Chapter 2: “On Drawing, or the Art of Delineating”

In: Karel van Mander and his Foundation of the Noble, Free Art of Painting
Author:
Walter S. Melion
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Chapter
Pages:
220–225
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004523074_006
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On drawing, or the Art of Delineating

The Second Chapter

(1) One may call Drawing, or the high art of
Delineating, the Father of painting;83*
Aye, one may vaunt it as the true entryway
Or the door through which one gains admittance to many Arts,
Goldsmithing, building, and more; indeed the seven
Liberal Arts could not exist without her;
For the art of Drawing encompasses all things,
Holding every Art within her measured skeins.
(2) She is a kindhearted Wet nurse of all the Arts,*
So Natalis Comes informs us;84
Yea even Grammatica, noble and knowledgeable,
Is suckled85 and swiftly raised by her,
Learning to trace letters and characters,**
Whereby Peoples of different tongues
Understand their mutual intents with one accord,
Whether they be far apart or present.86
(3) The perfection of the art of Drawing must needs come forth
From a sound understanding,87 and understanding
Must [in turn] draw strength from practice, having taken root
In a spirit endowed by nature, which, being
Ingenious and resourceful, fortifies [understanding] and deftly vivifies it.
Together with good judgment, this prompts the Artist
To fashion in thought a preliminary design of all
That it pleases him to draw by hand.88
(4) This Father, then, of Painting is*
Practiced at disclosing hidden meanings,
An expression, a striking elucidation of intention,
A witness to it, which decidedly
Consists in drawing, drawing over, drawing round
All that [the sense of] sight may apprehend
Within the limits of the World,
Above all, the Human form, most precious of all created things.89
(5) Now, Youths, in order to pursue this course,
That is, to become practiced in the art of Drawing,
You must begin with great gusto
By inscribing an oval, and therein a cross,*
Very needful for learning to position a human face
From any angle: for one sees how many Painters,
Inattentive to this cross, distort the face deplorably,
Expending much effort, but to no effect.90
(6) Further, learning to depict a figure after the manner [of another’s picture],
With one foot bearing firmly, without faltering, the weight of the whole body,
Is not to be spurned,
As will be recommended in [the chapter on] Actitude:
And let the hip swing outward from the standing foot.91
Now, any great Master who published for your benefit,
O Youths, an A.b.[c.] book of prints on the rudiments of our Arts92*
Would greatly deserve your gratitude.
(7) I lack the means or the wherewithal,
Whereas others, who have what it takes,
Have proved too reluctant; thus, O deserving Youths, do I, for fear of censure,
And they, for fear of difficulty,
Rob your eyes of so expedient a guide:
In olden days, long flown by,*
Was our Art compiled in various Books,
For which now to search, ‘twould be in vain.93
(8) At School Youths learn about
The Seven liberal Arts in Books; ample Texts
Are approved for young Apothecaries
And Chirurgs to keep them on the right path:
Yet for you, up and coming young Painters, who resemble new beakers,*
There’s nothing tried and true in our language,
From which useful, instructive subject matter might be imparted
And linger with you like a strong fragrance.94
(9) Therefore, ‘twere good to find an accomplished Master*
From the start, in order to accustom oneself to a good manner95
And learn the sure, firm foundations
Of disposition, handling, contour, projection,
And to become familiar with sound placement of lights and shadows,
By subtly drawing where the light strikes,96**
First with Coal, then with Chalks and Pens,
Such that one may hardly see hard, robust strokes anywhere but where the shadows fall.
(10) You may do it all: hatch and wash*
As your spirit inclines, with fiery effort,
Hastening to set your hand to copying97
With Coal or Chalk, on Paper gray as ash,
Or on pale blue [Paper], heightening
And deepening: but you will not allow
Highlights and deep shadows to converge,**
And will rather give breathing room to the ground color between them.98***
(11) Diligently refrain from heightening too much;
Whether you wash with tinctures or watery inks,
Always strive to blend them softly,
Or, if you work with coal and chalk, have sticks
Tipped with cottonwool at the ready, to make the graded tints
Flow [smoothly] at either side, whether doing this after prints
Or after stationary sculpture in the round.
Each gladly does that to which he inclines.
(12) Fine prints with colored grounds and deft highlights*
Have opened the eyes of many a spirit,
As one sees from [the prints] of the famous Parmigianino,99
Amongst others; thus, to become productive in the Arts,
Graft your spirit with these offshoots,
Or copy something finely cast in plaster,
And observe the well-placed lights:100**
For the highlights will assuredly have their say.
(13) Now that you, through patient effort,
Have made your lively hand to lack heaviness,
And your eyes have begun to see clearly,
Go from contrivance to the [naked] truth,*
That is, to life, most gracious to us,**
In which an easy, unaffected sweetness,
Openly perceptible both in stillness and in motion,
Serves as the Lodestar whereby to steer our ship.
(14) This is the target at which to shoot, the ground upon which to build:
No better text can be cited,
No finer nor surer example trusted,
Than a fully nude Man or Woman.
These are the most learned Books to be consulted,
An inexhaustible [source of] practice;
So, too, are children in the nude, and every kind of Beast.
‘Twere otherwise impossible to devise anything.101
(15) ‘Tis wondrous, the grace one sees Nature
Pour forth into life, from every side;
Here everything can be found that we might lack in ourselves:*
Action, attitude, fine foreshortening,
Contour, cross-contour, to gladden us.102
By doing and redoing over time,
One attains the experience of a revered Master:
But one must also learn to fashion from out of oneself.103**
(16) From an early age, Invention must develop in concert [with Nature],104
Else shall we compose ineptly105
And then need to look to others’ storehouses.106
We must also attend well to proportion,
If we wish to increase or decrease,
And in particular, let us ably remember*
That which we draw, to become wise by experience,
For, see, Memoria is Mother to the Muses.
(17) Moreover, ‘tis the treasure chamber of knowledge,
But in portraying your model, pay close regard*
To situating it in the place it belongs,
For many a Painter blundered therein:
Set it neither too high nor too low, or too much to the side:
Some use gridded panes and nets,
Or small casements strung crosswise with threads,
To eliminate faults from their copies.107
(18) This is the Velum that I discuss in passing108*
In my chapter [5] on composition, but I leave everyone free
To use whatever instrument he will,
For it’s all one how one’s work arrives
At a pleasing effect and a right measure.
What’s more, a good understanding
Of how Muscles begin or end (gained from seeing flayed corpses)
Will greatly facilitate the art of Drawing.
(19) This is altogether necessary,
If every aspect of the nude is fully to be understood:
And yet, in such an undertaking, one must refrain
From rendering the Muscles or Sinews*
Too hard: then would
Our Figures appear lost to view for being overly thin.
Nor through inattention should one disregard
The fleshy, sleek softness of the living figure.109
(20) You may stump, that is, draw out the chalk with cottonwool,
Or work it in a grainily gentle way110
Without hatches or rubbing with something:
If you wish to improve in artful hatching,
Then will you fortify your strokes from thin to thick,111
That is, from above to below, with attention*
To rendering the muscles and other bodily parts well,
As if the Graces were disporting therein.
(21) One will make crayons from various colors*
Rubbed with partly decomposed glue,
With which one may portray the forms of Nature**
And, more than this, give every figure its [proper] color,
Whether youthful or withered:112
Hereby can honor be obtained,
For the art of Drawing is the Father of Painting;
No two things could resemble each other more.
(22) In sum: the art of Drawing can be helpful
To every estate, be they young or old and gray,*
So, too, to Princes, Captains, and Soldiers,
Whenever they might wish to speak aptly about Art,
Or describe the circumstances
Of fortifications and [other] places. Therefore,
The noble art of Drawing is to be prized,
And having elucidated it, let us proceed to Proportion.

End of the art of Drawing.

Footnotes

*

Drawing, the father of painting well, or again, drawing is the Body, and painting the Spirit of drawing.

*

The art of Painting, that exists in and through the art of Drawing, which is the wet nurse of all good Arts and sciences.

**

The art of Writing is nursed by the art of Drawing.

*

What drawing or the art of Drawing actually is.

*

The necessity of understanding the ovoid and the cross.

*

There is need for a Book on first principles for young Painters, which might teach them to place a Figure with ease, and guide them from there to even greater perfection.

*

Amongst the ancients, the artful Painters wrote diverse Books on their Art.

*

For Painters, nothing had previously been written in our language.

*

For youths it is useful to get under way with a good Master.

**

Gently to draw on the lit side.

*

To draw on Paper [prepared] with a ground color, heightening and deepening, is most advantageous.

**

One shall not place highlights and deep shadows side by side.

***

The ground color is the middle- or half-tint / tone.

*

That it is good to work after prints or another’s manner of handling, wherever deep shadows and highlights are to be found, as well as after sculpture in the round.

**

That highlights achieve much in the art of Drawing.

*

That one must work much after the life. In life, a sure, sweet, and simple ease is to be found.

**

Life is the lodestar of Picturing, its foundation stone and target.

*

One finds everything in life.

**

One must work from out of oneself, in order to possess invention.

*

Memory, mother of the Muses, and for that reason called Mnemosyne; see Plutarch in his On the [Liberal] Education of Children.

*

The model, that is, the nude figure one intends to portray, should not be set too close.

*

The Velum is a casement with threads strung in a grid, which is likewise drawn on the sheet of paper to ensure good placement while looking at the model through this velum.

*

Muscles must fully be fathomed, but activated only when appropriate.

*

One shall draw hatches in a downward stroke from above.

*

Crayons: how one makes them.

**

Crayons are useful for representing colors after the life.

*

The Art of Drawing is useful to Princes, Captains, and Soldiers for recording cities and fortifications; read the first part of the lives of the Painters, how Lucius Scipio, the Brother of Scipio Africanus, portrayed the capture of Carthage.9112

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Karel van Mander and his Foundation of the Noble, Free Art of Painting

First English Translation, with Introduction and Commentary

Series:  Brill’s Studies on Art, Art History, and Intellectual History, Volume: 62
Cover Karel van Mander and his <i>Foundation of the Noble, Free Art of Painting</i>
E-Book ISBN:
9789004523074
Publisher:
Brill
Print Publication Date:
20 Sep 2022
Front Matter
Introduction “ ‘Pictura’s Cornerstone’: Karel van Mander and His Foundation of the Noble, free Art of Painting”
Illustrations
Den Grondt: The Foundation of the Noble, free Art of Painting: In which her form, origin, and nature are placed before the eyes of inquisitive Youth, in discrete Parts, in Rhymed Verse.
Dedicatory Prefaces, Preface to the Foundation of the Noble, Free Art of Painting, and Selection of Preliminary Poems on the Grondt
Chapter 1: “Exhortation, or Admonition to up and coming young Painters”
Chapter 3: “Analogy, Proportion, or measurement of the Parts of a Human Body”
Chapter 4: “On the Attitude, Decorum, and Decorous Motion of a Human Figure”
Chapter 5: “On the Ordonnance and Invention of Histories”
Chapter 6: “Portrayal of the Affects, Passions, Desires, and Sorrows of Persons”
Chapter 7: “On Reflection, Reverberation, re-reflected luster, or re-reflection”
Chapter 8: “On Landscape”
Chapter 9: “On Cattle, Animals, and Birds”
Chapter 10: “On Fabrics or Drapery”
Chapter 11: “On Sorting and Combining Colors”
Chapter 12: “On Painting Well, or Coloring”
Chapter 13: “On the Origin, Nature, Force, and Effect of Colors”
Chapter 14: “On the Interpretation of Colors, and What They Can Signify”
Register of Commonplaces: “Table of the Foundation of the Art of Painting”
Commentary
Illustrations

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