THE ARTS.
LOUGH'S STATUES.
Tuts young artist, whose Milo, almost the first production he ex- hibited, stamped him at once a genius, and placed him in the first rank of modem sculptors, has opened an exhibition of his works in Great Portland Street, which should be visited by every person of taste. It consists of his Milo, David, Musidora, Orpheus, Somnus and Iris, a group of Samson slaying the Philistines, and of Duncan's Horses, with other works that are already known to the lovers of art; and a
• " Lord Byron, on his first arrival at Newstead, in 1793, planted an oak in the garden, and nourished the fancy. 'that as the tree flourished so should he. On revisiting the Abbey, during Lord Grey de, Rut liven's residence there. he found the oak choked up by weeds, and almost destroyed : hence these lines. Shortly after Colonel Wildman, the present proprietor. took possession, he one day noticed it, and said to the servant who was with him, • Here is a fine young oak ; but it must be cut down, as it grows in an improper place." I hope not. Sir.' replied the man ; for it's the one that my Lord was ao fond of, because he set it ltiraself? The Colonel has, of course. taken every possible care of it. It is already inquired after. by strangers, as 'THE Maori OAK.' and promises to sbare, iii after times, the celebriti. of Shalispeare's mulberry and Pope's willow.—Y" colossal fgure of Satan, a group of Adam and Eve, &c. now for the first time exhibited.
Mr. LOUGH displays great boldness and power of style, but not equal originality. His figures too strongly remind us of the antique, not in form merely, but in attitude and composition. His David and Adam appear composed from the Belvidere Apollo; and his Musidora reminds us of the Venus de Medicis. The same nude female form with our sculptors is made to stand for a Venus, an Eve, or a Musi- dora. Now we conceive, that not only in the attitude, but in the character of the form, there should be an essential difference. In the Venus, we look to find not only the ideal of form, but the refinement of personal beauty and voluptuousness, spiritualized. In the Eve we expect to see a perfect model of the female form, of full and ample mould, with a plenitude of physical beauty ; chaste in its maturity of loveliness ; with an unconstrained grace and freedom of action; and a moral beauty in its ensemble developing the majesty of womar- hood, and bespeaking the "universal mother." The Musidora should be a young and innocent virgin, of retiring beauty and delicate and almost petite form, that has scarcely attained the full ripeness of its beauty. Mr. LOUGH'S Musidora and Eve are almost tWin sisters. His Adam is a graceful figure, of the stature and proportions of men of the present day, and with a little of the elegance of the Apollo. What Eve should be to Musidora, Adam should be to a modern man. We do not desire a gigantic figure, 1 ut
" A beardcd man, with nervous, sinewy limbs,"
of patriarchal dignity ; a robust form of massive mould, yet full of vigour and activity, and characterized by a simple grandeur. David is described as "a stripling;" Mr. LOUGH gives him the perfect form of a full-grown man. The Satan is physically grand in form, and modelled in the finest milliner; but there is a fleshiness in his massive limbs, that is charac- teristic of Adam rather than of Satan,—whom we fancy to be tall in proportion to his bulk—more spare RINI Sinewy in his human form, as wasted by his bad passions, and fitted for activity and speed. Its beauty should be scathed ; although "it had not lost all his original brightness."
The familiar, yet natural and simple attitude, is more like that of Vulcan resting from his toil. The face has rather good character ; the features are finely emit; but their beauty is dimmed by a bad expression. They are of the -Apollo east, however, though on a larger scale. In the countenance of Adam, there is also a look of the Apollo. Why. has Mr. LOUGH omitted to indicate the veins in the Satan,—the figure not being all muscle and sinew, but having plenty of flesh and blood ?
The Hercules, in the death of Nessus the Centaur, reminds us of the Dutch Hercules : it is turgid almost to caricature ,• and the female igiitti Y:rstraitted. The Orpheus is graceful • but, like most
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of the other figures too conscious. There is an air of? display, an ap- pearance of studied attitude about them, as though -Macready had stood for the model. The Satan has none of this ; but in him we look for less of simple nature, and more elevation of style. But David, though active and free, and therefore graceful in his movements, did not take, up a position to watch the effect of his turn; nor did Adam and Eve, when they left Paradise, move elegantly. Grief and sense of shame do not tend to give an elasticity of step. Adam looks like a sorrowing but innocent man, retiring in conscious dignity : he is not dejected. The group does not convey the beautifully natural idea in Milton- " They hand in band, with wandering steps and slow,
Through Eden took their solitary way."
Mr. LOUGH is not successful in his draperies. That of the Monk is a little too severe and heavy ; though not ostentatiously so, like that of the Elijah, which is extravagant. The Milton wants repose. The girl being confirmed, and intended for the monument of Bishop Mid- dleton, is poor and commonplace in style, and not much better than the Bishop exhibited last year : it is not equal to CHANTRY'S.
These remarks may be deemed hypercritical by some ; but the elevated character of the subjects, and the boldness and skill of Mr. Lotion, require a higher standard to be applied to them than the ordi- nary works of modern sculptors. And, indeed, it is with a view of directing the attention of the talented sculptor to what we consider his defects, that we dwell upon them. If his mind and imagination be equal to his hand and style, he will be the greatest sculptor of modern time. But let him remember, that to model a fine or graceful figure, is not all that is required of a sculptor.
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