weather. On the whole, though, he was an artist whose
careful, refined, finished pictures always were an ornament
to the exhibitions--which cannot be said of many of the
paintings of the period under discussion.

Such a period of stagnation as the early seventies has
never been known before or since in Danish art. Three-
quarters or more of the painting had become landscape.
And what did it amount to? What there had been of in-
spiration, or at least of warmth, had sunk to tepid routine.
Tenseness had been succeeded by the relaxation of all ardor
and energy in the treatment of nature, to which for twenty
years previous every effort of Danish art had been devoted.
Debility had spread far and wide. Art had become a leis-
ure occupation, a domestic pastime, a handicraft.

While Danish art was in this state, French art had made
tremendous strides. On the one hand, there were the new
requirements for the rendering of material objects imposed
by the cry for "realism;" on the other, there were the fugi-
tive color effects, which French artists felt bound to fix
still living on their canvas. The term "impressionism" was
already on men's lips. Both of these new methods de-
manded ability, especially in execution, of a degree un-
dreamed of in Denmark. In France men had attained the
necessary skill by various means, among others by a
thorough study of the old Spanish masters, Ribera, and,
particularly, Velazquez, "le peintre le plus peintre qui ne fût
jamais." Thus a real, true art of painting had grown up
in France with the emphasis on carefully worked-out color
schemes, while in Denmark the painters were still content
merely to cover the canvas with colors.

There were some people in Denmark, however, even
before the Universal Exposition of 1878, whose eyes had
been opened to the advantages to be gained by young paint-
ers from a journey to Paris. From 1877-1878 on, the city
on the Seine became the meeting-place, as Rome had been
before. For the second time Danish art was regenerated
by contact with French. What David had been to Eckers-
berg, Bonnat was to be to Kröyer and Tuxen.

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