The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1899-09-20
BELGIUM LETTER.
NoRrHERNER's CORRESPONDENT WRITES
ENTERTAINMENT FROM ANTWERP.
Antwerp, Belgium, sept. l, ls99.

Sunday, August 9th, was the last day
of the series of brilliant fetes the city of
Antwerp had organized in honor OF
Anthony Vandyck, the great pupil OF
Rubens, who was born in this city three
hundred years ago, and attained such
celebrity as a painterof religious subjects
in his youth. and later as portrait
painter at the court of Charles the First
of England. Preparations have been on
foot for over year in anticipation of the
celebration just closed, and requests were
sent to the different continental countries
to loan their works of this Flemish mas
ter. to be placed on exhibition in the
Antwerp museum of fine arts for two
months, beginning August IL. The re-
suit was most fiattering and one hundred
and thirty five canvasses, engravings and
pen drawings were collected. The lot
as whole is insured for 10000 pounds
sterling against damage of any sort.
England was the most generous and sent
over one-third of the whole number, in
GLIDING three chefs d oeuvre from Wind
sor castle. kindly loaned by the queen
On the afternoon of August II, in
the presence of many of the high digni-
taries of Belgium, numerous members OF
the nobility and the foreign academi-
clans, the Burgomaster of Antwerp
formally declared the loan exhibition
open and the public were at liberty to
feast their eyes upon this magnificent
aggregation of subject pictures and por-
traits, whose coloring is still unsurpassed.
Born of a well TODD merchant father,
Vandyck inherited his rare art from his
mother, Maria Cuypers, an artistic be-
ing whose divine afliatus was undoubted-
ly held in check by her round dozen of
children, but which descended so prodi-
gally to her seventh son, Anthony, whom
the world still delights to honor The
father was deeply religious and it was
probably owing TO his influence, as well
as to the membership of Rubens, that
Vandyck's early pictures were all biblical
subjects
Not so grand in conception as his
master, but much more correct in his
drawing, the beauty of Vandyck's work
seems to be in the matchless execution
and the marvellous color effects. In the
picture Christ betrayed by Judas" the
gorgeous reds and yellows have retained
their splendor for nearly three centuries
and seem imperishable. Many Of these
large religious pictures are the property
of old churches and that they are not
totally ruined by the dampness is almost
inconceivable. On some of the canvasses |
one can see where the destroyer has af-
fected the linen but the glorious colors
still remain and appear to defy time.
When Vandycks fame reached England,
King James l. summoned him at once to
become court painter, but it was some
years later at the court of King Charles
l. that he reached the zenith of his
career and accepted wife and knight
hood from the hands of that elegant and
arbitrary monarch For this breach of
loyalty the people of Antwerp never for
gave him and when the English court
was dissolved and the unhappy king
went to the scatfold, Vandyck returned
with his English wife to Antwerp, but
met with cold reception. Later he re-
established himself in London, where he
died at the early age of forty-two years
and his body was inferred in old st.
Paul's. During subsequent political dis
turbances this church was pillaged and
the body lost sight of.
There is little doubt but that environ
ment had great influence upon the art
of Vandyck Always an aristocrat, he
took kindly to courtly ways and embod-
led the elegance of his surroundings and
the innate nobility of his ideas in the
portraits of the mobiles, from the king
down. Much to the disappointment of
the dilettante, the famous equestrian
portrait OF King Charles /, owned by
the Earl Of Warwick, is absent. but the
collection, as whole, is very remarkable
and will continue TO attract the CONT
mental tourists up to the date of closing
in October
After the exposition of the paintings,
the most imposing part of the fetes
which at best / can only give an inkling
of, was the cortege, IL art "A trayers les
siecles' (the progress of art through the
ages. 1t was organized by ten private
societies of Antwerp and represented in
fourteen groups, the ideaization of the
different artistic epochs from the time of
the Egyptians to the end of the 10th
century and the birth of Vandyck. Since
the middle ages the city of Antwerp has
had a worldwide reputation for organic
ing pageants of wonderful richness and
historical. accuracy, and to say that in
this last effort she has nobly sustained
her reputation, is to say all. The cos
tunes of the different periods were
faithfully portrayed, even to the minut-
est detail, such as feathers, bits of rib
bons and buckles Even the old time
musical instruments were reproduced
and played the airs of their respective
periods.
The first group represented Egyptian
art, and consisted of numerous Egyptian
priests and scribes, preceding and en-
circling a throne borne by black slaves,
on which Pharaoh was seated with
look of the wisdom of ages on his face.
Following came his court, which in turn
was succeeded by an immense car drawn