The Press. — London, England, 1853-05-07 00:00:00

MAY 7, 1853. surround the heavenly choir. This is a hazardous experiment, though the Venetian masters have left us some successful examples of it, but they would never, under such circumstances, have clothed the figure in blue robes, which must nece,sarily appear black in the shade ; and, though many of the Italian painters have represented the Magdalen contem plating the vision of the Cross, none of them would have combined her beatific dream with an action so ordinary as laying down the price of the spikenard which she destined for her pious ministry. Though we are much pressed for space, we cannot mold noticing the very remarkable performance of a young amateur. Mr. J. Leslie. w e understand, fol lowing the bent of his own inclinations, and abandoning the career for which his friends bad destined him, quitted the army and retired to Germany, where he studied painting with an ardour that few professional 'students possess, and with a success that out Many attain. His picture represents an aged peasant in structing her grandchildren in the mysteries of their faith. Her attitude is good, but. her hands are too delicate in form and texture, and not absolutely cor rect in drawing. The expression of the two elder children is admirable in its fixed and reverential attention ; it is so happy, indeed, that it can only have been the result of the closest observation of nature. The expression of the youngest child has perhaps too much of active terror; we think something of awe and perplexity would have been in better accordance with its age and condition. Mr. Overheck, though neither an Englishman nor residing in England, has exhibited a picture repre senting " The Incredulity of St. Thomas"(3o). We notice his performance because he is one ofthe founders of that school which has at last found admirers in England, and has driven some of our young painters into affectation and extravagances. Mr. Overheat is, we suppose, a man of talent ; at least he and his countrymen have the merit of originating an absurdity which we have only imported. His picture, exhibiting a cold correctness of design, and an impassive hard ness in execution, is painted in a solution of brick dust, and touches neither eye nor heart. Such as it is, it is a specimen of that style which the artists we are about to notice profess to admire and imitate. Mr. W. H. Hunt is one, we presume, of the pre- Rafthelite brethren of the nineteenth century. One of his pictures, designed, we suppose, as a practical joke, is styled "New College Cloisters" (5:4), and re presents the half-length portrait of a clergyman in his scarf and surplice. The other is more ambitions--- the subject is taken from Shakspere's Measure for Measure (441, and represents the dialogue between Claudia and Isabella. The figures are stiff, the design affected, and the action inexpressive. We own we were principally attracted by the inscriptions in red Gothic letters which adorn the frame---a style, by the bye, which no more belonged to the age of Shakspere than to our own. Mr. Hunt is a man of talent': we hope he will pardon us if we advise him to study nature as the a ply true model, to observe the works of the great masters of his art, and to abandon all attempt to paint on his present false system. Mr. Millais possesses superior claims to our ail en tiou. He has already made himself remarkable for the controversial works he has exhibited on former occasions, and in which it is said he aimed at restoring the art of painting by reviving the method as prac tised before the birth of Ratfaelle. We are willing to hope that. lie has abandoned this ill-judged attempt---au attempt that must inevitably fail, silica., though the defects of these masters may be imitated, the ig norance which excused them cannot be as sumed. Mr. Millais has still, however, much to learn and not a little to forget. He is a young man, however, of much talent and promise, and with the industry he possesses, and with the taste we hope he will acquire, we cannot doubt of his ultimate success. He will find the greatest stumbling-block in his path is affectation: men of genius have sometimes not been exempt from it, but to it all their defects may be traced. The two pictures by this artist which the exhibition contains are of most unequal merit. If we noire one of them at all (No. :'eto), it is a tribute to the merit of the other. " The Proscribed Royalist" represents a fugitive gentleman sheltering himself in the hollow of a tree---an operation for which the intervention of his female protectress seems wholly unnecessary. The co t untenance of the lady expresses neither hope, fear, ndr anxiety. Her right hand is thrust into her pocket-hole (an action we are at a loss to explain ), while the cavalier kisses her left with the air of Don Basilio in the opera. The arms sories are painted with a laborious exactness, in which all the true principles of the imitation of nature are violated, and which, if not otherwise objectionable, distracts attention from the principal objects. Sheri dm said of Mr. Whitbread's It rjected Address" for the opening of Drury-lane Theatre, that he had in troduced a ph(vnix which he had described like a poulterer: not the colour of a feather had been omitted. Mr. Millais paints landscapes like a natu ralist ; we have butterflies, foxgloves, fern, and every THE PRESS. variety of the " family of grasses." All we have not is expression, character, and dramatic interest. If to Itafletelle we owe the true method of telling a stor of grouj►ing the figures, and dressing them in appropriate cost► n ne. and to Titian the magic of glowing colours. we ►►we not less tee Leonardo Its Vinyl for the intention of clliaroscun►. that ditiltsite concentration of light which is ter►ued edict. To Correggio we are indebted for the 'learnt of half tints aunt that delightful gradation of light which pervades his pietures„ that indescribable harmony which delights the artist and bewitches the most ordinary observer, etneeenscioos of the spell that hia t la Mtn. These tour great men, turi‘ ailed. unapproaclicel. lime marshalled the. It, their• appearance was in its infancy ; diet their de !su•ture it suddenly sunk into decline and decrepi tude. NVIe will et painter of real merit l►'rcist ill ignoring their existence, and painting in despite of their• example' . . . . In Mr. Millais' pientres then. is a tibial absolve of ehianeseuro : we' have no eonse- Illiently, un hanneski. His lights and shadows are abruptly contrasted. and his forms want roundness and reality. His outline is hard. and, in spite of the Imis of nature, its everywhere too strongly defined. The Order of Release, NM" (No. ::11:1 1. is a subject. well chosen to enlist our sympathies. A wounded and im prisoned highlander is released from his capth its, and his wife is the bearer of the welcome tidings of release. The treatment of the subject is less happy, perhaps, than its selection. The husband, already beyond the walls of his prison, his wounded arm supported in a napkin, sinks overcome on the bosom of his wife, while his left ann encircles her waist and lays a firm grasp upon the infant. child who slumbers on her shoulder, undisturbed by his hard pressure ; a faithful dog leaps up to lick his ninster's wounded hand. and exhibits in his obstreperous welcome a strong contrast to the impassive wife and sleeping child, who seem to take no interest in the event. The wife is in fact the greatest defect of the picture : her countenance exhibits no emotion, or joy, or anxiety, and her glassy eye is fixed on vacancy. Ina pic ture of this description the sentiment depends on the dramatic propriety of the details. The captive is already beyond the walls of his prison, while his gaoler is in the act of inspecting the order for his release. which the wife has not yet given up : neither is costume preserved; the date, WM, ostentatiously appended, does not accord with the three-cornered cocked hat of the gaoler and his rolled stockings : these are the habiliments of the following century. Till we consulted the catalogue, we supposed the highlander to be a follower of Clinch's Edward, antler the charge of one of Cumberland's grena diers. The total absence of any background, and of any of those obtrusive accessories in which this school loves to indulge, is a great advantage. We wish we could also compliment the artist up►n the accuracy of his drawing and his composition. One of the highlander's legs is nearly invisible, and the other. though carefully painted, is ill-drawn ; and he stands upon neither. Mr. Millais will excuse, we hope, the sincerity of our criticisms: it is the greatest compliment in our power to pay him ; if we did not admire his talents we should not waste our advice upon him. We would earnestly entreat him not to he led away by his present populatit• : it cannot last, because it. is grounded upon what is new and false in his painting, and not upon what is excellent. The time is per haps not, far distant when he will look with regret upon his present delusion, and with surprise, and it may be contempt, on that of the public. WATER-CoLOUR EXHIBITIONS. Our notice of the water-colour exhibitions comes somewhat late; lint Mr. Puff's hero was unable to answer questions before the play began, and even Tristram Shandy protests against being obliged to record his opinions before he was born. We plead the same excuse for our tardiness. Both water-colour exhibitions opened some little time before the period of our corporate existence; we shall, accordingly, not attempt to point oat the most striking pictures, which are already familiar to most of our readers, lint shall confine our attention for the most part to such as present any feature% of novelty, or suggest matter for discussion of the principles of all. We always enter the water-colour exhibition with much pleasure and with some pride. The urt of water-colour painting. as there displayed, is of English origin, and of very rapid and vigorous growth. Man of our readers may remember the time when water-colour painting was taught and practised by a regular receipt. The blue of the sky was laid in by a wash of indigo. The landscape was then finished in neutral tint, the grey blue of the distance graduatilig into tones successively warmer till it became reddish grey in the foreground. little colour was then washed on the landscape aecordhig to the receipt. The clouds were warmed with yellow ochre ; the man fishing was brought out with red ; the woman carrying sticks. with blue ; and the drawing was complete. This style had at least the merit of being easily imitated in coloured mezzotints and the prints of the huge quarto books of travels then in vogue may boast of being quite as good as the drawings from which they AVIV In Itch, a here first the art of water-colours was extensiyely practised for sale. the early attempts dis play 44 something more of sparkle and originality. In the latter halt' of the lust century. when "my lord" made the " grand tour" with his " goyernor " t the word was not then slang). a n d in hi. " the painters who made preparing tier him pictures of the principal ruins began to di. coyer that their sketches Math. OA the spot in water colours. as mere memoranda of 1•44011 r, were more popular, And met A All a readier sale mote than their finished produetions. Hatt this discovery led, as it miturnllY ought, to a frequent and close study trim nature. II Mai 114hAlli'e ill art would 1111%0 Will Mat. A SWI..; I. tin principal professiir ill dila new art, as n HAM or talent. l i nt. unf4 r fimately, the temptation of making money easily was irresistible. The " studio - was fitniisheil with a cer tain number of patteni.drawingm. Froa ehr.r d ui tourist made his seleetion, and copies, slightly touched by the master, wen. furnished hint by the apprentices seeretly employ IA in this 11110111f1WtOr of art. In one respect the English school had the advan tage of the Italian. The necessity of breadth" and effect " wens earl• perceived ; and, indeed. these qualities were sometimes pursued (as in the case of black nml ontn;te chiaroscuro!: ► to the neglect of all others. tlistin. who is sometimes called the father of modern water-colours, wits the first to give more substance to his landscape. In looking over the ter) earl• works of Turner. it is curious to see how long this giant was mainlined by the leading strings of his early ellucati • it may be, by the necessities of his poveny ; but very earl• in his career we perceive a longing for more variety of tone, and a gradual intmiluetion of warmth and local colour into his shadows. . _ Their contemporary. Glover, now neglected and forgotten, endem•inre.l not to change the 8, stem or neutral tint, hut to improve it, and so missed his way. He worked much from nature ; ho made the skies more 'brilliant and more varied; his tints were more vivid ; and sometimes, in his representations of early morning. where the shadows of nature are cold and colourless, ho is very successful. We remember with pleasure his sunlit rocks, gleaming through the monting mist, and reflected in the leaden-coloured. glassy lake. A great change was now at hand. Turner roan to his full powers; John Farley, with many other artists, began to take their efliiiiirt out of doors, and on the spot, to try to render the tints of the landscape, not according to any pteeoncrivedtheoly, but as they appear under the sorbing eiremustanees of nature. The result is the water-colour exhibition such as it, has been for many years past. lint the mote triumph with which we ...included the last lairngraph suggests a word, if not of censure, nt least of caution. The grotind which has been gained by a cor..ful study of nature must he main tained by a Maude nu 14.. s And this is a matter of some prnetical difficulty. The artist's summer blur is usually arranged for the purpose of recruiting health, enlarging observation, and collecting fresh subjects. To engraft on this a close study of nature, with a slew not merely to catch her passing effects, but to realise her minute details, is often very inconvenient, and quite as often very distasteful. To relinquish the consciousness of power with which the accomplished artist dashes off his memoranda of form and effect for the Inunbler earnestness with which he sits down to realise some morsel of nature, and feels himself (as who does not') a mere tyro, is no small sacrifice, and it is no wonder the easier course is so often adopted. In going round the present exhibition we see indi cations that many of the pictures have been finished from slight sketches, and the result of this is feeble ne-s, a feebleness nut arising front the want of ismer, hut rmiti the want of information. Hence not merely poveliy of detail, but a poverty of colour. The artist's imagination cannel tetrlaY the varieties 01. nature; nor, withont indure before hint, can he bring himself to believe what strong colour% may be intro duce(' into the distance, and yet fifty he made to keep their plan; or, in the foreground, what endless varieties of tint fluty be nominee.' without destroying bre.ollll. It is to the deficiency of study that we attribute the front truth whirl' is the Insetting sin of !m a n. art. We .10 not now wan " truth" in the technical sense in which it is used by the artist, but troth of fact, 01 ...minute, of accessories. When an artist's materials are defective he seems to think no farther restraint on his imagination is necessary than t., (wke care that what he introduces should" compst, well." Ina fine drawing which bears the name of " Amalfi " ( No. MO, Mr. Richardson has enlivened the plain walls of an Italian backyard with the I 1