropriate age and dressed accordingly, in the foreground with a symbolic seasonal object. In the background figures doing work associated with each season. The paintings are from c.1644 and pretty small, about 22x16cm.

Spring is personified as a gardener heaving a large pot containing a young tree, kept during winter in the orangery and now back outside as weather is getting milder. There is still a chilly background; it seems as if April showers are approaching. Other gardeners dig the soil, making a formal garden in the fashionable style set by French designers and followed with keen interest in Flanders.

David Teniers the Younger (Antwerp 1610 – Brussels 1690) is one of the most famous 17th-century Flemish painters and particularly known for developing the peasant genre and tavern scenes. He was working for the King of Spain, as well as for Prince William of Orange and the Governor of the Netherlands, the Archduke Leopold. Teniers moved to Brussels where Archduke Leopold became his main employer. One of Teniers’ key tasks was to look after and enlarge the Archducal collection, which grew to incorporate about 1300 works. The archduke’s collection became the nucleus of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.

Summer is a young peasant with a sheaf of wheat he has just finished binding together with straw. The peasants behind him are working hard. The man wields a scythe to cut the wheat, while the woman bends to heap it into sheaves, ready to be tied. Behind them the trees are in full leaf and the distance is hazy with the summer heat.
Autumn is a jolly wine drinker – a stout fellow with a handsome moustach and a comfortable belly. In the background, a man raises a hammer to fasten down the lid of a barrel of wine. Another guy attends to a barrel that has spilled grapes onto the ground. It’s the grape harvesting season. Autumn holds a flagon in one hand and raises a glass with a fancy stem in the other, like tasting Beaujolais Primeur, and seemingly happily ignorant of the grey autumn clouds piling up behind him.
Winter brings the cycle of the seasons (and life!) full circle with an old man representation the coldest of the four seasons. Wrapped in velvet and fur, he hunches over to warm his hands at a brazier. In the background a skating scene with some misty figures. 

Fours Seasons by Hendrick Goltzius (1558 – 1617)

The Four Seasons (1601), designed and drawn by Hendrick Goltzius and engraved by his pupil Jan Saenredam, offer lush depictions of flora and fauna through changing times of the year. The prints simultaneously follow a young girl and boy’s journey into adulthood. The discovery of the bird’s nest of Spring passes seamlessly into the harvesting of Summer’s ripe crops. Autumn’s root vegetables and fruits attract the interest of a full-grown goat and a pig, while the adults and their loyal hound skate the Winter away on a frozen river. On Spring and Summer an Amor figure is shooting his arrows of love towards the boy and girl, and in all four prints the warm or cold wind is blowing from the mouth of a child’s head high in the sky. This is a series about the four seasons, about falling in love, and about growing up.

Two young children, a boy and a girl, study a bird’s nest containing chicks. A kid goat and a young deer are in foreground. And Amor, God of Passion and Desire, flies around; ready to shoot his arrow. Love is in the air.
“Humanas recreo mentes, volucresque ferasque: Omnia floriferi laetantur tempore veris.” or “I am enlightening every man’s heart, and the birds and the wild animals; everything is happy and in full flower in the season of Spring.”

Hendrick Goltzius (Dutch, 1558–1617), draftsman, engraver, print publisher, and painter, was one of the most important engravers and print publishers of his time. He lived and worked in Haarlem, close to Amsterdam, and established his own print publishing business. He trained a number of engravers to work in his distinctive style. Goltzius and his workshop were internationally acclaimed; his patrons included sovereigns from all parts of Europe, most notably the art-loving Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II who also granted Goltzius copyright protection, which can be seen on the Spring engraving. It mentions “Cum Privil Sa Cae M” which means Cum Privilegio Sacrae Caesarea Majestatis or With Privilege of his Holy Imperial Majesty, and with the date Anno – in the year – 1601. This should prevent other engravers from copying Goltzius’ design and prints. Once such privilege was granted, artists indeed went to court and took action against illegal copying of their works of art.

An encounter between a boy and a girl: the boy at left holding a sheaf of wheat and a rake over his shoulder while she has a yoke and two water buckets. A cock and hen are in the foreground. And Amor still flying around! In the background farmers are harvesting wheat, a typical summer activity.
“Per me larga Ceres densis canescit aristis, Agricolasque beo foecundi frugibus anni.” or “Through me, the wheat fields are full and golden shiny; I make the farmers happy with gifts in this fruitful year.”

Jan Pieterszoon Saenredam (Dutch, 1565 – 1607) was a printmaker in engraving, born in Zaandam (hence his name). He showed great artistic talent and the young Saenredam was sent to learn drawing and engraving from Hendrick Goltzius in Haarlem, where he became a master at the age of 24. After working for some time with Goltzius, he encountered the almost inevitable professional rivalry and jealousy, prompting his departure and set up his own workshop in Assendelft (just north of Amsterdam and Zaandam). He died of typhus at the age of 41, and was buried in the Saint Adolphus church at Assendelft. Jan left his wife a sizeable estate as a result of lucrative investments in the Dutch East India Company.

A boy and a girl, now young adults, are picking grapes and carrying a basket with freshly picked pears. Vegetables in the foreground and a goat chewing one a branch with vine leaves. Is this the goat from Spring, but older?
“En ego maturos Autumnus profero fructus, Efficioque mei ne sit spes vana coloni.” or “Look at me Autumn, who gives fruits that are ripe and takes care that the hope of my farmer is not in vain.”
A young woman and a young man in rich clothes, are holding hands and skating, oblivious of the deer beset by a wolf in the background, or any of the season’s dangers. Is this poor deer the same one from Spring? A dog in lower right corner is the couple’s companion and a symbol of loyalty in love.
“Accumulant homines totum quaecunque per annum, Haec ego consumo, soli haec mihi cuncta parantur.” or “All that has been gathered and collected throughout the year, that’s consumed by me, it’s all prepared for just me alone.”

David Teniers the Younger (Flemish, 1610 – 1690), Spring, The Four Seasons: Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, c.1644, Oil on Copper, 22x16cm, National Gallery, London.

Jan Saenredam, printmaker (Dutch, 1565 – 1607) after design by Hendrick Goltzius (Dutch, 1558 – 1617), The Four Seasons represented by four pairs of children: Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, 1601, with Latin text by C. Schonaeus (Dutch, 1540 – 1611), Engraving on cream laid paper, 22×16 cm, The Art Institute of Chicago.

About the annotations on the prints:

  • H. Goltzius Invent. or HG Inve. This means that Hendrick Goltzius is the “inventor” or “drawer” of the design of the print.
  • I. Sanredam Sculpt or I.S Sculp. This means that Jan Saenredam is the “sculptor” or the “engraver” of the print.
  • Cum Privil Sa Cae M,. This means that the print was protected “Cum privilegio Sacrae Caesarea Majestatis” or “With imperial privilege from the Holy Roman Emperor”, as protection against illegal copies.
  • A° 1601 means “Anno 1601” or “in the year 1601”
  • C.S. means “Cornelis Schonaeus”, a scholar from Haarlem who wrote many Latin lines and verses that are found on prints of the Haarlem circle of print designers and engravers.
Winter in art

Winter in art

“Baby, it’s cold outside…”

Now that we are in the middle of the winter, I’ve started thinking about how this “winter” concept has been represented in art. It’s the harshest season of the year, certainly when there was no electricity or gas, but some touching images have been produced over the centuries.

It was not just landscape painters who gave us winter scenes with frozen rivers and skaters. Painters also personified winter as an old man with a fur coat and warming his hands at a brazier. And from the the 18th century, artists depicted winter as a young woman, adding a sensual and warm touch to the cold.

I choose some ten works of art, all depicting winter as a “personification”; as a human figure depicted with symbolic attributes, representing the abstract idea of “winter”. Starting with the French Impressionist Berthe Morisot, as I like her paintings so much. And then going back in time to the 17th century Flemish painter David Teniers, to Madame de Pompadour – lover of King Louis XV of France, to the bedroom of King George III of England, to La Frileuse, the chilly girl, by the French sculptor Houdon. It’s an eclectic batch of art, but all lovely. They give inspiration and warmth in this cold season. Like Vivaldi’s Winter from The Four Seasons.

Along with its Summer pendant, Winter depicts a fashionable Parisian woman who personifies a season. Berthe Morisot debuted the paintings together at the Paris Impressionist exhibition in 1880. Morisot’s images of the Parisienne, a popular figure type representing an elegant, upper-class Parisian woman, were considered utterly contemporary. A critic said about Morisot’s Winter: “with its figure, so courageously modern, of the Parisian woman braving the cold in her furs.”

Berthe Morisot (Édouard Manet’s model and sister-in-law) was one of the most respected members of the Impressionist movement. At the beginning of the 20th century, her aura began to dim and her painting, labelled “feminine”, was relegated to second rank. Only recently, thanks also to the grand 2019 Morisot exhibition in the Musée d’Orsay, Berthe Morisot was incontestably regarded again as a great artist.

Abraham Bloemaert (Dutch, 1566 – 1651), Allégorie de l’hiver (et de l’amour) or Winter (and love), c.1627, 70x58cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris.

This old man by the Dutch Golden Age painter Abraham Bloemaert is representing Winter. Wearing a fur hat and very carefully warming himself at a small stove full of red-hot coals or charcoal. His nose and cheeks reflect the heat of the coal. It’s not only a representation of winter, but also hinting to love and passion. Love – and it’s pleasure – happens to be gallant to the ones who court the fire of love with caution.

David Teniers the Younger (Flemish, 1610 – 1690), Winter, from the series The Four Seasons, c.1644, Oil on Copper, 22x16cm, National Gallery, London.

David Teniers the Younger brings the cycle of the seasons to an end with an old man representing Winter. Wrapped in velvet and fur, he hunches over to warm his hands at a brazier, a small stove that’s heated with charcoal. His face is wrinkled, his beard long and frosted with white. In the background a small, monochrome skating scene. It’s a personification of winter and Teniers chose a character of an appropriate age and dressed him accordingly. Winter as the last season of life.

The tiny picture is on a copper base, which allowed the paint to flow more freely than it would on canvas. Teniers could show minute detail: the facial characteristics and expressions, Winter’s splendid hat and the objects on his table. Allegorical paintings of the seasons were popular at the time, and Teniers painted several versions of the subject. David Teniers was cashing in on the popularity of the series and turning them out quickly to fulfil demand.

Caesar Boëtius van Everdingen (Dutch, 1616 – 1678), A Young Woman Warming her Hands over a Brazier: Winter, c.1646, 97x81cm, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

This young woman by Caesar Boëtius van Everdingen warms her hands above a dish of glowing coals, holding her hands under a piece of cloth. She personifies Winter. This season was usually represented as an old man: old because the year is coming to an end, like towards the end of life. Van Everdingen’s choice of a young, richly attired woman is rather unusual. Cesar Boëtius van Everdingen was a Dutch Golden Age painter, from Alkmaar.

Giovanni Battista Pittoni the younger (Italian, 1687 – 1767), Allegory of Winter and Summer, c.1730, 125x112cm, Bristol City Museum & Art Gallery, Bristol, United Kingdom.

For this allegory of Winter and Summer, the painter Giovanni Battista Pittoni turned to traditional iconographic examples. Summer is personified as a young woman, and Winter as an old man warming his hands over a brazier. Summer gestures to a small angel-like figure in the top right corner (difficult to see on the picture). That’s the Spirit of Dawn whose urn of water provides the dew droplets of summer and frost in the winter.

The Winter pastel by Rosalba Giovannia Carriera was acquired by George III, King of England. It entered the Royal Collection in 1762 as “a Beautiful Female covering herself with a Pelisse”. In traditional images Winter was typically shown as an old man, but Rosalba Carriera transformed the subject into a beautiful young woman. “Winter” was put on display in George III’s bedchamber at Buckingham Palace, alongside “Summer”.

Rosalba Carriera was born in Venice. She began her career as a painter of snuffboxes, but rose quickly to fame for her pastel portraits, which became highly desired across Europe. Carriera made several sets of allegories of the Four Seasons. The largest group of pastels by Carriera belonged to Frederick Augustus Elector of Saxony. Over 100 of her pastels were on display at his residence in Dresden in a ‘Rosalba Room’. The artist became blind in later life and died in 1757.

François Boucher (French, 1703–1770), The Four Seasons: Winter, 1755, 57x73cm, The Frick Collection, New York.

François Boucher painted this Winter from the series The Four Seasons in 1755 for Madame De Pompadour, King Louis XV’s long-term official mistress. Their original location is unknown, but their peculiar shape suggests that they were used as overdoors, no doubt in one of Pompadour’s many properties in France.

Instead of the hardship that traditionally illustrates the theme of winter, Boucher depicts a delightful encounter in joyous colours, a frosty background and a landscape buried under snow. A Tartar in pseudo-Russian dress pushes an elaborate sleigh with the heroine – most likely referring to Madame de Pompadour herself. Glancing out at us coyly, she sports a billowing fur-trimmed gown and a little fur necklace. Her hands may be warmed by a muff, but her upper body is completely exposed. This combination of luxury and seduction, treated in a fanciful and humorous manner, is typical of Boucher.

Étienne-Maurice Falconet (French, 1716 – 1791), Winter, c.1770, Marble, 135 cm, The Winter Palace, State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg.

In April 1764, the 42-year-old Madame Marquise de Pompadour, the official chief mistress of King Louis XV of France unexpectedly died, and in the workshop of her beloved sculptor Etienne Maurice Falconet, the last of the statues she commissioned remained unfinished – the marble Winter, a young woman sitting on an ice cube and gracefully covering flowers with her robe.

A year later Falconet received an invitation from the Russian Empress Catherine the Great to work at her court. It was agreed that at the expense of the Russian treasury all unfinished work from the Falconet workshop would travel with him to Russia. And part of that deal was the unfinished “Winter” sculpture. Falconet completed “Winter” only 5 years after arriving in Russia. That’s how this statue, made by a French sculptor, ended up in the Winter Palace of the State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg. Contemporaries of Falconet received the work as a masterpiece and the artist himself wrote: “This might be the very best work which I can do; I even dare to think that it is good.”

Jean Antoine Houdon (French, 1741 – 1828), Winter (La Frileuse), 1787, Bronze, 144x39x51cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

L’Hiver or Winter is a bronze statue of a young woman cast by the neoclassical French sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon. The statue personifies the winter season and is nicknamed La Frileuse, The Chilly Girl. This is reflected in both the medium (a cold, dark bronze) and the features of the sculpture, a young woman clad only in a shawl. Upon its completion and presentation at the 1787 Salon, the French yearly art fair, Winter shocked the French artistic establishment but delighted art lovers. The critics at the Salon indulged in some irony: “La Frileuse by Monsieur Houdon does not seem to achieve its effect. When someone is really cold, he tries to pull all his limbs close to him and covers his body more than his head. Nevertheless, it is pleasant to the eye and the proportions are correct” and “One must concur that winter would be a very desirable season if pretty shivering girls did not cover themselves in any other way.” Don’t think this critic will still have a job after saying this nowadays. In terms of her clothing, the Metropolitan Museum of Art describes it as “elegant but hardly adequate”. La Frileuse made me think of the song Let it Go from Frozen, “The Cold Never Bothered Me Anyway.”

The statue was bought by Louis Philippe Joseph, Duc d’Orléans, confiscated during the French Revolution and now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Paul Heermann (German, 1673 – 1732), Winter, c.1700, Marble, 65x64x34cm, Getty Center, Los Angeles. 

Shrouded in a heavy hooded cloak, this elderly man by Paul Heermann looks down with a deeply furrowed brow. As a personification of Winter, the bust gives visual expression to the chilling cold of that season. His old age refers to winter’s occurrence at the very end of the calendar year. This bust was probably part of a series of sculptures personifying the four seasons. At the Versailles Palace, it was fashion including statues of the seasons in the program for garden sculpture. The high level of finish and finely worked details of this bust, however, suggest that Winter was meant to be viewed up close, in an indoor palatial setting.

Jacob Matham (Dutch, 1571 – 1631) engraver, after Hendrik Goltzius (Dutch, 1558 – 1617) drawer, Winter, 1589, from the series The Seasons, engraving, diameter 26cm, National gallery of Art, Washington DC.

This Winter engraving has a very traditional iconography. The personification of Winter is an elderly man wearing a coat and warming his hands by holding a pot containing a fire; beyond is a wintery townscape with ice skaters and people collecting fire wood; the signs of the winter zodiac (Pisces, Aquarius and Capricorn) in the sky; and a cute little putto plays the cold Northern wind blowing into a cloud which results in rain and snow. And just so that we do not get it wrong, Hendrick Goltzius put the name “Hyems” just above the man, which is Latin for “Winter”.

Hendrick Goltzius designed four series with the seasons; Winter depicted here is from the set engraved by Jacob Matham.