Historical
paintings are not necessarily bad, of course, but the good ones are
good despite the history, and a proof of their excellence consists in
the fact that when we see them they make us forget for the moment our
historical erudition.
This norm does not exclude from the sphere of painting the expression
of the relation of man to his fellows; it simply confines painting to
the delineation of momentary and self-sufficient glimpses of social
life. Pictures representing a mother and child, a pair of lovers, a
family group, festival, tavern scene, or battle charge are
illustrations. In Dutch painting the social life of Holland in the
seventeenth century found its record; yet there is little or no
anecdote. The genre, the representation of a group of people united
by some common interest and with an appropriate background, has the
same legitimacy, if not the same eminence, as the portrait. It does
not possess the rank of the portrait because, since the interest is
rather in the action or the situation portrayed, the figures are more
merely typical, being developed only so far as is necessary to carry
the action; seldom is a subtle and individualized inner life portrayed.
Objections are rightly raised, however, against pathetic, sentimental,
and moralistic painting. Here color and line, the whole picture in
fact, counts for little or nothing except to stir an emotion, usually
of grief or pity or love, or to preach a sermon; the unity of form and
content is sacrificed, the one becoming a mere means to the other.
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