ART.
MR. ORCHARDSON has certainly painted a very fine portrait this year. His Earl of Crawford (No. 243) is one of those pictures which attract and fascinate without proclaiming themselves noisily. It is in a picture such as this that one realises what great artistic powers Mr. Orchardson possesses, and one is tempted to wonder how he can consent to bury them under such heaps of incidental rubbish as he frequently does,—Mothers' voices and Marriages of Convenience, and all the rest of it. Let us be grateful, however, when the artist asserts himself so completely as he does in the present work. Another fine portrait is that of Mr. Gerald Balfour, by Mr. Watts (No. 175). In accordance with this artist's latest method of portraiture, all mere externalslhave been suppressed, and the personality of the sitter shines forth unhampered by surround- ings. The extreme simplicity and reticence of the work make it very difficult to write about, but render it an impressive picture to look at. Mr. Abbey has given us so much that was fine in the past that his two pictures this year are a little disappointing. 0 Mistress Mine (No. 289) at any rate has a most beautiful woman's face in it, for which we can be sin- cerely grateful. The whole effect of the picture is, however, not quite satisfactory. It seems as if the painter had lost the effect of air and twilight in the elaboration of the dresses of the figures. As usual, Mr. Abbey shows himself a colourist as daring as successful. The lovely orange-pink of the lining of the sleeves and the purple bows in the woman's hair make a harmony as original as it is delightful. Perhaps the picture one would least soon get tired of in the Exhibition is Mr. Colin Hunter's Signs of Herring (No. 138). The science of the painting is so deep but so hidden that only the beauty is apparent. Few people have both the sympathy with the beauty of gently moving sea and the power to represent it combined, but to Mr. Colin Hunter belong both these gifts. The deep purple mountains, whose joining on to the water is veiled by mist, the sky, the fishing gulls, and the boat are all fused together by poetry and fine painting.
After the picture galleries the rooms where the sculpture is shown come as a great relief. Whether this relief is due to actual merit, or to the absence of the fearful discords of colour in the picture rooms, it is difficult to say. Statues do not fight with one another and gibber like pictures, and the marble, bronze, and plaster soothe senses distracted by violent colour. To turn from Mr. Byam Shaw's Lone the Conqueror (No. 906) into a room full of monochrome statues, is like going from a place 'where many saws are being sharpened into a quiet crypt.- On a little mound stands Love mounted on a black charger, while on all sides stream processions of people "in most admired .disorder." It is like the guests of an exceeding ill arranged dinner-party going down stairs. Michel- angelo and Cleopatra, Beethoven and Lohengrin, are hardly well-matched guests. Such things as these would be but small faults if the picture had any pretensions to beauty, either of form, colour, or surface. One quality it has—power —but this power is wielded with such brutality that, after a short look, flight into the sculpture room is best.
If the Queen has not been worthily painted, she has at any rate been the subject for a remarkably fine bust in marble by Mr. Onslow Ford (No. 2,053). One hardly knows which to admire more, the exquisite beauty of the modelling of the face and drapery, or the quiet dignity of the whole.
Mr. Thornycroft seems determined that no newspaper war shall be waged over his Cromwell. Walk round this statue, and what is there to find fault with ? Nothing. No element seems left out except one, but that is unfortunately the most important,—inspiration. Cromwell, or rather his clothes, stand before us, to which has been added his Bible and his sword. Of course the workmanship is excellent, for Mr. Thornycroft is a most accomplished sculptor. If the imagina- tion is allowed to go free, what a statue of Cromwell it is possible to conjure up. Cromwell, oddly enough, presents the most admirable material for an imaginative portrait. To begin with, he had the dcemonic energy and force that we find in Michelangelo, in fact the terribilta. Passion in him was not repressed under a mask, and therefore he has been called insane. But this unveiling of the emotions is just what is wanted in art, especially when the shattering strength is united to deep tenderness. There was this union in the character of the Protector, who when at the height of his power still mourned for his son who died in childhood. Mr. Thornycroft has been much more successful in his group of Colet and his schoolboys (No 1,965), which has great charm and grace, according well with the beautiful character we meet in the letters of Erasmus. Mr. Herkomer, who does everything, exhibits a large metal shield with pictures in enamel called The Triumph of the Hour (No. 2,016). The meaning of the allegory is not very clear, but this does not much matter, as the beauty of the work lies in the harmonious use of dull, silvery metal and brilliant enamel. The disposition of the little pieces of colour is excellently contrived, and the effect of the whole very good. When examined in detail, one notices the absence of distinc- tion present in all this artist's later work, though his excursion into decorative art is a very welcome change from the violent form of portraiture Mr. Herkomer practises ;—examples shout from the walls in many of the rooms.
The architectural room is a somewhat dead-alive place, and rather gives support to the theory that architecture is no longer a living art, but merely exists ghoul-like upon corpses. Certainly the endless cooking up of old styles apparent on these walls seems to point to a want of life-giving originality. Of course, to judge of the architecture of the country from one quite small room is absurd, and one wishes that the Academy would for a change some year fill several of the picture galleries with architectural work of a kind that can be understood by those who are not experts. If they let the intention be known beforehand, a really interesting collection might be the result. One good sign is apparent in a small way this year, and that is the tendency to decorate the interiors of houses with wall-painting. If people would only have their walls finely and appropriately decorated, and did not cram their houses with irrelevant assortments of bric-i- brac, a far more dignified appearance would result.
In the following list of pictures will be found works which lack of space has prevented being noticed fully. A writer has often to choose for detailed description not the best pictures, but those about which it is possible to express something in words. Too often fine work cannot. be written about with interest, but attention can be called to it in a list: —Baile de los Rises, G. Bilbao (No. 566) ; The Garden, L. Smythe (No...68) ; Kyles of Skye, Colin Hunter (No. 159) ; The City of Mansoul, A. Goodwin (No. 258); Sundown as Sea, E. Gouldsmith (No. 276) ; Sheep Washing, Aumoniet (No. 666); Among the Galtees, J. North (No. 679) ;Indian Afterglow, A. Goodwin (No. 923) ; Smugglers, Napier Henry (No. 600) ; Allotment Gardens, G. Clausen. (No. 115) ; St.
George, statuette, G. Frampton (No. 1,932). - H. S.
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