lint arts.
THE NATIONAL INSTITUTION.
Somewhat fresher than the British Institution, somewhat less bad than the Society of British Artists, is the character which the National Insti- tution at the Portland Gallery has been wont to maintain. The collection of the present year does not quite forfeit that character, but it goes hard to do so the tone of the works being extremely low, the average of teelinical attainment poor, and the exceptions which manifest an like decided superiority few indeed.
The department of figure-subjects is marked by a certain individuality, debased enough in kind, thanks to Messrs. Marks and Rossiter, who ad- dict themselves to representing after Shakspere scenes and personages of low humour, which they sink into vulgarity. The best of these is Mr. Marks's " Autolycus as the Pedlar ' ; In which the face is of an appro- priate type, sly and cunning, without over-ugliness or exaggeration. The details are careful, the colour somewhat subdued ; but the legible printing of the ballad which Autolycus cries is a degraded affectation. The ancient and moat quiet Watchman," dozing under an old porch in the chill grey dawn, ranks next ; " The Gravedigger's Riddle," from Hanalei, borders on the offensive ; and this is still more strongly the case with Mr. Rossiter's " Bardolph," which merits nothing but condign re- probation. The same gentleman's " Fluellen compelling Pistol to eat the Leek," wanting as it is both in vitality and in humour, may be credited as a conscientious attempt after its kind. Of another section of Mr. Rossiter's contributions the fairest specimen is " Please to remember the Fifth of November," which displays a certain photograph-like literality. Altogether, however, Prieraphaelitiern has something to answer for in having produced the class of art represented by Mr. Marks and Mr. Rossiter,—hard, flat, low, and in colour both dull and staring. Yet Mr. Marks, at any rate, is capable of better things.
A work of more imposing character and more advanced attainment than any of these is Mr. J. Eckford Lauder's "James Watt and the Steam-engine—the Dawn of the Nineteenth Century "; where the eager discoverer, in his dim and dingy laboratory, compasses in hand, and pri- mitive steam apparatus fizzing hard by, strains forward, rapt and ponder- ing with eyes which see into the future years. The picture rises above the expedients of cheap heroics into something of a hard-handed epic of the unbeautiful ages. The " Head of an Old Jew," by the same artist, is a superior stuff y in what may be called " appliedR,embrandtisin." Mr. Collinson exhibits three pictures. " The Orange-Girl," marked " Unfinished," possesses a quality of homely prettiness, much in advance of the painter's works in general, and is altogether a well-treated figure. " A Man who has been with Death" is a disabled Crimean hero ; the head soldierlike and honestly rendered, but the style needing some greater refinement. The principal picture of the three "The Music- Lesson, a Preparatory Exercise"—represents a child who prefers her ball, coaxed to the piano by a somewhat elder sister. The notion is pretty, and fully expressed; but, to be worth much, it demands a grace of execution which it has scarcely received here. This grace, as far as immaturity of practice permits, has been attained by Mr. E. Wensley Russell in "The Rustic Billet-doux" : the cottage interior is quaint and charming, the arrangement piquant, the light pleasant. In the head of " A Highland Girl ' symptoms appear .of a capacity for greater largeness and breadth : the head has feeling, some nationality, and a promising notion of colour.
Four of the landscape-contributors make what may almost be called a distinguished appearance. First we would place, on account of its tender unhaclmied feeling for nature, the " Aberclour astle " of the Institution's President, Mr. R. S. Lander. The foreground, broken stony soil patched with soft verdure, is full of beautiful detail, handled with an artist's power of turning everything to advantage ; the dark clump of trees to the right
makes a solemn distance; the whole effect is subdued and sweet. The small foreground figures of the girl and her lamb ought either to be painted with reasonable care and solidity or to be obliterated. Mr. Oakes sends, in "The Clyde," the finest picture we have seen from his hand ; and especially. an admirable waterfall, rushing, tumbling, bubbling, spirting, foaming,—true in tint and texture,. quite in motion, and done without painful air of effort. The water-rainbow is excellent in effect, and so is the foliage in drawing. The colour is more positive than in most of Mr. Otikes's works, and has a general sufficiency about it: the upper sun-lit greens, however, are rather crude. 44 Peel Castle" is an- other very. clever view ; the sea-shore moistness well -given, and the colour again more full. In "A Summer Eve by haunted stream," Mr. At. W. H. Hunt gives earnest of high powers. His colour has beauty and mystery throughout; and the marking, and purple and green inter- change of tinting, in his foreground of water-furrowed stones, are par- ticularly faithful and happy. He has moreover caught with artistic ap- preciation the luminousness and flatness of .objects under twilight effect. The evening mists rising from the stream, whose surface is skimmed by a bat, have too much of smoky opaqueness. The picture looks as if Mr. Hunt had availed himself of a photograph in studying it, but in a spirit which has nothing mechanical or illegitimate. " The silent Pool " of Mr. Hodges is a work of some real mass and genuine power, with sunset burning through its gloomy trees. Of -detail there is lithe; so little that the artist must be on his guard against the treacherous trans- ition from unelaborated power to coarseness. Mr. Hulse and Mr. Hargitt send works of merit in their characteris- tic styles. Mr. Dearle continues to show acute perception, but little dis- position to rid himself of mannerism, or work under sterner self-disci- pline. There is very striking effect in Mr. A. W. Williams's "Ap- proaching Storm" and "Shades of Autumn" ; effect which, although obtained by means obvious enough, renders these two of the most sue-
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e,essful pictures he has produced. Mr. Charles Marshall's " Willow Way, Creek of the Avon, spite of crude whitish colour, evidences a right conception of what willows are like. Mr. J. F. Hardy has sweet tender spring hues in " On the Lledr, North Wales " ; and a somewhat similar key of colour, with a different motive and some simple depth of feeling, is attained by Mr. Baylis Thompson in his " Vietv of the Bocce di Toss on the Logo Maggiore." Fulness and subtilty of view, together with a skill which only needs development, characterize the four small works of Mr. Harry W" rendering respectively aspects of afternoon, twi- light, evening, and a subsiding gale. M. Wagrez has the cleverness of a Frenchman ; and Mr. Bridell's ' Forest of Stone Pines on Fire at the Zuyspitz Mountains," if too hot and gleamy, has merits which also mark foreign study. It is satisfactory to note that several of these names are wholly or almost new in landscape.
The most noticeable point in the animal-painting is the Rosa Bonhcur influence marked in the oxen of Mr. H. B. Willis's " Morning Rest in Ploughing-time, near Newhaven." The beasts, however little they might sustain comparison with those of the French lady, are stalwart and well rendered; but the human figures and landscape background are singularly weak and raw. The water-colours include a large variety of Mr. Rayner's Gothic and other interiors—dashing, mottled, effective, but in parts cold and hastily concocted;' three nice views by Mr. Boyce, of which two are from Wales, while the third is a picturesque and well-chosen " Street in Ve- nice " ; and a brace of Mr. Burcham's pure and close studies of flowers and fruit.
Mr. Munro's well-known group (in plaster) of "Paolo and Francesca" is accompanied by a small figure of " The Spirit of Nature," conceived with a right feeling for sculpturesque simplicity and dignity of pose.
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