I observe a new interest in the relationship between Protestantism and the visual arts. Seymour Slive assumed that this relationship should be obvious and demonstrable but did not undertake any research in this direction. Hans Rookmaaker did not doubt this connection and spoke about what he called a Calvinist attitude towards culture. He attributed for example the natural depiction of a landscape by the painter Jan van Goyen to the Protestant Reformation. With regard to this Protestant view of reality he was of the opinion that the 17th-century landscape was healthy and lifelike and that its veracity did not ask for an explanation. To him the truth of this art was a fruit of the Reformation.
J. H. van den Berg also reflected on the relationship between the broad development of Western culture and art. In a fascinating final chapter of his Metabletica ('The Subject and His Landscape') he points out that the inner life of humans was not always understood to be there but was discovered at some point in history. Jacques Claes has applied Van den Berg's ideas to the experience and perception of space. Claes argues that from Copernicus and Galileo onwards the position of the earth changes as the earth is increasingly experienced as a weighty lump of matter. One starts to see the place of things differently, experience them differently and therefore they are given a different form. According to him this phenomenon goes hand in hand with the appearance of perspective and perspectival space in art. The earth and things could only take on this new form, place and space, because they were seen and experienced differently than before. The depiction of the landscape became different because its content became different.
It is a little different in the case of Ton Lemaire's book, Philosophy of the Landscape, which is related to the starting points of metabletics. Like Spengler this author believes that the experience of space is the primordial symbol for what deeply moves and typifies a culture spiritually. The appearance of the landscape in painting then is a symptom of a profound change in the Western experience of space and of the Christian way of life as a whole. With the appearance of the landscape and the visible horizon, the disappearance of Christianity as a way of life has basically begun, the transcendent God of Christianity fades away to finally evaporate in the bright light of Impressionism and Expressionism. Landscape painting is important because it depicts and explains culture. In the development of the landscape therefore the spirit of Western culture can be discerned as in a mirror, which manifests itself as opening up to the world (1400-1550) and then – and this is again relevant to our subject – living confidently within the familiar horizon of one's own country (1550-1775).
Also Lemaire considers perspective to be the instrument with which in the Renaissance the world is objectified, the world is reduced to how our eyes see it and the individual is subjectivized. The perspectival depiction of the world as a landscape is an act of liberation and independence of the individual, or more precisely it is through one and the same movement that the individual posits himself as an autonomous subject and the world appears as a landscape space.
Lemaire, however, distinguishes himself from the aforementioned writers by speaking of a new profane space, for he calls landscape painting the explication of a gradual process of secularization. The appearance of the landscape is a symptom of the power that the autonomous individual acquires over the desacralized world. He adds, however, that later, in Romanticism, the individual will again make himself dependent on a god, no longer on God, but on the sublime, deified nature. The landscape is precisely the place where the rational attachment to a supernatural God is transformed into the modern attachment to 'nature.'
The appearance of the landscape is a symptom of the power that the autonomous individual acquires over the desacralized world.
The fascinating thing is that for Lemaire landscape painting is the self-justification of a culture and that the fundamental direction or 'spirit' of a culture can best be read from its worldview, insofar as this is contained in its religion. In other words, the visible worldview of the landscape reflects the spiritual worldview of the culture as a whole. The landscape as an artform cannot therefore be understood without referring to a belief in God or to the lack thereof. The landscape in the West is then both an image for God's concealment and a sign of his presence.
The appearance of the landscape in painting can be seen as the progressive emancipation of the visible space of the world into pictorial worth. The earth had to lose its privileged position as God's creation according to God's intention before it could be considered worthy of depiction and exploration in itself. The fact that ordinary reality, perceptible to the senses, is considered worthy of depiction without being immediately reduced to a symbol of God's creation and intentions, was an event of far-reaching significance in our culture. It was a decisive date in the history of demythologization and the disenchantment of the Western world.
It is therefore rather obvious, precisely because Lemaire links the development of landscape painting to the secularization of the worldview, to interpret the landscape as a profane space, as autonomous nature. But Lemaire makes very decisive nuances here. Between the desacralization, demythologization and disenchantment of nature and the admiration, elevation and worship of nature lies a period in which the landscape was experienced in peace, trust, and contentment. The landscape was stripped of all myth and idealization and humans settled in it. It is this Dutch landscape of the 17th century in which, according to Lemaire, the curious combination of self-confidence and a sense of dependency is expressed, which is perhaps the secret of Protestantism. Nature has then neither disintegrated into physical and ‘exalted’ nature, nor has self-submission to a God who has been transformed into nature progressed to a subjugation of nature to humanity. And he sees the reason for this miraculous balance in the fact that human power over nature was still limited and dependence still dominated.
It is this Dutch landscape of the 17th century in which, according to Lemaire, the curious combination of self-confidence and a sense of dependency is expressed, which is perhaps the secret of Protestantism.
Lemaire has not elaborated on this idea, but his view boils down to the fact that one can no longer simply say that the appearance of the landscape is the manifestation of a vanishing belief in the Christian God, but that this was rather due to a changing and changed experience of God. The disenchantment of the world has made a new religious experience possible. Perhaps, however, at the same time it was the case – and this would be my own hypothesis – that a new religious experience fostered or even caused the disenchantment of the world. One can then assume that this disenchantment was accompanied by a new visual perception and representation of the landscape.
The new view of the surrounding world, the reliance on one's own independent and accurate observation and careful experimentation were expressed in the first place in topography, geography, cartography, and botany.
The theory of perspective, which had already been devised by Alberti in 1435 and had been excellently applied by Piero della Francesca in his paintings in 1450, became one of the most important means of expression for Italian Renaissance art. Perspective was often applied together with the theory of proportion and knowledge of anatomy. It was also a means by which the artist, who had hitherto been an unpretentious and simple craftsman, could appropriate the status of a ‘natural philosopher’ (as a scientist was called at that time. The word ‘scientist’ was coined in 1834). Vasari even believes that with the advent of perspective the visual arts made scientific progress. This new reference point did not spread only in Italy, but throughout Europe and was taught in all the art schools that were established in the following years. Perspective was important because it provided the 'framework' within which field of vision could be accurately determined and formulated. With the help of perspective a painting became a kind of window on the world, and from this window concept evolved the development of attention for the space, vista, panorama and landscape.
In England in the years between 1606 and 1612 the English author Henry Peacham became aware of the landscape as a genre in painting when he wrote the following:
Landskip is a Dutch word & it is as much as wee shoulde say in English landship, or expressing of the land by hills, woodes, Castles, seas, valleys, ruines, hanging rocks, Citties, Townes &c. as farre as may bee shewed within our Horizon.
If it be not drawne by it selfe or for the owne sake, but in respect, and for the same of some thing else, it falleth out among those things which we call Parerga.
Norgate expresses himself even more enthusiastically about the landscape, which is reflected in the following exclamation:
There is not in my opinion in all the arte of paynting such variety of delectable collours, nor cann the eye bee soe richly feasted as with the prospecte of a well-wrought landscape.
In the works of the poet Jacob Cats (1577-1660), who enjoyed unprecedented popularity among simple people, this changed attitude towards the landscape is also clearly visible. H. Smilde states the following:
Cats was too much of a realist to paint a pure pastoral scene. For him the beauty of the land of Zeeland consisted in the fertility of its soil. There is no dreamland for the poet where guileless shepherds make love to beautiful shepherdesses in the midst of a nature whose purity speaks to the receptive heart, but rather the rich Zeeland soil, where ordinary farmers work in the sweat of their brows for a good piece of bread. Hence his admonition to thank God daily for the peace that reigns in this land of plenty, and not to squander its fruits on luxuries that trade brought to the cities of Zeeland. He is thoroughly national in his plea for the preservation of the old national mores. Not a poetic 'return to nature,' but his goal is a continued contentment in nature.
Jacob Cats is only brought into the discussion to clarify a certain attitude towards the landscape. Not only to indicate how loved and how popular the landscape was in itself, but especially because this 'continued contentment in nature' – as Smilde points out – comes very close to the experience of peace, trust and contentment in the landscape, which Ton Lemaire found so typical of the period in which nature was desacralized, demythologized and disenchanted, the period in which self-confidence and dependence were intertwined, which he saw as the secret of Protestantism.
Calvin sharply distinguishes between beauty in art, beauty in nature or creation, and spiritual, divine beauty. To the latter is attached God's honour and glory. What divine beauty really is, we can only surmise from its faint reflection in creation, the dazzling radiance of the sun, the inexhaustible richness of God's creation plan and, above all, in Jesus Christ. Only through faith can one connect with and experience this divine beauty. The earthly world, however, cannot itself be raised to this level. For Calvin, then, true beauty is in fact divine revelation, or rather, revelation of divinity. Wherever it is experienced, there is inner peace, perfect harmony. True beauty consists of clarity, moderation, and perfection. It can also be found in creation, especially by believers, when they perceive God's order in it.
Calvin also believed that the visual arts could no longer be tolerated within the church – whether sacred or liturgical art because of idolatry or as books of the laity (such as windows and paintings with biblical subjects), because they distract from the core of the gospel message. Art can no longer function as one of the paths to salvation, because faith comes from hearing and the Reformation therefore placed the proclamation of the Word central. Concerning public worship and salvation Calvin clearly distinguishes what should remain in and what should stay outside the Christian church.
Yet this is not a question of cultural avoidance or a lack of artistic sense, but of a Calvinist appreciation of art, especially with regard to its rightful place in the context of the Christian life. As if to rule out any misunderstandings about this, Calvin remarks: "And yet I am not so caught up with superstition that I think that no images should be tolerated at all. But since sculpture and painting are gifts of God, I desire a pure and lawful use of both, so that what God has given us for his glory and for our good may not merely be defiled by wrong abuse, but also not be used to cause our destruction."
Gillis van Conincxloo
A striking starting point for the relationship between Calvinism and landscape painting can be found in Frankenthal, where in 1562 Elector Frederick III of the Palatinate allowed sixty expatriate Dutch families to settle. Since then, new crowds of expelled Calvinists from the Northern and Southern Netherlands were constantly moving there. Already in 1577 Frankenthal had become a prosperous industrial colony, which was famous for its weaving and tapestry making. It counted gold- and silversmiths among its inhabitants and also had a group of Dutch landscape painters, of which Gillis van Conincxloo (1544-1606) was the most prominent figure. After his apprenticeship and a stay of several years in France, Conincxloo joined the guild of Antwerp in 1570, but left this city as a convinced Calvinist in 1585 when it had fallen into the hands of Parma and new severe religious persecutions threatened. At the beginning of 1587 he settled in Frankenthal, but in 1595 he moved to Amsterdam, where he lived until his death in 1606.
Conincxloo had a great influence on his contemporaries with his landscape paintings, including the painters Paul Bril, David Vinckboons, Carel van Mander, Hercules Seghers, and Jacob and Roelant Savery. His popularity is also evident from the interest in the sale of his estate in 1607, which included a not insignificant collection of paintings.
Carel van Mander mentions in his Schilder-Boeck that painting is more excellent than sculpture,
because the painter paints everything that is visible to the human eye: the firmament, the sky, different weather conditions, the sun that sometimes sends its rays through the clouds over cities, mountains and valleys; when it is dark and cloudy, when it rains, hails or snow[s]; the great variety of greenery on trees and fields, when the laughing spring excites the birds to sing. All that the sculptor cannot possibly express in his stone, and which is one of many other proofs, that painting is a more important art and is more popular than sculpture. A confirmation of this can be found in the artful works of the eminent landscape painter Gillis van Coninxloo from Antwerp.
Van Mander did not know of a better landscape painter and had observed that his style of painting was very much imitated in Holland. It is therefore highly probable that his chapter which is devoted to landscape and recommends a certain style of painting was inspired by Conincxloo's work.
Conincxloo breaks with the Renaissance idea that the landscape merely serves as a backdrop for a dramatic action with one or more figures in the foreground. Nor do we detect in him a tendency to depict the landscape as a place of meditation, in which the memory of an important event or of the past itself had to be evoked. Yet, on the other hand, he does align himself with the so-called Mannerist tradition. This is not about an accurate representation of reality, an image that is as natural and true to nature as possible, but about the application of a certain style in which the landscape had to be impressive, imposing, richly varied and detailed and preferably constructed by one's own imagination. In landscape painting one can in fact contrast the Mannerist style with working from one's own perception of reality and one's own experience. The painter often makes use of different horizon heights in a painting and applies a common, but very artificial, backdrop-like colour scheme to suggest a three-dimensional effect: brown areas in the foreground, green in the middle and blue in the background.
Initially, Conincxloo painted highly dramatized and exaggerated rock formations, winding rivers, impressive trees and foliage, castles, cities and ruins, and he invariably needs a biblical or mythological figure to make the landscape acceptable as such. The smaller the figures are depicted, the clearer it becomes that his real attention was focused on the landscape.
Gradually, therefore, changes occur in his work. In the first place his depiction of trees and foliage was more natural and based more on his own observations than was the case with earlier painters. Conincxloo arrived at an increasingly true-to-life representation of the landscape, especially the forest landscape. In the second place in his later work he was more successful in merging the confusing multitude of details and the cluttered structure into a compositional unity. The extravagant increasingly gives way to the simple and natural.
Although his work remained filled with the rich abundance of nature, he did seek to create order in this multiplicity. By placing a number of tall trees in the foreground of his forest landscapes, his later work was given a sturdier construction. We can also notice that the small figures in his later work have almost disappeared and are hardly of (visual) significance. The forest landscape from 1598 is a good example of this. In this painting the natural forest scene has become the actual subject of the work. Moreover, Conincxloo was capable of subtly using atmospheric perspective. This means that with lines and in the rendering of sky and colour he was able to achieve such depth and thereby also make the naturalness so much more believable that the schematic and artificial threefold division of colours for the sake of depth could be overcome.
The greater naturalness and lifelikeness of Conincxloo's later work make clear that he gave an increasingly important place to his own perception and experience of the landscape. This can also be seen in the elimination of the different horizon heights in one painting and the gradual choice of one point of view. By building compositional unity around a 'natural' view of the horizon, Conincxloo eventually managed to involve the viewer in his landscape spaces as if they stretched out in front of them.
Developments in Haarlem: Esaias van de Velde
Carel van Mander, who was a poet and had written rhetorical plays, had been briefly apprenticed as painter to Lucas de Heere, who himself was banished from the country because of his sympathies for the Reformation. In Italy Van Mander became acquainted with the academy and with much loftier views on painting than those he met in 1583 as a member of the strict guild in Haarlem, to which he had fled as a Mennonite refugee. In Haarlem was already a well-known art centre, which worked in the 'Italian way' or the Mannerist style. In the same year, together with Cornelis Corneliszoon and Hendrick Goltzius, he founded an academy to work from nature, from living models. Following the Italian example of Florence, Lucca and Bologna, this initiative was intended to offer an alternative to the guild, in which Van Mander did not feel at home as an artist. However, the academy only existed until 1591, when Goltzius left for Italy. Carel van Mander moved to Amsterdam in 1604, where he was able to move more freely and also published his Schilder Boeck (Painting Book). Mannerism no longer caught on in Haarlem. The old guild did not dissolve itself into the academy but developed itself, which makes clear that the arts did not aspire to an exalted status for their own sake, as in Italy and France.
The renewed interest in the landscape arose in the Netherlands around 1590 when a changed mentality and a new approach to reality began to assert itself. In Haarlem this movement revealed itself as a phenomenon that went against Mannerism and rather abruptly initiated a new development. It was mainly Hercules Seghers, Willem Buytewech and Esaias van de Velde who settled in Haarlem in 1612 who gave the final impetus to the development of realistic landscape painting. Initially all three focused on their own observation, but Seghers left Haarlem as early as 1613.
Especially Esaias van de Velde (1590-1630), who was a member of the Reformed Church, is of great importance in our context. As a student of Conincxloo he built on the latter's innovations in vision and approach. Even less preoccupied than his predecessor with style and rendition, his greatest concern was to preserve fidelity to nature. Van de Velde rendered things so painstakingly that this sometimes led to detailed elaboration. Nevertheless he succeeded even better than Conincxloo in maintaining the compositional unity atmospherically. He managed to capture the perspectival and atmospheric effects of space in such a masterful and suggestive way that there are no separate plans, but the foreground and background merge imperceptibly from the outset. The continual difficulty that Conincxloo experienced in making the landscape the actual subject of his art – which was evident from the ever-shrinking dimensions of his figures as 'staffage' for his landscapes – has been completely overcome by Esaias van de Velde. His figures are integrated into the landscape. They belong to it in a natural way and are inextricably linked to it.
Van de Velde's work also bears witness to a development, even more radical than Conincxloo's. He was an innovator of the river landscape, which would be imitated as a genre by his pupil Jan van Goyen and Salomon van Ruysdael, and of the dune landscape that we also see a little later in Pieter Molijn. He himself stood at the beginning of this development.
In his painting View of Zierikzee (1618) he achieved an exceptional degree of naturalness and realism. The horizontal silhouette of the city can be seen at close range, so that there is room for sufficient detail. The dark brown tones stand out clearly against the brightly coloured fishermen in the foreground, creating a natural suggestion of space. Moreover the unity of the scene is carefully enhanced by an extremely differentiated treatment of tonal values, which would later lead to a monochrome painting style, which was mainly imitated by Jan van Goyen. There is a lot of sky and water in which the city is reflected, and one sees patches of clouds and waves moved by the wind that suggest a wide expansive space, which is so typical of the Dutch landscape. Conspicuous here is any absence of embellishment or mannerist artificiality.
His painting The Ferry, which can be seen in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, shows a more lavish detailing of figures, animals, houses and groups of trees. Nevertheless, Van der Velde is able to create a great unity in the landscape. In the context of a river landscape he has depicted a vision of the totality of reality in all its shades and diversity, in such a way that one is even inclined to speak of a programmatic intent. Here there is no interesting accumulation of details, no mythological or biblical fact to be illustrated, no imaginary dream to compensate for a lack or loss of literary content, but here is a synthesis of reality as it appears and can be seen in actual human life, a reality characterized by inner peace and contented activity. Here is a landscape in which man is blessed to dwell, a feast for the eyes and, if you will, a grace from God.
Here there is no interesting accumulation of details, no mythological or biblical fact to be illustrated, no imaginary dream to compensate for a lack or loss of literary content, but here is a synthesis of reality as it appears and can be seen in actual human life, a reality characterized by inner peace and contented activity. Here is a landscape in which man is blessed to dwell, a feast for the eyes and, if you will, a grace from God.
In this work numerous aspects emerge that are typical of Calvinism and that demonstrate that there is a vision underlying it. It is no coincidence that humanity and the world are in such a balanced relationship with each other, and yet one cares about one’s daily duties in dependence. It is no coincidence that so many aspects of reality have been depicted and that this multiplicity points beyond itself to a harmony that must have been intended by God. Even in its restrained simplicity and sobriety this painting testifies to an experience of reality in which 'staying content in nature' (Smilde) and 'self-confidence intertwined with dependence' (Lemaire) come to the fore.
In the Netherlands of the 17th century hardly any authority was exercised by Renaissance or Mannerist theories of art. Of course there were various treatises on perspective, but in general they were not only averse to theories but they also knew little or nothing about them. There was no serious discussion about art, painting or sculpture in general, as was the case in Italy and France. For this reason Van Mander's Schilder-Boeck was not very popular among those painters who worked from their own observation and experience. That is why the art of the Dutch painters was also held in low esteem abroad, precisely because it did not seek to connect with the Italian masters of the Renaissance. The lack of interest in theorizing was expressed by the absence of strict rules. After all, the remarkable thing about the work of Conincxloo and Van de Velde is that it is characterized by a steady development and growth towards personal experience and representation. Conincxloo was rooted in Mannerism but managed to come to terms with it. Van de Velde deliberately opposed Mannerism.
The new phenomenon that had manifested itself with the Reformation, first in the religious and ecclesiastical spheres and then in science, was the independent, free research that no longer obeyed the prescribed rules of tradition – or in the case of art of the theory of art – but that based itself on one's own observation and experience of reality. Therefore it is wrong to think that landscape painting originated from Renaissance theories of art. In any case, this does not apply to landscape painting in the Low Countries. It can be said that since Francis Bacon one's own perception and experience have been honoured in such a way that this attitude could no longer be ignored by the visual artists, at least insofar as they had not already done so of their own accord. Mannerism did not correspond to one's own experience of reality that had just been given so much attention, and was therefore not imitated. It is striking that a large part of the many innovations in scientific and other fields has been the work of Calvinists. That is why I think it is not surprising that two Calvinist painters, Gillis van Conincxloo and Esaias van de Velde, have made a special contribution in the field of landscape painting. What is even more remarkable is the fact that this connection has never been made.
There are also several other factors that make Calvinism all the more probable as the supporting foundation. In the first place the breakthrough of 'realism' took place during the Twelve Years' Truce (1609-1622) and Calvinism became the leading religion in the Republic. At the same time the more flexible or liberal Remonstrants were repelled, while simultaneously the conflict between the northerners and southerners – despite the common Spanish enemy – intensified. There was a great cultural gap between these two populations, which should not be underestimated. Despite their freedom the exiled Southern Dutch always felt themselves to be strangers in the north. They also brought with them different habits, different clothing and housing. Their frivolity, pomp and circumstance, vanity and excess were unusual in the North and were considered misplaced. In 1614 Trigland preached against the pride and ostentation of the southerners and reproached the Flemings for not having adapted their appearance to the simple, humble environment of the north, thus setting a bad example.
On the one hand people in the northern provinces were elevated by the civilization that the southerners brought with them and on the other they did not want to admit that they needed them. Especially at a time when national feelings of autonomy and independence were beginning to stir, this state of affairs must have been a thorn in the side of many. The foundation of Leiden University in 1575 and the flourishing of trade after 1585 contributed not a little to this growing sense of self. When the Calvinists gained the majority with the start of the Truce in 1609 and pushed through a change of course, Dutch simplicity and frugality were therefore emphasized a little more than was strictly necessary. In this way too the simple, down-to-earth, and realistically depicted landscape can be seen as a conscious distancing from the Manneristic, exuberant Flemish style. It is the same down-to-earth sobriety and love for the fatherland that we saw in Jacob Cats.
On the other hand Calvinism gradually managed through the national church structure to break through particularism and provincialism and to focus more and more on the national interest. That is why national soil management and the energetic commencement of diking and reclamation can be seen as a consequence of this. It was precisely during the Truce that the reclamation of the Beemster took place, which in turn strengthened the love for the fatherland as well as the attention that was paid to their own territory.
Calvinism, by placing the whole of human life under the direct authority of God's Word and his commandments, has encouraged (rather than held back or even stagnated) the more general phenomenon of one's own perception, the study of reality according to its own nature, the distancing itself from philosophically speculative theories and philosophies and from tradition in several areas, in short the down-to-earth but at the same time loving sense of reality. It cannot be maintained that the visual arts flourished in the Golden Age, especially in its early period, despite Calvinism. On the contrary, at important crossroads in cultural history Calvinism appears to have been of essential importance. Its influence can also be seen in the visual arts.
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