Copenhagen

T H E SIGHTS OF COPENHAGEN.

and spirited portraits, has left us fine pictures of the then very picturesque outskirts of Copenhagen. The end eavou r to create a national art found a zealous advocate in Hoyen, the able and influential art-historian and critic, and was aided by the flourishing state of Danish poetry at the b eg in n in g of this century. The best am ong st the lan d ­ scape-painters — J. T. Lundbye (who was also an excellent anim al-painter), P. Skovgacird, G. Rump, V. Kyhn, — en ­ deavou red to give a faithful representation of Danish scenery; and the figure painters largely occupied them selves with the depiction of every-day life in Denmark. Sonne, Dalsgaard, Vermehren and Exner , tow ard s the m iddle of the century, p ro ­ duced pictures with subjects from peasant life, which are beautiful and full of feeling. There was, however, one d angerou s tem ptation that often enticed the Danish painters away from the representation of th eir own nature and hom e life. Nearly all of them were drawn tow ards Italy, where Thorvaldsen had gained his w orld-w ide fame. Beautiful Italian pictures were painted by Constantin Hansen, w ho , after he returned to D enm ark, executed the fine decoration of the Lobby of the University of C openhagen. The most powerful gen iu s am ong st all the Danish painters, Vilhelm M arstrand (1810 —1873), is the one who has m ost fre­ quently depicted Italy in its splendour, as people then loved to see it and did see it. He has treated the m ost varied subjects w ith equal success — Bible subjects, comical figures from the plays of Holberg, the Danish Molière, pathetic scenes from Danish history, and the stir of Italian street-life. It was also in Italy that Carl Bloch (1834—1890) attained a proficiency that enabled him to give to his painting a strength and brilliancy of effect till then unknow n in ou r art. His powerful pictures, "Samson in the Prison House" and "K ing Christian II. in P rison", produced — and with goo d reason — an ou tbu rst of surp rise and adm iration. Otto Bache, and many of the o ther young e r painters, have

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