Gari Melchers: Painting Worship

"The Sermon" by Gari Melchers . (62 ⁵⁄₈" x  86 ¹⁄₂ ")

"The most important of Gari Melchers' early Dutch paintings are a group of large canvases depicting local townspeople at worship. Numerous preliminary sketches and studies in oil provide evidence of the care taken with each work. Their significance was recognized by his contemporaries and the works enjoyed success in the juried shows to which they were submitted. 

'The Sermon' received honorable mention in the Paris Salon of 1886 and won Melchers the First-Class Gold Medal at Amsterdam the same year. In 1888 'The Sermon' also won a First-Class Gold Medal at Munich. This painting, two other works, and 'The Communion' were exhibited in the Paris Universal Exposition of 1889; the latter won the Grand Prize for American painting, an honor which Melchers shared with no less a figure than John Singer Sargent.

The formal and narrative focus of 'The Sermon' is the stooped-over young woman who slumbers in a chair in the center foreground, and the older woman to her right who turns to look at her. By featuring the young woman's completely human reaction to the homily, Melchers avoids any religious sentimentality that might diminish the power of this candidly realistic scene.

In the sketch the artist employed generalized forms in order to work out the overall composition. He did, however, finish in detail the facial features of the woman on the extreme right, finding it useful to bring at least one figure to completion even at an early stage in the work process. 

A comparison of the sketch and final version reveals that Melchers adjusted both the color scheme and composition in the finished painting. He changed the color of the dress of the turning woman from blue to green and brightened the hue of the box pew. He eliminated the hanging oil lamp, a detail present in the earlier work. These adjustments reveal that, although a realist, Melchers did not strive just to represent his subjects exactly as they appeared but worked with composition and color to simplify and clarify design."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Gari Melchers: His Life and Art" by Joseph G. Dreiss.)