New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1874-04-18
FINE ARTS-MUSlC-DRAMA.'
FINE ARTS.
NATIONAL ACADEMY or DESIGN FoRTY-rNrH AN.
NUAL EXHIBITION. .
Fourth lrtek @


NUAL EXHIBITION.
Fourth lrttk. tA
Mr.. s. J. Guys "Going 10 the Opera
which the show piece OF the East Room. needs
make the judicious grieve. We can sympathize with
him, with any artist who finds himself face face
with such subject but the solution OF the difficulty
in his own power. Besides. we bold the artist
himself responsible for not little In this
picture that Is disagreeabIo TO contemplate and for
much In 10 that makes smile. 10 is true,
tain barbarian Grand Duke sDubbed OF the merchat
princes OF city who dining him by asking him
why the NewYork rich people do not live in houses but
allow themselves 10 be shut up In binsbut we do not
think 1t common nd ORA win In New-York
small ss this ono In which fifteen persons are put
TO 1t for room to turn around The grouping.
too the artist Is surely responsible for cannot ba
that IL no had anything natural and pleasing to
suggest, IL could not no made to commend
itself to people OF ordinary intelligence. But thera
are two impressions that must be made upon
every who looks at this picture. One ID
that nobody In 1t, except the gentleman who 10
timing the whole party as II they were IN egg boiler.
is really doing the thing he appears 10 be engaged
in. Tho children not playing backgammon the gem
tleman is not buttoning the lady's goye the young
man at the end of tho sofa 4: thinking how no looked
when he last surveyed himself In the glass.
whereas be ought TO DO talking to the lady
next bin or listening to her, one OF the othee
gentlemen In the background Is negiecting his lady
also. waiting for the signal from the holder OF tho
stopwatch that Is to him "done;" and thu
lady the foreground who Is obigingy turning her
back upon us is meaning to be uncivil-she is only
enjoying the ou ou OF her robe AS for the others.
tb6y Ara simply standing about III helpless attitudes
we see people In the groupings OF thirdrate photo
graphers apparently merely thrown In TO get their
moneys worth. The other impression left by this pic
that all these people dressed up for the occa
sion, that their clothes all spickandspan new and
and hat EF -OlOu
especially a rapture and an agony. Indeed.
the kd-gloves become and more conspicuous the
longer the picture studied, and at last the unhappy
seems to be hiding its face with It's hands
Surely this IS an artistic defect which Mr. Guy might
have avoided he had taken palms. 1t Is not to be de-
MED that he had difficult subject but there are not
few famous pictures the world that nothing but
family pieces ALL and to too far away from
home, American artists, Peee, and West and Copley.
and, in day Eastman Johnson have found such
subjects Incentives to put forth all their powers
of invention and all their TASTE and have succeeded
in making delightful pictures out OF even such
unpromsing material It must be confessed, however.
that Mr. Guy has not done himself Justice IN the
ton picture. 1t full Of glarng faults The per-
spective Ia badymanaged and the treatment OF Bridget
who is the kground holding the wraps, reminds u
of the way which in early religious pictures the per-
son who gave the commission to the artist and who stp-
ulated the introduction OF his own portrait, IL
painted very much small ia order express at
his humility his nferiOry. Bridget is on the same
perspective pane with all the people IN the picture who
bring up the rear but she is small IL she were sup
posed TO be at the far end Of the back paror BY an
opposite error the gentleman with the sopwach has
head not only large for his body but too large for
the bodies OF other members OF his family III Mr.
Guy painted Bridget too small to keep her In her place.
he NAV have put too big head the owner OF the
subject out OF compliment 10 his position. But wa
that the artists heart IL in the right place. ana
that 1t only his perspective that out OF JOINT There
is not single thing OF all the many things in this
picture that well painted, and in the general effect all
the objects speaking at onee-there is no suoordina
ton People who easily astonished think much OF
the painting OF tho gus burners but this Is al easy
trick.
When we have had enough Of Mr. Guys picture. wa
turn with pleasure Mr. c. G. Colemans " street In
Rome" painted with such solidity and harmony ana
where the people not dressed up as dolls vus
breathing The picture has this defect that
the foreground and the distant houses seen above tho
wall are not painted to be looked at together. Seen
near that figures be studied and enjoyed tho
buildings in the background look hard and hat Seen
from the room where the figures are nearly lost
the buildings into their proper place. and make
one harmony OF tone with the foreground and the sky
But the excelIences OF this picture conspicuous
that this deec-easly remedled for the rest with lit
tie brush-work-is hardly to be much insisted on.
Mr.. Charles H. Miller has two pictures in tho exhibit
tion Of which interesting, 1t TO us.
is in the East Room. We first Mr Mier's work In
the Artists Fund Exhibition, where he had one OF the
hes pictures in the gallery this bought by Mr.
william Schaus and made the artist many friends after
ward in the printselers exhbition-room. There, a.
here, the influence of Corot upon the artist evidens
but his individuality shown by the freedom with
which he worked under that nfuence-In NO way sub
jected by it, and clearly promising one day to shake 10
of entirely. Mr. Miller interests us greatly.
fau xrhA tn
have been able their French training 1--WE TAX
ing for granted knowing nothing as to the facts and
merely reading IL in his pictures that he has had French
trainng) without abusing It, and we look now TO see
fresh hand working with the fine material Of our Amcr
can landscape and showing what Daubgny and Rous-
seau would have they had been born here rather
than In France.
Mr. T. b. Irving has attempted In his Musqueteer OF
the Seventeenth Century" to meet Messonier his
own ground; but 10 was hardly worth while. IL
mistake to suppose that Mess0Diers excellence lies onY
In his microscopic finish; 1T lies partly In the way
In which he reconciles breadth and freedom
and strength of drawing with this wonderful
finish and partly the great skill he has In portrayng
character He never contents himself with painting
suits OF clothes the forms and shows OF things
He paints and paints them well. His people arc
studies OF character worth studying as those In Gil
Bias or Moliere. II it were not MISSIONER would
long ago have his popularity with Fiche and
anu even rl0renb WHO
but one note and scrape away that with damnabls
iteration. But all this dramatic power is backed by
drawing mastery that TO have hand, foot face OF
his to study, is intellectual delight feel thats
of wonderful perception has been working for u.
and that Nature herself ought to take pleasure 10 beng
reported by him. Mr. Irving has been content with
trying to copy the outside of Meissoner's styls
But the result Of such superficial study must itself be
superficial and though there is much careful finishing
here nothing is really finished greatly worth finish