BRITISH FINE ART COLLECTIONS. INTRODUCTION BY RICHARD REDGRAVE, ESQ., R.A. Oil Paintings. MR. SHEEPSHANKS having generously presented to the nation his valuable pictures and drawings, the works of British artists, with a view to the formation of a national collection of British art, the following catalogue has been prepared: it is intended to serve not only as a register of the paintings, &c., but also as a means of affording the public information on the works and their authors. A few prefatory observations on the aim and objects of British art, and on some of its marked characteristics, may enable the public to enter into the intentions of the artists, and more fully to enjoy a noble gift which has been specially offered for the gratification of all. In considering the aim of British art, it is natural to compare it with that of the modern Continental schools, but in doing so it is particularly necessary to bear in mind how differently the latter have been fostered and encouraged. In France, for example-and the same observation is not less applicable to other countries--the Church and the State are the great patrons of art, and pictures are largely commissioned for town halls, palaces, and churches. These are constantly of large dimensions, and calculated by their mere size to make an impression on those who do not reflect that all the highest qualities of art may be contained in pictures of moderate size, as is sufficiently proved in the works of Raffaelle, Fra Angelico, and Hemling. The subjects of these works are all of a public character, religious when commissioned by the Church, or historical when for the State. But Protestant Britain has never quite overcome the objections of her reformers to scriptural subjects: our church still denies them admission into ecclesiastical edifices, and, until lately, the State has in this country done little to promote pic-torial art; so that our battles and our triumphs have had no national commemoration by the painter, but have been left to the poet to sing, instead of to the artist to portray. Moreover, our insular position has, under Providence, protected us from actual contact with war and its terrors, and thus had some share in the subjects of our choice. Art here has flourished from the demands of those who love it as a home delight; therefore our pictures are small, and suited to private houses, while the subjects are such as we can live by and love; and hence, they have been largely illustrative of the feelings and affections of mankind, and of the beautiful nature of which we desire to be reminded as a solace in the moments of rest from the hard labour of daily life. And it may be said, that in no school of ancient or modern times have such subjects been more touchingly treated, more happily conceived, or more beauti fully executed. The contrast between the British and the Continental artists in their choice of subjects was singularly apparent in the vast gathering in Paris in 1855. Το pass from the grand salons appropriated in the Palais des Beaux Arts to French and Continental works, into the long gallery of British pictures, was to pass at once from the midst of warfare and its incidents, from passion, strife, and bloodshed, from martyrdoms and suffering, to the peaceful scenes of home. It was said of our pictures that they reflected the life of a people who had long been permitted to dwell safely. The subjects chosen by British painters have been disparagingly classed with those of the Dutch school, but they are of a far higher character, and appeal to more educated and intellectual minds. Thus, if we examine the works of Teniers, Terberg, Ostade, Jan Steen, De Hooge, Dow, Mieris, and others of that school, they will be found to consist of music meetings, tavern scenes, conversations, feasts, games, revels, and drinking-bouts; often very doubtful in their subject, and frequently of the very lowest taste and character. They seem to be the productions of men who never read, since the subjects chosen rarely or ever have any connexion with the literature, or have been derived from the poets or writers, of their own or any other country; but represent, certainly with admirable truth and force, the scenes the painters daily saw, and among which they daily lived, embodying generally only the lowest sentiments and instincts of our common nature. The subjects of British artists, on the contrary, if they are below what is usually classed as historic art, almost always appeal to the higher sentiments, and embody the deep feelings and affections of mankind. Our poets and writers, as well as those of other countries, find in them loving illustrators. Even when the painter chooses for his subject our rough sports, our native games, our feasts and merry-makings, he contrives so that some touching incident, some tender episode, or some sweet expression, shall be introduced to link them to our higher humanity; and those offensive accompaniments which the Dutch artist seemed instinctively to revel in are judiciously passed over, or hinted at rather than prominently displayed. Landscape-painting also is a class of art which has been very successfully cultivated in this country, and British artists have been allowed greatly to excel in it. The present collection contains fine works by Constable, Turner, Collins, and Callcott, among those passed away, and many by eminent living painters. Unlike the Continental practice, our artists, both subject and landscape painters, mostly study art for themselves, and prefer nature to the painting-rooms of their eminent contemporaries. This habit has led not only to truth, but to variety and individuality; and these are among the greatest charms of British landscape painting. Great is the difference between Collins and Constable, although both paint English nature as it is presented to the view of all who love to look on it and learn to see it, and both prefer the fresh breezy sparkle of our own downs and commons, of our green woods and fields or shingly shores, to any other, as the subjects for their pictures. Still greater is the difference between these and Turner, the true painter of mist and cloud, of air and distance,—who, not content to restrict himself to our own scenery, delights in the scenery of brighter atmosphere also; and fulfils nature with all that an imaginative mind could gather through the most informed and gifted eye. The dews and mists of England have been a boon to our island-painters, sometimes shrouding the earth and rendering it vast and grand by dim uncertainty, sometimes glittering in the rosy gleams of morning, or lighted by the golden tints of evening. Every way, these accidental effects have been seized upon as a source of infinite variety and beauty; they contribute to the verdure and fertility of the land, to the "Long fields of barley and of rye That clothe the wold and meet the sky," as well as to the abundant weedage of our heaths and hedgerows-both fertile sources of the true picturesque, and both studied with intense love by the true artist. From what has been said, it will not be felt surprising that historical art has been little practised in these kingdoms, since there has been no demand for it by private patrons or corporate bodies, for our churches or for our state buildings; yet artists have never been backward, and some have from time to time sacrificed their worldly interests to do away what has been made a reproach to us. We may instance noble historical works by men who were our contemporaries, by Haydon, Hilton, and Etty, as well as by living artists; works which may well take rank with what has been achieved by modern Continental painters; and when Government at last came forward to promote historic art in the decoration of our Halls of Legislature, an immediate response was given that has resulted, and will result, in works which posterity may perhaps place higher than contemporary judgment. The present collection, however, consists of pictures of cabinet proportions illustrative of every-day life and manners among us, appealing to every man's observation of nature and to our best feelings and affections, without rising to what is called historic art: as such, they are works that all can understand and all more or less appreciate. And this is especially to be insisted on, since a wrong impression is only too widely entertained that art does not appeal to the multitude, but only to those specially educated to appreciate it. Pictorial art does appeal directly to all in some of its highest qualities, inasmuch as it embodies images of beauty and expression; since both of these are parts of a language which nature has made common to all who are embued with a sense of the beautiful, and an instinctive feeling enabling them to read the heart in the varied expression of the face or action, and therefore enabling them to enter into the painter's labours if he has truly rendered nature. Thus far, then, all can judge of the painter's art,-all can tell if he fills them with pleasure by a sight of the beautiful, or touches their heart in sympathy with the expression he has portrayed. Not that it is asserted that all feel these qualities in their full force, or can be moved equally by his art. We are created with senses capable of culture, and as the Indian becomes acute of hearing and keen of vision by constant exercise of these bodily senses, so the intellectual may be cultured and improved; and this constitutes the high mission of the artist, and that which renders him a public benefactor-that his art stimulates mental culture. Nor does this culture contradict the first assertion, that art appeals directly to the multitude; there may be a difference in degree, there is none in kind, and as far as beauty and expression go, the painter appeals to all, knowing that in these respects "the whole earth" is still "of one language and one speech." Nor are the untaught multitude shut out from the enjoyment of a still higher quality of the painter's art-the imaginative. Unlike the poet, who clothes his noblest images in words, which to the many never reveal things, of the painter it may be more truly said that through his art— "We can behold Things manifold, That have not yet been wholly told, Have not been wholly sung or said;" and not alone all that is probable, but all that is possible, becomes actual, embodied by the painter's skill on canvas. Now if we would simply allow these three qualities in a picture to act upon our minds, how much of the painter's art would become a source of delight, shut up only when we attempt to be learned in qualities which we have not studied, and critical where passive enjoyment would bring the truest pleasure. Let us look at any picture in the present Collection appealing distinctly to the qualities spoken of, and, simply endeavouring to enter into the painter's intentions, forget awhile to be critical, and be content for once to be amused. There is no work in the Collection more fully illustrating the pleasure which all will derive from pictorial beauty than the Perdita and Florizel of Leslie (No. 114). It is impossible to suppose that one quite unacquainted with the play would be otherwise than deeply interested by the surpassingly sweet face and the modest purity of Perdita, or the more manly form and princely grace of him to whom she gives the flower; and all can understand the deep devouring love with which he gazes on her. Far higher, no doubt, will be the pleasure of the spectator who, although equally untaught in the rules of art, has read the poetical play from which the subject is taken. He will at once fully enter into the painter's beautiful embodiment of her whose princely lineage shone through her shepherd rearing, and agree with Florizel to think her "... No shepherdess, but Flora Peering on April's front." The depth of love which the painter's skill reveals to the unread spectator will be far stronger in its appeal to him who has read the inimitable lines the poet has put into the mouth of Florizel : - "What you do Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet, I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms; Pray so; and for the ordering of your affairs, To sing them too: when you do dance, I wish you A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do Nothing but that; move still, still so, and own No other function: each your doing, So singular in each particular, Crowns what you are doing in the present deeds, The enjoyment of the intelligent observer will not end here. He will be led to remark how the painter has enhanced the loveliness of Perdita by contrasting it with the homely comeliness of Mopsa, and given her actions additional grace by the truthful clumsiness of the country maiden; nor has the samé artifice been neglected to add youth and beauty to the prince as compared with the aged father and his councillor. Many more sources of pleasure might be pointed out, but they refer to other qualities. These we may defer to the consideration of expression as a source of pleasure to all, and illustrate it by Mulready's picture of "Giving a Bite," No. 140. The subject matter of the picture is very slight; but the story told is perfect in its kind-two boys, the one giving to the other a bite from an apple. The boy who is giving the bite is one of those whose look belies him that his gift is a compulsory one. He is evidently a poor-spirited creature, who dares not resist the demand "give us a bite;" but he yields it unwillingly, as his face and whole action most fully express. Instead of proffering the apple freely he shrinks, and drawing back his elbows, brings the fruit in the closest proximity to himself; he pinches it with his fingers, and covers it up to limit the bite to the smallest possible surface; while the bully who enforces it expresses in countenance and hands the eager and intense greediness of his nature; the hands are instinct with expressive action; he seems pouncing on his prey. At the lower part of the picture, the monkey of a poor Italian stroller eyes, with a face of the same expressive fear, a large dog, equally dreading a greedy bite. A child in a little girl's arms is also most thoroughly expressive of sleep. Into the various expression portrayed all can enter the uninstructed in art as well as he who has made art his study; the former, indeed, from being entirely free to rest upon the story, is likely to enjoy it even more fully than the latter, whose thoughts are taken up with other qualities of art into which the unlearned do not strive 10 enter. The present Collection is not rich in purely-imaginative works, that is to say, works representing ideal beings or states of being, such as are the fairy scenes of Maclise or Paton, the scripture visions of Danby, or the mythological and poetical landscapes of Turner. Many works, however, and, among them, all those embodying subjects from our poets and other writers, are necessarily works of imagination, although they may be so fully realized by the painter's art that we forget the invention in the completeness of the realization. The Dinner at Page's House, by Leslie (No. 110), for instance, makes us, as it were, personally acquainted with the imaginary individuals of the poet's drama, with Slender and Anne Page, with Falstaff and Bardolph, as well as with the two merry wives"; so much so, indeed, that we accept them as real persons, and overlook that the whole is a pure invention, first of the poet-who makes us 66 know the characters by their deeds and speech—and then of the painter who, entering fully into the poet's mind, enables us to see what the latter had but partially revealed. Thus, when the painter is a thorough master of his art, he helps to open up the poet to the many; and "Sweet Anne Page," probably a mere abstraction when read of, becomes henceforth a living reality, that may, perchance, never more be separated from the language of the poet. This realization by the painter, the multitude are thoroughly able to enter into and appreciate. It has been found by experience that men apprehend more easily by the eye than by the ear, that pictures are to them greater realities than are words; and, certainly, he that has, in ignorance of the play, looked with pleasure on such a work as the above, admiring it merely as the representation of a feast in the olden time, and drawing the characters of the guests only from the expression portrayed, will be interested more deeply still when he reads the play, and sees the skill with which the painter has revealed to him the conception of another. Thus the inventions of the painter are not only a source of pleasure in themselves, but open out other sources of gratification also. In some cases the invention of the artist is exerted rather to exercise and call forth the imagination of the spectator himself than to display his own. "Suspense," by Landseer, is an excellent example of pictures of this class. A bloodhound is watching at a closed door, shut out, one may imagine, from the wounded knight his master. There are the steel gloves removed from the now powerless limbs-the torn eagle-plume speaks of the deadly strife—and the continuous track upon the floor shows how his life-blood flowed away drop by drop as he was borne within. Who does not watch with the faithful hound in deep "suspense" for some token that he yet lives? Others, again, may read the picture far differently; they may imagine that the dog has tracked the author of some act of violence or deed of blood; torn from his casque by the struggling victim, lies the plume on the floor, sprinkled with the blood shed in the struggle ere the victim was borne within the now closed portal; we recognize the scuffle of the moment, the hand clenching the door-post with fearful energy to prevent the closing, the stifled cries, the hopeless resistance. Yet there, like a watchful sentry, waiting in silence, the animal crouches, whose deep instincts teach him untiringly to follow the object of his search; the spectator himself waits in anxious eagerness for the re-opening door, anticipates the spring of the animal, and the renewed struggle that will ensue. Thus variously may the picture be read, each painting for himself a far different scene; but there are few who, looking on the painter's work, will stay entirely without the door, nor allow imagination to carry them away beyond the narrow canvas actually bounding the artist's labours. Enough has been said to show the manner in which pictorial art speaks to all, and is intelligible to all, and how greatly the spectator's pleasure may be enlarged if he will examine in a true spirit. Some further remarks, however, may be useful to illustrate other qualities of pictorial art; remarks tending also to a just appreciation of the artist's labours. Among these, one of the first to be considered is imitation. Painting is classed as one of the imitative arts, and there can be no question that much of the pleasure we derive from pictures arises from the imitative representation of objects. Take the lowest class of works, pictures of still life. In these we shall at once allow that, while grouping, light and shade, and colour conduce to the pleasurable sensations they afford us, the imitative truth with which objects solid and in relief are represented on a flat surface, with all their varied qualities of colour, texture, transparency, &c., is the great source of our pleasure in them. As subjects take a higher aim, and rely more largely on beauty, expression, or feeling, mere imitation becomes more and more secondary to those nobler qualities; and in works appealing directly to the imagination, it is surprising how small an amount of imitation is consistent with our deriving the fullest gratification from them. Thus the naked females of Vanderwerf are both well drawn and coloured, and evidently far more imitative than an outline by Flaxman; but the touching groups of the Hesiod would lose in their effect upon us, if coloured by even a greater hand than the Dutch painter. |