the boy was put into a notary's office. The usual signs of
disinclination for office work and a passion for art having duly
appeared, he was sent to Boucher, who advised him to go and study under
Chardin. This he did for a short time, but finding it dull--for Chardin
was not as great a teacher as he was a painter--he went back to Boucher
as an assistant. In 1752 he won the Prix de Rome, although he had never
attended the Academy Schools, and in 1756 started for Italy.
Reynolds had just returned from Rome at the date of Fragonard's capture
of the opportunity of going there, and we know from the _Discourses_ how
he spent his time there and what direction his studies took. Fragonard
pursued an exactly opposite course, being advised thereto by Boucher,
who said to him, "If you take Michelangelo and Raphael seriously, you
are lost." Feeling that the advice was suitable to himself, if not
sound on general principles, Fragonard devoted himself to the lighter
and more sparkling works of Tiepolo and others of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. He also made a tour in South Italy and Sicily with
Hubert Robert, the landscape painter, and the Abbe Saint Non, the latter
of whom published a number of etchings he made after Fragonard's
drawings, under the title of _Voyages de Naples et de Sicile_.
On returning to Paris in 1761 his first success was the large
composition of _Callirhoe and Coresus_, which was exhibited at the Salon
in 1765, and is now in the Louvre. But he soon abandoned the grand
style, chiefly, it is probable, owing to the patronage of the idle or
industrious rich who showered commissions upon him, for smaller and more
sociable pictures with which to adorn and enliven their houses. The
beautiful, but exceedingly improper picture at Hertford House, called
_The Swing_--or in French, _Les Hazards heureux de l'Escarpolette_,
appears to have been commissioned by the Baron de St. Julien, within the
next year or two, for in the memoirs of Cotte a conversation is recorded
which shows that the Baron had asked another painter, Doyen, to paint
it. "Who would have believed," says the indignant Doyen, "that within a
few days of my picture of Ste. Genevieve being exhibited at the Salon, a
nobleman would have sent for me to order a picture on a subject like
this." He then goes on to relate how the Baron explained to him exactly
what he required. We cannot entirely acquit Fragonard of all blame in
accepting such a commission, but he was a young man, just starting as a
professional artist, with the example of Boucher before him, and it
would hardly have seemed wise to begin his career by offending a noble
patron. The whole incident throws a glaring light on the conditions
under which the art of France flourished in the Louis Quinze period,
when Boucher was everybody and Chardin nobody.
For the real Fragonard we may turn to _Le Chiffre d'Amour_, or the "Lady
carving an initial," as the prosaic diction of the Wallace Collection
has it (No. 382). In this the equal delicacy of the sentiment and of the
painting combine to effect a little masterpiece of Louis Quinze art. It
is simple and natural, and entirely free from the besetting sins of so
slight a picture triviality, affectation, empty prettiness, or simply
silliness. In its way it is perfect, and for that perfection is for ever
reserved the popularity which we find temporarily accorded to pictures
like Frith's _Dolly Varden_ or Millais' _Bubbles_.
Another of the Hertford House examples, the portrait of a Boy as
Pierrot, is equally entitled to be popular for all time, and like
Reynolds's _Strawberry Girl_, might well be called "one of the
half-dozen original things" which no artist ever exceeded in his life's
work. A comparison between the two pictures, which were probably painted
within a few years of each other, will serve to show the difference
between the English and French Schools at this period. On the one
hand--to put it very shortly indeed--we see Fragonard influenced by
Tiepolo, France, and Louis XV.; on the other, Sir Joshua, influenced by
Michelangelo and Raphael, England, and George III.
The mention of JEAN BAPTISTE SIMEON CHARDIN among this brilliant and
frivolous galaxy seems almost out of place. "He is not so much an
eighteenth-century French artist," Lady Dilke says of him, "as a French
artist of pure race and type. Though he treated subjects of the
humblest and most unpretentious class, he brought to their rendering not
only deep feeling and a penetration which divined the innermost truths
of the simplest forms of life, but a perfection of workmanship by which
everything he handled was clothed with beauty." That the Wallace
Collection includes no work from his hand is perhaps regrettable, but
truly Chardin was someone apart from all the magnificence that dazzles
us there. His was the treasure of the humble.
The effects of the Revolution upon French painting were as surprising as
they were great. That the gay and frivolous art of Boucher and Fragonard
should have suddenly ceased might have been considered inevitable; but
whereas in Holland, when the Spanish yoke had been thrown off, and a
Republic proclaimed, a vigorous democratic school arose under Frans
Hals; and in England during the Commonwealth the artistic influence
which was beginning to be spread by Charles I. and Buckingham utterly
ceased; in France an artistic Dictator arose, as we may well call him,
in the person of JACQUES LOUIS DAVID, who not only made painting a part
of the revolutionary propaganda, but succeeded under the Emperor
Napoleon also in maintaining his position as painter to the Government,
and thereby imposing on his country a style of art which had a great
influence on the whole course of French painting for many years to come.
But the most remarkable thing was that it was to the classics that this
revolutioniser went for inspiration. The explanation is to be found in
the fact that he was bitterly aggrieved by the attitude of the Academy
to him as a young man, and in the accident of his famous picture of
Brutus synchronising with the events of 1789. He was at once hailed as a
deliverer, and made, as it were, painter to the Revolution.
[Illustration: PLATE XXXVI.--FRAGONARD
L'ETUDE
_Louvre, Paris_]
But what was even more important in the influence he exerted at this
time was his actual appointment as President of the Convention, which
gave him the power to revenge himself upon the Academy, which he did by
extinguishing it in 1793, and to remove any inconvenient rivals by
indicting them as aristocrats. Of the older painters, Fragonard and
Greuze were the only important ones left, and as they could not under
the altered circumstances be considered as rivals to the classical
David, they both saw the century out. Fragonard simply ceased painting
for want of patrons, and David was good enough to procure him a post in
the Museum des Arts, or he would have starved. Unfortunately he
attempted to adapt himself to the new style, and was promptly ejected
from his post--ostensibly on his previous connection with royalty--and
was wise enough to fly to his native town in the south.
During the first quarter of the nineteenth century the dictatorship of
David was supreme. How it was finally overthrown we shall see in another
chapter.
_THE ENGLISH SCHOOL_
I
THE EARLY PORTRAIT PAINTERS
In the preface to the _Anecdotes of Painting_ written in 1762, Horace
Walpole observes that this country had not a single volume to show on
the works of its painters. "In truth," he continues, "it has very rarely
given birth to a genius in that profession. Flanders and Holland have
sent us the greatest men that we can boast. This very circumstance may
with reason prejudice the reader against a work, the chief business of
which must be to celebrate the art of a country which has produced so
few good artists. This objection is so striking, that instead of calling
it _The Lives of English Painters_, I have simply given it the title of
_Anecdotes of Painting in England_."
As Walpole's work was merely a compilation from the voluminous notes of
George Vertue, a painstaking antiquary who had collected every scrap of
information he could acquire in the early years of the eighteenth
century, his conclusions can hardly be questioned, and the foundation of
the English school of painting is therefore generally assumed to have
been effected by Reynolds. But as Wren's Cathedral replaced an older one
which was destroyed by the fire of London, and as that was reared on
the foundation of a Roman temple, so we find that the art of painting in
England was certainly practised in earlier times, and but for certain
circumstances much more of it would have survived than is now to be
found.
In other countries, as we have seen, the Church was in earlier times the
greatest if not the only patron of the arts, and there is plenty of
evidence to show that in England, too, from the reign of Henry III.
onwards till the Reformation, our churches were decorated with frescoes.
This evidence is of two kinds; first, entries in royal and other
accounts, directing payment for specified work; and secondly, the
remains of fresco painting in our cathedrals and churches. The former is
of little interest except to the antiquary. The latter has suffered so
much from neglect or actual destruction as to be considered unworthy of
the attention of either the artist in search of inspiration or the
critic in pursuit of anything to criticise; but when every
inconsiderable production in the little world of English art has had its
bulky quarto written upon it, it is curious that no one has yet
discovered what a splendid harvest awaits the investigation of these old
frescoes all over the country.
As it is, we have only to note that as religion was so important an
influence on painting in other countries so was it in England, only
unfortunately as a destroying and not a cherishing influence. Granting
the probability that there were few, if any, of our English frescoes
which would be comparable in artistic interest with those in Italy,
where the art was so sedulously cultivated, it must nevertheless be
remembered that only a fragment remains here and there out of all the
work which must have been produced, and that after the Reformation even
those works which did survive were treated with positive as well as
negative obloquy, so that where they have been preserved at all it is
only by having been whitewashed over or otherwise hidden and damaged.
Even worse than the Reformation in 1530, was the Puritan outburst a
century later, which not only destroyed works of art, but extinguished
all hope of their being created. Is it to be wondered at, then, that the
foundation of the English School of painting should have been postponed
for a century more?
At the same time it is interesting to note that the little painting
which did creep into England in the sixteenth century, was of the very
kind that formed the chief feature of the English School when it was
finally established, namely portraiture. Here again we see the influence
of religion; for to the reformed church, at least as interpreted by the
English temperament, the second commandment was and is still second only
in number, not in importance. To Protestant or Puritan the idea of a
picture in a church was anathema. As late as 1766, when Benjamin West
offered to decorate St. Paul's Cathedral with a painting of Moses
receiving the tables of the law on Mount Sinai, the Bishop exclaimed, "I
have heard of the proposition, and as I am head of the Cathedral of the
Metropolis, I will not suffer the doors to be opened to introduce
popery."
The painting of a portrait, however, was a very different matter, and
from the earliest times appears to have appealed with peculiar strength
to the vanity of Britons. Loudly as they protested against the iniquity
of bowing down to and worshipping the likeness of anything in heaven
above or in the earth beneath or in the waters under the earth, they
were never averse to giving others an opportunity of bowing down to and
worshipping the likenesses of themselves; and while religion fostered
the arts in other countries, self-importance kept them alive in this.
The portrait of Richard II. in Westminster Abbey, if not actually an
instance of this, certainly happens to seem like one.
With the exception of Jan de Mabuse, who is said to have been in England
for a short time during the reign of Henry VII., the first painter of
any importance in this country was Hans Holbein. Hearing that money was
to be made by painting portraits at the English Court, he forsook his
native town, his religious art, and his wife, and came to stay with Sir
Thomas More at Chelsea, with an introduction from Erasmus. Arriving in
1527, he started business by making a sketch in pen and ink of More's
entire family, with which marvellous work, still preserved in the Museum
at Basle, the history of modern English painting may fairly be said to
have begun; for though it was long before a native of England was
forthcoming who was of sufficient force to carry on the tradition, the
seed was sown, and in due course the plant appeared, and after many
vicissitudes, at last flourished.
The immediate effect may be noted by mentioning here the names of
GUILLIM STREETES, who was possibly English born, and JOHN BETTES who
certainly was. To the former is attributed the large whole-length
portrait at Hampton Court of Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey, in a suit of
bright red. Another portrait of Howard belongs to the Duke of Norfolk,
having been presented to his ancestor by Sir Robert Walpole. Both were
exhibited at the Tudor Exhibition in 1892. Streetes was painter to King
Edward VI., and according to Stype he was paid fifty marks, in 1551,
"for recompense of three great tables whereof two were the pictures of
his Highness sent to Sir Thomas Hoby and Sir John Mason (ambassadors
abroad), the third a picture of the late Earl of Surrey attainted, and
by the Councils' commandment fetched from the said Guillim's house."
Horace Walpole was under the impression that this was the Duke of
Norfolk's picture, but the Hampton Court Catalogue claims the other one
as the work of Streetes.
In the National Gallery is a bust portrait of Edmund Butts, physician to
Henry VIII., which is inscribed _faict par Johan Bettes Anglois_, and
with the date 1545. In this the influence of Holbein is certainly
discernible, though not all pervading. There were two brothers, THOMAS
and JOHN BETTES who are mentioned by Meres with several other English
painters in _Palladis Tamia_, published in 1598--"As Greece had moreover
their painters, so in England we have also these, William and Francis
Segar, brethren, Thomas and John Bettes, Lockie, Lyne, Peake, Peter
Cole, Arnolde, Marcus (Mark Garrard)," etc. Walpole, quoting this, adds,
"I quote this passage to prove to those who learn one or two names by
rote that every old picture you see is not by Holbein." At the same time
it must be admitted that until some considerable fund of information
concerning these early days of painting is brought to light, there is
very little to be said about any one except Holbein till almost the end
of the sixteenth century.
That Holbein was "a wonderful artist," as More wrote to Erasmus, is not
to be denied. But in placing him among the very greatest, we must not
forget that his range was somewhat limited. We might nowadays call him a
specialist, for in England he painted nothing but portraits, and very
few of his pictures contained anything besides the single figure, or
head, of the subject. The famous exception is the large picture called
_The Ambassadors_, which was purchased at an enormous price from the
Longford Castle collection, and is now in the National Gallery.
Important and interesting as this is as showing us how Holbein could
fill a large canvas, there is no doubt that he is far happier in simple
portraiture, and that the L60,000 expended on _Christina Duchess of
Milan_ was, relatively, a better investment for the nation. In the
famous half-lengths like the _George Gisze_ at Berlin (which was painted
in London) and the _Man with the Hawk_, where the portrait is surrounded
by accessories, Holbein is perhaps at his very best; but it is as a
painter of heads, simply, that he influenced the English School, and set
an example which, alas! has never been attainable since.
For one thing, which is apart altogether from talent or genius,
Holbein's method was never followed in later times, namely, the practice
of making carefully finished drawings in crayon before painting a
portrait in oils. He was a wonderful draughtsman, and in the series of
over eighty drawings at Windsor we have even more life-like images of
the persons represented than their finished portraits. I am not aware
that any portrait drawings exists of Holbein's contemporaries or
successors in England earlier than one or two by Van Dyck. There are a
good many belonging to the seventeenth century, but with one or two
exceptions they are little more than sketches. And though sketches have
only survived by accident, as it were, not being intended for anything
more than the artist's own purposes, finished drawings would have been
kept, like Holbein's, with much greater care.
In a word, then, Holbein's first and chief business was in rendering the
likeness of the sitter. Being a
[Illustration: PLATE XXXVII.--HANS HOLBEIN
ANNE OF CLEVES
_Louvre, Paris_]
born genius, he accomplished far more than this; but it is important in
tracing the development of the English School of painting to remember
that its origin was not in the idealization of religious sentiment, but
in the realization of the human features. From the time of the first
great genius to that of the next, exactly a century later, there is
hardly a portrait in existence that is valued for anything but its
historic or personal interest. Between Holbein and Van Dyck is a great
gap, in which the only names of Englishmen are those of the
miniaturists, Hilliard and Oliver, who were veritably of the seed of
Holbein, but only in little.
Van Dyck struck deeper into the English soil, and loosened it
sufficiently for the growth of larger stuff, if still somewhat coarse,
like the work of William Dobson and Robert Walker. To Van Dyck succeeded
Peter Lely, who boldly and worthily assumed the mantle of Van Dyck, and
kept English portraiture alive throughout the dismal period of the
Commonwealth. After the Restoration he was still in power, and under him
flourished one or two painters of English birth, like Greenhill and
Riley, who in turn gave way to others under Kneller without ceding the
monopoly to foreigners. From these came Jervas, Richardson, and, most
important, Hudson, who was Reynolds's master, and so we arrive at the
beginning of what is now generally known as the English School.
Another source, however, must here be mentioned as joining the main
stream, and contributing a solid body of water to it, chiefly below the
surface, namely the art of WILLIAM HOGARTH. Being essentially English,
and without any artistic forefathers, it is not surprising that he left
less perceptible impressions on his immediate successors than the more
accomplished and educated Reynolds; but the solid force of his
character, as exemplified in his career and his works, is hardly a less
important factor in the development of the English School, while from
his outspoken opinions on the state of the arts in his time he is one of
the most valuable sources of its history.
II
WILLIAM HOGARTH
WILLIAM HOGARTH occupies a curious position in the history of English
painting. There was nothing ever quite like him in any country--except
Greuze in France; for though a comparison between two such opposites,
seems at first sight absurd, it must be remembered that French and
English painting in the middle of the eighteenth century were no less
far apart. Both Greuze and Hogarth, in their own fashion, tried to
preach moral lessons in paint, the one in the over-refined atmosphere of
French surroundings, the other in the coarse language of England in his
time.
Hogarth's chief characteristic was his blunt, honest, bull-dog
Englishness, which at the particular moment of his appearance on the
artistic stage was a quality which was eminently serviceable to English
painting. Though of humble parents, his honest and forceful character
won for him the daughter of Sir James Thornhill in marriage (by
elopement) and his sturdy talent in painting secured for him his
father-in-law's forgiveness and encouragement. Thornhill came of a good,
old Wiltshire family, and had been knighted by George I. for his
sterling merits as much as for his skill in painting and decorating the
royal palaces and the houses of noblemen. His place among English
artists is not a very high one, but he deserves the credit of having
stood out against the monopoly that was being established by foreigners
in this country in every department of artistic work, and in this sense
he is a still earlier forerunner of the great English painters, than his
more forcible son-in-law.
If Hogarth had been content to follow the beaten track of portraiture as
his main pursuit, and let the country's morals take care of themselves,
he would in all probability have attained much greater heights as a
painter. But his nature would not allow him to do this. His character
was too strong and his originality too uncontrollable. There is enough
evidence among the works which have survived him, especially in those
which were never finished, to show that his accomplishments in oil
painting were of a very high order indeed. I need only refer to the
famous head in the National Gallery known as _The Shrimp Girl_ to
explain what I mean. In this surprisingly vivacious and charming sketch
we see something that is not inferior to Hals, in its broad truth and
its quick seizure of the essentials of what had to be rendered. In
another unfinished piece, which is now in the South London Art Gallery
at Camberwell, we see the same powerful qualities differently exhibited,
for it is not a single head this time, but a sketch of a ballroom where
everybody is dancing, except one gentleman who is even more vivid than
the rest, in the act of mopping his head at the open window. There is
nothing grotesque in this picture, but it is all perfectly life-like and
wonderfully sketched in.
In his finished pictures Hogarth does not appear to such great
advantage--I mean as a painter; but it must be remembered that in his
day there was little example for him to follow in the higher departments
of his art. Nor had he ever been out of England to see fine pictures on
the Continent. Not only this, but as his work was intended especially to
appeal to ordinary people, it is hardly to be expected that he would
express himself in terms other than might most quickly appeal to them.
His most famous works, indeed, were executed as well as designed for the
engraver, namely _The Harlot's Progress_, _The Rake's Progress_,
_Marriage a la Mode_, and _The Election_, each of which consisted of a
series of several minutely finished pictures. In portraiture he showed
finer qualities, it is true; but even in these he was thinking more of
getting the most out of his model, according to his forcible character,
than of any technical refinements for which he might be handed down to
posterity as a great painter.
It was easy enough for Reynolds to sneer at Hogarth for his vulgarity,
when he was trying to impress upon his pupils the importance of painting
in the grand style. "As for the various departments of painting," he
says in his third Discourse, "which do not presume to make such high
pretensions, they are many. None of them are without their merit, though
none enter into competition with this universal presiding idea of the
art. The painters who have applied themselves more particularly to low
and vulgar characters, and who express with precision the various shades
of passion as they are exhibited by vulgar minds (such as we see in the
works of Hogarth), deserve great praise; but as their genius has been
employed on low and confined subjects, the praise which we must give
must be as limited as its object." And yet it was in following an
example set by Hogarth in portrait painting that Reynolds gained his
[Illustration: PLATE XXXVIII.--WILLIAM HOGARTH