Dresden Gallery

“ In the Munich Gallery is A Soldier, dated 1662, of admirable transparency and softness. Also A Lady in a yellow satin dress fainting in the presence of the doctor. In the Hague Gallery is A Boy Blowing Soap-bubbles, dated 1663. This is a charming little picture of great depth of the brownish tone. Also The Painter and His Wife, whose little shock dog he is teasing; very naïve and lively in the heads, and most delicately treated in a subdued but clear tone. In the Dresden Gallery are Mieris again and his wife before her portrait. ”

“ I don’t know why, but an air breathes from his landscapes, pure, refreshing as if it came from other years; there is a look in his faces that never passes away. I saw one the other day. Amidst the heartless desolation and glittering finery of Fonthill, there is a port-folio of the Dresden Gallery. It opens, and a young female head looks from it; a child, yet woman grown ”

“ The scenery on the banks of the Elbe, until within a few miles of Dresden, is of the most enchanting character. Dresden has a population of seventy thousand. It is delightfully situated on the bank of the river, and ranks high among European cities for its attractions, and the number and objects calculated to gratify the intelligent traveller. It is the residence of the king, and has consequently all the accompaniments of a national capital. Its picture gallery has the finest collection of paintings to be found north of the Alps. ”

“ Russel is quite right in his observation that the Correggios are hung too near together: the fact is, that in the Dresden gallery, the pictures are not well hung, nor well arranged; there is too little light in the inner gallery, and too much in the outer gallery. Lastly, the numbers are so confused that I found the catalogue of little use. A new arrangement and a new catalogue, by Professor Matthaï, are in contemplation. ”

“ Yesterday, on arriving, having missed the hour for the Gallery, I walked about Dresden in all directions, and it is, I assure you, a charming city; very preferable as a residence to that mean and melancholy Berlin. It has the look of a capital; partly a Swiss, partly a German town; the environs are picturesque and all is charming. I can conceive of living in Dresden; there is a mixture of gardens and dwellings that delights the eye. ”

“ The Dresden Gallery owned a seventeenth century replica. Early in the war, Prince Ludwig had sent the original to his Silesian castle for safekeeping. Grundmann had brought it back to Bavaria along with the ten cases now at Coburg. From Coburg he had taken the Holbein to Schloss Banz, a castle not far from Bamberg.
He said that the Prince was living at Wolfsgarten, a small country place near Darmstadt. Ludwig was eager to regain possession of the painting. Did we think that could be arranged? We told him he would have to obtain an authorization from Captain Rae at Munich. ”

“ No excellences of coloring, no marvels of foreshortening, no miracles of mechanism can consecrate the salacious images of mythologic abomination.
The cheek that can forget to blush at the Venus and Cupid by Titian, at Leda and her Swan, at Jupiter and Io, and others of equally evil intent, ought never to pretend to blush at any thing. Such pictures are a disgrace to the artists that painted, to the age that tolerates, and to the gallery that contains them. They are fit for a bagnio rather than a public exhibition.
Evening. Dresden is the home of Madame Jenny Lind Goldschmidt. ”

“ His Artist's Studio.—An Artist's Studio, of which there is a replica dated 1666 in the Dresden Gallery, shows a painter sitting at an easel with his back to the spectator; he wears a violet coat and a red cap. The other features of the composition are a black dog asleep, an assistant grinding colors in a corner, and a pupil preparing a palette. The artist is supposed to be Ostade himself in both instances ”

“ It had been furnished for her by her parents on the occasion of her marriage in the year 1891. It was so long for its width that it had the effect of being a brocaded tunnel; the walls were hung with pale pink, on which electric lights and French water-colors alternated; the chairs were, of course, copies of Louis XV, and the mantelpiece was as crowded as a lawn-party with Dresden figures. No books were visible, except a copy of the Girlhood of Shakespeare's Heroines, bound in black-and-gold, and three immense volumes of steel-engravings from the National Gallery. ”

“ The manufactures are not unimportant, and are various in character; the china, however, for which the city is famed, is made chiefly at Meissen, 14 miles distant. The commerce is considerable, and has greatly increased since the development of the railway system. The chief glory of Dresden is the gallery of pictures, one of the finest in the world, which first became of importance under Augustus II, King of Poland and Elector of Saxony, but owes its most valuable treasures to Augustus III, who purchased the greater portion of the gallery of the Duke of Modena for £180,000. ”

“ Further on is a lovely copy of the Madonna Caracci, in the Dresden Gallery. Several pieces of valuable old blue china, quaint bits of Oriental flat figures, together with a plate or two of old Dutch ware decorate the walls, and an ancient convex mirror of great antiquity. Two antique corner cupboards (Dutch) with flat glass doors disclose many little treasures of enamel, old Worcester and Nankin, which Mrs. Cameron says that she prizes as much from association as for their own intrinsic value. ”

“ His pictures exhibit a combination of skill in drawing, grace and natural colouring. Some of his easel pieces in oil are in different collections; one of the finest, in the Dresden Gallery, represents the martyrdom of St Peter and St Paul. ”

“ Then a fortnight's unspeakable journey to Salzburg, Ischl, Linz, Vienna, Prague, and finally Dresden, which is our last resting-place before returning to Richmond, where we hope to be at the beginning of September. Dresden is a proper climax; for all other art seems only a preparation for feeling the superiority of the Madonna di San Sisto the more. We go three days a week to the gallery, and every day—after looking at other pictures—we go to take a parting draught of delight at Titian's Zinsgroschen and the Einzige Madonna. ”

“ Zuinger Palace.He commenced the Zuinger, a magnificent palace in a part of which the picture galleries are located; he contributed largely to the collection of pictures which has made Dresden famous in Europe, and in his reign the manufacture of Dresden porcelain was invented or largely developed.
The pride of the picture gallery is Raphael's Sistine Madonna which is said to be the finest picture ever painted by the hand of man! ”

“ On the contrary, American artists are very popular there, and will continue to be welcome visitors at all the galleries. The Saxon Government hopes that the American art-tariff will be abolished or reduced some day, in response to the demand of the best artists of our own country, and without the pressure of any reprisal. If one would know how valuable are the privileges enjoyed by American artists and students abroad, let him enter the famous gallery of paintings, which is the chief glory of Dresden, and look around him. ”

“ Dresden has always been considered as the Florence of Germany and has always been renowned for its Gallery of paintings; hence the almost innate taste of the Saxons for the Beaux Arts and the great encouragement given to them at all tunes by this Government. It is here and at Meissen that the best German is thought to be spoken, tho' Hanover disputes this prerogative with Dresden. ”

“ We must part company with this deplorable family. If Mr. Ruck and his ladies cannot be induced to go to Chamouni—a journey that no traveller with the smallest self-respect would omit—my daughter and I shall be obliged to retire. We shall go to Dresden.”
“To Dresden?”
“The capital of Saxony. I had arranged to go there for the autumn, but it will be simpler to go immediately. There are several works in the gallery with which my daughter has not, I think, sufficiently familiarised herself; it is especially strong in the seventeenth century schools.” ”

“ In 1546, on the return of the artist from Rome to his home, Casa Grande, in Venice, he painted the portraits of his lovely daughter Lavinia, now in the Dresden Museum, and in the Berlin gallery. "From the first to the last this beautiful piece (in Dresden) is the work of the master, and there is not an inch of it in which his hand is not to be traced. His is the brilliant flesh, brought up to a rosy carnation by wondrous kneading of copious pigment; his the contours formed by texture, and not defined by outline ”

“ The Gallery of Dresden is well known to most amateurs from the engravings which have been made of many of its most capital pictures. In the works of Correggio it stands preëminent above all others; and although some of these have suffered by injudicious cleaning, still they are by Correggio. In the works of Titian, Raffaelle, Lionardo da Vinci, Parmiggiano, Andrea del Sarto, the Caracci, Guido, &c., it holds also a high place; while it is rich in the works of the Flemish and Dutch masters. Of the works of Reubens there are, 30; of Vandyck, 18; of Rembrandt, 15 ”

“ His hand is practised enough, his imagination ardent enough, to make the study of the great models of art profitable to him. Dresden has been the cradle of the painter; it is time that Home should be the school where his young inspirations shall be purified; he must go and live the free life of the artist, in the bosom of the country in which all the conceptions of the genius of man flourish. The classic soil of the great masters is necessary to the painter, as the influence of the warm sun is necessary to the shrub to develope its foliage and gild its ripe fruits. ”

“ Its unrivalled elegance and neatness, a general air of cheerfulness combined with a certain dignity and tranquillity, the purity and elasticity of the atmosphere, the brilliant shops, the well-dressed women, and the lively looks and good-humoured alertness of the people, who, like the Florentines, are more remarkable for their tact and acuteness than for their personal attractions;—all these advantages render Dresden, though certainly one of the smallest, and by no means one of the richest capitals in Europe, one of the most delightful residences on the continent. ”

“ After having pass'd the Elbe, over a wooden Bridge, going out of Meissen, I came in less than three Hours to Dresden, the Capital of the Electorate of Saxony. The City is pretty large, fortify'd with Art and Regularity; and very lightsome. Its Houses are high and substantial, the Streets broad, strait, well pav'd, neat, and in the Night-time well lighted. There are great Squares in it; and the whole City is so well laid out, that Dresden may be rank'd among the finest in the World. ”

“ No doubt misery and evil dwell in Dresden, as in all the congregated societies of men, but no where are they less obtrusive. The city has all [140] the advantages, and none of the disadvantages, of a capital; the treasures of art accumulated here, the mild government, the delightful climate, the beauty of the environs, and the cheerfulness and simplicity of social intercourse, have rendered it a favourite residence for artists and literary characters, and to foreigners one of the most captivating places in the world. ”

“ The dome of the cathedral is the first spot which a stranger should visit, as it is the only place which spreads everything before him, as on a map, and all in their just proportions and distances. The city of Dresden is by no means extensive, even when including the old and new town; but the surrounding and distant country presents scenery of great variety and beauty. The southern views take in Saxon Switzerland—the northern, the fertile plains and vales that stretch away towards Leipzig and Berlin. ”

“ In Berlin and Dresden the interest in art was much greater in the eighteenth than in previous centuries, and with this new impulse many women devoted themselves to various specialties in art. Miniature and enamel painting were much in vogue, and collections of these works, now seen in museums and private galleries, are exquisitely beautiful and challenge our admiration, not only for their beauty, but for the delicacy of their handling and the infinite patience demanded for their execution. ”

“ The student of art, music, and history finds a rich field for educational purposes here, where there are so many choice collections of antiquities, museums, and remarkable paintings. The Zwinger Museum contains among other treasures a collection of three hundred and sixty thousand engraved plates, all of great value. Art treasures and [Pg 220] libraries are freely open to the public, as in all parts of Europe. Dresden is a busy city, commanding a large trade, and containing over a quarter of a million inhabitants. Gold and silver manufactures form a large share of the industry ”

“ Dresden is a city where works of art are most cunningly copied. You can order, if you like, copies of any but the most intricate of the treasures of the Green Vaults, and you will not be disappointed with the results. You can order copies of any of the most famous pictures in the Dresden galleries, and have them executed with like exquisite skill. Nor is there any city in all Europe where it is so satisfactory to buy a souvenir of a town, which you will not want to throw away when you get home and try to find a place for it. ”