'Zoo kunstenaar, zoo atelier.' De weergave van het atelier in Elsevier's Geïllustreerd Maandschrift (1891-1897)

Abstract

According to nineteenth-century convictions, the studio reflected the soul of the artist. In the 1850s reporters started to write about visits to artists' studios. Every month, the Dutch magazine Elsevier's Geïllustreerd Maandschrift published a story about a visit to the studio of an artist from the The Hague School. The aim of this article is to define what the editorial views were during the first seven years of its publication (1891-1898) on the relation between the artist and his studio. Like Emile Zola, the editors of Elsevier's believed that an artist's disposition is manifest in his work. And because the studio was supposed to reflect this disposition, they believed a description or depiction of an artist's studio would provide insight in his personality and work. Thus, an account of a visit to an artist's studio satisfied the curiosity of the public about the artist's 'true nature'. According to Elsevier's, an artist's studio embodied his personality: 'Like studio, like artist'.