Iiin 3rte.
ROYAL ACADEMY. Tnnan NOTICE.
Mucg of Mr. F. Leighton's work this year is replete with great beauty. In poetic feeling, the refinements of drawing, harmony. of lines in composition, and general. balance of parts, he may safely challenge comparison with any English painter. If he sometimes appears too academic, it is only because we are more accustomed to our
haphasard way of painting pictlites than to the more systematic course pursued by the continental schools in which Mr. Leighton has studied. His largest picture, " A Dream" (399), is the least satis- factory of any. The colour is lurid and sulphurous, and the head of the Saviour, as far as can be seen from below, is deficient in intellect and dignity. "Paolo e Francesca" (276) has a sensuous, not to say sensual, poetry of its own, but why the background, intensely, black, and wanting in air, should be made more prominent than the figures, is a point .which must be left to the painter to decide. 128 is a poritait of a lady in black bonnet and dress, very masterly in drawing, modelling, and expression. " Capri" (645) shows what can be done by this artist in landscape. mit it is in " Lieder ohne Worte" (550) that Mr. Leighton's powers are seen in perfection. This picture of a girl reclining in an attitude of voluptuous and dreamy indolence by a white marble fountain, the stillness only broken by the gurgling of the limpid water and the song of the bird, is a masterpiece of refine- ment. It has its faults, but it Charms in spite of them. One returns to it again and again with renewed. pleasure. It is not perhaps within a critic's province to speak of picture frames, yet I cannot help drawing attention to that which surrounds this work. The pure taste and inventiveness which it displays would almost imply that the painter had a hand in its design. The hangers have not been guilty of a crueler act this year than that of placing this beautiful picture at a height where its merits can be only partially seen. Mr. Wallis has a gorgeous assemblage Of colours, but little good colour in "Elaine" (492). The faces are emotionless and commonly painted.
i The best figure s the "clnmb old servitor," a Charon-like boatman. There is wondrous imitation of brooade and black satin, but the utter want of heart is painfully apparent. In " Gmidomar" (101), the Spanish ambassador watching from a window the execution of Sir Walter Raleigh on Tower-hill, Mr. Wallis is more himself. The figure, though turning its back to the gazer, is full of meaning, and the colouring rich without the garishness displayed in the " Elaine." Very beautiful is Mr. S. Solomon's " Hosanna" (493), a single figure of a young Jew playing a harp. The face is thoroughly national and full of reverential feeling. Great inventive skill is shown in the details of the background andthe ornamentation of the instrument. The colour is subtle and refined, shown particularly in the relief of
the white harp against drapery of approximate tint, and in the golden girdle and head-dress. The gracefulness of pose and action in this induce nduce the hope that Mr. Solomon has for ever bidden adieu to that grotesque quaintness which disfigured his earlierpictures. Mr. A. Solomon has a humorous scene from "Le MaIade Imaginaire" (464). M. Diafoirus and his son Thomas are feeling Argan's pulse. The elder doctor is excellent in character and expression, the younger scarcely realizes the pedantic simpleton of the play. The execution is coarsely vigorous, and the humour, perhaps, is a little wanting in refinement. 'Consolation" (180), by the same painter, represents a Sister of Mercy, pretty and quaintly simple in her gray robes and gigantic head-dress, standing by a. peasant woman whose loss is betokened by an empty cradle. More expressive action is needed in the nun, as whatever powers of consolation,she may possess she is certainly not exerting them now. Mr. A. Johnstone is rapidly becoming a mannerist and a manufacturer. "Bunyan in Bedford Gaol" (239) displays great dexterity of hand, but of a meretricious kind. Mr. Johnstone must be perfectly aware that the shadows of green dresses cannot, under any circumstances, be brown, yet he has been content so to represent them for a long period of years. The face of the daughter does not suggest that of a blind girl. She screws up her eyes with overacted energy. Tarn your back and she will open them directly. The most ambitious picture ever painted by Mr. Rossiter is " Puritan Purifiers" (277). Groups of iconoclastic " Ironsides" are destroying the carvings on a font, cutting up oaken saints for firewood, and preaching. The main incident is unfortunately chosen, as not only are the Puritans working without energy or combination, but a font would have been about the last object on which they would have vented their fury. Their destructive powers were employed on altars, effigies of the Virgin and the saints, and on anything which, according to their views, was idolatrous in its tendency. They respected what did not interfere with their own tenets. This is proved by the very numerous ex- amples of fonts of all periods still existing in their entirety in our Gothic churches. Throughout there is a want of movement and vitality in the figures, and it is difficult to discover whether the artist sympathizes with or disapproves of the men whose actions he depicts. From this want of mental impress the picture, though carefully studied, loses that influence on the beholder which it might otherwise possess. " Beleaguered" (125) is well painted and brilliant in effect. Two women standing together on a winding turret stair, watch through a loophole the operations of the siege without. This is one of the most effective pictures Mr. Rossiter has produced. " Slaves waiting for Sale" (328), by Mr. E. Crowe, explains itself by its title. It is an interesting and truthful representation of negro life, far preferable to the sham biographical works generally contributed by this painter. Here is something genuine on which we can look with pleasure, and gather information while we look. In point of .paint- ing it shows great improvement, and its quiet pathos is deserving of all praise. Mr. MacCallum is represented by two admirable land- scapes, " Spring—the Outskirts of Burnham Wood," and " Winter— Simon the Forester, Sherwood" (456, 503). The mossy boles of the beech-trees, with the reflected sunlight on their trunks, are painted with an elaboration and truth of representation which it would be diffi- cult to excel. Equally. good is the second picture. A gigantic monarch of the forest stands in naked majesty and solitary grandeur on an open space covered with the snows of winter. The declining sun casts a warm glow on the upper half of the tree, the branches of which are drawn rounded and foreshortened with truth and know- ledge. Cold desolation in this, and genial warmth in the " Spring," are rendered with great power. "The Franciscan Sculptor and his Model" (381), by Mr. H. S. Marks, is a decided advance in many respects. The humour is less coarse, though there is yet room for improvement in this particular, and the painting is freer and more solid. The subject has the charm of novelty. On a scaffold underneath the parapet of an abbey-church in process of building, a young monk is hewing away with mallet and chisel at a stone waterspout. Out of its shapeless form is gradually appearing the likeness of a rustic, who leans on a scaffold-pole and bears a pitcher on his shoulder. The carver is quick and eager; the model hot, cramped, and uneasy. On the parapet are brothers of the convent watching the work with in- terest or making sly jokes on the model. A boy, leaning on a ladder, connects the carver with the groups above. He looks wistfully at the result of the monk's work, and has evidently made up his mind to be a sculptor some day. I am glad to see that if Mr. Marks has little feeling for beauty, he has, on this occasion at least, avoided caricature. But why does he never paint women? Mr. W. F. Yeames makes visible progress in "II Sonetto," an Italian lover walking in an open corridor composing a " woful ballad to his mistress's eyebrow." The architectural portions are painted with great firmness, solidity, and appreciation of texture. The figure is not so good—he is pasty in complexion, and his legs are not quite so beautiful in form as those of the Apollo Belvidere. In general colour and effect the picture is very satisfactory. Though "Floren- tine Sawyers" (549), by Mr. F. Smallfield, may look a little awkward and angular in composition at first sight, it must be regarded as the best oil picture he has painted. Not only interesting as being the i relation by an eye-witness of the manner in which the Italian wood- sawyers set to work—so different to our method at home—this pic- ture shows a smartness of touch and a facile handling of pigment -which contrasts pleasantly with the laboured painting of which there is so much in its vicinity. Mr. Lidderdale is earnest and thoughtful in "The Inventor" (393), a mechanic endeavouring to solve some scientific problem which has apparently baffled his skill hitherto. The instrument on which he has been at work stands before him. His wife, nursing their child, sits by his side. Great care has evidently been bestowed on the "getting up" of this picture, but though soundly and honestlytreated, the subject scarcely appeals to the general public. Mr. G. E. Hicks, true to his scenes of London life, has been studying this year in Thames-street. " Billingsgate" (511) is much better than the "Post Office" of last year. The figures are not so painfully clean as in that work. There is plenty of bustle over the fish-auction, and plenty of cleverness in its delineation. It is no use lamenting a want of Hogarthian power in depicting a scene like this. We have only seen one Hogarth, and were he to appear amongst us again and paint pictures, I fear he would have as hard a battle with the critics as he had in his own day. Mr. Hicks has done his best, and is not namby-pamby this year. Just a little more dirt, a little more cha- racter and figures, a little less talk next year, Mr. Hicks, if you. please. " Life's Sunshine" (436) is a pretty notion of a young mother leaning on a drawing-room mantelpiece looking fondly down on her baby, who is joyously indulging in infantine gymnastics on the hearth-rug. Mr. F. B. Barwell's "Hero of the Day" (411) re- presents a rifle volunteer bringing home his wife and children in a taxed cart after a day's shooting, in which he has been the successful competitor. A ploughboy follows the hero with lumpish gait, gaping mouth, and staring eyes. This is the best character in the picture. The mother and children, one of whom holds the "cup," are smiling and happy. The landscape background is glowing and natural, the pony looks as if lie were about to fall—decidedly he is out of his perpendicular—possibly he is tired. In Mr. Barwell's second picture, "A Mother's Relics" (546), the colour is crude and inharmonious, and the hesitating, uncertain execution is not redeemed, as in the other picture, by happy character or expression. "George Stephenson at Darlington" (309) is by Mr. A. Rankley. The great engineer is shown instructing the daughters of Mr. Pease in em- broidery. He sits at the frame while the young Quakeresses regard his work with prim reserved interest. This picture is not remarkable for any great qualities, but its simple daylight effect and freedom from meretriciousness of any kind should ensure it respect. Mr. Stone's "Fainting of Hero" (425) does not bear out the favourable imprea- sion I at first formed of it. It attracts, but does not rivet the spec- tator. Full of cleverness—a cleverness remarkable in one so young— it is deficient in intensity of feeling and conscientious study. Hero herself is beautiful, and faints with due grace and elegance, but ex- pression of an appropriate kind will be looked for in vain in the other faces. That this is not an attempt to render the scene as it would actually have occurred will be evident to any one who takes the trouble to peruse the scene indicated in the catalogue. Mr. Stone must think out his subject more fully for the future, and depend less for success on his pictorial facility. Mr. E. Hughes lives in a cottage Arcadia of his own, where the men never use bad language or beat their wives, and avoid beer and tobacco. They enrol themselves in the Band of Hope ere they are well out of long clothes, put money in the savings bank, and shun strikes as they would the plague. The women, equally perfect, are equally unintcrestiug. Scandal and idleness are to them unknown. The children's pinafores never lack a string, nor the husband's shirt a button. In "Bedtime" (225), a working. man of unutterable mildness kisses his child with a lackadaisical air that must be seen to be appreciated. "Ruinous Prices" (241), by the same painter, seems to imply a moral. A widow (of course) and her child have just brought a parcel of needlework to a shop, the proprietor of which is bullying them, utterly forgetful of the fact that that fault- less dollish young lady sitting near must be shocked at his display of ill-temper. It is comforting to know that the widow, though she may and does work her eyes red and her fingers to the bone, can yet contrive to maintain a dog in comfortable rotundity. Another painter of waxy prettiness and universal bone-polished smoothness, is Mr. G. Smith. His " Seven Ages" (434, 440), an unoriginal treatment of a well-worn subject, is insincere and unimaginative. The " Schoolboy" and the " Soldier" are the best compartments. From these "pretty pictures" it is refreshing to turn to the sound healthiness of Mr. Clarke's work. "The Wanderer" (518) and "Restored" (519)—a picture in two divisions, a sort of domestic diptych—is one of the best and truest in the rooms. In the first the little wanderer, a child of some two or three years, is seated on the grass, nursing a kitten. With her finger in her mouth she looks with charming bashfulness at an old gentleman and his daughter who have entered on the scene. The young lady stoops down to the child with gentle solicitude in her face, the old gentleman looking on with interest the while. The background is formed by the skirts of a wood and some meadow land. In the second division the child is brought home, still fondly holding the kitten. The mother runs to welcome the little one she has scarcely missed, and to thank the strangers for their kindness. The old gentleman points with his um- brella to indicate the spot where they found the child. The cat, with true maternal feeling, stretches out a long neck and greets her off- spring as the human mother greets hers. Nothing can be truer or better than the actions and expressions. They are perfectly right in feeling, and the touches of gentle playful humour will be easily ap- preciated. It is a pity that Mr. Clarke has so little feeling for refined beauty. The young lady is interesting but not pretty. By their cold greyness these pictures present also a grave deficiency in colour not observable in former work. If he could overcome these defects Mr. Clarke would be such a painter of cottage life as we have not seen in England. He takes homely scenes and ordinary incidents, but with the originality of genius be makes them eminently his own, and one can scarcely gaze long on his pictures without feeling purer
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