ART.
THE ROYAL INSTITUTE OF PAINTERS IN WATER- COLOURS.
[PIM NOTICE.] Taa exhibitions of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water- Colours steadily increase in importance; and the present one is remarkable for the high average of the work exhibited, rather than for isolated examples of special merit. A certain amount of rubbish is present, indeed, as always must be the case in a large exhibition where the contributors are not limited to the members of a given Society. At the present time, this Gallery stands in the same relation to water-colour art, as the Academy stands to the art of oil-painting ; and it is to be noted, that even members of the Royal Society of Painters in Water-Colours seem to recognise this fact, for its members occasionally send contributions to the Institute exhibitions.
But perhaps the greatest difference between the galleries of the Royal Institute and the Royal Society, is the difference in the intellectual and emotional aspect of the pictures shown therein,—those of the Old Society being more restricted, more conventional, and more respectable in their sentiments ; while the subjects which the Institute men choose, and the way in which they regard them, are more modern, less English, and less irreproachable in their character. There are not wanting in each Society, artists who display the characteristics which mark the rival exhibition; as, for instance, Mr. Wainwright, Mr. North, and Mr. Albert Goodwin in the Royal Society; and Mr. Wimperis, Mr. Collier, and Mr. Edwin Hayes in the Institute. But, for the most part, the young men, those of them at all events who are abreast of the newer artistic developments of the time, join the latter exhibition as members, or exhibit there as outsiders ; the mere fact that the Royal Society does not admit any outside exhibitors, prevents it from acquiring any examples of the incompletely skilful but rapidly developing talent in painters who have not yet become distinctly famous.
So much was necessary to say in justice to the newer Gallery, which is showing itself a real friend to artists, in the liberality of its action towards those who most need help,—those, that is to say, who are fighting an uphill battle against conven- tionality, and the weight of established reputations.
Let us now turn to the pictures, and in this first notice give a brief glance at the Gallery as a whole, taking the pictures as nearly as possible in the catalogue order. First, let us mention two studies by comparatively little-known artiste,—the figure of a peasant by Mr. Harry Becker, soberly and carefully drawn ; and a seascape by Mr. A. E. Elmslie, of a boat on the side of a " climbing wave," in which a man has fallen overboard, and one of the Bailors is leaning over the gunwale in the at- tempt to rescue him. The last-named little unpretentious picture is chiefly notable for the impression which the artist has succeeded in conveying, of the mass and the power of the water. We feel that there is a whole sea behind the wave which alone is visible, and great depths of green water below the boat and the sinking man. Near this hangs a cool, wide landscape by Mr. Joseph Knight, full of rest and stillness, broad spaces of air, and long stretches of field and woodland. Indeed, it is chiefly in this latter respect that Mr. Knight's picture is admirable,—for its atmosphere and distance. We look at the landscape, with a feeling of security that the artist will lead our eye rightly from incident to incident, till he lands us at last, without sense of abrupt transition, in the bright, misty vistas of his clouds. And here a word should he given to the painter who in this matter of atmosphere, bears off the honours of the present exhibition,—Mr. E. M. Wimperis. We will not speak at length of his large picture, but ask our readers to look for proof of the above praise at No. 638, a wide expanse of sandy
shore at low tide, overhung by a grey sky, heavy with im- pending rain. In many respects this picture rivals the work of the late David Cox,—rivals, that is, the work of the- artist who painted the atmosphere and the aspect of rainy skies, better than any artist that ever lived. In respect of colour, however, Mr. Wimperis does not compare favourably with his predecessor; his tints are, as a rule, at once thin and rather hard. We mean that they lack the soft gradation. and the depth of Nature. In the present work this defect is scarcely visible ; and we feel inclined to say that this is the most admirable landscape in the exhibition ; it is, at all events, the one which approaches moat nearly the work of our greatest English landscape-painters.
Contrast with this, Mr. Alfred Parson's sunny meadow over- spread with great trees of flowering hawthorn, and thickly sown with cowslips. The spirit of this composition—or perhaps we should rather say, the artistic method as well as the aim of the- painter—is entirely modern. The subject is within the narrowest compass ; the details, though treated broadly, are insisted upon individually rather than given in their general effect. The trans- parency of the old water-colour work has entirely vanished, and been replaced by a thick plaster impute, which gives a puddingy quality to the painting, and suggests that the colour has been stirred up with a spoon, or mixed, like mortar, with a trowel. Combined with this there is, nevertheless, moat beautiful and. dexterous work, thoroughly skilful after its lights, and executed with mingled precision and freedom. The drawing, for instance, of flower, leaf, and branch is admirable; the amount of indi- vidual truth very considerable ; the effect of the whole genuinely artistic and pleasant to look upon. The difference is, that the painting is above all things self-conscious, in a manner from which the older painting was entirely free. It is almost impos- sible to look at this picture without thinking that it is by Mr.. Alfred Parsons, and admiring the dexterity of his handiwork ;, it is almost impossible to look at Mr. Wimperis's landscape. without being taken in fancy to the broad shore and rainy sky which form the subject. The first brings us face to face with the artist ; the second, face to face with Nature.
Before we proceed to works which call for lengthened' criticism, we must call attention to a pretty little picture of two blue-tits (or axe they humming-birds?) by Miss E. Cooper, which seems to be delicately painted, though, unfortunately, it is hung too high for us to speak with confidence in this respect;. and a carefully drawn group of "Relics," by Miss Ellen San- ford, which are pleasant in colour and delicately worked, but need the usual requisite of student's work,—namely, that greater attention should be paid to the "values."
We will now speak of the drawing which, in our opinion, is the most successful in the exhibition, considering that it is by a comparatively little-known artist, that it deals with a subject of ordinary city life in which many of us would have found no beauty, and that nevertheless it succeeds in making the subject in question beautiful, interesting, and, in a sense, dramatic. This is Mr. Alfred East's " New Neighbourhood "—a picture of the corner of a new road, with freshly planted saplings fenced round from the boys in the neighbourhood, and unfinished houses rising here and there drearily out of the snow. It is twilight on a dark winter's day, and the snow lies heavy on the ground, the roofs, and the scaffolding-poles of the " new neighbourhood!' Technically speaking, this is an admirable piece of finishedi water-colour drawing. But the picture's chief merit lies in the intellectual and dramatic conception of the artist, which manages to convey to the spectator the protest of Nature against this fresh invasion at the hands of man. We thank Mr. East heartily for one more proof that modern life offers in its moat essential characteristics, as fine subjects to the artist who has the eyes to- see, the brains to understand, and the heart to feel them, as any bygone and more easily picturesque period of civilisation.
Alas ! many artists, if we are to judge them by their worlr, have neither the brains nor the heart, or they would scarcely give us such pictures as Mr. Topham's " Recruiting for Savonarola," in which we hardly know whether the staring colour, the postage-stamp-in-the-middle-of-the-envelope style of composition, the utter absence of meaning or intention in the faces, or the washy, unreal dexterity of the painting, is the least admirable. There is no need, however, to linger over such a work, still less over Mr. F. S. Morgan's very correctly dressed young lady, who, with a striped shawl on the back of her chair, a Japanese vase of flowers on an Arab table in front of her, and a guitar posed negligently in the corner of the
picture, site to prove to us, by the contrast of herself and her surroundings to the flowers which she is in the act of arranging, how very superior " Fashion " is to Nature.
We will rather turn to subjects of a very different kind, and by a painter of far greater ability, Mr. W. Langley, who has this year made a great advance upon his previous water-colour achievements, and has two pictures in this exhibition,—one of a reaper and his daughter returning homeward at the close of the day; and the other, which he has entitled " Betrayed," of a woman with a baby and a bundle, passing down the village- street in the twilight, while the children and the gossips in the background, regard her scornfully or curiously. Both pictures are admirable specimens of water-colour painting in transparent colour. We believe that since the death of that group of artists of whom Fred. Walker was perhaps the chief, there has been no painter who has come quite so near their idyllic sentiment as Mr. Langley. For instance, in both the above-named pictures, there is not only a distinct emotional quality, but there is also a largeness of gesture, and a sense of dignity of man or woman- hood, which is perhaps the most vital requisite in these idyllic compositions. Mr. Langley's figures are real men and women; it needs an effort to think of them as models. Artists frequently of more matured technical powers fail in this respect, as may be seen, for instance, in the important picture by the President, Sir James Linton, representing "The Studio of Albert Wirer visited by the Emperor Maximilian." This drawing, as a finished work of water-colour, can scarcely, perhaps, be surpassed in the dexterity of its brush-work, and its rich yet sober colouring. Yet, despite the clever and harmonious grouping, and an almost perfect realisation of detail, the figures in the tableau are not alive, and consequently do not interest us. They may be like the people; they are not the people themselves.
And since we are on the question of living folks, and clothes- props fashioned more or less speciously in their semblance, let us turn to Mrs. Evelyn de Morgan's (better known as Miss Evelyn Pickering) "Hero Watching for Leander," a woman who—with one knee on an impossible rock, placed in front of a palpably card-box city, washed by a sea whose waves have no resemblance to those of any possible ocean—waves a torch to attract her unfortunate lover to her feet. Here we see undeniable feeling, undeniable ability, undeniable patient, and, of its kind, dexterous work,—all utterly wasted because the young lady who possesses them has been so extremely unfortunate as to become acquainted with Mr. Burne-Jones and Mr. Spencer Stanhope. Of course, we do not mean personally acquainted, but acquainted in the sense of having grown to admire and imitate their work. The conse- quence is that, in endeavouring to see the world through their eyes, the artist has become incapable of recognising its simplest facts. These paintings of hers—beautiful as they so nearly are, refined and delicate as they do succeed in being—are never- theless intellectually and artistically feeble and flat, echoes of echoes ; not even owing their eccentricities to the idiosyncrasies of the artist who produced them.
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