FINE ARTS.
ROYAL ACADEMY : STORY PICTURES.
TM temper of a time is shown not only in its historical events, or even in its social manners, but eminently in its arts. You may descry a state of things in the exhibition at Trafalgar Square cognate to the disruption of parties in the political world: to a considerable extent artists have broken away from set classes; each has applied himself to work out his natural vocatien; and the result is a large accession, not only in variety, but in the completeness of conception. Conventional forms, especially in the matter of design, are less in the ascendant; and painters in the class which, for want of a more specific and recognized name, we call story pictures— those in which some story is told by means of figures—have not only mul- tiplied, but have struck out a multiplied variety of paths, in which each moves more freely and vigorously than he would have done while slavishly following the vestiges of some predecessor. We do not know that the artist can take a more useful survey of the exhibition than to observe the way in which talent has thus been freed and strengthened by being indi- vidualized.
Distinct from all others are Webster's admirable sketches of society. This artist has gained power exactly in proportion as he has relinquished mere tricks of humorous manner, and devoted himself to a modest and faithful conception of nature. Look at " The Village Choir." It has been said that Webster is a repetition of Wilkie; the resemblance lies in their reference to a common source—to nature itself. But there are easily ob- served distinctions. Wilkie sought for a more strongly marked record of character; he devoted immense pains to the elaboration of the traits of ex- pression: each individual figure became a fixed and separate study, every part of it subservient to the main abstract idea: the idiosyncrasies of cha- racter were the thing always vividly present to the mind of the painter, animating his hand: hence, with wonderful reality in that regard, there is a fixity, an isolation, about Wilkie's figures, that derogates from their life- someness. Webster appears to be less exclusively absorbed in the contem- plation of abstract character than in the contemplation of the concrete human being—character, costume, action, circumstance; and all: hence a more living reality. The clerk who rules the " warbling quire " with so much imbecile dignity, the rustic songsters with the clownish carriage of countenance, the respectable middle-class shopkeeping dilettanti, the fresh and youthful trebles, boys and girls,—are all so many real persons; not caricatures, not something beyond reality, but only brought up to the truth. It would be a mistake, however, to say that Webster's pictures are mere "literal transcripts" of common life; the literal transcriber, the slavish copyist, cannot portray the passing traits of living nature: they are too transitory for his process, and must be really imagined by the painter while at work. The same may be said of the portrait of a little girl in a white frock, by the same painter.
The same of Leslie's " Children at Play "—a quadruple family portrait. Two little girls are imagining themselves to be horses; the boy who sits as coachman on the coach of chairs swells with the earnestness of his cha- rioteering; the lady inside is a perfect analysis of character—she is a young girl with promise of the woman affecting to be the woman, a real lady playing the lady. The way in which the painter has discriminated between these realities and affectations, and combined them, is admirable. The colouring is harsh; though less so than Leslie often is. He labours too much to imitate particular tints and patterns, empirically, and wants some definite and consistent system of colouring.
For different kinds of excellence, and different degrees, may be men- tioned other pictures of character; such as " Hill-Preaching in the West Highlands," by Mr. Drummond, and "Leaving the Manse," by Mr. George Harvey—both clever, especially the latter, but painfully disagreeable in subject and treatment. The moralist might recognize in both scenes—in the carriage of the people, the countenances, the expression, even in the breed—the absence of art. Mr. Pickersgill's scene on the Neva may also be classed here; though far from disagreeable.
In Mr. Frith's pictures you depart somewhat from the matter-of-fact style to a more imaginary class. This artist is one of the most individual-
ized as to his style, and one of the happiest. He has great fertility of in- vention: the countenances, the action, the purpose, and feeling, have all the play and spontaneity of nature. In his larger picture—" An English Merrymaking a Hundred Years Ago "—there are as many distinct and separate characters as there are persons: the elderly gentleman who is dragged towards the dance, the girls who are dragging him, the children who are helping, with more headlong compulsion, the fat elderly woman making tea—every feature so swollen with obesity that there is scarcely room for it among the rest, and a smile is a physical contest for place; the several pairs of lovers, the lout asking the scornful beauty to dance, quite unconscious of his own despised condition, and the combatively-disposed rival who is quite conscious of his; the gipsy, the dancers, the folks coming from a distance—it is all like a real scene, with its endless variety. Yet one spirit is over all—mere holyday-making. There is also a great deal of beauty: the girls, especially the one looking over her shoulder at her lover, and the laughing blonde who is hauling the patriarch, have that exquisite sweetness that touches the heart. The old man's face is equally charming—full of beauty, material and moral. The beads throughout the picture are finished with the laborious industry of true genius; and indeed no desirable work is neglected in any part. On several days we observed the effect of this picture—which may stand the canons of criticism—on the promiscuous spectators as they approached it: admiration, pleasure, that benignant smile and moan of satisfaction which denote a stir of tba deeper feelings, were common marks of the effect.
The artist's other picture, " A Scene from the Spectator," is one to at- tract less notice, from its quieter tone; but it is not less skilful. Sir Roger de Coverley's portrait has been painted as the Saracen's Head, and he has brought his friend to see it: Sir Roger, taking the matter ease/liar, wiping his spectacles and steadying himself on the faltering legs of age, looks anxiously into his friend's face, for an opinion; the friend smiles, and is casting about for an answer that shall be neither false nor offensive; the landlord, who evidently thinks the matter of the first importance, holds up the picture with patient and imperturbable gravity; a beautiful bar-maid Is carrying in a foaming tankard. Every part is instinct with truth—the faces—the characteristics of the several ages—the wrinkles of humour and town life that play round the mouth of the young man—the wear and tear of his clothes, which are really worn, not merely hung on to be painted— the bare and dingy furniture of the inn-parlour—are but a few among A hundred traits that stamp life and reality on the scene. Yet no detail in this carefully and industriously studied picture is brought out in ascents- tious prominency : each part is subdued to the whole All is full without being turgid. The picture is a good sample of conception thoroughly car- ried out.
In Mr. Redgrave's pictures we get at social sketches with a more pre- cisely didactic moral purpose. " The Deserter's Home "—with its painftd, panic-stricken anxiety—should be hung up in every barrack: the won and despairing aspect of the disguised man, who is told that the soldiers are coming, is enough to strike a chill into the heart of the hardiest rebel against military discipline. The accessories are feebly worked out: in the group of young women the colouring is excessively opaque and chalky. "The Slaves of Fashion" is more perfectly executed. A young lady, half dressed, is reclining on a sofa; the scent-bottle in her hand, the book that she is reading, her whole manner, denote lassitude—a sacrifice of herself to " faihion " and its toils. She points reproachfully to a clock: a pale manteau-maker has brought home some article of dress; she has half-killed herself to finish it in time, but it has come too late. A waiting-maid leant for support while she rests from the fatigues of dressing her lady, but looks indignantly towards the more toilworn slave. The whole picture tells its story well, without exaggeration or effort. It is a simple incident, like thousands of simple incidents that occur every year—pain waiting on the breath of exacting caprice.
A host of pictures illustrate passages in books. Mr. Mulready shows Burchell aiding Sophia in haymaking—a very vigorous and animated design. The effect aimed at is that of brilliant sunshine, which shows forth colours in their intensest power, and brings the distance near to the eye; and there is a singular force in the effect. But in no natural view, we believe, are colours so harsh, so flat, or so dry. However, the picture suffers consider- ably from the contiguity of others that do not harmonize with its tone. Mulready will be best seen in the contemplated exhibition of his works at the Society of Arts, where he will occupy the field alone.
Among clever illustrations of books or social scenes may be mentioned Mr. Egg's Gil Blas, and scene from the Taming of the Shrew; Mr. Elmore's Beppo, and " Invention of the Spinning-loom"; Mr. J. Hollins's Yorick feel- ing the lady's pulse; Mr. Deane's scene from the Medecia malgri lui—presum- ing that the artist is a young man, and will overcome many weaknesses and crudities of manner; Mr. Stone's " Impending Mate " and " Mated "—a pair of youthful lovers, whose faces in the more critical scene scarcely come up to the point of emotion indicated by the event; and Mr. Goodall's " When the merry bells ring round "—another merrymaking, more ambitions than Mr. Frith's on the score of character, in the sense used above--moss crowded with figures, and really a clever animated picture.
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