ART.
[CONCLUDING NOTICE.]
IN this, our concluding notice of the Royal. Academy Exhibi- tion for 1881, we must begin with the mention of Mr. Luke Fildes' picture of "The Queen's Shilling" (408), in the fifth gallery. This is a large, oblong work, with many figures, chiefly of children, and a background representing an old-fashioned .country village. The title of the work is taken from the chief .figure, a stalwart, albeit, somewhat intoxicated rustic, who, having taken the shilling, and apparently expended the greater Tart of it in drink, is holding out a few coppers to a crowd of admiring children. The incident can hardly be taken to be a • particularly interesting or beautiful one, but it is well painted ; and there is a good deal of action in the various figures, though the chief one, that of the recruit, is, we think, very exaggerated. The chief fault of the picture is its excessive lack of all real !feeling ; it is one of the most unreal works in the Academy ; it is difficult to conceive that any group of people could interest us so little as do.the actors in this drama. For work which does not aim at the reproduction of emotion or dramatic interest of
any kind, or at the delineation of beautiful form, it. is diffi-cult to conceive of anything being much finer, than Mr. James
Linton's " Benediction" (428), in this room.. It represents a ..knight of the middle-ages receiving the Benediction of the . Church, on his return from battle. The background represents the altar-screen at St. Mark's, Venice. The' picture is full of ,good painting,—of painting, indeed, so very good, that it deserves special mention, the work being solid and elaborate, without .,pettiness, and indeed uniformly good throughout. The armour is particularly well-executed, and the careful modelling and draw- . ing of the faces affords a refreshing contrast to much of the wOrk which is considered "good enough" by the Academicians :themselves. Compare, for instance, in this particular, the work of Mr. Linton with that of Mr. Seymour Lucas, who has corn- „position of a somewhat similar kind (dealing, that is, with men- at-arms and costumes), on the other side of this gallery. This latter picture (354) represents an interview between Charles I. and two of the leading citizens of Gloucester, and is fall of rough ability ; but it can hardly be said to be painted at all. Except in the accessories, the faces, hands, Sm., of the figures 'are dabbed in with' clever suggestiveness, but have scarcely any definite form or texture. At a little distance, they give the Ampression. that is wanted ; viewed closely, they are shapeless and repulsive. But the point which we would wish our ..readers to notice most carefully about Mr. Linton's Work, is that it shows a quality very rare in English contem- porary painting, and that is the dignity of the painter's aim. .Me may be—we think he is—wrong in considering that the impersonal and undramatic style of art of which he gives us so many examples is the best form, but there can be no question . that in so thinking, he surrenders boldly all mean methods of tattraativsuess,—that he gives up almost all chance of vulgar
popularity,—and that by relying entirely upon the power of his artistic skill, he takes up a position which, if he is successful at all, will render his success as certain five hundred years hence as it is now. The difference between painting and Smudging is very commonly lost sight of by the public, but here, at least, we have a painter who aims at the most perfect technique which he can conceive, who bases his work upon that of the old Italian and Spanish masters, and who does actually succeed in'giving us something not altogether unworthy of such an ideal. There is a clever, sketchy, sea picture above this work of Mr. Linton"s, by Mr. Hope M`Lachlan (427), illustrative of a scene from Coleridge's "Ancient Mariner,” and showing qualities of imagination which are somewhat fare amongst the painters North of the Tweed.
In the South Gallery we find " Shrimpers : Boulogne," by Mr. L. P. Smythe, a pretty little sketch; three pictures of Royal Prin- cesses, by Mr. Robert A. Muller, as vgoodeny as anything in the exhibition ; a dozen or so very uninteresting works, and then we come to Mr. Brett's picture of the year, called " Golden Pro- spects." By the way, we must not forget to congratulate the Academy upon having at last had the courage to elect Mr. Brett as an Associate. After he has been one of the chief attractions of their exhibition for a dozen years, without recog- nition, it must be confessed that the recompense comes some- what late, and reminds us a little of Dr. Johnson's celebrated letter to Lord Chesterfield,—" Your recognition, my lord, had it been earlier, had been kind." The present picture of Mr. Brett's is hardly so attractive as most of its predecessors, but is, in our opinion, klmost more skilful. Its merits are the accustomed ones of reproducing breadth of sunshine, without losing sight of the innumerable details of nature, and of giving us a glimpse of some large expanse of country, sea, and cloud, with the most wonderful truth of atmospheric effect. The scene of this picture might be almost anywhere on the West Coast of England, and shows us high cliffs, along the edge of which stand huge, lichen-covered boulders, while beyond is seen a blue sea, rippling in the sun-light.
There are two foreign pictures in this room, both skied re- morselessly, which seem to be good, if one could only see them, and which are certainly both by men who are first-rate in their special line. These are the "Norwegian Harvest-field," by L. Munthe (454), and "A Gleam of Sunshine," by Carl Heffner (462). Mr. Keeley Halswelle has a fine, cold landscape, close to the latter of these, entitled, "After Rain," Mr. Rooke's " Devonshire Orchard" (468), Mr. G. A. Storey, A.'s "The Coral Necklace" (470), Mr. Marks, R.A.'s "Man of Law" (478), and Mr. Hook, R.A.'s "Past Work" (489), are all worthy of notice. Perhaps the most imaginative picture in this gallery is "The Pied Piper of Hamelin" (491), by Mr. J. S. Christie, .illustrating the moment, in Mr. Browning's poem, when the Piper is enticing the children away with his charmed music. This is one of the unpretentiously good works which make us hopeful of English Art. It has plenty of delicate painting, the drawing is careful and fairly, good throughout, and the artist has evidently felt his subject before he painted it. The Piper is a distinct con- ception of the character, the variations of expression in the child- ren's faces are extremely subtle, and the general grouping of the figures is natural and pleasing. We do not know whether Mr. Christie be a young man or not, but if lie be, and can do work like this now, he may, if he chooses, hope to fill the place which has been vacant since Pinwell, Mason, and Walker died. There is much of the true idyllic feeling which marked, though in so different a manner, the work of the above-named painters, ill this illustration of Mr. Christie's ; and if it errs at all; it .is rather on the side of reticence than •extravagance. We should have been almost better pleased if the work had been a little less subdued, both in colour and action. Two portraits in this gallery, by Mr, G. F. Watts, R.A., and Mr. Edwin Long, A., deserve notice (511, 509), as does a little landscape by Mr..F. Dicksee, called "The Monks' Walk."
In the seventh gallery there are two sea pictures by Mr. Walter. Shaw, of "Atlantic Rollers" (530), and "A Comber" (536), which show all the careful wave-drawing for which this artist is remarkable. The waves, too, are not only well drawn, but well painted, and the water is wonder- fully transparent. It is a pity that Mr. Shaw makes his skies so excessively conventional. These pictures would have been infinitely improved, had the clouds been drawn as carefully as the sea. Mr. A. Hunt's" Safe in the Mud " (529), shows the artist
dealing with another phase of Whitby life. Last year it was the churchyard, this year it is the harbour at low tide, with the various craft lying about," safe in the mud." The picture is very careful in its drawing and painting, and, albeit, a trifle sombre, has that touch of imagination that so frequently marks Mr. Hunt's work. There is a largish picture here by Miss Jessie Macgregor, illustrative of "The Mistletoe Bough" (551), which is somewhat out of place on the "line" at the Academy ; and immediately above it is a huge work, by Mr, Edward Armitage, ILA., of" Samson and the Lion," which is singularly unhappy in its conception. When we say that Samson is holding the lion up above his head, preparatory, we suppose, in the words of the quotation, to rending him," as he would have rent a kid," we have said sufficient to show that Mr. Armitage has taken a moment in which the sublime treads close upon the heels of the ridiculous, a lion held above a man's head by the scruff of the neck being an object not lightly to be conceived. As a matter of fact, we fear Mr. Armitage's picture will raise more laughter than admiration in its beholders. The "Fence and Quiet of Tregurriou " is a good oil sketch by Mr. Buxton Knight (576), and Carl Schloesser's " Duet" (583), shows good work, in a rather dull, foreign style. The cleverest picture in the room is C. Van Haanen's "Washerwomen, Venice" (589), a picture of two figures in a doorway, one steeping to wash some clothes, the other standing beside her, with her dress bound tightly round her limbs. This work is fine in colour, and the action of the figures is both strong and natural. N. Herbert Gandy's "Julian and. Camilla," a scene from Mr. Tennysoa's "Golden Supper," shows careful work, something in the manner of the late Mr. Poole, R.A.
There is little in the Water-colour Gallery of very especial merit, though there are numerous examples of good technical work. The fruit and flower painting especially is good, and Mr. B. W. Spiere's pictures of old books, prints, &c., leave abso- lutely nothing to be desired in point of execution. Mr. John O'Connor has a large distemper painting on canvas in this room, of "The Market-place at Verona" (562), which will repay examination, and which has a freshness and brightness very pleasant to the eye, though it lacks refinement of colouring. Mr. Edwin Buckman's decorative panel of Labour "is clever, —it represents a navvy pausing in his work. •
The two war pictures in the lecture-room, of " Candalmr " and " Rorke's Drift," by Mr. R. C. Woodville and Mrs. Butler (better known as Miss Thompson), are the principal centres of interest. Both, if the truth must be told, pass little beyond the province of newspaper illustrations, but in both there is con- siderable ability. Miss Thompson's work suffers from not giving. the main idea of the engagement in question, and rumour says that a certain great personage, for whom the pic- ture was painted, expressed her disappointment at there being so few Zulus in the composition,—whereupon Miss Thompson stuck a few. more into the corner of the picture. Whether this be true, or only ben trovato, certain it is that the English have most of the picture to themselves, and that their antagonists are rather huddled into a corner, and obscured with smoke. We feel for a lady who has to evolve Zulus out of her inner consciousness, but the mistake, perhaps, is less pardonable, as it was one of choice. For the rest, the picture is effective, but melodramatic, and about on a level, as far as painting goes, with M. Desange's pictures of the Crimean War. Mr. Woodville's is a better work, . if only because he has caught some of the spirit of the scene, and has not broken up his composition into two or three picturesque incidents. Indeed, this picture is full of action, and suffers chiefly from a rather hurried painting of the extremities, and a rather cold, glaring sort of colour. In this latter respect, Mrs. Butler's is by far the more powerful, but in all the essentials of composition and action, we think Mr. Woodville has easily
the best pi the comparison. •
We must close our notice of this year's exhibition with the mention of Mr. Robert Macbeth's large picture of." The Perry," one of the most meritorious English pictures in the exhibition. It represents a lot of peasants, labourers, and maidens, crossing a small stream, on one of the rough, wooden-stage ferry-boats which abound in the Pens. Tho figures are well drawn, grouped, and coloured, and the whole picture is ull'of life and pleasant colour.
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