18 JUNE 1898, Page 22

ART-BOOKS.

Messrs. Sampson Low have produced a huge folio volume of photo- gravures from the pictures of the late Mr. Armitage, R.A. (28 net.). Academic in the extreme, and untouched by any strong feeling for beauty, these works produce a depressing effect. There is not the deep learning of the French academic painters, which, how- ever dull, is curious from its thoroughness. The English tendency to descend into incident is here present clothed in the paraded learning of the schools. Where the artist comes most to ther surface is in the studies of single heads ; many of these are full of character and are strongly drawn. A portrait of the artist as a young man is a good instance; so also is the " Moslem Doctrinaire," one of the painter's late works.