David Teniers II's Theatre
of Imitation
Joanna Woodall,
Courtauld Institute
David Teniers II's
small copies in oil afer the Italian pictures of his
patron, the Archduke Leopold Wilhelm, form the primary
focus of this paper. My discussion is concerned with
the values that can be attached to these little works
during a period in which the status of the copy was
contested, as an aspect of the broader crisis in visual
representation articulated by iconoclasm. On one hand,
there was a concept of the copy derived from the icon,
in which the authority of the sacred model is disseminated
through faithful imitation. On the other, there was
the emergent, 'modern' view of the copy as an empty,
mechanical reproduction opposed to a unique, authored
original.
Teniers's copies have
been discussed largely in terms of the mechanical
process whereby their Italian models were repoduced
in the prints illustrating the Theatrum Pictorium, the catalogue of the Archduke's collections published
in 1658-60. My paper begins by substantiating this
explanation, using research on a collection of fourteen
Teniers copies in the Courtauld Institute Galleries.
This investigation was undertaken by Helen Smith for
her 1998 Final Year Project in the Institute's Department
of Conservation and will be published here with her
kind permission and approval. Material features of
the copies, such as the presence of regularly spaced
pin-holes and inscriptions visible in infra-red light,
elucidate their role in producing the Theatrum illustrations.
Yet close attention
to the material and visual properties of the copies
raises as many questions as it answers, in that some
features of Teniers's works seem irrelevant to the
task of transforming their painted models into prints.
For instance, their duplication of the colors of the
originals seems at best superfluous and at worst a
hindrance to the production of the spare graphic language
of the etched and engraved Theatrum illustrations.
Compare, for example, the grisailles produced
by Rubens in preparation for prints. Secondly, the
distinctive technique and style of the copies, which
are consistently identifiable with Teniers rather
than referring to his Italian models, are difficult
to explain exclusively as a means of producing transparent
reproductions. Furthermore, the high quality and preservation
of the copies, which suggest that they are autograph,
indicate that they were invested with significance
beyond their technical use in translating a design
from one place to another. Far from being empty copies,
they begin to acquire the character of the oil sketch,
replete with the value of an author intimately and
creatively engaged with the subject or object of his
interest.
The engagement here
is with Italy, and my paper argues that the sketch-like
character of the copies places Teniers not in the
realm of mechanical reproduction but amongst the ambitious
northern painters for whom a personal dialogue with
this locus of authority was a way of defining their
own art. Teniers's extraordinary group of paintings
of Leopold Wilhelm's collection, which show mostly
Italian works, can be seen to enact a similar dialogue,
and there is a print in the Theatrum Pictorium which is extremely reminiscent of these compositions.
I suggest that, by personally imitating the world
of Italian art in all its material variety and specificity,
and by transporting this world into the symbolic spaces
of the Flemish connoisseur's cabinet, the Antwerp
artist's studio and finally the Theatrum Pictorium, a commemorative volume of prints published at his
own expense, Teniers 'translated' the prestigious
values associated with Italian art into his own, Netherlandish
terms of reference. This can be seen as part of his
effort to combine the position of a noble artist at
an international court with his identity as an Antwerp
citizen. It also raises broader questions about two
prevalent concepts of artists' relationship to established
models of authority: mindless subservience and progressive
supersedence. A
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