Matthijs Maris

Matthijs Maris, Washing Day , 1917

Matthias Marris (born August 17, 1839 in The Hague , † August 22, 1917 in London ), who called himself Matthijs Maris and was called Thijs , was a Dutch painter who initially worked in the Impressionism of the Hague School , but always did his later works deviated more to a very own style influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites . He was also an etcher and lithographer .

Family and life

Matthijs was the middle of three brothers, the other siblings were Jacob Maris and Willem Maris . They also had an older sister, Henriette. Grandfather Wenzel Maresch came from Prague, married Metge Smit from Amsterdam at the beginning of the 19th century and settled with her in The Hague. In 1809 his son Mattheus was born and registered under the family name Marris . The family later called themselves Maris . Mattheus married Hendrika Bloemert, and since he was a master printer, the children came into contact with art prints by the old masters at an early age, which they admired and tried to imitate. So her talent was discovered early. Matthijs is considered the most talented of the three brothers, Jacob the more successful.

In 1851 Matthijs received his first lessons from JCElink Sterk (1806-1856), who provided him with a scholarship with which he worked at the Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten (Royal Academy of Fine Arts) in The Hague from 1852 to 1855 and from 1855 to 1858 was able to attend the Antwerpsche schilderschool (today: Koninklijke Academie voor Schone Kunsten te Antwerpen ) with his older brother Jacob , where he was a student of Nicaise de Keyser .

In 1859, Matthijs and his brother Jacob received a series of portrait commissions from Princess Marianne , the fees of which gave them the opportunity to rent a studio in The Hague, to work increasingly in the artists' colony Landgut Oosterbeek (which is considered the Dutch Barbizon ) and to support their parents financially .

At first Matthijs worked in the same style as his brother Jacob, namely in the tradition of the 17th century artists they admired so much and also joined the Hague School founded by Jozef Israëls around 1870 in The Hague. The Hague School is particularly characterized by works that have similarities to the Barbizon School . Later he went his own way: his works became vague, he increasingly moved away from realism towards visions, towards dreamlike. His late works reflect symbolic rather than real objects and situations.

In 1860 he went on a trip to the Rhine with his brother Jacob as far as Switzerland and returned to the Netherlands via France. There he got to know Moritz von Schwind and Wilhelm von Kaulbach and dealt with his romantic style. Furthermore, the city of Lausanne made a great impression on him and was the subject of some of his works.

In 1867 Matthijs moved to Paris , where Jacob had already successfully settled and where he caught up with his younger brother. In 1870 the Franco-Prussian War broke out and Matthijs volunteered for the Garde Nationale , whether out of a sense of duty or from a financial point of view, is not known. Jacob returned home in 1871, but Matthijs stayed until 1877 and saw the Paris Commune with him. It has been proven that he himself was not a communard , but he witnessed the unrest in the city, the armament of the people and the siege by the French government troops. The works he created during this time were only hesitantly accepted on the continent. It was only thanks to his friend Elbert van Wisselingh , an employee of the A. Goupil art dealer , that something was occasionally sold. In England, on the other hand, interest in his art grew steadily. The art dealer Daniel Cottier, who also acquired numerous works by Matthijs for himself, was able to convince van Wisselingh and later also Matthijs Maris to settle on the island.

In 1877 Maris finally moved to London, where he stayed for life. He moved into a room in Cottier's house and in return undertook to produce a certain number of works. His relationship with Cottier quickly deteriorated, accused Matthijs of exploiting him and forcing him to produce works that he then sold for a lot of money. Such works, which Matthijs had to produce and sell for financial reasons, he called disparagingly “pot-boilers” - bread works - and subsequently distanced himself from them. Cottier did not keep his promise to set up his own studio. Matthijs' life was lonely, dissatisfied and unproductive. In 1888 there was a final break with Cottier. Elbert van Wisselingh had found him an apartment of his own in London and negotiated higher fees so that he could live without financial worries in the future. Still, he produced very little until his death.

His death attracted a lot of attention, especially in England, where he was honored and valued as a great artist. He was buried in London.

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Most of his works are in the hands of various museums in Great Britain and the United States, but are also privately owned. In the Netherlands, his works are still not as popular as those of his brother Jacob. One of his greatest admirers was Vincent van Gogh , as can be read in some of his letters.

Maris' life and work can be divided into different phases. His years at The Hague Academy from 1852 to 1855 formed the first phase. During this time he received numerous commissions from the art dealer AA Weimar , for example works in the style of the painters A. Schelfhout or BC Koekkoek, well-known at the time . Weimar also ensured that Maris was able to work for Louis Meijer (1809–1866) from 1853 to 1855 . There, too, Maris mainly made works to order, but also began with his own work. In addition to the work prescribed by the academy, he portrayed his friends and fellow students . These early portraits are naturalistic and academic in predominantly gray, brown to blackish brown tones with highlights in ocher. He attached great importance to light / shadow contrasts and accentuated the incidence of light.

His time in Antwerp can be seen as the second phase of his work. One of his friends there was Lawrence Alma-Tadema , who lived in the same house as Matthijs and Jacob Maris. They often went out together to paint landscapes, cityscapes or scenes of the hustle and bustle of the market. The picture Markttafereel , which hangs in The Hague Municipal Museum , dates from this period - 1856 - and shows that Maris designed his pictures in pencil before working with color. He proceeded in the same way with his watercolors during this period.

The third phase began when he returned to The Hague in 1858 after successfully completing his degree. This phase was to last until 1869. Matthijs joined the Hague artists' association Pulchri Studio , which gave him the opportunity to paint from a living model twice a week. Nevertheless, his urge to earn a living by painting was very limited. For Matthijs, painting was a reproduction of his innermost and truest feelings and thoughts. This created a conflict between the wishes of his clients and his own needs. He often devoted himself to the Oosterbeek landscape and painted naturalistic scenes in rust-brown, olif to yellow-green tones with light gray effects and light blue sky colors used sparingly. He accentuated the structure of tree trunks or roots by scratching in lines with the end of the brush; grasses, shrubs, and the vegetation of the forest and dyke landscapes have a structure as if he had been working on very rough paper. The relationship between Matthijs and Jacob is clearly visible in their works during this period.

At the end of 1860, Matthijs began to withdraw and isolate himself more and more, but in 1869, after a long hesitation, followed his brother to Paris, where the fourth phase of his work began and he primarily created cityscapes to secure a livelihood. The gray rows of houses around Montmartre , the mills there, a small corner café were his favorite motifs.

Matthijs' fifth and final creative phase began in London, which would last until his death and was the least productive from an artistic point of view. He produced little; he worked on many works for years. Over time, he was also prevented from having rapidly progressing vision problems. The last work he started in 1900 and worked on until his death was Grief , also known as "Vanished Illusions", which is now privately owned.

Remarks

1. ↑ Matthijs Maris - een communard? in: "Spieghel Historiael" (a Dutch popular science history journal), number 11 (1976), pages 302-307

literature

• Willem Arondeus : Matthijs Maris. De tragiek van den droom. 1939 (Dutch)
• Ernest D. Fridlander: Matthew Maris. Bestbooks 2001. ISBN 0-7222-5460-1 . (English)

Web links

• Artcyclopedia (Dutch), with many other references
• Instituut voor Nederlandse Geschiedenis (Dutch)

Commons : Matthijs Maris  - collection of images, videos and audio files