New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1918-12-29
HE FOUNDERS OF AMERICAN PORTRAITURE
Il. Clarke s Collection of
Stuart and Their
Successors

! ing pictures as we'll as the habit of
painting portraits for cxacting clients
II Is not improbable that our develop
mcnt, artistically, would have been ad
vanced by several generations. As it
was we have to watch out in the old
historic years for the gust of per-
sonallty, tho pressure of the individual
force, which sometimes breaks the
bounds of habit.
ms does not appear in the earliest
of Mr. Clarke's portraits, the examples
of Smibert, Theuss, Pine, c. w. Peale,
and so on, until we come to the two
works by Coplcy. The other men have
their sedate merits and occasionally
disclose talent Of so high an order that
we are warmed-if one may risk the
figure-to their austerity. Witness the
serene, winning quality of Ralph Earps
Truman Marsh, of Litchfield. Rector
and Scholar" Struggling somewhere
in the back of this artists mind, we
suspect, was the wish to paint not
only an image but an impression of his
sitter Some sort of pictorial inten-
ton DINNERS up through the rather
suited composition. One thinks. mo-
mentarily, of some of Zurburan's i'm
mobile but strangely vitalized clerics.
What is it that keeps good master
Earl from achieving the same "macis-
terial" effect? A certain naivete, we
surmlse, certain want of technical
odroitness and tradition. See, on the
ether hand, what Copley Immediately
secures with both in his odd little full
length of flames Tilley," which is al
most miniature, and in his pastel Of
elizabeth Byles Brown" portrait
that might have come straight out of
, eighteenth century France. Copley, in
other words, is the truly inspired
artist, the artist who goes in not only
for work but for fun, to whom
technique is separate fascination. He
is sophisticated, where Earl is naive.
And, incidentally, he catches a CLEAN
Of that quality which we miss oftener
than any other in the art Of our
pioneers, the quality Of beauty. The
portrait Of Mrs. Brown is dainty, be-
quilting thing, as full Of grace and
charm as g drawing by Boucher. The
miniature aforesaid is, in the nature
CT things. harder, less elastic per-
Torrance; but this, too, has in it the
spirit of painters painting.
That, of course, is the spirit of our
| noblest founder, Gilbert Stuart, who
is represented here by two fine por-
traits. The more important Of these,
from the historical point Of view, is
naturally the George Washington"
and it is besides notable specimen of
Stuart's deliberate but flowing brush
work, his skill in modelling, the
luminous nature of his forid flesh
tints, and, in short, the qualities which
lift him head and shoulders above all
his countrymen in the eighteenth CEN
fury. But for the essence of Stuart,
we would turn rather to the Claw
renee Reid Yates" with its exquisitely
drawn head and face, and even more,
its positively Whistlerian grays. Well
placed, too, is the figure in this can
vas, an instance of the painters par
tlcipation in that pictorial instinct to
which we have alluded. From this, as
from the Copley pastel, there exhales.
/ family but automatically, the atmos-
phere of beauty. To the student we
would especially point out that this
atmo sphere makes itself felt, wherever
IN the exhibition it is asserted, pre-
clsely in proportion to the ardor with
which the artist gives himself up to
the genius of technique. 1t is in the
portraits that arc, in word we'll and
interestingly painted, that we recog-
nlze the artists for whom portralture
alone was not enough, who had to pro-
duce something not only accurate, but
beautiful. They are easily to be iden-
titled. Place in category by them
selves the romantic Lord Byron" by
Sully, and his Hoppner-like "Mrs. Jo
seph Hopkipson," the mastery "Joscph
Rcade" of Vandcrlyn, and the fine
George w. King" Of Samuel +. B.
Morse. Detached from the rest, thew
maintain their isolation for obvious
reasons-they contain so much rood
painting. The Vanderlyn, by the way,
IS little jewel which we long to see
established in the Metropolitan Mu-
scum. Though the sitter was an
American, this portrait is unmis-
takably Influenced by the painters So
Journ in Paris and particularly by his
contact with the works of David. And
David, we may add, could hardly have
bettered in drawing this strong. sim
pie canvas.
Beauty, then, was a rare visitant in
the studios Of the forerunners. We
have cited very few instances Of it
from the present exhibition, nor do
these point in every case to a sustained
faculty. Vanderlyn, for example, is
also represented by an "Antiope," after
Correggio. 1t is not. any more than
his famous "Ariadne," truly beautiful
thing. Beauty, as he created it, was
not so much an element consciously
sought as it was the outcome of tech
meal eXaltation, SO to say, Of method
raised to higher power, as in the
SDlendidly drawn "JOsnph Reedev And