During
Peter Paul Rubens’s lifetime, Europe continued to be a cauldron
of international skullduggery. The contending nations were England,
Spain, France, Portugal, and Holland. Belgium (Flanders) was caught
in the middle. It was controlled by Spain.
At
the beginning of the Eighty Years War (1568-1648) the Low Countries
were Spanish possessions, but the seven northern provinces, Holland,
succeeded in breaking the Spanish stranglehold and became a major
colonial power, with a formidable fleet and possession of one of the
most lucrative trading empires any European player ever exploited,
the Dutch East Indies, now known as Indonesia.
After
bribing the Spanish Duke of Lerma for Vincenzo, Duke of Mantua, with
a combination of faked replicas of admired paintings by Italian
masters, Rubens spent a year in Madrid, where
works by Titian and Raphael abounded. He copied these and other
Italian masterpieces enthusiastically, but he found no talent among
the Spanish painters of the time, only “incredible
incompetence.”
Alarmed
by reports of his mother's ill health, Rubens rushed back to Antwerp.
Too late. Although under commitment to return to Vincenzo’s
employ in Italy, he did not.
The
Belgian sovereigns, Isabella and Albrecht, pressed him to be a court
painter. He agreed on condition he could maintain his studios in
Antwerp instead of Bruxelles. He had no desire to be a court courtier
again. He might still have defied the Flemish commands and returned
to Italy, except that he fell in love and married Isabella Brant.
Rubens, Self-Portrait with Isabella Brant
Treaties
had blocked the Scheldt to sea commerce forever, and commercial power
had shifted from Antwerp to Amsterdam. Only with Napoleon two
centuries later would Antwerp's full port rights be restored.
The
embargo on Antwerp sea trade was not total, but what little was
permitted was strangled by procedures: at the mouth
of the Scheldt all imports had to be
transferred to Dutch boats and carried to the fleet stationed at
Lillo, there to be examined by the enemy and taxed. Goods passed were
carried to Antwerp in barges.
As
the political tides capriciously changed, Antwerp either prospered
reasonably well or plunged into economic doldrums. It was, however,
still the Wall Street of Europe, a great center of exchange for
raising money on diamonds or plate, and the most important mart for
pictures and books of devotion.
Perhaps
Rubens would have been content to live out his life as a painter, but
he already had political contacts with men of influence —
bishops, princes, prelates, diplomats, businessmen, ministers from
Italy to Spain, a certain amount of valuable experience that
had given him lessons in use and abuse of influence and pressure, and
an indisputable cover: as a painter of uncontested fame he could be
sent here and there ostensibly to paint but actually to spy, subvert,
or negotiate.
He
bore a sincere and passionate patriotism for a unified and tolerant
Netherlands, the patriotism of the Antwerpers more than the narrower
feelings of Bruxelles or the university town, Louvain.
Albrecht
and Isabella soon called Peter Paul for secret diplomatic missions.
Because of a truce with the Northern Provinces, a decade of
ostensible peace began when Rubens settled back in Antwerp, but
conditions were just cranking up for the start of a new Thirty Years
War.
Outwardly
the causes were religious, but at the base of all were economic
rivalries and forces. It was a family struggle, too: Europe‘s
ruling houses all seemed almost incestuously interrelated.
Albrecht
and Isabella wished to see the Northern Provinces (Holland, House of
Orange) restored to Bruxelles sovereignty but did not relish going to
war again to gain them. They also preferred escape from Spanish
domination and knew that resumed hostilities would bring Spanish more
intervention.
Such
intervention was quite impossible to prevent anyhow: the provisions
under which Spanish Netherlands had been given by Philip II to
Isabella and Albrecht required that they revert to Spain if the
couple had no children.
They
had none.
Rubens, Philip II of Spain Berating William the Silent, Prince of Orange
In
Spain, King Philip III, Isabella’s
half-brother, was willing to extend the truces. He demanded that the
Dutch restore free access to the Scheldt. Overriding violent
objections from Amsterdam, the Dutch might have met this price, but
Philip added a demand: they must withdraw from the lucrative East and
West Indies. That was too much.
During
the abortive negotiations, Philip III died and was succeeded by his
son, Philip IV, but nothing changed, except that just then up in
Belgium Duke Albrecht died. Archduchess Isabella was left as the sole
ruler of her country.
Philip
IV promptly dispatched his Spanish troops — and over them an
Italian commanding general, Ambrogio Spinola, in Rubens’s
words, “the most prudent and sagacious man I have ever known”
to occupy her lands.
Poor
Isabella! From her Coudenborg Palace she needed to keep tabs on
Olivares in Madrid, Buckingham in London, and Richelieu in Paris.
Small wonder she needed the diplomatic genius of Rubens to tell her
what was going on. Thus again Peter Paul was hauled into the vortex
of Europe’s deepest machinations.
Feelings
in France towards the Netherlands questions were unstable. So
Isabella gave Rubens an exit visa so he could go to Paris to take
charge of decorating the new Luxembourg Palace. Marie de’Medici,
whose proxy wedding he had attended with Vincenzo, too, was now a
widow. Henry IV had been assassinated.
From
Isabella Rubens delivered a small dog wearing a necklace of 24
enameled plates.
Rubens
carried out a series of 22 huge allegorical paintings depicting
Marie’s life. Much of the work actually was done in his Antwerp
studio. The queen's advisor, the Abbe of St. Ambroise, publicly
declared, “Two painters of Italy could not carry out in ten
years what Rubens would do in four.”
During
the period the artist was in constant and intimate contact with
Marie, but, the lesson of his father in his mind, he fell into no
compromising situation. While he was readily accepted in the French
intellectual community, Cardinal Richelieu knew he was a political
emissary from Spanish Netherlands.
In
order to build up the weak French monarchy, Richelieu was undermining
Habsburg influence by every means possible. He secretly subsidized
Protestant powers and made treaties with England, Denmark, and even
the Dutch Republic. So Rubens was constantly overwhelmed by secret
directives to find out what was going on and to work for peace
between the two Low Country kingdoms.
Intrigue
made use of many people. Rubens met and exploited Jacques Fauguières
of Antwerp, an adventurous landscapist who traveled widely in Italy
and Germany and became the chamberlain of France’s Louis XIII.
He was engaged to paint backgrounds for some of Rubens’s
Luxembourg series, and it is quite likely Fauguières painted a
few clandestine “Rubens” himself.
He
was useful as an informant, but he was
difficult to handle because he had an irascible temper — and
always kept a sharp sword on his easels!
Fahry
Peiresc, whom Rubens had met in Padua, a nobleman from Aix, became
his closest friend. He had good inside sources in Paris. The agent
for both men was an engraver from Antwerp, one Melchior Tavernier,
"Dealer and Printer in Ordinary to the King,” who was
close to Richelieu By selling prints and engravings, he had his own
valuable entrees.
At
one time to cut down on Rubens’s influence while he was out of
Paris, rumor was spread that he was dead. Peiresse said “ ...
that Pearl of Honor ... there was not a more amiable soul in the
world than Rubens.”
Efforts
had been made to mate Charles I of England with the sister of Philip
IV of Spain, but these negotiations failed. So Charles decided he
could lie contentedly with France’s Princess Henrietta Maria —
no sacrifice could be too great for country. The wedding was to be
celebrated by proxy in Paris. The Duke of Buckingham, the favorite of
King Charles, came to Paris to escort the virgin bride back to
London.
Under
the ruse of portrait painting, Rubens arranged meetings with
Buckingham and urged upon him the wisdom of a Dutch reconciliation.
Incompetent, capricious, arrogant, narcissistic, the duke was called
“the most beautiful man in England." But the art-loving
duke yearned for a hot war with Spain.
Buckingham
also tried to devise a scheme to steal the Mona
Lisa. But he yielded to Ruben’s
adroit arguments to continue in negotiation with
Spain through Rubens.
The
duke had working for hin another painter-spy, a Flemish
intriguer of less rigorous honesty named Balthasar
Gerbier, who also bought and sold art when he wasn't playing or
painting credible miniatures. Gerbier traveled about Holland buying
pictures for Buckingham’s collection.
No
sooner was Rubens back in Antwerp than Isabella and friends won
military victory at Breda, and the opposition, playing for time, let
her know that negotiations might be possible. Off Peter Paul went
diplomatically again ... but Buckingham’s
fleet attacked Cadiz, and an England-Northern Provinces compact
against Spain was sealed.
Rubens, The Duke of Buckingham
However
disconsolate Rubens felt over the renewal of hostilities — a
depression made worse by the death of his wife from the plague that
swept Antwerp — he did not fade away from diplomatic
involvement. Channels with England were still open.
Gerbier
arranged for Rubens to sell his large collection of statues, coins,
antiquities, and gems to Buckingham for 100,000 florins. Rubens threw
thirteen of his paintings into the bargain.
Rubens
paid ten percent of this to an agent in England for the King of
Sweden — sales commission, a payoff, or a bribe?
The
artist certainly did not need the money, but he did need cover to
see Buckingham again to kick around ideas for restoring
Anglo-Spanish peace.
Isabella
and General Spinola wanted peace, but the Spanish king
certainly did not. (Spinola often remarked that
Rubens had so many talents that painting seemed the least of them.)
Rubens believed peace overtures would have to come
from England.
Conditions
in Antwerp were desperate. While the Spanish did win land battles,
the Dutch tightened their control of the sea. Unemployment was
widespread — except in the Rubens factory — and grass
grew in Antwerp’s deserted streets.
In
1627 Rubens obtained a passport to go to Holland to defend his right
as an artist against the fraudulent production of unauthorized
engravings of his work. The cover permitted him to see Gerbier and
to renew contact with his old friend Dudley Carleton, the English
ambassador to the Hague.
Diplomatically
the trip was a failure.
Interestingly,
in this same year the impoverished Vincenzo II was forced
to sell his entire Mantua art collection to King Charles in England,
one of the largest art transactions in history. With it went the
innumerable copies done by Rubens and other artists.
One
more year — and Richelieu found himself overwhelmed with the
Protestant revolt at home. He quickly smoked a
peace pipe with Spain, but Philip IV nonetheless wasted no trust on
the cardinal. Since Rubens was the expert on England, Philip
summoned him to Madrid, where Rubens negotiated
with his left hand and copied Titian with his right.
Pachecco
says Rubens at this time copied all
70 Titians in the royal palace. He
was always eager to discover secrets of his craft, and the way to do
so was to pit his wits against the original
creator and match his achievement.
(When
Rubens died, many of his copies painted in
Italy and Spain were found in his home but cannot now be traced. His
collection is known to have contained thirty of the replicas of
Titian he painted and ten other pictures actually attributed to
Titian. Some of the Rubens copies must hang here and there in the
world wrongfully attributed to the Italian master.)
The
political story gets stickier — but is still relevant.
Rubens
expounded his views first to Gaspar de Guzman, the Count of
Olivares, and then to King Philip IV. Gerbier materialized —
and then came news Buckingham had been assassinated. (His widow
subsequently disposed of much of the Buckingham art collection on
the Antwerp Friday Market.)
The
Dutch whipped the Spanish fleet off Cuba. Then the Protestants and
the English in La Rochelle capitulated to Richelieu, and the
Huguenot war was over. France’s alliance with Spain became
excess baggage. For Spain, peace with England was necessary, but the
idle young king blindly followed a corrupt administration dominated
by the psychotic, death-wishing Olivares, who frequently lay down in
a coffin surrounded by monks chanting De
Profundis.
After
six months Philip decided — really too late — to send
Rubens as head of a peace mission to London. Because Peter Paul was
not of the nobility, the haughty Spaniards sent him off officially
as Isabella’s envoy and as secretary to the Royal Council, a
title manufactured for Rubens in the best public relations fashion.
As
a mark of personal esteem, however, Philip IV gave Rubens a ring
worth 2000 ducats.
Rubens
made the trip via Bruxelles and Antwerp. He had to gather
intelligence from Isabella, needed to check up on the work of all
his painters, to make sure they were executing in the Rubens manner,
to retouch various canvases, and to sign his name in appropriate
places.
In
England he got on well with King Charles and was welcomed as a
renowned painter, but was driven to the best of his wits by the
opposition of ambassadors from France, Holland, and Venice, all of
whom were anxious to prevent reconciliation.
King
Charles agreed with Rubens to make peace with Spain — but he
was then confronted by Albert Joachim, the Dutch ambassador, and for
the first time he learned just how implacable was Holland’s
hatred for Spain. Reunification of the 17 provinces would only be on
Holland’s terms. His efforts were of little use.
England
and Spain would cease war, and that was a brilliant diplomatic
success; yet Rubens left without a reunification treaty ... but not
without the esteem of England. Cambridge bestowed on him a Master of
Arts, and King Charles knighted him and gave him a costly sword,
ring, and diamond hatband.
Rubens
was no sooner home than he was called to France by Dowager Marie de
Médici (French spelling) and caught once more by his old and
unfortunate loyalty in her abortive efforts to depose her son from
the French throne, Richelieu with him. Exiled, she never ceased
plotting. Ironically, she died in Cologne in the way house that had
sheltered Marie Pypelinex, Rubens’s mother.
Cardinal
Richelieu was contemptuous of Rubens’s meddling but not
vindictive. Permitted to return to Belgium, Rubens continued in
secret negotiations on behalf of Isabella for reunification until
she died in 1633.
Since
there was no Albrecht-Isabella heir to wear the tiara, the younger
brother of Philip IV, ex-Cardinal Ferdinand, was named to take
his aunt's place as the Belgian head of state.
For his Day of Joyous Entry into the city, the Antwerp Town Council
decreed that festivities should exceed those thrown for Albrecht and
Isabella 35 years earlier.
The
direction and planning, particularly of the theaters and triumphal
arches, were given to Rubens. Depictions, dramatic and plastic, not
only honored Ferdinand but called his attention to the plight of
blockaded Antwerp.
Fireworks
were shot off from the cathedral tower to a fanfare of trumpets and
cannon as the procession moved from display to display, with a
troupe of musicians at each.
After
the processions each night there was Rubenesque eating and drinking,
although Peter Paul was ill abed. Ferdinand had such a great time
he concluded, happily perhaps, “The people here live like
beasts.”
Rubens’s
eight-day extravaganza was characteristically prodigious and way
over budget.
Released
from incessant diplomatic maneuvering, Rubens could turn much of his
energies for his remaining six of seven years painting.
A
few months after returning from England he married a beautiful
teenage girl, Helene Froment, whose lush, robust, firm, translucent,
rosy flesh he immortalized.
Rubens, Portrait of Helene Froument
Even
so, suffering from gout, he considered himself old and beyond
creative capacity. But his studio was busy. Eight months after he
died, in his 63rd
year, he became a father for the last time.
So
great and widespread had grown Rubens reputation, so admired
was his
art, that he became more copied, counterfeited, imitated,
plagiarised, and faked than any artist in history until that time.
Sometimes he was guilty of forgery of his own works.
In
Memoires
published in 1729, Campo Weijermann painted a grim but undoubtedly
true picture: “Thousands of pictures have been painted from
engravings by Rubens and still are today, by the Friday Market men
of Antwerp, who produce paintings as a sow gives birth to a litter
of pigs, and where bogus canvases are passed off as the genuine work
of Rubens. These outrageous fakes are still in circulation among a
host of dealers, who are leading a comfortable, lazy life of ease as
a result of the fictitious use of that great master’s name.”
Lawrence Jeppson is an art consultant, organizer and curator of art exhibitions, writer, editor
and publisher, lecturer, art historian, and appraiser. He is America's leading authority on
modern, handwoven French tapestries. He is expert on the works of William Henry Clapp, Nat
Leeb, Tsing-fang Chen, and several French artists.
He is founding president of the non-profit Mathieu Matégot Foundation for Contemporary
Tapestry, whose purview encompasses all 20th-century tapestry, an interest that traces back to
1948. For many years he represented the Association des Peintres-Cartonniers de Tapisserie and
Arelis in America.
Through the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, the American Federation of
Arts, the Museum of Modern Art, and his own Art Circuit Services he has been a contributor to
or organizer of more than 200 art exhibitions in the United States, Canada, Japan, and Taiwan.
He owns AcroEditions, which publishes and/or distributes multiple-original art. He was co-founder and artistic director of Collectors' Investment Fund.
He is the director of the Spring Arts Foundation; Utah Cultural Arts Foundation, and the Fine
Arts Legacy Foundation
Lawrence is an early-in-the-month home teacher, whose beat is by elevator. In addition, he has spent the past six years hosting and promoting reunions of the missionaries who served in the French Mission (France, Belgium, and Switzerland) during the decade after WWII.