LANDSCAPE PAINTERS.
JOSEPH MALLORD WILLIAM TURNER (1775--1851) stands at the head of English
landscape painters. It has been said that though others may have
equalled or surpassed him in some respects, "none has yet appeared with
such versatility of talent." (_Dr. Waagen._) The character of Turner is
a mixture of contradictory elements. He possessed a marvellous
appreciation of the beautiful in nature, yet lived in dirt and squalor,
and dressed in a style between that of a sea-captain and a hackney
coachman. The man who worked exquisitely was sometimes harsh and
uncouth, though capable of a rude hospitality; disliking the society of
some of his fellow-men, he yet loved the company of his friends, and
though penurious in some money transactions, left a magnificent bequest
to his profession. Turner owed nothing to the beauty or poetic
surroundings of his birth-place, which was the house of his father, a
barber in Maiden Lane, Covent Garden. But as Lord Byron is said to have
conjured up his loveliest scenes of Greece whilst walking in Albemarle
Street, so the associations of Maiden Lane did not prevent Turner from
delineating storm-swept landscapes, and innumerable splendours of
nature. The barber was justly proud of his child, who very early
displayed his genius, and the first drawings of Turner are said to
have been exhibited in his father's shaving-room. In time the boy was
colouring prints and washing in the backgrounds of architects' drawings.
Dr. Monro, the art patron, extended a helping hand to the young genius
of Maiden Lane. "Girtin and I," says Turner, "often walked to Bushey and
back, to make drawings for good Dr. Monro at half-a-crown a piece, and
the money for our supper when we got home." He did not, of course, start
from London.
[Illustration: THE GRAND CANAL, VENICE. _By_ TURNER. A.D. 1834.]
In 1789, Turner became a student in the Academy, and exhibited a picture
in the next year at Somerset House, _View of the Archbishop's Palace at
Lambeth_. He was then only fifteen. From that time he worked with
unceasing energy at his profession. Indeed, the pursuit of art was the
one ruling principle of his life. He frequently went on excursions, the
first being to Ramsgate and Margate, and was storing his memory with
effects of storm, mist, and tempest, which he reproduced. In 1799, when
made A.R.A., Turner had already exhibited works which ranged over
twenty-six counties of England and Wales. In 1802 he was made full
Academician, and presented, as his diploma picture, _Dolbadarn Castle,
North Wales_. In this year he visited the Continent, and saw France and
Switzerland. Five years later Turner was appointed Professor of
Perspective to the Royal Academy. We are told his lectures were
delivered in so strange a style, that they were scarcely instructive. Of
his water-colour paintings and of the _Liber Studiorum_ it is impossible
to speak too highly; he created the modern school of water-colour
painting, and his works in oil have influenced the art of the nineteenth
century. He visited Italy for the first time in 1819; again ten years
later, and for the last time in 1840. His eccentricity, both in manner
and in art, increased with age. Though wealthy, and possessing a good
house in Queen Anne Street, he died in an obscure lodging by the Thames,
at Chelsea, a few days before Christmas, 1851, Turner bequeathed his
property to found a charity for male decayed artists, but the alleged
obscurity of his will defeated this object. It was decided that his
pictures and drawings should be presented to the National Gallery, that
one thousand pounds should be spent on a monument to the painter in St.
Paul's, twenty thousand pounds should be given to the Royal Academy, and
the remainder to the next of kin and heir at law. The National Gallery
contains more than one hundred of his pictures, besides a large number
of water-colour drawings and sketches. In his earlier works Turner took
the old masters as his models, some of his best pictures showing the
characteristics of the Dutch school, as _The Shipwreck_, and _The Sun
rising in a Mist_. In _The Tenth Plague_, and _The Goddess of Discord_,
the influence of Poussin is visible, whilst Wilson is imitated in _AEneas
with the Sibyl_, and _A View in Wales_. Turner was fond of matching
himself against Claude; and not only did he try his powers in rivalry
with the older masters, he delighted to enter into honest competition
with painters of the day, and when Wilkie's _Village Politicians_ was
attracting universal notice, Turner produced his _Blacksmith's Shop_ in
imitation of it. In his later pictures Turner sacrificed form to colour.
"Mist and vapour, lit by the golden light of morn, or crimsoned with the
tints of evening, spread out to veil the distance, or rolled in clouds
and storms, are the great characteristics of Turner's art as contrasted
with the mild serenity of the calm unclouded heaven of Claude."
(_Redgrave._) Turner in his choice of colours forsook conventionality,
and "went to the cataract for its iris, to the conflagration for its
flames, asked of the sea its intensest azure, of the sky its clearest
gold." (_Ruskin._) The same critic considers Turner's period of central
power, entirely developed and entirely unabated, to begin with the
_Ulysses_, and to close with the _Temeraire_, a period of ten years,
1829--1839.
JOHN CONSTABLE (1776--1837) was born at East Bergholt, in Suffolk, June
11th, 1776, and the sunny June weather in which the painter first saw
the light seems to pervade all his pictures. Constable's father was a
miller, and intended that his son should succeed to his business; it has
been said also that it was proposed to educate him for holy orders.
Constable, however, was meant for a painter, and became one of the best
delineators of English scenery. In 1800, he became student in the Royal
Academy. In 1802, he exhibited his first picture. In 1819, he was
elected A.R.A., and became a full member ten years after. Constable's
earlier efforts were in the direction of historical painting and
portraiture, but he found his true sphere in landscape. He was
thoroughly English. No foreign master influenced him, and rustic life
furnished all he needed. He said, "I love every style and stump and lane
in the village: as long as I am able to hold a brush, I shall never
cease to paint them." To this determination we owe some of the most
pleasant English pictures, full of fresh, breezy life, rolling clouds,
shower-wetted foliage, and all the greenery of island scenes. He loved
to paint _under the sun_, and impart a glittering effect to his foliage
which many of his critics could not understand. Indeed, Constable was
not appreciated thoroughly till after his death. He seems to have known
that this would be the case, for early in his career he wrote, "I feel
now more than ever a decided conviction that I shall some time or other
make some good pictures--pictures that shall be valuable to posterity,
if I do not reap the benefit of them." Constable did not attempt bold or
mountainous scenery, but loved the flat, sunny meadows of Suffolk, and
declared that the river Stour made him a painter. In the National
Gallery are his: _The Corn-field_, _The Valley Farm_ (see
_Frontispiece_), (a view of "Willy Lott's House," on the Stour, close by
Flatford Mill, the property of the painter's father), _A Corn-field with
figures_, and _On Barnes Common_.
[Illustration: TRENT IN TYROL. _By_ CALLCOTT. _In the possession of Mr.
Samuel Cartwright._]
SIR AUGUSTUS WALL CALLCOTT (1779--1844) has been styled the English
Claude. He was born at Kensington Gravel Pits, then a pretty suburban
spot. He was, for some years, a chorister at Westminster Abbey, but
early adopted painting as his profession. Callcott was a pupil of
Hoppner, and began as a portrait painter. He soon devoted himself to
landscape, with an occasional attempt at history. He became a full
member of the Academy in 1810, his presentation picture being _Morning_.
His best pictures were produced between 1812 and 1826, during which
period he produced _The Old Pier at Littlehampton_ (National Gallery),
_Entrance to the Pool of London_, _Mouth of the Tyne_, _Calm on the
Medway_ (Earl of Durham). Callcott married in 1827, and went to Italy.
On his return in the following year he soon became a fashionable
painter. "His pictures, bright, pleasant of surface, and finished in
execution, were suited to the appreciation of the public, and not beyond
their comprehension; commissions poured in upon him." (_Redgrave._) The
Queen knighted him in 1837, and in the same year he exhibited his
_Raphael and the Fornarina_, engraved for the Art Union by L. Stocks,
which, if it possesses few faults, excites no enthusiasm. In 1840
appeared _Milton dictating Paradise Lost to his Daughter_, a large
picture, which overtaxed the decaying powers of the artist. Among
Callcott's later pictures are _Dutch Peasants returning from Market_,
and _Entrance to Pisa from Leghorn_. As a figure painter he does not
appear at his best. Examples of this class are _Falstaff and Simple_,
and _Anne Page and Slender_ (Sheepshanks Collection).
[Illustration: THE FISHERMAN'S DEPARTURE. _By_ COLLINS. _Painted in_
A.D. 1826 _for Mr. Morrison_.]
WILLIAM COLLINS (1788--1847) was born in London, where his father
carried on business as a picture dealer, in addition to the somewhat
uncertain calling of a journalist. The future painter was introduced to
Morland, a friend of his father, and learnt many things, some to be
imitated, others to be avoided, in that artist's studio. From 1807 he
exhibited at the Academy, of which he became a full member in 1820. He
exhibited one hundred and twenty-one pictures in a period of forty
years, specially devoting himself to landscape, with incidents of
ordinary life. Now he would paint children swinging on a gate, as in
_Happy as a King_ (National Gallery); children bird-nesting, or
sorrowing for their play-fellows, as in _The Sale of the Pet Lamb_.
Collins was also specially successful in his treatment of cottage and
coast scenery, as in _The Haunts of the Sea-fowl_, _The Prawn Catchers_
(National Gallery), and _Fishermen on the look-out_. After visiting
Italy, Collins forsook for a time his former manner, and painted the
_Cave of Ulysses_, and the _Bay of Naples_; but neither here nor in the
_Christ in the Temple with the Doctors_, and _The two Disciples at
Emmaus_, do we see him at his best. He wisely returned to his first
style.
WILLIAM LINTON (1791--1876) was employed in a merchant's office in
Liverpool, but quitted it to begin an artist's career in London. In
1821, he exhibited his first picture, _The Morning after the Storm_.
After visiting the Continent, Linton returned to England, and produced
pictures of the classic scenes he had studied. After a second foreign
tour, in which he visited Greece, Sicily, and Calabria, he exhibited
_The Embarkation of the Greeks for Troy_, _The Temples of Paestum_
(National Gallery), and several works of a like character.
PATRICK NASMYTH (1786--1831), son of a Scotch landscape painter, was
born in Edinburgh, and came to London. His first exhibited picture at
the Academy was a _View of Loch Katrine_, in 1811. In the British
Institution Gallery of the same year his _Loch Auchray_ appeared. It is
by his pictures of simple English scenery that Nasmyth is best known. He
took Hobbema and Wynants as models, and chose country lanes, hedge-rows,
with dwarf oak-trees, for his subjects. Nasmyth was deaf in consequence
of an illness, and having lost the use of his right hand by an accident,
painted with his left. In the National Gallery are a _Cottage_, and _The
Angler's Nook_; at South Kensington are _Landscape with an Oak_,
_Cottage by a Brook_, and _Landscape with a Haystack_.
[Illustration: ST. GOMER, BRUSSELS. _By_ DAVID ROBERTS.]
DAVID ROBERTS (1796--1864), a native of Stockbridge, near Edinburgh,
began life as a house-decorator, and, becoming a scene-painter, found
employment at Drury Lane in 1822. Marked success in this capacity led
him to attempt a higher flight in architectural landscape. He exhibited
_Rouen Cathedral_ at the Academy in 1826, and very often contributed
pictures to the British Institution and Society of British Artists; of
the last-named body he was a foundation-member. Roberts made a tour in
Spain for materials of pictures and sketches; noteworthy among the
results of this journey are _The Cathedral of Burgos_, an exterior view,
and a small Interior of the same, now in the National Gallery. Extending
his travels to the East, Roberts produced _The Ruins of Baalbec_, and
_Jerusalem from the South-East_. He was made a full member of the
Academy in 1841, and lived to see his pictures sold for far higher
prices than he had originally assigned to them. David Roberts is well
known by "Sketches in the Holy Land, Syria, and Egypt."
RICHARD PARKES BONINGTON (1801--1828) passed most of his life abroad. He
studied in the Louvre when a child, and gained his knowledge of art
exclusively in Paris and Italy. His influence on the French school of
_genre_ and dramatic art was very great indeed, almost equal to that
which Constable produced on the French artists in landscape. He died,
aged twenty-seven, from the effects of a sunstroke received while
sketching in Paris. Bonington excelled in landscape, marine, and figure
subjects. He exhibited in the British Institution, among other pictures,
two _Views of the French Coast_, which attracted much notice, and _The
Column of St. Mark's_, _Venice_ (National Gallery). Sir Richard Wallace
possesses several of his best works, notably _Henri IV. and the Spanish
Ambassador_.
[Illustration: FRANCIS I. AND HIS SISTER. _By_ BONINGTON.
_In the possession of Sir Richard Wallace, Bart._]
WILLIAM JOHN MUeLLER (1812--1845) was another landscape painter whose
career was brief, and who chiefly painted foreign scenery. He travelled
in Germany, Italy and Switzerland, and for a time practised as a
landscape painter at Bath, though with little success. In 1838 Mueller
visited Greece and Egypt, and in 1841 he was in Lycia. He had
previously settled in London. His pictures were chiefly of Oriental
scenes, and his fame was rapidly growing when he died. His works now
command high prices. In the National Gallery we have a _Landscape, with
two Lycian Peasants_, and a _River Scene_.
JOHN MARTIN (1789--1854) held a distinguished place as a painter of
poetic or imaginative landscapes and architectural subjects. He was born
near Hexham, and began the study of art in the humble field of coach
painting at Newcastle. Coming to London, Martin worked at enamel
painting, and in 1812 exhibited his first picture at the Academy, _Sadak
in Search of the Waters of Oblivion_, which is one of his best works.
This was followed by _Joshua commanding the Sun to stand still_ (1816),
_The Death of Moses_ (1838), _The Last Man_ (from Campbell's poem), _The
Eve of the Deluge_, _Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah_, &c. Martin's
most famous works were not exhibited at the Academy, _e.g._
_Belshazzar's Feast_, _The Fall of Babylon_, and _The Fall of Nineveh_.
Many of his compositions were engraved, securing for them a wide
circulation. Mr. Redgrave said: "We can hardly agree with Bulwer, that
Martin was 'more original, more self-dependent than Raphael or Michael
Angelo.'" But if in his lifetime Martin was over-praised, he was
unjustly depreciated afterwards. Many of his brother artists and the
public, when the first astonishment his pictures created had passed
away, called his art a trick and an illusion, his execution mechanical,
his colouring bad, his figures vilely drawn, their actions and
expressions bombastic and ridiculous. But, granting this, wholly or
partially, it must be remembered that his art, or manner, was original;
that it opened new views, which yielded glimpses of the sublime, and
dreams and visions that art had not hitherto displayed; and that others,
better prepared by previous study, working after him, have delighted,
and are still delighting, the world with their works.
[Illustration: BELSHAZZAR'S FEAST. _By_ JOHN MARTIN. _Exhibited at the
British Institution in_ A.D. 1821.]
THE NORWICH SCHOOL.
We must now speak of a provincial school of landscape painters which was
founded by JOHN CROME (1769--1821). The father of the Norwich Society of
Artists is generally known as "Old Crome," to distinguish him from his
son, who was likewise a painter. Crome, the son of a journey-man weaver,
born in a small tavern at Norwich, was in due course apprenticed to a
house and sign-painter. The young house-painter spent his spare time in
painting something more attractive than the walls of houses, and chose
the scenery round Norwich for his subjects. The flat, sunny landscapes,
dotted with farms and cottages, through which the sleeping river glided
slowly, and the Norfolk broads, with their flocks of wild fowl, remained
to the last the frequent subjects of Crome's pencil. Determining to be a
painter in good earnest, Crome, when his apprenticeship was over, eked
out his scanty resources by giving lessons in drawing and painting. At
the Royal Academy he exhibited only fourteen pictures, but in his native
town one hundred and ninety-six. With the exception of _The Blacksmith's
Shop_, all the works shown at the Academy were landscapes. "He wanted
but little subject: an aged oak, a pollard willow by the side of the
slow Norfolk streams, or a patch of broken ground, in his hands became
pictures charming us by their sweet colour and rustic nature." "Crome
seems to have founded his art on Hobbema, Ruysdael, and the Dutch
school, rather than on the French and Italian painters; except so far as
these were represented by our countryman, Wilson, whose works he copied,
and whose influence is seen mingled with the more realistic treatment
derived from the Dutch masters." (_Redgrave._) In the National Gallery
are his _Mousehold Heath_, _View of Chapel Field_, and _Windmill on a
Heath_: all views near Norwich. _A Clump of Trees, Hautbois Common_
(Fitzwilliam Gallery, Cambridge), is another favourable specimen of his
art.
JAMES STARK (1794--1859) was a pupil of Crome, and takes rank next to
him in the Norwich school. In 1812, he was elected a member of the
Norwich Society of Artists. In 1817, he came to London, and became a
student in the Royal Academy. There appeared some of his best works:
_Boys Bathing_, _Flounder Fishing_, and _Lambeth, looking towards
Westminster Bridge_. Illness obliged Stark to return to Norwich, where
he produced his "Scenery of the Rivers Yare and Waveney, Norfolk;" a
series of illustrations engraved by Goodall and others. Stark lacked the
vigour of Crome in colour and drawing.
GEORGE VINCENT (1796--about 1831) is best known for his _View of
Greenwich Hospital_, shown from the river. It was painted for Mr.
Carpenter, of the British Museum, and was in the International
Exhibition of 1862. Vincent was specially fond of sunlight effects or
clouds in his pictures.
JOHN SELL COTMAN (1782--1842) having escaped the life of a
linen-draper's shopman, devoted himself to art, and coming to London
found a friend and patron in Dr. Monro. From 1800 to 1806 Cotman
exhibited pictures at the Academy, and, returning to Norwich, was made a
member and secretary of the Society of Artists there. In the year 1808
he contributed to the Norwich exhibition sixty-seven works. Cotman paid
many visits to Normandy, and after 1834 was Professor of Drawing in
King's College School, London. He was more successful as a water-colour
artist than a painter in oils. He painted chiefly landscapes, marine
pieces, and executed many engravings of architecture.
The Norwich school no longer exists as a distinct body.
* * * * *
FRANCIS DANBY (1793--1861) excelled Martin in the poetry of landscape
art. He was born near Wexford, and gained his first knowledge of art in
Dublin, where, in 1812, he exhibited his first picture, _Evening_. In
1813, he was established at Bristol as a teacher of drawing in water
colour. He became known to the artistic world of London by his _Upas
Tree of Java_, which was at the British Institution of 1820, an
intensely poetic work, now in the National Gallery. His _Sunset at Sea
after a Storm_, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1824, was purchased by
Sir Thomas Lawrence. A year later Danby exhibited _The Delivery of
Israel out of Egypt_, for which he was elected an A.R.A. He is most
famous, however, for quiet scenes, calm evenings at sea, sunset effects,
combined with some poetic incident, and always remarkable for great
brilliancy of colour, among which are _The Artist's Holiday_ and _The
Evening Gun_. In the National Gallery is _The Fisherman's Home,
Sunrise_. He never became a R.A.
WILLIAM CLARKSON STANFIELD (1793--1867) holds one of the highest places
among English landscape and marine painters. Beginning life as a sailor
in the Royal Navy, he sketched vessels as they passed his own. A severe
fall compelled retirement from the navy. He began his art career as a
scene-painter in the Old Royalty Theatre, Wellclose Square, and later
became scene-painter to Drury Lane Theatre. His first exhibited picture
was _A River Scene_ in the Academy, 1820. In the same year _A Study from
Nature_ was at the British Institution. He exhibited _Ben Venu_, and _A
Coast Scene_, at the Institution in 1822. In 1824, he was a
foundation-member of the Society of British Artists, and sent five
pictures to their first exhibition in that year. Stanfield's large
_Wreckers off Fort Rouge_, was exhibited at the British Institution in
1828. In 1827 appeared _A Calm_, in the Royal Academy. From that time
Stanfield's success was assured. His truthfulness in reading nature,
whether in naval battle scenes, views of foreign sea-ports, or mountain
and river scenery, has seldom if ever been surpassed. He became a full
member of the Academy in 1835. An unwearied worker, he exhibited one
hundred and thirty-two pictures at the Royal Academy. We may mention
_The Battle of Trafalgar_; _The Victory, with Nelson's Body on board,
towed into Gibraltar_; _Entrance to the Zuyder Zee_; _Lake of Como_, and
_The Canal of the Giudecca, Venice_ (all in the National Gallery). Among
his earlier works are _Mount St. Michael, Cornwall_; _A Storm_; _A
Fisherman off Honfleur_, and _The Opening of New London Bridge_.
[Illustration: TERMINATI MARINA. _By_ STANFIELD. A.D. 1840. _In the
possession of the Marquis of Lansdowne._]
JAMES BAKER PYNE (1800--1870), born in Bristol, began life in a
solicitor's office, which he quitted to make a precarious subsistence by
painting, teaching, or restoring pictures. He went to London in 1835,
where a picture exhibited a year after at the Academy attracted notice,
and opened the way of success. He became famous as a delineator of lake
scenery, and for _pseudo_-Turner-like treatment of sunlight effects.
THOMAS CRESWICK (1811--1869), one of the most pleasing modern English
landscape painters, was born at Sheffield. He came to London when only
seventeen, and his pictures were exhibited by the British Institution
and the Royal Academy in that year, 1828. Having settled in London, he
delighted lovers of landscape with views in Ireland and Wales, and,
later, turned his attention to the North of England, the rocky dales and
rivers of which furnished subjects for his finest works. In 1842, he was
elected an Associate of the Academy, and received a premium of fifty
guineas from the British Institution for the general excellence of his
productions. In 1851, Creswick became a full member of the Academy, and
somewhat later executed pictures into which Frith and Ansdell introduced
figures and cattle. There is a charm in his paintings, the character of
which may be gathered from _The Old Foot Road_, _The Hall Garden_, _The
Pleasant Way Home_, _The Valley Mill_, _The Blithe Brook_, _Across the
Beck_. In the National Gallery is _The Pathway to the Village Church_.
"He painted the homely scenery of his country, especially its streams,
in all its native beauty and freshness; natural, pure, and simple in his
treatment and colour, careful and complete in his finish, good taste
prevailing in all his works, and conspicuously so in his charming
contributions to the works of the Etching Club, of which he was a valued
member, and also in his many designs on wood." (_Redgrave._)
[Illustration: THE PLEASANT WAY HOME. _By_ CRESWICK. _Exhibited in
1846._]
JOHN LINNELL (1792--1882) the son of a carver and gilder in Bloomsbury,
was at first brought up to his father's trade, and had many
opportunities of studying pictures. At eight years of age he copied
Morland so well that his versions were often taken for originals. Soon
afterwards he became a pupil of John Varley, and in his studio met
Mulready and W. H. Hunt, with whom he frequently went on sketching
tours. In 1807, when only fifteen years of age, Linnell sent his first
pictures, _A Study from Nature_, and _A View near Reading_, to the Royal
Academy Exhibition, to which for more than seventy years he was a
regular contributor. He frequently painted portraits, and was
particularly successful in landscapes with many trees. Mr. Ruskin says,
"The forest studies of John Linnell are particularly elaborate, and in
many points most skilful." For many years towards the close of his life
he lived at Redhill, with his two sons and his son-in-law, Samuel
Palmer, all landscape painters, near him.
During his long life he painted many hundred pictures, which are now for
the most part scattered in private galleries in England. Two of his
works are in the National Gallery, _Wood Cutters_, and _The Windmill_;
and three at South Kensington, _Wild Flower Gatherers_, _Milking Time_,
and _Driving Cattle_.
EDWARD WILLIAM COOKE (1811--1880), the son of an engraver, was intended
for his father's profession; but he preferred the brush to the graver.
In 1851 he was made an associate and in 1864 a full member of the Royal
Academy, to whose exhibitions he was a most constant contributor: he
also exhibited at the British Institution. His works are, for the most
part, coast and river scenes, generally in England, and frequently on
the Thames or Medway. Paintings by him are in the National Gallery and
the South Kensington Museum.
[Illustration]