Youngpeople's

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YOUNG PEOPLE'S STORY OF

OUR HERITAGE

YOUNG PEOPLE'S

STORY OF

OUR HERITAGE

FINE ARTby

V. M. HILLYER and E. G. HUEY

New Edition Designed and Revised by Childrens Press, Chicago

Consultants

Ruth E>>serman, Chairman, Art DepartmentHighland Park High School, Highland Pork, Illinois

Everett Saunders, Art Lecturer, Northwestern UniversityArt Consultant, Wilmette School System, Wilmette, Illinois

Meredith Press, New York

Illustrations in the order

in which they appear

Ingres, Stamaty Family, Group Portrait/2

Corot, Church at Marissel/4

Homer, Flamborough Head, England/9

David, Napoleon at Mt. St. Bernard/11

Delacroix, The Lion Hunt/12Delacroix, Orphan at the Cemetery/19Hogarth, The Shrimp Girl/21

Reynolds, Master Hare/25

Gainsborough, Lady in St. James Park/26

Reynolds, Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse/28Gainsborough, Mrs. Siddons/28Blake, Illustration from-the Book of Job/30Constable, Wivenhoe Park/35Constable, The Hay Wain/36Turner, The Lake From Petworth House/38Turner, Grand Canal/41

Corot, Just Before Sunrise/44

Millet, Self-Portrait/50

Millet, The Gleaners/51

Monet, St. Lazare Station/52

Monet, Rouen Cathedral/54

Monet, The River/54

Manet, The Fifer/58Manet, Le Journal lllustre/59

C6zanne, Self-Portrait/61

C6zanne, The Card Players/61

Van Gogh, Self-Portrait/62

Van Gogh, Bedroom at Arles/62Gauguin, Tahitian Woman with Chlldren/67

Gauguin, The Burao Tree/67

West, Penn's Treaty w\tt\ the Indians/68

Stuart, The Skater/69

Stuart, Portrait of George Washington/69Peale, John Paul Jones/70Copley, Portrait of Paul Revere/70

Trumbull, Capture of the Hessians at Trenton/76

Peale, Still Life/78

Inness, June/80Inness, Etretat, Normandy/83Homer, The Herring Net/84Homer, Eight Bells/86

Whistler, Portrait of the Artist's Mother/91

Whistler, Gray and Green, The Silver Sea/92Sargent, Robert Louis Stevenson/94Sargent, Daughters of Edward Boit/95

Remington, Howl of the Weather/99Bellows, Dempsey and Firpo/101

Bellows, My Mother/102

Bellows, Lady Jean/102Picasso, Acrobat's Wife/107

Hofmann, The Golden Wall/107

Pollock, Grayed Rainbow/107Picasso, Three Muslcians/108

Picasso, Le Gourmet/108Kandinsky, Improvisation No. 176/109

Dali, Mae West/110Curry, The Tornado/115Benton, Aaron/116Wood, American Gothic/117

Hopper, Nighthawks/117Hopper, Early Sunday Morning/117Wyeth, Young America/118Rivera, Madame Marcoussis/123Rivera, Assembly of Motor/123

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 66-11324Copyright 1966 by Meredith Publishing Company. Originally published under the title of A Child's History of Art by V. M. Hillyerand Edward G. Huey. Copyright, 1933, by D. Appleton-Century Company, Inc. Copyright, 1951 by Appleton-Century-Crotts, Inc.Copyright, 1961 by Mercantile Safe Deposit and Trust Co. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. Published simultaneously in Canada.

Contents

Acknowledgments / 8

Stirring Times in France / 10

The First Great English Painters / 20

Three Englishmen Who Were Different / 31

The Poor Barbizon Painters / 12

Impressionism / 55

Postimpressionism / 60

Early American Artists / 68

More American Artists / 77

Two European Americans / 88

Remington and Bellows / 96

Modern Art I lOU

More Modern Painters 1 113

Index to Fine Art,

The Last Two Hundred Years 1 121^

Credits / 127

Acknowledgments

Cover: Pablo Picasso, A Mother Holding a Child and FourStudies of Her Right Hand, detail, black crayon on creampaperCourtesy of The Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University,Meta and Paul J. Sachs Collection

Georges Mathieu, Homage to Richard I, Duke of NormandyCollection Richard Brown Baker, New York City. Transparency by FrancisG. Mayer, New York City

Page 2: J.A.D. Ingres, Stamaty Family, Group Portrait,Louvre, ParisArt Reference Bureau

Frontis: Jean Baptiste Camille Corot, Church at Marissel,Louvre, ParisArt Reference Bureau

Opposite: Winslow Homer, Flamborough Head, England,detail, gouache and w/ashCourtesy of The Art Institute of Chicago, Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. RyersonCollection

Designed by Jolin IHollis

Edited by Joan Downing

FINE ARTThe Last Two Hundred Years

Stirring Times in France

It was the year 1793. The FVench Revolution had overthrownthe government of the king of France. The common peoplehad stood hardships and injustice until they could stand themno longer. Then they had rebelled. France had been made arepublic. The heads of hundreds of peopleenemies of therepublicwere being cut off. The king and his family had beenput in prison. It was voted that they too should lose their heads.One of the men who voted yes to the question, "Shall the

king be killed?" was Jacques Louis David (Dah-veed). Davidwas a painter. He believed the revolution was right, eventhough he had been one of the court painters. By court painterwe mean the king's own painter.

Jacques Louis David, Napoleon at Mt. St. BernardChateau, Versailles

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Eugene Delacroix,The Lion Hunt

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Some of the revolutionists had read about the old Romanrepublic. They liked to think of themselves as strong and bravelike the ancient Romans. They liked to think of their republicas like the old Roman republic. So it became the fashion in therevolution to imitate the old Roman heroes. David got theactors in the theaters to wear Roman costumes instead ofFrench clothes. Soon other people were trying to dress like

the Romans. They even made their furniture in imitation ofRoman furniture. David found that the people wanted Romanpictures, so he painted many pictures of scenes from Romanhistory.

Today we think that David's paintings are not so wonderfulas the revolutionists thought them. But they are importantbecause they set a style in painting. The old Roman andGreek days are known as the classical times, so this style thatDavid made so popular is called the classical style of art. AndDavid and the other classical style artists said that no otherkind of painting was worth doing. They made many rules forpainting that they expected all good artists to follow.

David had begun painting pictures of the Romans even be-fore the revolution. One of these paintings is called The Oath

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of the Horatii. The Horatii were three brothers who werechampion fighters. Rome was at war with another city. In-stead of letting the two armies fight, which would have meantthe death of many men, each side agreed to pick three fightersand let them fight it out to see which city should win the war.The Romans chose the three brothers, who took a solemnoath to win for Rome or die trying. David's picture showsthem taking this oath.

WTien the fight was ended, two of the brothers had beenkilled. But the third one had managed to kill the other threefighters and so to win the war for Rome.Another famous Roman picture by David shows the women

stopping the fight between the Romans and the Sabines byrunning out between the two battle lines.David was also a portrait painter. He painted a portrait of

a French lady, Madame Recamier, who is shown lying on acouch. The couch is Roman in style and the lady's dress showsthe Roman styles that French women wore then.

After the revolution came Napoleon. Napoleon made him-self emperor of France. David admired Napoleon greatly andpainted several pictures of him. He painted him on a rearing

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horse, crossing the Alps. He painted him being crowned em-peror. (Napoleon crowned himself.)But after Napoleon, there came another kingof the same

family as the poor king who had lost his head. Naturally,David wasn't court painter to himnot after having votedfor the other king's death ! In fact, David had to run awayfrom France, and he lived in Brussels for the rest of his life.But the strict rules of the classical style of art lived on.

David had had many pupils and some of them became famouspainters, too. One of these pupils was the artist Ingres (Angr).Ingres was a wonderful draftsman. That means that the lineshe drew were beautifully done. He thought more about thelines in a picture than the color or the light. All classical

painters tried to make the lines and shapes in their picturesmore important than the colors. Their colors are dull and life-less. Ingres is probably best known for his portraits. And theportraits that he drew in pencil and did not paint at all showhow great a draftsman he was (see page two).

Baron Gros (Grow) was another pupil of David, and it wastoo bad that he was, for the classical pictures he painted, asmuch as possible following David's strict rules, were not sosuccessful as those he painted in another style. Gros kept try-

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ing to paint great classical pictures and was brokenheartedwhen he found he couldn't do them well. His really fine pic-tures he thought little of, because they were not about Greeks

and Romans. These others are interesting to us because theypictured the events that were taking place then.

Napoleon thought it would be a good idea to have a painter

with his army. So he made Gros Inspector of Reviews in thearmy so that the painter could go with the troops and paintthe battles. Gros watched the fighting himself, so he did notpaint war as a glorious thing. He showed the heroism of thesoldiers, but he showed their terrible suffering too.Now we come to a French painter who did not believe at

all in classical painting. The strict rules that the classicalpainters said all artists should follow made this artist angry.He was Delacroix (Della-crwah). Delacroix led a revolt againstthe classical style of painting. Painters who thought as Dela-croix did were called romanticists. The romanticists didn't seeany sense in painting Greeks and Romans. They wanted topaint what was going on in the world at that time. The ro-manticists revolted against the classical style in another way.

They believed in color. They thought color was more importantthan beautiful line drawing.

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Of course the classical painters hated the romanticists andtried to do all they could to stop them. But Delacroix and hisfollowers became more and more popular and finally they tookthe place that the classical artists had once held.

Delacroix painted pictures of the Crusaders, of Bible stories,

of the people of Algiers, and of the war going on in his time be-tween the Greeks and the Turks.One of Delacroix's paintings is called Liberty Leading the

People. It is supposed to show a scene in a new French Revo-lution that took place in 1830 when there was fighting betweenthe people and the soldiers of the king in the streets of Paris.It is a stirring picture, full of action and movement. It hasreally a double meaning. The classical style of painting thattried to keep all other ways of painting out of France neededto be overthrown too. And this picture may be thought of asLiberty leading romantic art against the too-strict rules ofclassical art.

Eugene Delacroix, Orphan at the Cemetery, Louvre, Paris

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The First GreatEnglish Painters

Do you know what an international picture show is? It is agroup of pictures brought together from different countries sothat people can see how much alike and how different thepaintings are.

Let's suppose all the great countries in Europe had decidedto have an international picture show in 1700 a.d. We shallhave to call it a make-believe show because the various coun-tries never thought of such a thing in those days.

We'll say it's 1700. Each country- can send onlj'^ one pictureand the best will get a prize.Now let's say that all the pictures have arrived:

A Titian from VeniceA ^lichelangelo from RomeA Velasquez from SpainA Rubens from FlandersA Rembrandt from the NetherlandsA Diirer from GermanyA Poussin from France

But where is England's pictiu-e? Every important countryexcept England has sent a famous painting. Now, England isone of the greatest countries in this year 1700, but aU we getfrom England is a letter sajing that she is verj^ sorrj' but shecan't send tis a picture h\ a famous English artist because shehasn't had any famous artists. What? One of the greatest coun-tries in Europe

perhaps the greatesthas no painters?

But though England had had no famous painters by 1700,she soon made up for lost time. Her first famous artist wasthree years old in 1700. His name was Hogarth. And after

William Hogarth, The Shrimp Girl, National Gallery, London

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Hogarth came many more artists. If we had held our make-believe international picture show in 1800, England would havehad plenty of paintings to choose from.Hogarth began as an engraver of silver. Then he learned to

engrave on copper and make prints from his copper plates.These prints were very popular and he sold enough of themto make a good living. But all the time he wanted to be apainter. So he painted pictures, but he was so well known asa print maker that very few people considered him a greatpainter. They preferred his prints and engravings. He foundthat he could make engravings of his paintings and sell printsmuch more readily than the paintings themselves.

Probably all boys and girls like to read the funny papers.A newspaper comic strip is usually very poorly drawn. Youcould hardly call it art. And yet Hogarth, in some of his paint-ings, used the same idea as the funny papers. He used to makea series of six or eight pictures about the same people, showingwhat happened to them from time to time. Only instead ofbeing simply funny, Hogarth's pictures were meant to showhow bad certain things were in England at that time. Theywere often humorous, as well. That kind of humor we call satire.

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Hogarth printed one series of pictures about a man who wastrying to be elected to Parliament. One picture shows the man

making a speech. Another shows him hiring men with clubsto make the people vote for him, another shows him bribingvotersthat is, paying them to vote for him. Each of thepictures is a good painting by itself, but the whole series was

supposed to be seen together, like the different pictures in a

comic strip. And these pictures made a great impression onthe Englishmen of Hogarth's time. Perhaps they did help makethings better as Hogarth hoped they would. Today electionsare certainly run as fairly in England as anywhere in the world.

Hogarth painted portraits too. He painted a portrait of him-

self with his little dog. He painted a picture of The Shrimp Girl.In London in Hogarth's time people bought shrimps from girlswho carried the shrimps around in a basket on their heads.

Hogarth caught the shrimp girl's smile as Hals caught the

smiles in the portraits he paintedwith quick, sure strokes of

the brush. If you put this painting side by side with Durer'sportrait of his father, it looks unfinished. And yet it tells youas much about the real shrimp girl as Durer's picture tells youabout his father.

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About the middle of the eighteenth century, while Hogarthwas still painting, two other Enghshmen were rising to fameas great painters. One was Sir Joshua Reynolds, the otherThomas Gainsborough. Both were best known as portraitpainters. Sir Joshua Reynolds was a few years older thanThomas Gainsborough, so I'll tell you about him first.

I'll begin this story with an African pirate. The pirate wasa kind of Arab king who was holding up ships in the Mediter-ranean. The British were sending a captain with a squadronof ships to talk things over with the pirate.

This captain was a friend of Reynolds and invited him tocome along on his warship. Reynolds accepted the invitationand when he got to Italy he stayed there, to study the greatpaintings of Michelangelo, Titian, Correggio, and Raphael. Heliked Michelangelo best. He liked Michelangelo so much hebecame deaf! That sounds strange, but it is true. Reynoldswas working in the Sistine Chapel, studying Michelangelo'spaintings. He was sitting in a draft, but was so interested inthe pictures he didn't even notice the draft. Not till he got upto go did he notice that anything was wrong. But after thathe began to grow deaf, and soon he had to use an ear trumpet.

Reynolds went back to London and became the favoriteportrait painter of the city. There were no cameras in thosedays, so no one could have a photograph taken. Instead, peoplewent to an artist and had their portraits painted. Poor peoplecould not afford portraits by so expensive a painter as Reynolds,so most of his portraits are of lords and ladies and their children.The king knighted him, and he became Sir Joshua Reynolds.

Sir Joshua worked hard and tried to make every picture hepainted better than the one before. He was especially goodat painting women and children. Have you ever heard ofpictures called The Strawberry Girl, Master Hare, The Age ofInnocence, and Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse? These aresome of Reynolds's best known portraits.

Sir Joshua Reynolds, Master Hare, Louvre, Paris

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nng out new kindsof paints and oils, so that many of his pictures have becomefaded or cracked. Some even faded soon after he painted them.But this didn't make him less popular. A friend of his said,"A faded portrait by Reynolds is better than a fresh one byanybody else."The other portrait painter, Thomas Gainsborough, liked

best to paint landscapes. He couldn't sell the landscapes,however, and so he continued to paint portraits all his hfe.And ver\- fine paintings they are. He made the people hepainted look so graceful and charming that he was in greatdemand. Gainsborough's colors are not so rich and glowing asReynolds'they are more silvery and gray.One of Gainsborough's paintings that has become world

famous as The Blue Bay is thought to have been painted

Thomas Gainsborough, Lady Walking in St. James Park, chalkBritish Museum, London

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because RejTiolds had said a picture with much blue in itcould not be beautiful. So Gainsborough painted The Blue Boy

to prove Reynolds was wTong. Gainsborough didn't seem tolike RejTiolds for some reason, and was always as rude to himas could be. Perhaps he was jealous of the other painter. Butbefore Gainsborough died he asked Re\Tiolds to forgive hisrudeness and told him how much he admired him and his work.

Gainsborough painted portraits of many of the same peoplethat RejTiolds did. They both, for e.xample, painted theDuchess of Devonshire and Mrs. Siddons. Which of the por-traits of these two ladies is better it would be hard to say.

Gainsborough's landscapes are more admired than they

were when he was alive. Though they are not so well-knownas his portraits, they will help us to think of him as an excel-lent British painter.

opposite left: Sir Joshua Reynolds,Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse

opposite right: Thomas Gainsborough, Mrs. SiddonsNational Gallery, London

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