The Sun.
London, England, 1858-05-06 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

The Art-Journal.

Sir Charles Eastlake's " Good Samaritan," and
Sir Thomas Lawrence's " Portrait of Sir Walter
Scott," are the chief engravings in the current
number of this valuable serial. The subject of the
first is not treated entirely to our taste, either as
regards poetic conception or artistic detail ; how-
ever,
it is a fine picture, and constitutes a fair spe-
cimen of Sir C'uailes Eastlake's style of painting.
Lawrence's portrait of Scott is, unquestionably,
the very best we have of the Great Magician.
There is a higher tone of spirituality and mental
expression developed in the face than we find in
any other portrait of him. Most of the likenesses
convey a notion of stolid imperviousness or heavy
abstraction, and fail to individualise the mixture of
benevolence and intelligence which radiated through
the plain and somewhat rugged features of Sir
Walter. The picture before us is among the hap-
piest of the great painter's efforts, and represents
the " Genius of Romance" with refined and faith-
ful accuracy. The statue of Thomas Moore, by
his namesake, C. Moore, is nicely engraved by
Roffe. The numerous vignettes and sketches scat-
tered through the work are of a very interesting
class, including Pope's Villa, Pope's Monument,
and Strawberry Hill, accAnpanied by descriptions
from the clever -pen of Mrs. S. C. Hall. The
general information connected with the fine arts,
and criticisms on the present exhibitions, evince
the usual ability displayed in the management of
this journal. We extract the following sensible
remarks from an article on the Royal Academy :
"If the Royal Academy were well instituted at the
period of its creation, its institutions must for that ex.
press reason be ill suited to the wants of the present
time. If it were rightly shaped to the Art conditions
amid which it saw the light, it can have no due adjust•
ment to the Art conditions which surround and appeal
to its maturity. The very theory of its perfection nicety
years ago, must, interpreted according to the mere letter,
be the theory of its insufficiency today.
"To say, merely, that the constituency for a national
institution which shall be an adequate embodiment and
representation of the Fine Arts amongst us at the pre-
sent time is, at the least, six times as large as that out of
which the Royal Academy originally i• sued, is to give a
very inc.implste expression to the amount of the ie.
terests now pressing for representation by means of such
an institution. The mere numbers of the artists who
constitute the true Art body of the nation now, and
who should therefore force a part of any institution which
affects generally to incorporate our artists, is—as we
shall shortly have to show—a part only of the facts in
the case,—though a part of itself sufficient, if there were
no more, to sustain the argument for a new solution of
the Academy question. When first it was felt expedient
to give academic figure, and something like means of
corprate action, to our native arts, the number of
artists thought necessary to compose an academic
presence of sufficient dignity and consistency was ,
obtained,—and that, not without difficulty, and
some delay,—only by admitting complimentarily
into the body two classes of perscns who are
, (*eluded from membership to-day,—foreigners and
females. It may be questioned much, whether the
age was ripe for a native Academy of Ales which could
not find amongst the body of native artists a sufficiel t
number of members to ccnstitu.e such Academy. Ba
that as it may, however,—out of the thirty-six
Academicians whom alone it was found possible at the
beginning to get together towards the full number of
forty which was the appointed figure of the young insti-
tution, nine were recruited from the ranks of farergn
artists—without seeking to ieclule in that category its
future president, the American, West—r nd two, Mary
Moser and Angelica Kauffman, belonged to what we
apprehend is considered (though we are not qui e cer-
tain whether the modern exclusion be formal or merely
casual), the nor.-academic I-EX. Toe exclusion of the
foreigner from a native Academy of Arts---t xcept under
some system of honorary attache-hip, to be inc.:rporated
into its new and enlarged constitutions, when we sot
them—will be recognised at once, we apprehend, as a
sound pvinc:p'e. The exclusion of fetnalo art, %here it
can make its tulle td admission g.-od on all otter grounds
than that of the artis,'s sex a 101,,, we hose to see either
justified on some argument a Lich for ourselves we tail
to discover, or aba.nooned as resting on no fp.od argu-
ment at all. There are, our readers know, some strange
motives operating, avowedly and otherwise, as the basis
of action in this Academy ; but we fancy that even an
insti:ution which appoints its professors not to profuse,
and gives its annual dinner as a sort of picture trade
sale, would yet ha: irate to uggest the alliteration as a
reason for placing the female in the category of the
foreigner. We should not, however, litre to assign a
limit to what same of the older and less apprehensive
members cf the Academy would do in the direction cf
the whimsical. Bu-, even if it should be finally deter-
mined, that the higher rank of the Acadernicianship is a
senate, and its inembirs must wear bards—arid, on
business grounds, and some other grounds of very sound
policy, there is sufficient argument why this should be
so—we can yet see no avoe able reason for refusing the
properly-constituted claim of the lady artist to associ-
ateship, when the Associates' door shall have Seen
opened, as we hope to see it, sufficiently wile to let in
the body generally of the profession."