ART.
THE DIRECTORSHIP OF THE NATIONAL GALLERY, Mn. GLADSTONE will shortly be called upon to appoint a successor to Sir Frederick Burton, in the directorship of the finest collection of pictures in the world. The task is no easy one, because apart altogether from personal claims, there are several plausible views as to the qualifications desirable in
such a head. It may not be thought, then, out of place, in a matter of so much moment, to urge that one of these views is the reasonable one, and to express the strong conviction of many of those who are conversant with the subject and with the qualifications of the candidates, that there is one man among them who is pre-eminently fitted for the post. To make this plain will be the object of the following article.
The two candidates whose claims need be considered, are Mr. Poynter, the painter and Academician, and Mr. Sidney Colvin' the Keeper of Prints at the Museum. The general question raised by their candidature is that of painter against connois- seur, and the view to be propounded is that, other things being equal, a connoisseur is what is wanted. Now it may appear at first sight reasonable to suppose that a painter will make the best director of a public gallery, because of his first-hand and practical knowledge of painting. It was under this very natural supposition, that appointments used to be made to those posts, and in the case of the National Gallery a succession of painters has held the office. The last of these, Sir Frederick Burton, has gone far to prove that a man may make an excellent director in spite of his having begun as a painter, for his strength of character and shrewdness have served the country better perhaps than a finer and more adventurous taste would have done. He has been a safe head, and has steadily bought
pictures that were certainly of interest, and that filled up gaps in the collection. But the experience of Europe, on the
whole, has outgrown the painter-directors. The reason is not far to seek. The study of the older schools of painting has become in recent times a branch of archmology pursued like other branches of archmology by specialists, who have the time and the patience to acquire a vast deal of exact knowledge. This exact knowledge, founded on a study of the public and private collections of Europe, on the comparison of drawings with pictures, coupled with the evidence of docu- ments, and dealing with the derivation, the likeness, the difference of masters and schools, the number of authentic pictures, the number and kind of copies and forgeries in existence, has been growing yearly. The extension of public galleries, ease of travel, and comparison by means of photo- graphs, have all made this growth the more rapid, and exact connoisseurship has become possible to an extent hardly yet appreciated in England. The office of director has become more arduous and strenuous in this competition of experts, and the old-fashioned painter-director is out of date. The adept in the study has a knowledge of the pictures ascertained to be by the Masters and, still in private hands, and he is ready with his knowledge, should they come upon the market. Or, should a new picture appear, discovered in an overlooked quarter, or disinterred from beneath an over-painting, he is ready with his trained eye and his knowledge of the various tests and points of evidence that bear upon the case to say what the picture is.
An objection will occur at this point. Your connoisseur, it will be said, can tell, with some approach to certainty, what the picture is, who it is by, and so forth. But can he tell whether it is a good picture? After all, the object is to have fine pictures, not to be certain that a tenth-rate picture is by a tenth-rate man. The answer is, that with regard to the older schools, the question hardly arises; because msthetic criticism, that is to say, the cumulative opinions of painters of all schools, has by now determined within narrow limits of variation the places of the Masters. The connoisseur who does not feel for himself can go by the authority that is re- flected even in general consent. He does not need to determine these questions, and is unlikely to buy the follower when he might secure the Master. The point is, that be knows the Master when he sees him, and knows the follower, and is in- terested in both. No one would dream now of proposing a modern sculptor as head of a museum of ancient sculpture. The museum of painting also requires an archmologist.
A gallery, then, as far as regards the older schools, may safely be treated as a museum, and managed by a man who knows what the painting is that is offered to him, can judge its historical importance, is aware of its testlietic value, and knows its market value,—a knowledge necessary, though secondary. How does the painter stand who is put in such a position? By the fact of his being a painter he is unlikely to have had either the time or the temper to make himself master of all this exact knowledge. His sympathies as a painter must be so deeply engaged for one school as to leave him indifferent towards others. If it is Florentine art he admires, Venetian will find him colder and less exact in his observation, Spanish and Dutch will be still further removed from his sympathy and his study. And even in the painters be admires he will rather look for and take away what he wants than attempt coldly to formulate exactly what they did. It is not, in a word, to be expected of him that he should allow a detached observation to play over the whole field of painting, with the scientific interest of de- termining the elements of antipathetic schools. He will be at the mercy of dealers who bring him forgeries of his favourite masters, and must neglect or buy ignorantly outside of his taste. Even if he has the makings of a connaisseur in him, it is a profession he has to learn.
The question, it will be observed, of Mr. Poynter's merits as a painter, has not entered into the argument. Suppose him ten times the painter that he is, he would be the more effectually disqualified as against the connoisseur who has spent his life in the study of art; and it is presumably as an eminent painter that Mr. Poynter is put forward. But the direction of Mr. Poynter's interests as a painter does become important when we consider another side of the question. The National Gallery, it has been contended, may, so far as the older schools are concerned, be safely treated as a museum, demanding from its director rather wide and exact knowledge than taste. If we cannot have both knowledge and taste, let us have knowledge. But as we approach modern times, and consider the schools that are fast ripening for consideration, the need of taste becomes greater, and of a mind in some sympathy with modern art. The National Gallery has been wisely con- fined in its purchases to schools of well-established reputation, and except in a few instances like the Vernon gift, has been shy of the too-generous donor of modern work. But as time goes on, new schools become old, and already, besides our own Preraphaelites, the great school of the French and Dutch Romanticists defines itself in the perspective of the century with a claim for inclusion. At present we have admitted of the Preraphaelites, Rossetti and Madox Brown; the names of Millais, Watts, and Burne-Jones are safe to be added in time. But on the other aide we stop dead with Constable, and his already canonised successors, Corot, Millet, Rousseau, Daubigny, followed by many another undoubted master, French and Dutch, like Monticelli and Matthew Maris,* are unincluded. The Impressionists may wait yet awhile, but some other great names, like those of Courbet, Manet, Whistler, and Degas, have also detached themselves and demand consideration.
This is the new claim which the new director will have to face. Now, if Mr. Poynter's being a painter makes it unlikely that he has the semi-scientific attainments necessary for the former task, the character of his work as a painter renders it unlikely that he is fitted for the new. It is no discredit neces- sarily to a painter that his back should be definitely turned on modern painting; but it makes it unlikely that his mind is elastic enough to appreciate its claims on the consideration of others. And here comes in a fresh objection. Mr. Poynter is not only a painter, but an Academician. Now, among modern developments, it is the Academy that seriously threatens the National Gallery. One does not wish to suggest that Mr. Poynter would allow a personal bias to affect his judgment, but the probability is that it is English academicism in modern painting that he admires ; his own work is academic, and its quiet and harmless academicism leads by easy stages to very barbarous develop- ments. 'Under Sir Frederick Barton the nation escaped the full impact of the too-generous donor of such academical crudities. Is it certain that Mr. Poynter would be so firm with a Mr. Tate ?
Mr. Colvin, on the other hand, has devoted himself to a wide and exact study of the field of art. He combines with the knowledge of the connoisseur an unusual amount and catholicity of taste. He has not had the painter's occupation and preoccupation to prevent and distract his study, but
has trained himself to the habit of discrimination. If he not absolutely in the first ranks of the connoisseur, he has the confidence and friendship of the leading men in his pro- fession, and on doubtful points knows where to look for • Several works by this rarely seen master, as well as expellent examples of the. whole school, are now to be seen in a loan exhibition at Van Wissalingh's, in Brook Street.
expert advice. He has also that knowledge of the dealers without being himself one, and of foreign languages, which would be a necessary part of the equipment for his duties, and the diplomatic address which is also so desirable. He has, moreover, and this ought to determine the matter, proved his efficiency already in two similar posts, at Cambridge and in the Print-Room. His enlightenment and tact have done various services to the national collection at the Museum, the latest of which was his securing a long loan of the famous Malcolm collection of drawings. The best of these are about to follow the admirable exhibition of drawings lately on view in the White Building, among which the names of great moderns like Watteau and Ingreg figured along with older masters. Mr. Colvin, then, has proved in the public service both his knowledge of ancient and his taste for modern art, —a rare combination, and rarer still in conjunction with administrative faculty and personal distinction. To all nearly interested in the future of a great national institution, he must appear the right successor to Sir Frederick Burton's trust.
D. S. M.
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