The Washington herald., 1914-04-20
Spurious Old Masters.

thor of pany good books about art is writing rather
remarkable set of New Guides to Old Masters, a
little bit on the art museum guide book plan and yet
of an original and quite noteworthy character. Vi
these new guides" which to box the compass OF
all the important museums in Europe two have been
received-"L ondon, Critical Notes on the National
Gallery and the Wallace Collection" and paris, Crit
ical Notes on the Louvre" (Scribners) The first as
the introductory volume of the SERIES copains most
interesting general presentation, with some valuable
observations on old and old mastership as
whole and photography of the old masters-that is
to say selected list of the accessible books on the
subject.
Mr.. Van Dyke is very, very incredulous about a
great many of the old masters that are sold by the
dealers nowadays and about the supposedly au-
thentcated pictures in the museums His explanation
is that workshop and school pieces and the pictures
OF sons pupils and mtators of the great painters are
regularly palmed off for the masters THE pride of
the Hermitage at ST. Petersburg" he says, is forty
or more Rembrandts-the finest collection of Rem
brandts in existence told but thirty out of the
forty are school pieces workshop performances and
OF the scant remainder there is only Rembrandt
the so-caled Sobieski-of the highest quality
Strange. is it not" Prof Van Dyke adds. that
Rembrandt should have 500 1000 canvases sill
preserved to him. while his of pupils have hardly
score of pictures among them? And stranger still
that Rubens should have pictures, and his forty
or more individually known pupils not half dozen
apiece and some of them single picture
Tiepolo and Ell Greco, he notes. have absorbed the
whole output of their sons who initiated their style
And there is the clever forger always at work.
Sometimes he paints Sienese primitive on an old
chestnut poplar panel utilizing perhaps, the old
gliding of the ground and the tooing and stamp
ing of the patterns. He gazes and bakes his colors
scrumbles and varnishes his surface his frame
and batters it in revolving hopper. At other times
he takes ffty-year-oId canvas and paints you glib
Daubgny, astonishing Corot which passes muster
under the of the experts at the Hotel Drouot.
The signature on an old picture, as Prof Van Dyke
points out very little. Forged signatures are
found everywhere AT the Brussels Gallery, picture
No 100 has two signatures, Van Goyen's and Cuyps,
ard three dates which suggests the enterprise of its
various owners. Paul Potters name pictures by
Verbeecq and Isaac Van Ostade is infrequent.
Rembrandts signature appears again and again on
pictures frankly given to Boil Macs and Others
while AIbrecht Durers monogram is still conveniently
used pictures by his contemporaries and followers
Indeed, the forged signature and date common
that all signatures and dates have be looked
upon with suspicion"
manner in which American miliionaires are induced
to pay large amounts for "replicas" of famous pic
lures which are only copies once bought for small
amount and hung up in some nobeman's or rich
mans house. Time goes by; the copy gathers dust;
the family fortunes decline, and the pictures
to London to be sold, and shortly hear from the
auction room that a replica OF the picture in the
kings possession at Windsor" is to be sold. Some
American millionaire buys the cheap copy for fabu
louS sum-and the delusion carries through to the
end.
Time and restoration" spoil many OF the old mas
tiers that actually in authentic existence OF
Titian's work, for instance, there not than
one two pictures in existence that he
left them. Prof Van Dyke gives us pitiful
OF the butchery to which Leonardo da Nincis IA
nous Mona Lisa" has been subj ected. The trip TO
Italy and back" he says has resulted in Just trihe
more rubbing of the surface, and every one knows,
that it had had enough before it lett the Louvre" 1t
has been rubbed down and off until it has hardly
any color left But it is still famous masterpiece,
and famous with good reason
= What is to be done about all these forgeries and
limitations OF the art OF the old masters? America is
full of these fakes Nobody truly say where the
genuine leaves off and the spurious begins Spurious
cid masterhood has invaded every public museum in
anu pTOOdDly every private OF
size. 1t would be very interesting to have Prof John
c. Van Dyke write guide to the museums of New
York-to turn upon the pictures at the Metropolitan
Museum the same searchlight that he turns picture
by picture upon the museums OF Paris and London.
Perhaps he will do il some time
In the meantime, it be said that in the long
run every picture will have prove itself Its stand
ing the work of a master will rest not upon
signature, upon the fact that it has hung in some
bodys collection but upon historical evidence that is
incontrovertble, and upon the concurrent Judgment
of the best authorities. No one mans say so" will
suffice. There is too much uncertainty about that
Good authorities have made egregious errors. And
the doctors disagree about many individual pictures
They will have to thrash it among themselves
and their mistakes and assumptions will be exposed
by patient criticism.
1t will take great many years to find out just
what have, among art treasures-and what
we have not.