ART.

ROYAL ACADEMY.

[SECOND NOTICE.]

WE said in our first article upon this Exhibition that some- attempt would be made in subsequent notices to classify- the principal pictures, both as to subject and merit. Such a classification must necessarily, within the limits of our spacer be both brief and imperfect, and many works will have to be put into one class or another somewhat arbitrarily.. Nor would we attempt so thankless, so ungracious, and so- laborious a task, were it not that we have found, by experience that considerable ignorance prevails as to the relative value of pictures, which could hardly continue if their merit was im- partially examined, not only as to the interest or worth of their subject, but also with regard to the completeness of their technique. Judgment of Art is mainly carried on by two classes, the first, by far the most numerous, judging of pictures by the appeal which is made to their sense of the pretty, the humorous, or the pathetic ; while the second class, which includes the whole body of artists, their sisters, cousins, and aunts are apt to leave out of sight all else but technical merits. Between these is a third class, who may

be practically left out of account, who combine admira- tion of technique with a certain hysterical sensitiveness to its various excellencies, and whose whole being is taught to quiver at harmonies of colour, or throb in pain- ful unison of sympathy, with the varieties of a zigzag, or the changes of a carve. Leaving, then, out of account this small though concentrated and fashionable class of mortals, we see that there is some ground to believe that the judgment of Art, either from the subject or the executive point of view, must, if taken alone, be imperfect and erroneous, and that what is needed is some formula which may help to reconcile the two, —some hydraulic press, as it were, which makes subject, aim, and .execution one, and so judges them.

Can any such criterion be found ? There comes no answer from the Void, save a doubtful murmur. "After all," said a -clever man to us the other day, "it's only a matter of opinion. You can't be sure that that combination of banners and bun- kum is a bad picture. You only know that you don't like it." And such a saying represents fairly enough most people's -opinion on Art. They would not have it in religion or morals, would, in fact, probably insist that it would be destructive of effort; but in Art they will have a cultivated agnosticism, which simply says, "Nobody knows anything about it; like what you please, you can't be shown to be wrong." However, we must 'even take the first criterion that comes to hand, or our article will be finished ere our criticism has begun.

Let us have the criterion which did duty for a thousand years or so in Greece, and set up as our first standard of merit the presence of beauty. In these notices, then, we shall refuse to 'consider any picture as good which contravenes this first law, —this is a set subject in which all candidates must pass. We will take the word in its very widest sense, to include pleasing colour, form, or any sort of human interest ; but we will refuse to consider cleverness of artistic production per se as included within our definition,—the mere painting of diffi- .eult things well, is not fine-art, unless it results in beauty. And, for our second qualification, we will take that quality which we usually seek for most eagerly when we first become acquainted with a beautiful woman ; the quality, namely, .of intelligence. We will ask of the work,—Is there any- thing in it; what does it mean ? And our third criterion .shall be the worth or worthlessness of the meaning found. And if we have to answer in the negative to these first queries, if we have to express by a zero the amount .of beauty and meaning in the work in question, we shall -consider it to be essentially bad art, though it may very possibly, and indeed probably, be good craftsmanship. So much being said of the method of judging, let us divide the fifteen or -sixteen hundred works roughly into classes of subjects, and ;begin.

First, in deference to the judgment of centuries, we will take the Historical compositions. The largest of these, and, in our .opinion, the worst, we have already spoken of in our First Notice; it is unnecessary to do more than to remark here that those who think the subject of the "Imperial Assemblage at Delhi" to have been in fault, and not the artist, may have their error re- moved by studying a little picture in the Grosvenor Gallery of a very similar scene. This is the Prince of Wales investing some Rajah or other with the Order of the Star of India, and is by Mr. Sidney Hall, better known as a wood-draughtsman than an artist. The second historical work in size in the Academy has reference to another incident in the Queen's life,—to the proclamation of her accession to the Throne, and is by H. T.

Wells, R.A. Now this is, unfortunately, a picture that every -one laughs at; it is like Hamlet at a small provincial theatre, amusing in its unconscious farce. There is no doubt that the

Archbishop of Canterbury may have worn a seratch-wig, and -that the Lord Chamberlain may have had an enormously large

and very shiny hat; but most unfortunately the hat and wig are the important things in the picture; the eye comes back to them irresistibly; they are as vital facts as Gilpin's hat and wig, and like those articles they are, apparently, too large for their wearers.

Mr. Wells has been faithful to the letter of his text ; there are -the .kneeling envoys and the standing Queen, in her nightgown, with her feet in slippers and the tears in her eyes, but there is little more to be said for the picture. It is not beautiful either in detail or as a whole,—the accessories are ugly, and the colour is washed out; nor is it intelligent. It possesses the one quality which of all others it should have lacked,—it makes the spectator laugh at a, scene which should be nothing less than laughable. "On Board H.M.S. Bellerophon,' July 23rd, 1815. Off Cape rishant, leaving France," No. 262, by W. Q. Orchaxdson, R.A. This is a fine picture, but of the second class ; that is, it is a fine specimen of work which, deliberately foregoing beauty of line, attempts to replace those qualities by an earnest and, on the whole, successful appeal to the sympathy of the spec- tator. Once refuse that sympathy, once feel that there is nothing pathetic in Napoleon's last look at France, and this picture almost ceases to be a work of art. Suppose the key lost. Suppose a generation which knew nothing of Napoleon, the grey overcoat, and the cocked-hat, and we should have only a picture of a short, fat man, standing apart on the deck of a. vessel, with a few men in the background, apparently watching him. This is not carping criticism on our part, at least we do not intend it for such; we only want to point out to our readers, the difference between art which is of a special time, and the higher art such as we find in the Old Masters, and sometimes, fortunately, in the modern ones, which is of no time. We have only now to congratulate Mr. Orchardson on the dignity and impressiveness of this work, which marks a very great advance in the artist's powers. Hitherto his figures have been small and comparatively unimportant, but the face and figure of Napoleon in this picture are powerful, dignified, and pathetic,— in fact, everything that they should be, and we are very glad to see that the Academy have purchased the picture.

"The Last Days of Edward VI.," by Andrew C. Gow, No. 490. This is a difficult picture to criticise briefly. There are in it so many good qualities, that one is loth not to admire the work as a whole, and yet as a whole, it seems to us, it is not admirable. Edward VI. is being held up to one of the windows of his dwelling at Greenwich, to satisfy the people that he is not yet dead. The picture is taken from the inside of the room, and through the window we see the crowd below and the river. On the whole, the arrangement is similar to that of Mr. Gow's picture, entitled "A Despatch from the Front," exhibited here two years ago. The face and helpless attitude of the young King are beautifully conceived, and the painting is, as usual with this artist, solid and good; but here praise must end. The grouping of the subordinate figures is not so much bad as uninteresting, and they are almost as much lay figures as those Cattermole used to introduce into his pictures; the colouring, moreover, is singularly dull. All the tints seem to have lost their brightness and quality, and the effect is similar to that of the works of the modern German schools of painting. It is a curious fact that this heavy, leathery sort of colour is not visible in the painter's water-colour work ; it seems, therefore, as if it resulted from none of that physical incapacity for appreciating colour which is generally the cause of such a manner of painting.

"Blenheim, August 13th, 1704," No. 453, by R. C. Woodville, and "Marlborough after the Battle of Ramilies," No. 459, by Ernest Crofts, A. These pictures are sufficiently alike in subject and treatment to render comparison in- evitable ; and the comparison, when made, is decidedly in favour of the first-mentioned artist, the one who is not an Associate of the Academy. In the first, the Duke is on horseback amongst his Staff, watching the lines of horse move forward to the attack ; in the 'second, he is at the head of his Generals advancing down the centre of the picture, in the fore- ground of which are the trophies taken, and wounded soldiers standing by the guns, frantically cheering as the General approaches. Both of these are, in our opinion, good pictures of the dramatically historical class, both composed with skill, and both successful in rendering Marlborough's figure imposing and interesting. The technique of Mr. Woodville's picture is far superior to that by Mr. Crofts, and the faces of the minor actors more individual, especially, for instance, that of the negro who is playing the kettle-drums in the background.

There is also an aspect of matter-of-fact determination in the faces of Mr. Woodville's soldiers which contrasts happily with the somewhat stagey enthusiasm of Mr. Croft's characters. The one point, and it is a very important one, where the latter seems to eclipse his rival is in the general air of intoxicating success

which he has managed to get into his picture. Marlborough is

riding down the hill absolutely swelling with pride, and what we used to call at school "cockiness ;" his soldiers have caught the infection of his triumph, and the spectator appears some- how to catch it, too. This is the vital good quality in Mr. Croft's picture, and one that should not be overlooked. Mr. Woodville had no chance of displaying that enthusiasm, but he

has in his way caught the spirit of the scene as truly, though not with quite so much dramatic point.