Het fin-de-siècle in de Nederlandse schilderkunst

De symbolistische beweging 1890-1900

[p. 308]

Summary

Chapter I.

Since the French Revolution the position of the artist had greatly changed. Whereas formerly he had found a solid support for his creative genius in ecclesiastical and secular patronage he now missed a definite destination for his products. Lack of orders left him mostly to his own initiative. This creative independence often made him lose contact with society, he became more and more isolated. The type of the bohemian was coming into being. As a reaction against this isolation the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, Ruskin and Morris, and after them Henry Van de Velde proclaimed the necessity of a reconciliation with society. This resulted in a return to handicraft, a revival of industrial art (furniture, tapestry, stained glass, etc., made by the people for the people). Towards the end of the 19th century the none too bright social conditions made the artists turn to anarchism and socialism in quest of a more ideal community. In Holland the socialistic ideals mainly found an echo with a painter like R.N. Roland Holst, and with some of the literary group of the ‘Tachtigers’.¹ For some time Jan Toorop and Johan Thorn Prikker felt attracted to anarchism. Another escape from earthly misery was sought, especially in France, in the vague atmosphere of mysticism rather than in the clear-cut notions of a Western religion. They look to Buddhism, the Rosicrucians (who had their centre in Paris), occultism and spiritism. Characteristic is their admirition of Emanuel Swedenborg. In Paris Remy de Gourmont and Joris-Karl Huysmans saw the medieval mystics in a new light; so did Frederik van Eeden in Holland. New translations of Ruusbroec were published.

The ‘fin de siècle’ was characterized by an apocalyptic mood. Out of this arose the symbolist movement which was officially formulated for the first time in Parisian literary circles viz. in Jean Moréas' manifesto of 1886. Two points are essential, which however had been put into practice before by Verlaine, Mallarmé and by Huysmans in his novel ‘A Rebours’: expression of the deepest emotions of the soul and this in a form no longer ruled by tradition. For the poets this meant the use of the free verse, ‘le vers libre’. Stress was laid upon the refined experiences of the senses. This made the

1 The outstanding literary group between 1880 and 1890.

[p. 309]

poets particularly sensitive to music, in this case the musical dramas by Richard Wagner.

In Holland Willem Kloos had proclaimed in 1890 the same principles as Moréas: ‘literary art is the emotion of an individual expressed in sounds of words - ... generally speaking art should be the most individual expression of the most individual emotion’. At the same time one notices in the other arts a gradual transition from impressionism to symbolism. There are three main characteristics:

1.	No longer satisfied with the naturalistic depiction of the world as it presented itself to the eye, the artists wanted to express their own inner life, their own spiritual experiences and moods through the medium of the symbol.
2.	As they wanted to suggest this spiritual world rather than fully depict it they schematized the form. At first they still used the neo-impressionistic technique, the pointillé, but in the end they only used pen or pencil, especially in Holland.
3.	Irrespective of their subject i.e. of the contents of the representation, the artists attached an aesthetic and symbolic value to the form i.e. to the composition of lines and colours in a flat plane according to a definite order.

In these three points we find the seeds for the art of the 20th century viz. surrealism and abstract art.

In 1891 G.-A. Aurier coined the word ‘symboliste’ also for the art of painting, in connection with Gauguin's picture La lutte de Jacob avec l'Ange, Aurier paid less attention to the contents which should be ‘idéiste’ (subjective) than to the style, which should be ‘symboliste, synthétique et décorative’. It was the flat-decorative style (forms and scenery in a single colour with thick outlines) and the drawn out figures, the deformation, which struck this critic in Gauguin's work as new. One of the first artists to be looked upon as a symbolist was Odilon Redon. Neither through flat-decorative representation however nor through deformation, but through a depiction of the most unreal things (still in three dimensions) he created an atmosphere of horror and weirdness, partly inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's lugubrious stories and poems.

Precursors of symbolist painting were William Blake, the Pre-Raphaelites, Gustave Moreau and Puvis de Chavannes. As a result of their tendency to stylizing and deforming the symbolists had begun to appreciate the similar art of former ages where they discovered qualities which could contribute to their own artistic expression: the primitive art of Tahiti and Peru, the early Christian and Byzantine, Romanesque and Gothic art, Giotto and the early Italian Renaissance (Botticelli), the 15th century Flemish masters (Van

[p. 310]

Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden), the Southern German masters (Holbein and Dürer), Indian sculptures, Egyptian and Syrian reliefs, and the Japanese prints. From alle these influences sprang up the Art Nouveau or Jugendstil, which for a time was the common language of the symbolists.

As to the contents of symbolism, the themes or symbols, they were the same in literature as well as in the other arts. They reveal the subjective intimate spiritual experiences of die artists. One of the most outstanding themes was the contrast between body and soul, between sensuality and asceticism, between Evil and Good. This contrast was the result of a hypocritical morality, in which sensual love had all the temptations of the forbidden fruit. A striking feature of it is the fatal woman, with her conventional enticements, long luxuriant hair and wide, languishing eyes. The symbolists saw these qualities of the fatal woman embodied in Salome, Cleopatra, Medusa and the Sphinx, and in their subordinate attributes: the serpent, chimaera, harpy and vulture. The male counterpart of the fatal woman is the faun Pan. In this symbol man's passion for life and love were fully recognized. With Pan goes the centaur. Beside these symbols of corrupting sensuality occur those of purity and innocence embodied in the innocent young woman, the Beatrice-character, fulfilling man's ideal of an unearthly, pure, spiritual love. Symbols of virginal innocence are the bride, Mélisande (after Maeterlinck's drama ‘Pelléas et Mélisande’, 1892), the delicate, elf-like sylphs, and the appropriate flowers of chastity: the lily (iris and arum), lotus, rose, sunflower, passion flower, and bindweed. The swan became the animal of purity (also as a result of the veneration for Wagner's musical drama ‘Lohengrin’). The musical instruments belonging to the innocent wcman are the harp, lyre and violin. After the woman-theme which for the symbolists was the most important of all, we find the themes which bear a relation to their conception of life (present-past-future), their destiny (fate and death), their spiritual outlook and moods (sorrow, melancholy) and their position in society (anarchism and labour).

Chapter II and III.

1. The most important figure of the Dutch symbolists is Jan Toorop. In Brussels he comes into contact with the Belgian group of avantgardists, the ‘XX’, founded in 1884, and in London he gets to know the works of the

[p. 311]

Pre-Raphaelites. Though originally painting in a naturalistic and impressionist style he came under the influence of James Ensor. In 1889 it was the first time that he left reality with his etherial composition Organ Sounds, inspired by the works of Odilon Redon and Félicien Rops. Living in Holland (Katwijk aan Zee) in 1890 he associates with the literary group of the ‘Tachtigers’. His subsequent works are mostly drawings with stylized, protracted figures and trees, composed into an unreal synthesis revealing an atmosphere of lugubriousness and dreariness as e.g. The Garden of Woes and The Rôdeurs. As a symbolist Toorop found the background for his work in ponds, surrounded by weeping willows with drooping branches like woman's hair, in thorny bushes with skulls growing on them. He transforms Nature into an oppressing unreal world after the style of Edgar Allan Poe. The atmosphere of Toorop's works is to be compared with Maeterlinck's plays (‘La Princesse Maleine’) and Frederik van Eeden's prose. A pessimistic outlook on life is shown in the gloomy death scenes of the painting Legend and in the black crayon drawing O Grave, where is thy Victory (1892). This drawing which became very popular shows Toorop's spiritual relationship to the works of the visionary English artist William Blake. The same atmosphere is found in Toorop's illustration for a prose poem by Lodewijk van Deyssel ‘Apokalyps’ (1891-1893).

An event of importance was the visit to Holland of Paul Verlaine and the grand-master of the French Rosicrucians Sâr Péladan in November 1892. Rosicrucian influence is to be traced in Toorop's drawing on canvas The Sphinx. After many preparatory studies Toorop completed in 1893 one of his most important symbolist works The Three Brides. In this drawing the linear stylizing is fully carried through, anticipating the Art Nouveau. Eastern influences are shown in the sylphs looking like wayang-puppets. They come floating down symmetrically to the centre where the Innocent Bride is standing between the blood-thirsty sensual Hellish Bride and the Nun Bride who lives in a higher spiritual world. On both sides of the Brides there is a new theme in the big bells ringing aloud and trying to keep humanity away from the temptations of sensuality. As to the style Toorop was greatly influenced by the illustrations made by Carloz Schwabe for the second edition of Emile Zola's ‘Le Rêve’ in 1892. In the years 1892 and 1893 Toorop was haunted by the idea of Fate, so dear to the fin de siècle, by the motive of the Sphinx (symbol of the mystery of life in general and of the mysterious sensual woman in particular). Again and again he used this theme in his drawings, also under the influence of La Sphynge by the Belgian Fernand

[p. 312]

Khnopff, whose relationship to Toorop is remarkable. This is shown in The Songs of our Time and in l'Annonciation du Nouveau Mysticisme. After 1894 Toorop's deformation is diminishing. He designs his first posters a.o. for the Delft Salad Oil and for a performance of Venise Sauvée (after the play by Thomas Otway). For his friends, the writers a.o. for Louis Couperas, he illustrates their symbolic stories. The music of Richard Wagner and Cesar Franck inspires him to Divine Extasy, a large drawing where a man and woman already enjoy a higher spiritual life after having overcome the earthly conflicts. Toorop's symbolism takes an end about 1900. It was a period in which he tried to find a solution to his doubts and inner struggles. In 1905 he found in Roman Catholicism a safe guide for his life and creativeness.

2. Johan Thorn Prikker.

In the beginning of his artistic career Johan Thorn Prikker did not receive the recognition of which Toorop could mostly reap the fruits. He had to struggle against poverty and misjudgement. Only after 1900 his talents came to full growth in Germany. For a good undetstanding of his symbolist work his correspondence with the essayist Henri Borel, interpreter in Chine and the Dutch East Indies is of great importance (this correspondence comprises the period 1892-1896). At first Prikker painted as an impressionist, in a rough dark touch inspired by the Dutch impressionist Breitner. Soon he showed his preference for a strong concentrated form and his desire to represent the soul of things instead of outward appearances of nature. About 1892 his symbolism manifests itself in a series of drawings on the life and passion of Christ. But as in the case of Gauguin's paintings of Christ these representations of the Saviour are only an occasion for him to express his own inner life and grief. In this respect Prikker is related to the literary group of the ‘Tachtigers’ of whom especially Willem Kloos and Albert Verwey often mention God and Christ in their poems as an interpretation of their own selves. Prikker had a strongly marked liking for flat-pattern designs. As for the French painter Maurice Denis, a painting or drawing meant for him: a flat plane filled up with colours, composed in a certain order. Prikker's painting Descent from the Cross is therefore to be compared with Denis' painting April, and with a design for a tapestry by the Belgian Henry Van de Velde: Angels watching over a sleeping child. Prikker used the line, made thinner or thicker in an undulating and looping motion - as a musician

[p. 313]

uses a crescendo or decrescendo - to indicate what is essential and what is accidental; the loops are used to connect the principal figure symbolically with its surroundings. His deformations are less than Toorop's. After 1893 his compositions like Odilon Redon's are extremely unreal: tall figures by the side of very small ones, excessive enlargements of some essential elements, e.g. a gross nail through the hand of Christ as a symbol of superhuman suffering. Trees are shown with forklike trunks, blooming flowers are indicated by one big flower.

His tendency to decoration and his preference for refined ornament made him admire the Japanese prints as well as the Chinese utensils. Eastern ornaments are therefore continually found in Prikker's drawings. Whereas he thought Sâr Péladan a poseur and phantast, Prikker was deeply impressed by Paul Verlaine, whom he met in 1892. A conception for a drawing Evangelical Landscape is a remembrance of the person and work of this French poet. Difficulties with some of his colleagues made Prikker resort to a symbolized representation of a better world of ‘purity and chastity’. He visualized these symbols in the pointillated painting The Bride and in other drawings. In 1893 he was invited to exhibit for the ‘XX’ at Brussels. He comes into contact with Belgian authors like August Vermeylen, Emile Verhaeren and with painters like Charles Doudelet and Henry Van de Velde. A firm friendship with the latter, in whose house at Uccle he was one of the first guests, stimulates him to apply himself to industrial art. He designs his first batik-work and in 1897 he brings this technique to perfection for the firm Uiterwijk in The Hague. Influences of Van de Velde and Georges Lemmen are found in his ornamentation of the third issue of the Belgian magazine ‘Van Nu en Straks’ (1893).

3. Antoon Der Kinderen.

The initial success of the Roman Catholic painter Antoon Der Kinderen became an obstacle rather than an advantage for his later career. At first using a romantic-naturalistic style (Monk lashed to death, 1882) he was drawn to a more stylized art with predominantly chalky and grey colours after he had seen Puvis de Chavannes' paintings in the Pantheon at Paris. It was also due to the orders he received: two mural paintings: the Procession in the chapel of the Beguinage at Amsterdam and the mural decoration in the town hall at Bois-le-Duc. The conception of ‘The Procession’ led to difficulties with his patron Mgr. Klönne, who was unable to understand

[p. 314]

Der Kinderen's inner artistic development, which was revealed in the vague colour-shades of The Procession. Only much later The Procession was placed in the chapel. And yet similar themes: processions passing by in festive attire were at the same time painted in other countries: e.g. Crane's The Triumph of Labour (1891) and Aubrey Beardsley's pen-drawing Joan of Arc entering Orleans. In his first mural painting at Bois-le-Duc one sees Der Kinderen's spiritualization: the colours become obscure, the figures are placed in a strict rhythm. So far there is no deformation. It does not occur until in his book-illustrations (litho's). One of his best friends was the composer Alphons Diepenbrock. For the publication of Diepenbrock's ‘Missa’ Der Kinderen made a frontispiece (a harp with two censers, surmounted by gothic arches). The first wall-decoration at Bois-le-Duc was even more a mural painting than The Procession, because it had to be adapted to the 17th century architecture of the town hall. From England new ideals about the harmony between architecture and the arts had penetrated this country. They were eagerly accepted by artists like Der Kinderen. The scenes on the mural painting at Bois-le-Duc have a mainly historical character, representing the Foundation of Bois-le-Duc in the time of the Crusades. Der Kinderen's ideas were understood and explained a.o. in ‘De Nieuwe Gids’ by the painter and essayist Jan Veth, who had translated Crane's ‘Claims of Decorative Art’ in 1893. Though he saw in Der Kinderen's work a first attempt at ‘communal art’ (based on the nostalgic passion for the Middle Ages with their cathedrals built by a pious community) and though the young Roland Holst looked upon the work as ‘religious art’, it could not yet be called real ‘communal art’ as rooted in the spirit of the period. For his contemporaries did not understand this sort of art. The spiritual foundations for this communal art had been formulated, propagated and defended by William Morris and Walter Crane in England, by Henry Van de Velde and August Vermeylen in Belgium. The realization of these ideals was expected from rising socialism. Before 1900 the ideas ‘communal art’, ‘popular art’ and ‘monumental art’ were still being regarded as more or less identical. Crane's influence on Der Kinderen is shown especially in his book-illustrations: in ‘Het Gedenkboek der Keuze-Tentoonstelling van de Hedendaagsche Kunst’ (1892), where even the slightest marginal ornamentation has a symbolic or allegoric meaning; also in the edition de luxe of Vondel's ‘Gijsbrecht van Aemstel’ (lithograph in colours). This work, considered by his contemporaries as a monument in the renaissance of the Dutch art printing, shows influences of the medieval French miniatures, of Morris' Kelmscott Press and Walter Crane's illustrations

[p. 315]

for ‘The Sirens Three’. In his second mural painting for the townhall at Bois-le-Duc, completed in 1896, he is inspired a.o. by Crane's ‘Flora's Feast’. The figures here are drawn out, of calligraphic design with heavy outlines.

4. Richard Nicolaüs Roland Holst.

The true herald of Dutch symbolism in the magazine ‘De Nieuwe Gids’ (to be compared with the Parisian ‘Mercure de France’) was the youngest of the four painters, R.N. Roland Holst, who was also a prominent essayist. According to him painters should be philosophers and scientists. In his early works Sermon in a field and Old man in a landscape (1892) he is influenced by Vincent van Gogh. The inner qualities of these drawings however differ from van Gogh's works: the surroundings in Holst's drawings are connected with the principal figure in a more explicit symbolism. In his first lithograph: a naked young girl with sunflowers and peacock, one notices the inspiration by Beardsley's ornamental sunflowets in ‘Le Morte d'Arthur’; in the peacock the influence of Whistler is revealed. In his design for the cover of the Keuze-Tentoonstelling der Hedendaagsche Kunst (June/July 1892) Holst is evidently influenced by the Belgian Georges Lemmen. The predominantly decorative style of Holst shows a tendency towards symbolism without losing itself completely as is the case in Toorop's and Prikker's works. Spiritual influences by the Pre-Raphaelites (D.G. Rossetti's Beata Beatrix) is shown in the representation on the cover of the catalogue for the Van Gogh Exhibition in Amsterdam (Dec. 1892), where a withered sunflower symbolizes Vincent's death. In the Flemish magazine ‘Van Nu en Straks’ he could give expression to his decorative abilities more freely. For the third issue of 1893 he made a woodcut: the head of a screaming woman against the background of a big sunflower has become purely ornamental. In his lithograph Anangkè (end 1892) the suffering head of Prometheus shows relationship to Toorop's style. In his depiction of sea and sky one notices influences by Van Gogh. The part played by Van Gogh in the development of Dutch symbolism was important, though not of essential significance.

Around 1894 a change in Holst's ideas takes place. By then he has met in London Charles Ricketts and Charles Shannon and from then on all his works will show their influence. His later works, made after 1900, are greatly related to Shannon's illustrations. Also Rossetti keeps inspiring him a.o. in the lithograph Helga's Entry. After he had married the poetess Hen-

[p. 316]

riette Van der Schalk in 1896, Holst turns more and more to Nature. He becomes also the propagandist of the socialist renewal.

5.

Symbolism finds an echo among many a contemporary of the four masters we have spoken about. Some of them sympathize more with the subjective symbolism and want to express their own inner life, inspired by Toorop and Prikker, by the authors Maeterlinck and Poe, by the mystic imagery of Redon, the erotic atmosphere of Rops and Beardsley and the languishing women of Fernand Khnopff. To this group we reckon Etienne Bosch, H.A. Van Daalhoff, S. Moulijn, and especially Henricus (pseudonym of Hendricus Jansen). An illustration of the latter for the edition of Pol de Mont's ‘Iris’ is inspired by Beardsley's ‘J'ai baisé ta bouche Iokanaan’. After 1894 we find in this group Antoon van Welie, P.C. De Moor and Karel de Nerée tot Babberich.

Others turned to the more objective symbolism which proclaimed to be the revelation of an abstract conception of life. They wanted to create art as a service to society, mainly inspired by the style of Der Kinderen and Roland Holst. They almost completely applied themselves to the purely decorative style restylizing Nature into an ornament of flat-pattern design. They had the support of the new handbooks on ornamental art and the schools for industrial art at Amsterdam and Haarlem. The most important of these artists, of whom many were to be of significance for industrial art and architecture, are Th. A.C. Colenbrander, Th. van Hoytema, L.W.R. Wenckebach, C.A. Lion Cachet, T. Nieuwenhuis, G.W. Dijsselhof, who illustrated Veth's translation of Crane's ‘Claims of Decorative Art’ with stylized animals and ferns, K.P.C. de Bazel, J.L.M. Lauweriks and the later architect H.P. Berlage.

After 1894 the symbolist movement loses its strength rather suddenly. The individualistically coloured symbols and deforming line have lost their functions in the new mental atmosphere, governed by the communal sense. What remains is the ornament, now serving the communal ideas, to which socialism gave its most outstanding form. Dutch art of to-day has its roots in this soil made fertile by symbolism.