FINE ARTS.
THE Exhibition season is close at hand ; already the note of prepa- ration is heard in Pull Mall. The British Institution received the pictures of Modern Artists on Monday and Tuesday, and they will be
open to the public early next month. The arranging of the National pictures in the new Gallery in Trafalgar Square, preparatory to its opening, is going on. We have heard rumours of "cleaning and re. pairing " pray Heaven, the magic tints of CLAUDE and RE:imitatrs be not scoured away by these picture-doctors ! We dread to see the old paintings shining with varnish in newly-gilded frames, like the panels of a Sheriff's carriage. Meanwhile, the lovers of art have been gratified by the sight of STANFIELD'S Views on the Moselle, which were exhibited this week at the print-rooms of Messrs. HODGSON and GRAVES : these gentlemen are publishing a set of lithographic fac-similes of them, to correspond with the Sketches of HARDING, LEWIS, and ROBERTS.
" The banks of the blue Moselle " do not seem so rich in pieta. resque beauties as was supposed ; indeed, we have heard two or three of the sketchers express themselves disappointed. The instant it was known that STANFIELD had gone thither, off went half a score of his brethren of the brush, HARDING among them, to follow his track; but when they got there, they found only a few old gabled houses, and a turreted chateau, that would delight PROUT, who did not happen to be among the number. Even STANFIELD, who can make up a picture out of small materials, has been fain to eke out his book with bits from the Meuse and the Rhine. His sketches—or rather drawings, for they are elaborate and carefully finished—are plain, bold, and masterly, and please by the seeming reality and matter-of-fact truth of the delinea- tions. They are drawn with the pencil on drab paper, and slightly tinted with white and colours. They do not strike by the variety or brilliancy of their effects, or the gracefulness of the touch,—for they are neatly rather than elegantly pencilled : bat we admire the facility and dexterity of the practised artist ; and his sober, quiet, unaffected style, satisfies, if it does not greatly excite. The appearance of fixedness and opacity—as if the objects were miniature models, or the scene were viewed in a camera—is equally observable in these drawings as in STANFIELD'S paintings ; although the want of atmosphere is not so much felt on the paper as on the canvass. The cause of this defect is evidently the distinct and uniform definition of every object in the picture, which makes their outlines too prominently visible. A painting by TURNER in the room-with them—that lustrous gem " Venice on a Festa-day "—afforded a striking instance of the opposite system. In it no outline is visible; the figures, nay even the buildings, when you look close into the painting, seem like shapeless daubs and smears of colour ; but viewed from the proper distance, the houses appear solid, the figures resume form and substance—all is life, air, and motion—the vision becomes realized. To this and the transparency of his colouring is ascribable the glowing atmospheric effect of TURNER'S pictures. This splendid landscape is engraved in line by MILLER, one of the most successful translators of TURNER'S colouring into black and white. The unfinished proof looked a little heavy and metallic, but this effect will probably disappear in the working : otherwise, it is admirably faithful, and bore the trying test of comparison well. PA nrus's portrait of the Queen, and GRANT'S clever portrait-picture of the King's Hounds, with the etchings from them, were likewise in the room ; and the whole made a very gratifying exhibition. A great number of visiters were attracted by the display.
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