Da n fel ,Vichola us Citodazirck, a native of Dantzic, was born in 1726 and died in Berlin in 1Soi. He was one of the chief miniature-paint ers of an age in which this art was carried to a degree of excellence never since surpassed. Chodoviecki had the good luck to be the son of a merchant in easy circumstances, himself an amateur miniaturist, and thus every facility was afforded him for the pursuit of art. After follow ing this branch of painting for several years he abandoned it for etching, in which he became even more successful. It is said that he executed upward of two thousand etchings, representing scenes from every-day life, often with a satirical turn that won for him the title of "The Hogarth of Berlin." Among other honors, he was named director of the Academy of Arts at Berlin.
Maria Angelica Kallfillal111, although a native of Germany, became so identified with the British school of that period as a member of the Royal Academy that she has been more particularly described in the section on British art.
n Ion Raphael .1Iengs. —We might go on to speak of such mediocre artists as Anton Graff (1774-1S32), Christian Bernard Rode (1725-1797), and others, were their merits sufficient to call for description in our limited space; but we must proceed to a discussion of the career of Anton Raphael Mengs, altogether the most considerable figure in the history of German painting in the eighteenth century. Although much of his life was passed in other lands, he may justly be considered a German painter. Mengs was born at Aussig, in Bohemia, in 172S, and died at Rome in 1778. His father was a miniature-painter whose devotion to art induced him to name his son after Corrcggio and Sanzio. Mengs was thus called from his baptism to tread in the footsteps of the great artists whose names he bore.
In childhood Mengs was taken to Dresden to study the paintings of the royal galleries, and at thirteen was placed in the schools of Rome. It is to these early influences that we owe the bias which guided the art of Mengs. He was not in any sense great as were the men whose colossal genius produced the wonderful achievements of the Italian Renaissance, but his scholarly mind and his reverence for the masters led him to follow in their steps with a dignity that commands respect, and inspired him repeatedly to produce works that are in advance of anything in the region of " high art " painted during that period. Ile was probably the greatest painter of continental art in the eighteenth century.
In 17.1.1, Mengs returned to Germany and was appointed conrt-painter to the king of Saxony, and painted a Holv Family, one of his best works.
Returning to Rome, lie painted for Lord Percy a fine copy of Raphael's School /kens and began to paint in fresco. One of his most ful works with this medium was the Apollo a ml The ,1 ses in the Villa Mengs was after this invited to Madrid, where at different periods he passed several years and decorated the royal palaces. The Apotheosis Trajan on the ceiling of the royal banqueting-hall at Madrid is one of the noblest art-creations of the century. His style was large and noble, and he had a fine feeling for ideal beauty. Refined in taste, he lacked creative individuality, as is shown even by his best work, Parnassus (pl. 50, fig. r), painted in fresco upon a ceiling of the Villa Albani at Rome. The picture is pleasing by its brightness of tone and the clear arrangement of the composition, but the Apollo reminds us of the Belvedere statue,. the Muses are imitations of Greek art and of Raphael. If he had not begun to paint in miniature, it is probable that there would have been more freedom and grandeur in his large compositions. As it is, he served to bridge over the otherwise unimportant interval between the earlier and the later periods of German painting.
Asmus Jacob Carstens, the true reformer of German art, was more profound and more original. He continued the good work of Mengs in keeping alive a feeling for genuine art in Germany, and, more than any other painter of that period, probably, led the way to the revival of German painting in the following period. He was born in Sleswick in 1754 and died at Rome in 1798. The early years of Carstens were not favorable to the pursuit of art. His father, a miller, died when the child was nine years old, and his mother, who took pride in his precocious talents, died soon after. The guardians of the lad apprenticed him for seven years to a wine-merchant. By great exertion the youth saved enough to purchase exemption from the last two years of his apprentice ship, and went to Copenhagen. He there earned a living by drawing portraits in red chalk, and attracted attention by ideal compositions sug gested by national legends, such as the Death of Balder. He then worked his way as far as 'Mantua, where he studied the works of Giulio Romano. Returning to Liibeck and resuming portrait-painting, he was enabled after a time, through his carefully-painted Fall of the Angels, to enter the Academy at Berlin, and eventually he received from the king a travelling pension which carried him to Rome. There, as a result of the study of the masters, Carstens produced his greatest work, Visit of the Aigonauts to the Centaur Chiron.