ART.
THE ROYAL ACADEMY.
IT is seldom possible to say in a word whether the Exhibition of the Royal Academy is good or bad. Of course the description must in either case be given by comparison with Exhibitions of former years, and the comparative improvement or deterioration to be observed in so short a time as one year cannot generally be expected to be very decided. Nevertheless, this present Exhibi- tion must be characterised as especially bad. Less than ever is there any sign of original thought, of real intelligence, or culti- vated art. More than ever do the ad captandain specimens of genre, the sentimental rustic and the namby-paneby domestic, possess the walls. The nibbliogs at " history" are feebler than ever, and landscape has found a depth even below its previous degradation. Strong contrasts and cutting lines are the means of execution most in vogue for attracting attention ; and truth and modesty are forgotten by men whose ambition is not so much to interpret nature, as to find favour in the eyes of a clique. This complaint may appear overcharged ; but let any real lover of art go round the galleries, and con- sider how often he has seen anything that gave him real plea- sure, and his conclusion cannot be very different. The prospect for Art is not good. Perhaps the picture with most brains in it is F. Walker's "The Harbour of Refuge" (227). The scene is the quadrangleof an almshouse, and the time is just after sundown. To be sure, the subject is a depressing one. To be the inmate of such a place implies a life's failure ; and such would seem to be Mr. Walker's meaning ; for the mower mowing down the grass suggests Time with his scythe as the only friend after the benevolent founder whose effigy adorns the centre of the court. Very sad is the fate of the old woman (finely sketched in black and gray), passing through life's last scene, without a friend, and supported by the listless, dissatisfied stranger-girl, whose fate is not less ()reel to be impri- soned in this uneventful nook. As usual with Mr. Walker, the painting, at least of flesh, is little more than flatting. It is a pity he does not study such work as that of Terberg (in the " Con- gress of Munster "), and note the splendour and vigour of the execution even on so small a scale. The sky consists of alternate smudges of gray and gamboge, and it is difficult to speculate on its probable condition twenty years hence.
The portrait of Sir James Paget by Millais (554), is a work of sterling merit. Not only is it a good likeness in the ordinary sense, but it expresses also the mingled keenness and patience of the philosophic inquirer, and withal the firmness of purpose re- quired to transmute thought into act. The great surgeon stands at the lecture-table ; at his bdck is the lecturer's slate. One is made to feel the seriousness with which he views his duty as a teacher. It is possible that still greater popularity will attend another portrait picture by the same artist, which represents three young ladies, dressed with sisterly uniformity in much-flounced lilac, and playing dummy-whist by daylight in a conservatory. There is a perfect tempest of lace, frills, flounces, rhododendrons, and azaleas ; and the whole is painted with that almost excessive freedom in which Mr. Millais sometimes indulges. A certain haggard look at the eyes (whether intentional or not), suits well enough with the dissipation of matutinal card-playing, while that and a too great consciousness in the expression of the right- hand face are in strong contrast with the inimitable simplicity of Sir Joshua's or Gainaborough's beauties. Mr. Millais challenges comparison with his great predecessors by the nature and treat- ment of his subject ; and if he does not gain, he yet has the solace of knowing that he suffers less by such a comparison than any living competitor. Very different is it when he attempts landscape. It is tree that last year he produced a pleasing im- pression by the extremely dexterous and effective way in which he painted a lot of whispering reeds in the foreground to his " Chill October." But one passage does not make a picture ; and it is to be presumed that if he persists in his efforts he will discover that something more is necessary to the production of a landscape than throwing sketchily together a number of details, careless draw- ing, and (to express distance) blurred painting. His " Flowing to the River " (56) cannot be ranked higher than a clever sketch. It is confused and flat, and misses the greatest charm of nature, its breadth and consequent dignity. Nature, it needs no reminder, is full of details ; but these are not what first take the eye. They gradually make themselves felt, stealing one by one on the attention, and perpetually refreshing the mind with new matter. It is the great masses that first arrest attention and excite the imaginatign. A great landscape-painter acts accordingly, and it needs only a short visit to the Liber Studiorum at South Kensington Museum, or to the rare collection of that series now at the Burlington Fine Arts Club, to see how firmly Turner held to this principle, and what exquisite truthful- ness he thus attained. But Mr. Millais seems rather to disdain study, or at least not to devote much thought to any of his pictures. What he sees at a glance (and that is not a little) he sets down with surprising and enviable 'ability ; and it is rare indeed for him to paint a picture of any sort that does not possess some merit of high order. But it is hard to discover what is the merit of his "Flowing to the Sea" (71). The subject, uninterest- ing in itself, has not received at his hands any artistic treatment worthy of the name ; the lines are poor, the colour is not pleasing, and the execution is slovenly. There is a red-coat on the right, a red-coat on the left, and a red-tiled cottage in the centre. There is a boat apparently waiting to ferry the red-coats across the river, and we are probably to suppose some interval of space between the craft and her intended freight ; but so ill is this expressed by the artist, and so disproportionately small therefore does the boat appear, that we are tormented by the thought that these brave soldiers will inevitably be swamped and drowned. On the same wall with these, but above them, hangs a veritable and well- considered landscape, by W. Field, " After the Day's Work (69). A ploughman with two horses, one of which he rides,. splashes homewards at evening through the flooded meadows, under a sky which has not yet discharged all its rain. A great- bank of cloud, flecked with crimson " messengers" of fantastic shape, leaves only a small portion of clear sky : this is luminous- in effect and pure in colour ; and the whole picture is enriched by great variety and subtlety of tones, the skilful arrangement of which produces that high charm of a landscape, spaciousness. It. is possible that the height at which the picture is hung prevents. our seeing some of the more delicate gradations ; but fortunately the work is largely conceived and, its light and shade being good, would be effective at any distance.
A portrait of Mr. Cardwell, by Mr. Richmond (336), will be- sure to win commendation by its accurate likeness. With just. such an air of self-assurance we may imagine the War Minister an-- notuicing, as he did in the early spring of 1871, that the British Army had been supplied with the Martini-Henry rifle, and we shall at the same time call to mind, with such an amount of satis- faction as the facts of the case allow, that some three regiments- are now really armed with that improved musket. An adjoining canvas is sent by Sir F. Grant. It is labelled " Lord Poltimore- and Hounds" (337). The artist has been so frequently employe& in painting pictures of the same kind that he ought to have made- it clear what sort of hounds were intended. Those he has repre- sented are about the size of harriers. But it were an irksome- task to criticise in detail this artist's portraits. Still there is one portrait-painter at least who finds much favour at the Academy, and whose work is inferior to that of the President's, but who- has this year exposed himself to especial animadversion by the manner in which he has treated the head and features of the well- known and deservedly popular Member for Frome (563). Nor is' this his only misdeed (319). But, in truth, the whole system,. routine, or custom which regulates the admission of portraits. ought to be reconsidered. Fashionably-attired women with, year after year, the same characterless features and expression (55 and 335 by Buckner, 123 by Graves) ; eminent judges, with characters- wholly unappreciated by the painters (556 by Sidley, 1,042 by Collins) ; civic dignitaries in full-length and of life-size, reminding one irresistibly, whatever the worth of the sitters, of the old play of " High Life below Stairs" (18 by Williams) ; Scotch noblemen,. un-dressed in what they mistakenly think is (or once was) the national costume of gentlemen in Scotland, and which, at all events, requires for fair pictorial treatment something more than the cross-barring that is to be bought at the popular "clan- tartan " shops,—these and such as these meet and pester the eye on every side, flatter the vanity of the sitters, and deprave the
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