28 MAY 1853, Page 16

FINE ARTS.'

, ROYAL ACADEMY EXHIBITION: FIFTH NOTICE.

• Among our living painters of Landscape, no one, for grasp of study and imaginative beauty, holds so Cminent'a position as Mr. Denby ; and never has he displayed these qualities more 'nobly than in " A Wild Sea-shore at Sunset.' The low tide that comes on with the sullenness of a spent storm hushing the solemn might of its roar, the red sinking sun, the rocks on the extreme peaks of which flickers a last sultry light, the omi- nous-looking congress of sea-birds—the gloom, the wailing mournful- ness, as it were, of all—make a grandly desolate poem. By the repro- ductive power of the painter's hand, the awe of the scene rests upon his canvass.- The execution also is thoroughly satisfactory ; unless it be that the sun appears perhaps somewhat too near. A reputation of the first class may rest secure on such a work. Mr. Stanfield's large picture, " The Victory, with the Body of Nelson on board, towed into Gibraltar," though evidencing unquestionable skill and practice, might surely have been made to express more. As it is, we see little bearing on the point of the subject beyond the vessel's battered dismantled conclithiff: An artist of imagination would have found a hundred resources,- not onitin- thid, but in the figures around, and in harmonizing the aspect of external na- ture with. the spirit of the event; may be done—given .the man to do it—without any theatrica effect, or sacrifice of the highest order of truth. " An Affray in the Pyrenees with Contrabandistas " is more distinct from the general run of his treatments than is usual with Mr. Stanfield, and proportionately more welcome. - The effect—a brown foreground of rocks, and a troubled sky which opens at the middle, showing the azure zenith and clear snow- peaks—is novel and striking, but verges on the scene-painting style. Mr. Roberts's very marked characteristics are largely exemplified, and well ; though they continue in various respects open to objections which have been urged so often as to make repetition useless. " Venice "—a capital specimen—has a crowded festival look, free briglitair, and smooth water. Very gay, pretty, and picturesque, is the close "Street in Verona," through which defiles a religious procession. In "The Cathe- dral of St. Stephen, Vienna "—another view of the edifies painted last year—Mr. Roberts really carries his opacity too far ; bit the scattered groups of worshipers have quite the Continental air. i The'senae fault of opacity, as well as the sketchiness of a hasty study, attached to the exe- cution of "The Inauguration of the Great Exhibition" ; an ungrateful subject, of which, seeing it was "painted by command," the worst we need say is, that not much more could have been made of it. Mr. Cres- wick confers the title of "The Happy Spring-time" on a clear agree- able representation of that chilly and almost bare-branched season from whose " happiness " we are very happy to be now at last escap- ing. The figures are evidently from the hand of Mr. Frith. Mr. Red- grave sends three landscapes with figures—all. noticeable for light touch and colour, and for multiplicity rather than elaboration of detail. "The Forest Portal," and "An Hour with the Poets,",„ arelfie-inost sa- tisfying: "The Lost Path," although the figures.are feeblidravvii, has a great deal of the appropriate sentiment and of the tangled luxuriance of summer vegetation. Of Mr. Linnell's three, " The Village Spring" is the best ; the whole scene being most sweet and countrylike, and the clear light and shade peculiarly lovely. The backward-winding path from the broken common, the herded sheep, and the boy standing with his back to the light, are charming passages of truth. " Under the Hawthorn" is very glowing in its woodland-shadowed sun, and other- wise abundant in beauties; but some defective points of Mr. Linnell's manner are here displayed rather strongly. The same may be said of "A Forest Road."

The loftiest in historic association, and one of the most carefully and finely treated of all the landscapes, is ". The City of Syracuse, from the ancient Quarries where the Athenians were imprisoned," by,by gr'.. Lear. The colour is both beautiful and peculiar, for its broad distinct Amasses of light and shade, and the repose of its Southern sunshine.' . The intense blue of the far sea-line is delicious ; the varieties of foliage are most fully discriminated ; and the brilliant-plumaged rollers and .colony of sedate jackdaws supply great character, just of the right degree for such a subject. Taken merely as vegetable and mineral studies, the fore- ground fig-tree and the blocks of the quarey are admirable.- With this thoroughly masculine and conscientious performance—which, by,the way, is inexcusably raishung—Mr. Lear pursues, and carries. yet further, the style adopted in his " Thermopylre." .," Prato Lthigo, new ,Tteme," is the alight work of an artistic hand. In Mr. Anthony's' "Monarch Oak" —a landscape of immense size—the mastery, energy, and power are also immense. There are many sections too, amounting to what would make considerable pictures singly, of great beauty ; but as a whole we think the work a mistake. The effort to treat such a subject—we might say any landscape-subject—on such a scale defeats itself.. The approxima- tion to a rendering of actual size positively precludes the artist from giving that finish and that complete proportion of parts which are the real essentials to truth of representation ; and, after all, materials such as the objects of outward nature, whose treatment admits scarcely of inven- tion and not in any way of passion, neither require nor compensate for this method of rendering. Mr. Anthony is the only painter who could do such a thing even tolerably, and he has done it well; but he can dO other things, better and with less labour. We refer for confirmation to " The Ivy-mantled Tower—Remembrance of Maxtoke Priory, Warwickshire" which contains more, in the proper sense of the word—is more adequate to fact in the impression it creates, and more fully developed—than "The Monarch Oak." The insensible advance of twilight, steeping all nature, sky, grass, cattle, and ruin, in the richness of profoundest rest, is con- veyed with searching, satiating truth. We think the composition would be improved were the pliory placed less centrally; but this is a minor point.

Mr. Pettit's "Code Castle, Sunset "—a companion to the twilight view of the same building at the Suffolk Street Gallery—sustains the evidence which that afforded of originality. and vigorous purpose. The °panoramic view from the summit of the eminence, and the strong opposition Of, sun- set warmth and shadow, are finely managed. "A Valley in Brittany," by Mr. Seddon, presents us with something agreeably new in both subject and manner. The colour is freshly green and crisp, the forms light, and the whole very clear in atmosphere. We feel that the scene is most exactly rendered ; while its nice artistic qualities redeem it from servility. Mr. M'Callum's "Pedmore Church, Worcestershire," is remarkable for its shadows on the snow and for general merit in design; Mr. Inchbold's "Chapel, Bolton," for careful particularity and strong though rather crude handling. " The Round Tower of Clondalkin, county Dublin," by Mr. Tonge, is the work of a very superior man, having an excellent sense of space, and decided notions of his own as to style. Its indePend- ence and poetic tone promise largely. Mr. "Blacklock has a snialkpicture, " Deveek Water," of great beauty in his peculiar method ; and Mr.Ra- yen, who is not without some resemblance to Mr. Blacklock, continues to produce works of almost every good quality of study save positiveness of colour. Mr. Capper's "Garden-Lawn at Clapton" is pleasantly faithful to its exact order of truth. "Llyn Ddinas, N. Wales," exemplifies Mr. Percy's style to unusual advantage; and Miss Louise Rayner's " Interior in Westniinster Abbey" is excellent. " • " We_ have .not by any means exhausted the list of meritorious land- scapes ; but must confine ourselves to merely mentioning, as a portion of them, the works of Messrs. Halpen, T. and J. Denby, Lupton, Hargett, Gendall, Carrick, W. Linnell, and Doarmer ; and among the water- colours, Miss Barbara Smith, Miss Alexander for an interior, and Messrs. Boyce, G. F. Phillips, and G. It. Lewis. Sir J. Watson Gordon stands boldly in advance of his brother Portrait- painters. There are great depth and saliency of expression this year in all his heads; which, without being in the remotest degree idealized, are manifestly so true to the main and permanent character of the sitters as to be almost abstract. For this quality, and for general dignity of treatment, Waticin Gordon far outstrips such competitors as Mr. Knight, Mr. Grant, and Mr. Pickersgill. "The Provost of Peterhead," and "Henry ]Iouldsworth, Esq.," are perhaps the two best, where all are good. Mr. Knight's "George Dawson" is a clever likeness cleverly painted; but the arms are feeble. "II. G. the Duke of Portland," by Mr. Grant, is capital for the easy expression of a hearty old age, and is altogether one of the artist's foremost works. Next to this we may place " The Marchioness of. Londonderry "; .a .canvass smaller than Mr. Grant commonly ern- itnd having-a rather more finished aspect in the accessories, as well ahhe aii-of:truth in likeness. Mr. Pickersgill makes a fairer. show than usual ; the fancy-portraits in Turkish costume named " Maternal Affec- tion" being moderately pleasing, and " Sheriff Cotterell" shrewd in pushing man-of-business character. Mr. Boxall shines rather by his sitter than by what he has done with him.' " Walter Savage Landor " presents the look of a quiet argumentative old man, careless of costume, with some caustic humour lurking at the corners of the mouth. t Grave Unaffected earnestness distinguishes both the personage and the treatment in Mr. Hunt's portrait, " New College Cloisters, 1852" ; the painting is finished With peculiar breadth of handling, and the manage- ment of the background and of the veiled sunshine streaming through pos- adzes that highest skill the force of genuine truth. Mr. E. Williams's "Portrait:of General Sir Charles Napier, and his Arab Charger, Red Rover," 'is One of the most important and talented: on_ tho walls ; the likeness striking, the general disposition consistent with • the dignity of historic portraiture, the colour careful and detailed, though somewhat opaque.. Most delicately and soberly perfect is Mr. Gale's " Mrs. Henry Peek" ; a little work, whose feeling, industry, and completeness, can scarcely be over-praised ;—the texture and arrangement of the close plaid ale exquidte. • • Mr: Deverell almost makes a subject out of his " Portraits of Miss Margaretta and Miss Jessie Bird" ; which evince that sense of graceful propriety to be perceived in his pictures of incident. Every- thing hero is very nicely characterized, though not highly wrought. The anonymous " Portrait" by Mr. A. Hughes has great sentiment of a se- rious class, and is honestly painted throughout, but the arms appear to us too short ; Mr. -Horsley's " Florence and Boatswain" is agreeable in childish and doggish expression ; and Miss Emma Veussel'a "Portrait of the Artist's Mother" is firmly painted, with broad solid character, mascu- line, yet not unfeminine. A speaking likeness indeed is that of "Hep- worth Dixon, Esq.," by Mr. Mogford. Don A. Giuliani's of the " Duke and Duchess of Montpensier" are unflattering to the extent of being for- bidding—especially the Duke ; but this may be conjectured rather to en- hance their real value. The "Portrait of Hiram Powers," by Mr. Phil- liPs-a thorough Yankee in appearance—will be interesting, though per- liifps diseppointing, to the devotees of the " Greek Slave." Mr. pearce's of the "Arctic Council," and particularly of "Captain Penny," '*ill-appeal to another large circle on grounds apart from their artistic de- serving's.; but on these also' they standeonspicuously well. The Captain, hahited in a bear-skin, glossy almost to illusiveness, looki a man not to be- daunted by Arctic winter or Admiralty snubbing,—a true hero of ex- ploration. ' Mrs. Carpenter exhibits the best picture we recollect from her hand ; and Miss E. Macironc, in water-colours, works with no lack of grandenr._ Excellence in Miniatures, and specimens by Sir W. C. Ross and Mr. Thorburn, have long been convertible terms ; but the latter'gives indi- cations of being in a rather perilous path that threatens to end in man- nerism. The qualities which were original and excited admiration four Or fide years ago may have become so familiar as to excite indifference or weariness by this time. This is putting the case of Mr. Thorburn ex- tremely, but not untruthfully-. There is scarcely one of his productions which-we should not sympathize with more cordially had we not seen previous works displaying the same elevated qualities in very much the same forma The exception is " The Countess of Airlic,"—a lovely work, whdae:womanly grace and refinement are comparatively unstudied. Mr. Wells's "Portraits "—a mother and daughter, one seated, the other stand- ing—yields hardly, if at all, to Mr. Thorburn for finish and style of execution... The colours are very delicate and harmoniously balanced ; and there is the right native unassumed stateliness in the bearing of the younger lady. If the actions and general disposition expressed, or at any rate suggested, a little more, this work might be deemed as unexception- able as it is highly successful. Mr: Wells has other miniatures less prominent but of a like degree of merit, and some good crayon heads. The=" Lady Duff Gordon " of Mr. Couzens is classic and imposing ; Mrs. liartholomew's " Miss Glyn in Cleopatra," a decided likeness, but scarcely quite appropriate to the exact shade of expression ; and Messrs. Archer, Derby, and Godbold, take an honourable position.