FINE ARTS. BRITISH INSTITUTION
The exhibition of this year is, we think, upon the whole, inferior to the one or two last exhibitions; for though the historical department is quite as respectably filled, there is not the same proportion of pleasing representations of common life, and natural scenery. In spite of certain classical prejudices, we should be sorry to see this which has been the most successful walk of the modern English school, neglected for the pursuit of prize-medals andepic mottos, which look well in the catalogue. There is indeed a greater difference between an historical picture, and a picture of an historical subject, than even some eminent painters seem to have imagined. But we are, we confess, so little refined in our taste, as to prefer a good imitation of common nature to a bad imitation of the highest, or rather to an imitation of nothing. Many of the pictures exhibited by young artists at this Institution, have shewn a capacity for correct and happy delineation of actual objects and domestic incidents, perhaps only inferior to the master-pieces of the Dutch school, from the use of a less perfect vehicle, and the want of long practice, steadily and uniformly directed to the same object. But in the higher, and what is rather affectedly called the epic style of art,—in giving the movements of the loftier and more violent passions, this country has not a single painter to boast, who has made even a faint approach to the excellence of the great Italian painters. We have indeed a good number of specimens of the clay-figure, the bones and muscles of the man, the anatomical mechanism, the regular proportions measured by a two-foot rule—large canvasses covered with stiff figures arranged in decent order, with the characters and story correctly expressed by uplifted eyes or hands, according to old receipt-books for the passions, and with all the hardness and inflexibility of figures carved in wood, and painted over in good strong body colours, that look as if some of nature’s journeymen had made them, and not made them well. But we still want a Prometheus to give life to the cumbrous mass, to throw an intellectual light over the opaque image, to embody the inmost refinements of thought to the outward eye, to lay bare the very soul of passion. That picture is of little comparative value, which can be completelytranslatedinto another language, of which the description in a common catalogue is as good, and conveys all that is expressed by the picture itself; for it is the excellence of every art to give what can be given by no other, in the same degree. Much less is that picture to beesteemed which only injures and defaces the idea already existing in the mind’s eye, which does not come up to the conception which the imagination forms of the subject, and substitutes a dull reality for high sentiment; for the art is in this case an incumbrance, not an assistance, and interferes with, instead of adding to, the stock of our pleasurable sensations. But we should be at a loss to point out (we will not say any English picture, but certainly) any English painter, who in heroic and classical composition, has risen to the height of his subject, and answered the expectation of the well-informed spectator, or excited the same impression by visible means as had been excited by words, or by reflection. That this inferiority in English art is not owing to a deficiency of genius, imagination, or passion, is proved sufficiently by the works of our poets and dramatic writers, which, in loftiness and force, are certainly not surpassed by those of any other nation. But whatever may be the depth of internal thought and feeling in the English character, it seems to bemore internal, and (whether this is owing to climate, habit, or physical constitution) to have, comparatively, a less immediate and powerful communication with the organic expression of passion, which exhibits the thoughts and feelings in the countenance, and furnishes matter for the historic muse of painting. The English artist is instantly sensible that the flutter, grimace, and extravagance of the French physiognomy, are incompatible with high history; and we are at no loss to explain in this way, that is, from the defect of existing models, why the productions of the French school are marked with all the affectation of national caricature, or sink into tame and lifeless imitations of the antique. May we not account satisfactorily for the general defects of our own historic productions in a similar way,—from a certain inertness and constitutional phlegm, which does not habitually impress the workings of the mind by correspondent traces on the countenance, and which may also render us less sensible of these outward and visible signs of passion, even when they are so impressed there? The irregularity of proportion and want of symmetry in the structure of the national features, though it certainly enhances the difficulty of infusing natural grace and grandeur into the works of art, rather accounts for our not having been able to attain the exquisite refinements of Grecian sculpture, than for our not having rivalled the Italian painters in expression.
The strongest exception to these general remarks in the present collection, is certainlyMr. Bird’s Picture of Job, surrounded by his friends. Many of the heads and figures in this very able composition have a strong and deeply infused tincture of true history. The best of them are in a mixed style, which reminds us at the same time of Annibal Caracci, and N. Poussin. The three finest figuresare undoubtedly those of Job, and the man and woman seated on each side of him. The countenance of Job displays a noble firmness with a mixture of suppressed feeling, not, perhaps, sufficiently marked for the character or for the interest of the subject. The full grey drapery which envelopes his whole figure, has an admirable effect, and seems in a manner to shroud him from the attacks of external misfortune, in the consolations of his own mind. The action of the man on his right hand, pointing with his finger, and indeed the whole figure, are equally appropriate and striking. The posture of the man leaning on a marble slab, is also natural and picturesque, though it has too great an appearance of ease and indifference for the occasion. The drapery of this last figure is remarkably loose and flimsy, or what the painters, we believe, callwoolly. There are several other good heads in the picture; but both the countenance and attitude of the man behind the messenger, and the face of the figure between Job and the front figure in red, are mean and vulgar—mere low life, without sense or dignity. The expression in the countenance of the messenger, who comes to inform Job of the last calamity that has befallen him, is neither intelligent nor beautiful; and the whole of the figure, both by its situation and the quantity of light thrown upon it, assumes a prominence disproportioned to its importance, and throws the rest of the composition into a kind of half back-ground. The story is illustrated (whether with chronological propriety or not we leave to the critics) by a group of figures just behind the circle of Job and his friends, carrying off the dead body of one of his children. The great fault of this picture, which displays much sense, character, study, and invention, is the heaviness and monotony of the colour. It is of one uniform leaden tone, as if it had been smeared over with putty, except where a sudden transition to a glaring red or yellow, or the introduction of a spotty light, not at all accounted for, serves, instead of relieving, to add greater weight to that mechanic gloom, which affects, not the imagination, but the eye. We think it right to notice a defect which may be more easily remedied by attention, viz. that the extremities of Mr. Bird’s figures are in general very ill made out.
Mr. Allston’s large picture ofthe dead man restored to life by touching the bones of Elisha, deserves great praise both for the choice and originality of the subject, the judicious arrangement of the general composition, and the correct drawing and very great knowledge of the human figure throughout. The figure of the revived soldier in the foreground is noble and striking; the drapery about him is equally well imagined and well executed. There is also a very beautiful head of a young man in a blue drapery with his hands liftedtogether, and in the act of attention to another, who is pointing out the miracle, which has much of the simple dignity and pathos of Raphael. With respect to the general colour and expression of this picture, we think it has too much of the look of a French composition. The faces are in the school of Le Brun’s heads—theoretical diagrams of the passions—not natural and profound expressions of them; forced and overcharged, without precision or variety of character. The colouring, too, is without any strongest contrasts or general gradations, and is half-toned and half-tinted away, between reddish brown flesh and wan-red drapery, till all effect, union, and relief, is lost. It would be unjust not to add, that we think Mr. Allston’s picture demonstrates great talents, great professional acquirements, and even genius; but we suspect that he has paid too exclusive an attention to the instrumental and theoretical parts of his art. The object of art is not merely to display knowledge, but to give pleasure.
There is a small picture ofDiana bathing, by this gentleman, which we think equally admirable for the character and drawing. The knowledge of the human figure in this pleasing composition might be opposed with advantage to the utter ignorance of it in some Musidora sketches, in which the limbs seem to have been kneaded in paste, and are thrown together like a bundle of drapery.
Of Mr. Hilton’s picture ofMary Magdalen anointing the feet of our Saviour, we have little more to say, than that the figures are much larger than life, and that, we understand, it has been purchased by the Institution for 500 guineas.
Mr. West’s picture ofLot and his Familyis one of those highly finished specimens ofmetallurgywhich too often proceed from the President’s hardware manufactory. As to the subject, we conceive it has been often enough treated in a country famed for ‘pure religion breathing household laws.’ We do not mean to lay it down as a rule, that the sublimity of the execution may not redeem the deformity of the subject of a composition, as there is a great and acknowledged difference between Shakspeare and the Newgate Calendar; but this of Mr. West’s is a mere furniture picture, and offers no palliation from the genius displayed by the artist. Having touched unawares on this very delicate subject of the ethics of painting, we shall just notice, that the picture of ‘Venus weeping over the dead body of Adonis,’ seems to have been paintedtout expres, for the purpose of being bought up by some member of the Society for the Suppression of Vice.
Mr. Turner’s grand landscape ofApulliusandApulliahas one recommendation, which must always enhance the value of this most able artist’s productions, that the composition is takenverbatimfrom Lord Egremont’s picture of ‘Jacob and Laban.’ The beautifularrangement is Claude’s; the powerful execution is his own. From this specimen of parody, and from his never-enough-to-be-admired picture of ‘Mercury and Herse,’ we could almost wish that this gentleman would always work in the trammels of Claude or N. Poussin. All the taste and all the imagination being borrowed, his powers of eye, hand, and memory, are equal to any thing. In general, his pictures are a waste of morbid strength. They give pleasure only by the excess of power triumphing over the barrenness of the subject. The artist delights to go back to the first chaos of the world, or to that state when the waters were merely separated from the dry land, and no creeping thing nor herb bearing fruit was seen upon the face of the land. The figures in the present picture are execrable. Claude’s are flimsy enough; but these are impudent and obtrusive vulgarity. The utter want of a capacity to draw a distinct outline with the force, the depth, the fulness, and precision of this artist’s eye for colour, is truly astonishing. There is only one part of the colouring of Mr. Turner’s landscape which did not please us: it is the blue of the water nearest the foreground, immediately after the dark brown shadow of the trees.
The picture of theFavourite Lamb, by Collins, has exquisite feeling. The groupe of children surrounding the little victim, and arresting him in his progress to the butcher’s cart, has a degree of natural pathos and touching simplicity, which we have never seen surpassed in any picture of the kind. It may easily draw tears from eyes, at all used to the melting mood.