Theatre Gymnase, Paris. Never before nor since that
pictorial performance did the wonderful Kobold of German art attain
such mellowness. Just as he had been under the influence of Courbet
when he painted his big iron forge picture--which, with the French
theatre subject, hangs in the National Gallery, Berlin--so he felt in
the latter the impact of the new Impressionistic school with its
devotion to pure colour, air, and rhythm. Max Liebermann was best seen
in his Flax Spinners of Laren, an early work, Dutch in spirit and
execution, and not without traces of the influence of his friend Josef
Israels. But of the real Liebermann, his scope, originality,
versatility, America, I think, has not yet had an adequate idea.

Versatility is commonly regarded as an indication of superficiality.
How, asks Mr. Worldly Wiseman, can that fellow Admirable Crichton do
so many things so well when it takes all my time to do one thing
badly? Therefore he must be regarded suspiciously. Now, there are no
short cuts in the domain of the arts; Gradus ad Parnassum is always
steep. But, given by nature a certain kind of temperament in which
curiosity is doubled by mental energy, and you may achieve
versatility. Versatility is often mainly an affair of energy, of
prolonged industry. The majority of artists do one thing well, and for
the remainder of their career repeat themselves. When Flaubert wrote
Madame Bovary his admirers demanded a replica and were disappointed
with Salammbo, with Sentimental Education, above all, with The
Temptation of St. Anthony and Bouvard and Pecuchet. Being a creative
genius, Flaubert taught himself to be versatile. Only through
self-discipline, did he achieve his scheme, beside which the writing
of the Human Comedy cannot be compared. There is more thought-stuff
packed in his five masterpieces, apart from the supreme art, than in
whole libraries: quality triumphing over quantity.

Greatly endowed by nature, by reason of his racial origin, and because
of his liberal education, Liebermann was bound to become a versatile
artist. That doesn't mean he is a perfectionist in many things, that
he etches as well as he paints, that he composes as well as he draws.
As a matter of fact he is not as accomplished a master of the medium
as is Anders Zorn; many a smaller man, artistically speaking, handles
the needle with more deftness than Liebermann. But as a general
impression counts as much as technique, your little etcher is s