FINE ART&
HISTORICAL PORTRAITS.
AMONG the many of Sir Robert Peel now competing for public notice, is one by portraits of Piekersgill, ILA., at Hering and Reming- ton's. Although we are assured that it measures some inches above sax feet, it looks too short. The apparent shortness is probably owing to the size and weight of the face; which resembles the original slightly in form, not at all in expression. Mr. Edward Davis has executed a working model for the bronze statue of the Duke of Rutland, to be erected in the market-place of Lei- cester. The general aspect is like, and the action is good; though there is something very incongruous between the colossal form and the strictly conventional English air of the excellent old gentleman. But the people of Leicester wanted a statue of their Duke, and Mr. Davis has done his best to make one out of an unsuitable subject. Mr. Foley's portrait of Hampden, for the Westminster Palace, has ar- rived at the same stage of completion. The sculptor has taken the licence to idealize his original, giving to Hampden something of a classic counte- nance. From divers biographical circumstances, needless to recount, we suspect that Hampden, who was a patriot of the pig-headed order, was also a heavy-faced and perhaps even a somewhat pig-faced man. The indivi- dual has been merged in the generalized statesmatiwarrior—the maximum merged in an "average." This is a mistake; and it is one not needed by Mr. Foley to disguise the want of power to impart vitality and indi- viduality to his figures—witness his group of a mother sporting with her children, now nearly finished. But there is life and nervous energy in the limbs of Hampden ; the action is simple, firm, and good: it will be an ornament to the national building.
Previous page
