François Crastre

“ Thanks to the rare power of his genius, the most audacious improbabilities vanish beneath the magic adornments with which he covers them, and it hardly occurs to one to notice his glaring historical errors or the superficialities of his pictorial conceptions in the continual delight inspired by the sense of concentrated life in his characters, the splendour of his colouring, the caressing charm of his draperies, the brilliance of his skies, and the impression of youth and of joy that radiates from his work. ”

“ In the case of Henner, at this time, the craftsmanship was perfect; nothing remained but to open a career for the artist. The young painter had faith, courage, and ambition; he dreamed of continuing his studies, of perfecting himself, of having other teachers. But these teachers were precisely what Strassburg could not furnish; and Paris, the great city, the centre of learning and of art, Paris was not far distant. What joy, if he could only go there! At this juncture, Guérin died. Having lost his master, Henner had nothing else to detain him in Strassburg. ”

“ The great romantic painter, although an admirable artist, was a mediocre instructor. He alone, for that [19] matter, could risk the violent colour schemes with which he covered his canvases; his pupils succeeded only in accentuating a debauch of thick-spread pigments by coupling together tones that cried aloud from the walls of the studio. The instinct of harmony and of proportion which was already awakening in Puvis de Chavannes, revolted against these audacities: he found himself ill at ease in the midst of this orgy of colour. It was after no such fashion that nature appeared to his eyes. ”

“ All these portraits are admirably conceived, in a simple, natural form, without superfluous details, and they are freely painted, in a rich and solid colouring, and stand out from the canvas, substantial, harmonious, pulsing with life, against those vaporous and imponderable backgrounds of which, since Velazquez, Goya alone has found the secret.
At this epoch Goya was not only a celebrated painter, he was also a man of fashion, mingling with persons of the highest rank. ”

“ From the outset, Veronese applied himself energetically to perfecting his skill in line drawing. The future genial painter of wondrous fantasy yielded himself without a murmur to the rude but salutary exigencies of technique. Strange caprice on the part of an artist who was destined to show so much dexterity in execution and lavishness in decoration, his tastes turned towards the most severe and least imaginative of masters, Albert Durer and Lucas Van Leyden. It was through copying the engravings of these illustrious masters that he learned how to draw. Such lessons always bear their fruit. ”