WHY NOT A HALL OF MASTERPIECES AT THE NATIONAL GALLERY
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IT has become a commonplace for those returning from Continental galleries to say of our national collection : "Here is at last a great gallery without rubbish." There are few things more depressing than that enormously long gallery in the Louvre, which starts with masterpieces thick on the walls, but which gradually declines in interest until the weary visitor desires to remain ignorant of the countless pictures. At last tired, he exclaims with Macbeth : "What, will the line stretch out to the crack of doom ? Another yet I'll see no more !" But when the wanderer in the Louvre has tired himself out among the tenth- rate works of the decadence, what a harbour of refuge the Direction has prepared for him in the Salon Carr& It is the lack of a hall of masterpieces which we deplore in the National Gallery. First, because such a hall is a standing protest against the notion that a gallery is primarily a place of instruction. It should be a palace of delight, and not a museum of specimens. Until people realise a picture as a thing of beauty standing alone, and needing no label to classify it, they have failed to grasp its real meaning. The person who looks firstly at a picture as an example of such-and-such a master or school, and lastly looks at it as a combination of form and colour expressing an emotional meaning, has little understanding of the inner significance of painting. The present arrangement of the National Gallery, which strictly isolates one school of painting from another as if they were fever patients, encourages the scientific study of pictures at the expense of the emotional. That there should be scien- tific study is quite right and proper, but it should not be forced upon people who understand the whole question imperfectly. After all, what we do not want is for our national collection to be a hunting ground for Pro- fessor Smelfungus. We want it to rouse interest and enthusiasm for great art in the public mind. This probably can best be done by assembling together the finest works of all times in one room. There is an im- pression of overpowering grandeur produced by master- pieces of different styles hung together. This grandeur compels recognition from those who are but partially awakened to the power of art, and delights those already awakened. When the National Gallery first acquired the great Velasquez Admiral, the picture stood on a screen in the Umbrian Room. Did it or the occupants of the walls suffer ? Far from it. The majestic figure in black gave by contrast a greater etherealness to the cloudless horizons of Umbria, and never since have the splendidly decorative qualities of the portrait been so conclusively felt. But to make the classifi- cation of schools complete the Admiral was removed to a dark passage room, and from there to the place he now
occupies,—at one time he had to be hung with his feet pro- jected towards the visitor, this last indignity being necessi- tated to avoid the reflection in the glass covering the picture.
Although our Gallery is not so rich in world-famous pictures as some of the Continental collections, it contains an ample supply of great works out of which to choose a gallery of masterpieces. Many pictures will be universally agreed upon ; the selection of others, of course, will depend on individual feeling. To make a selection is an amusing occupation ; many of the following would no doubt appear in most people's lists. Raphael's Ansidei Madonna, Vision of a Young Knight, and St. Catherine, Perugino's Triptych, Leonardo's Virgin among the Rocks, Crivelli's Annunciation, Michelangelo's Virgin and Child (the picture with the angels). The Venetian pictures offer a large selection, and foremost among these come Titian's Bacchus and Ariadne and his Holy Family with the wonderful moun- tain background and the St. Catherine in a pale-green dress ; Bellini's Lored,ano, Moroni's Tailor, and the lady in red by Paris Bordone. When we come to the Dutch pictures the same richness exists. The two new Rembrandts are master- pieces, undoubtedly so is his Rabbi, and, of course, Vandyck's wonderful man in black, Ver Meer of Delft's lady, and one, if not two, Peter de Hooghs, the fantastic gentleman in black by Terburg, the great Van Eyck portrait group, and Holbein's Ambassadors. Of Velasquez the finest pictures we possess are the head of Philip IV. and the Admiral, and these would be conspicuous in any gallery except perhaps that of Madrid. Among the English pictures ought to he included Sir Joshua's Lord Heathfield and his portrait of two young men. Among the landscapes Old Crome's Windmill and Mousehold Heath would be prominent, while the glory of the colour of Turner's Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus would cer- tainly uphold that picture's claim to a place among the greatest. Nor would we exclude modern work when such a portrait as Millais's Gladstone could be included. About the French pictures opinions will differ. Though most people would be glad to welcome a great Claude among the master- pieces, would many share the present Director's enthusiasm for Poussin? Would Sir Edward Poynter, we wonder, include Jean Francois Millet were the Gallery so fortunate as to possess a first-rate example of his art?
French art is indeed but poorly represented in the National Gallery, in spite of its importance, for it has influenced other countries so greatly, including England, sometimes for good and sometimes for evil. Now that the Wallace Collection provides us with such a large gathering of eighteenth-century French pictures, it would be absurd for the National Gallery to waste its resources on this particular form of painting. In spite of a small department of modern fashion, this school is not of any more use for the advancement of great art than were the moral ideals of the people who inspired Watteau and Lancret of use to the advancement of mankind. With more modern French art the case is different. Both for the good of artists and man- kind in general it is desirable that we should have an example of Millet. Not only did this great man show us the beauty and the tragedy of the tiller of the soil, but he also revealed that the grandeur and terribilita of Alichelangelo's form did not come to an end in Rome, but are still with those who have eyes to see. The English are wont to pride themselves on their appreciation of landscape, both natural and painted ; but why has our Gallery no picture by the man who of all others entered into the quiet peace of Nature, and whose work breathes the very spirit of the fields and trees ? Corot has taken his place so surely among the great painters of this age that the most pedantic must no longer refuse him the title of master.
A great many of the rooms at the National Gallery suffer from insufficient light. lathe winter the great Venetian Room is habitually murky. The skylight is too high up, and far removed from the pictures. The paler early paintings are not so invisible as the later works in which the dark end of the chromatic scale is largely used. The glory of Titian's blues in the Bacchus and Ariadne is invisible in the snuffy light that filters through the ground glass of the ceiling. Surely it would be better to have plain glass and be able to see the pictures in winter, even if chimney pots were visible when one looked out for them by gazing at the roof instead of at the walls A blind would temper the summer sun.
It is no doubt easy to make suggestions on paper, and it is no doubt equally easy to produce formal objections to all plans of reorganisation. Nevertheless, while we rejoice in having in London one of the finest picture galleries in the world, it is still worth while to consider whether there are not gaps which ought to be filled up, and rearrangements which ought to be made so that our treasures of art may have a setting worthy of their greatness.
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