Year: 1873




,vpou SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT OF THE rRIBUSE.]


VIENNA, NAV 2S-The Austrian contribution to
,ho Art Hall ia on the whole, more creditable than
had anticipated from the little to be learned of it
elsewhere than here; but close review of the three
rooms containing it will modify the surprise which
the first look causes as it resolves the whole school
into purely foreign elements. The French school
has many followers the Dusseldorf another set and
the Flemish stll another. In all home exhibitions
OF any school there is an immense deal of that ann
less and yaueless painting which only serves TO give
bent TO mistaken aspirations and importunate en-
thusasms. The Germans are, in general, more
gwen to this kind of sentimental seif-immolauon'
and they paint on the whole more sincere pictures
which had better not be painted-fruits OF ylcart
ous inspiration,-than any other European nauon'
The gravity and earnestness of these blunders does
not diminish their number-the contrary rather (;
and notwithstanding all the grave devotion ana
academic attainment, every new study of Teutonic
art leaves me more convinced that the highest at
tanment in the plastic arts is intellectually mpos-
sibIe to the race No hidden and unexpected force
of eenus ever seems to come to break up the mold Of
Journalism. and every work is turned out in all its
sober and common sense land commonplace COM
pleteness.


The national character, which obtains in all the
Teutonic people is in the Austrian school visible as
a con ponent element in it's results. The traditions
of French art have taken more healthy growth
than those of Munich or Dusseldorf, and in some Of
the best works in this exhibition the combination
Of the two is visible while some of the emulations
ofTroyon and Daubigny hardly to be classed out
out of French art. Among the landscapes one by
Otto Won Thoren is in largeness Of style and tech
meal power, almost worthy to be placed with the
best Of the French landscapes here. A shepherd of
b.1p bor1 irO
races, gathers his flock about HIM in the nightfal,
at the alalm of wolf in the distance and prepares
for shot IN an admirably drawn attitude, full of
meaning, He is alert and rideman-like; his un-
couth profile aud huge mustache under his round
black felt hat is relieved sharply against the golden
gray sky under which the night msts begin to
gather He seems undecided whether he sees the
wolf OF not, but his companion, who restraints his
frightened donkey with one hand. points with the
other in the direction of the danger as if he had Just
seen it, and white dog has gone out hundred
yards or SO en- ridette, while a brown looks in
ieuty up to the shepherds face 10 get signal to CO.
The sheep huddle in aud crowd round their master
The landscape is gray and brown, stretching away
Cat and tame with turn Of the river, catching
Team from the sky. and the bits of forest that
break the distance melt away in space until sky and
land are cOnfOunded. II is, in its dominant interest





and landscape are in such perfect harmony, the
twilight repose and sOemnity over all are perfect
that you feel the outdoor influence the night COM
ngoD and the uncertainty of vision, the ndstinct-
0ess Of detail than anything else at first sight.
A comparison to this-cattle sheep and hay carts
huuWnC home before a stOrm-is too like TTOyOn,
and not enough like Troyon's best work to be very
satisfactory, and the sky is crude and white.


The best of the pure landscapes, in which the
6gure is unimportant, are those Of SCHNEIDER, per-
lectly French in feeling and worthy the teaching
Df Rousseau aud TroyOn. One, a marshy pool sur
rounded by trees through the graygreen foliage Of
which CLEAN the snow-white walls of a farmhouse,
with ducks and geese summing themselves on the
matted water-plants, OF gathering to be fed by
woman al the further edge of the pool, is admirable
Tor tone and luminous gray local color and its foil
ige is unsurpassable for its Openness and leaty
uncertainty. In this respect it is better then any
hng / remember by either of the two eminent
masters smaller picture, pool in mill-stream,
with batllers is exqusitely picturesque, and spark
ing with play Of light through the tree branches
and on the white walls. The weird foreground, too
shandled with suggestiveness and accidentalism
very rare in the French school even. larger pic
ure Of forest glades, by forsaken channel Of the
Danube, is not so satisfactory in detail, and is





saWbole. 1t suggests Constable somewhat.


OF another type of subjects and treatment are
some picturesque architectural subjects by Robert
Russ two Of wind-mills and riverside architecture,
md one the cloister of ruined convent. The
largest an upright about five feet by eight, has one
sd mill, standing by the side of a Dutch canal occu-
pying half of its hight and three Others in line
leading away into the extreme distance. The sky is
that Of a showery day. broken blue and gray, and
he whole subject is in shadow. the local color
Of barges. architecture, and broken banks telling
powerfully all through it. 1t is low in tone and re-
narkable for its mOduatOns there are red tiles,
Uay and wall--yenow grays and green grays-with
the water occupying the foreground and mingling
With reflective sky and land-black barges and gray
in admirable water painting lustrous and tremulOus.
In color it reminds one of Leys, in execution OF
Stanfeld Another very successful study by Eugen
Jettel Of leaden SKY and duh sunlight on a gray
riverside, with glimpse of green trees the far
distant shore, cattle and peasant women standing
knee deep IN the water in the middle distance, while
hogs innumerabe walow in the earth of the fore
ground, is also worthy Of careful note ms mastery
study in grays, with only two points of ANYTHING
approaching positive color in 1.-THE blue dress Of
awoman IN the middle distance and speck of red
81 the head dress Of another Some white and gray
geese in the sun give the conventional high lights
the extreme notes Of a scale of which a black hog
standing partly in shadow furnishes the other.


Two gray and brown studies by painter who, if
Austrian, has borrowed a French name well as
style-ChaIlemout--comp the list Of contribu-
tons essentially worthy of note in the French wing
Of the Austrian school. They are. like the picture
Of Jette abstemOus Of color 10 the last degreeal-
most monochromatic, but fun of fine feeling for
space and tone for that suppressed color which the
modern French school has added to the motives ot