we have named, has long given a home to and inspired the art of a number
of our most prominent sculptors, who are now permanently residing in
Florence and Rome--Randolph Rogers, Story, Rinehart, Meade, Gould,
Thompson, Miss Hosmer, and several others, all of whom merit more than a
passing notice. Rogers, who has executed many exquisite works
indicating fine sentiment and fancy, is most favorably known for the
bronze doors in the Rotunda of the Capitol at Washington. Eight panels,
representing scenes in the history of Columbus, have afforded abundant
scope for the exhibition of a genius which, while it borrowed the idea
from Ghiberti, had yet ability sufficient to give us an original work.
The "Angel of the Resurrection," for the monument of Colonel Colt at
Hartford, is also an important and beautiful creation by this artist.
Larkin J. Meade, of Vermont, has justly won a wide reputation for
portrait and monumental works, like that to Abraham Lincoln at
Springfield, Illinois. It is of colossal dimensions, costing nearly
$300,000, and in size and importance ranks with the majestic monument at
Plymouth designed by Hammatt Billings. One of the noblest art
opportunities of the century was offered when that monument was
proposed. If Mr. Billings's original design had been fully carried out a
work would have been erected of which the country might justly be proud.
Lack of funds and a pitiful lack of enthusiasm resulted in reducing the
dimensions of the work by half. Martin Milmore has also executed some
very important civic monuments, and has turned the late war to account
by numerous military memorials erected to our dead heroes. The one
recently finished at Boston is the most noteworthy. The art represented
in these works is, however, not of a high order, perhaps because such
subjects are so trite that even an artist of very unusual ability would
be staggered in treating them. Franklin Simmons, whose abilities have
been chiefly devoted to a similar class of works with those of Meade and
Milmore, often exhibits true art feeling, and a sense of the beautiful
that makes his art exceptionally attractive. The monument to the Army
and Navy, at Washington, which he has designed, is not wholly
satisfactory, but it contains some effective points. One of his best
works is the statue of Roger Williams. Another Americo-Florentine artist
who has created some remarkable and beautiful ideal works is Thomas R.
Gould. Among these may be mentioned "The Ascending Spirit," at Mount
Auburn, "The Ghost in _Hamlet_," and "The West Wind." The latter is
fascinating rather for the delicate fancy it shows than for technic
knowledge, for it is open to criticism in the details; the drapery, for
example, is so full as to draw away the attention from the figure. This
is a blemish quite too common even in our best sculpture. Mr. Gould has
also been very successful in portraiture, and is now engaged on a
full-sized statue of Kamehameha, late King of the Sandwich Islands. In
the ideals of this artist we notice a powerful originality, and an
attempt to render in marble effects usually left to the higher orders of
pictorial art. Allegory he treats with marked power, and such ideal
conceptions as the heads of Christ and of Satan suggest possibilities
scarcely yet touched by sculpture.
Another of our sculptors, working near the quarries whence comes the
marble into which he stamps immortality, was W. H. Rinehart, of
Baltimore, one of the truest idealists whom this country has produced.
Criticism is almost disarmed as one gazes at his "Sleeping Babes," or
the tender grace of "Latona and her Infants."
[Illustration: BUST OF WILLIAM PAGE.--[WILLIAM R. O'DONOVAN.]]
In all these artists we find more or less dexterity of execution and
delicacy of sentiment, but are rarely impressed by a sense that any of
them indicate great reserve force. In William W. Story this idea is more
clearly conveyed. No American in the art world now occupies a more
prominent position or shows greater versatility. Possessed of an ample
fortune, and originally a lawyer, and preparing legal tomes, he then
devoted himself to poetry, the drama, and general literature, and has
succeeded as a sculptor to a degree which has caused a leading London
journal to call him the first sculptor of the Anglo-Saxon race since the
death of Gibson. He certainly occupies a commanding place, fairly won,
among the prominent men of the age. But here our praise must be
qualified; for it may be seriously questioned whether we are not dazzled
by the sum of his abilities rather than by any exceptional originality
and daring in anything Story has done. Of his sculpture it may be said
that it indicates the work of a rich and highly cultivated mind; it is
thoughtful, thoroughly finished, and classically severe. But it commands
our respect rather than our enthusiasm. There is in it nothing
inspirational. It is talent, not genius, which wrought those carefully
executed marbles--talent of a high order, it is true. "Jerusalem
Lamenting," "The Sibyl," and "Cleopatra" and "Medea," are works so
noble, especially the first, that one is impatient with himself because
he can gaze upon them so unmoved. The "Salome" is, perhaps, the most
perfect work of this sculptor, who might have done greater things if he
had not depended so exclusively upon foreign inspiration.
Miss Hosmer, who has resided in Italy ever since she took up art, has
achieved a fame scarcely less than that of Mr. Story. This has doubtless
been owing in part to her sex, for from the time of Sabina Von Steinbach
until this century it has been exceedingly rare to see a woman modelling
clay. But Miss Hosmer has a strong personality, and if her creations are
not always thoroughly successful as works of art, they bear the vigorous
impress of individual thought and imagination. She is best known in such
versatile works as "Puck," "The Sleeping Sentinel," "The Sleeping Faun,"
and "Zenobia," in whose majestic proportions the artist has sought to
express her ideal of a woman and a queen. Miss Hosmer took her first
lessons in sculpture with Peter Stephenson, an artist who died too early
to achieve a national reputation, although not too soon to be esteemed
by his fellow-artists for his abilities. He studied awhile at Rome, and
left a number of portrait busts, and a group of "Una and the Lion,"
which indicate undoubted talent. Other ladies who have essayed sculpture
with success are Miss Stebbins, the biographer of Charlotte Cushman, and
Mrs. Freeman, of Philadelphia, who has executed some beautiful works.
Miss Whitney, who studied abroad for a time, but has wisely concluded to
continue her work in this country, has shown a careful, thoughtful study
of the figure, and is moved by a lofty idea of the position of sculpture
among the arts. Among her more important works is an impressive statue
of "Rome," in her decadence, mourning over her past glory; a statue of
"Africa;" and one of Samuel Adams, in the Capitol at Washington.
[Illustration: ABRAHAM PIERSON.--[LAUNT THOMPSON.]]
[Illustration: "THE CHARITY PATIENT."--[JOHN ROGERS.]]
There are other American sculptors deserving more than mere allusion,
like Dexter, Richard Greenough, Barbee, Volk, Edmonia Lewis, Van Wart,
Ives, Macdonald, Kernys, Ezekiel, Calverly, and Haseltine, who in
portraiture or the ideal have won a more than respectable position; but
our space limits us to a notice of several artists who, like Ward,
combine great natural ability with traits distinctively American. One of
these is Erastus D. Palmer, of Albany, who has won transatlantic fame
by the purity and originality of his art. The son of a farmer, and
exercising the calling of a carpenter until nearly thirty, Palmer did
not yield to the artistic yearnings of his nature until comparatively
late in life. When he at last took up the pursuit of art, it was in his
own town that he studied and sought fame, and his success was rapid and
entirely deserved. Few of our sculptors have been such true votaries of
the ideal, few have been able better to give it expression, and none
have shown a type of beauty so national, or have more truly interpreted
with an exquisite poetic sense the distinctive domestic refinement or
religious thought of our people. It is beauty rather than power that we
see expressed in the works of this true poet--moral beauty identified
with a type of physical grace wholly native. It is an art which finds
immediate response here, for it is of our age and our land. Among the
notable works of Palmer are his "Indian Captive," "Spring," "The White
Slave," and "The Angel of the Sepulchre;" but we prefer to these the
exquisitely beautiful bass-reliefs in which he has embodied with extreme
felicity the domestic sentiments or the yearnings and aspirations of the
Christian soul. The radical fault of Palmer's art is that he has
depended more on his fancy than upon a direct study of nature for his
compositions. The natural result has been that he soon began to lapse
into mannerism, which has become more and more prominent in his later
works.
Another sculptor of great ability owes his first instruction in the
plastic art to Palmer--Launt Thompson. He was a poor lad who early
showed art instincts, but was employed in the office of Dr. Armsby,
until Palmer stated one day that he was in search of an assistant, and
asked Dr. Armsby if he could recommend any one. The doctor suggested
Thompson (who was in the room) as a youth who had a turn that way, but
had been unable to find opportunity to gratify his art cravings. Thus
began the career of one of our strongest portrait sculptors. In the
modelling both of the bust and the full figure, Thompson has been
equalled by very few American sculptors. Among many successful works may
be mentioned his Napoleon, Edwin Booth, General Sedgwick, at West Point,
and President Pierson, at Yale College. It is a cause for just regret
that, after having achieved such success at home, Thompson should have
deemed it necessary to take up his residence permanently in Italy.
[Illustration: "THE WHIRLWIND."--[J. S. HARTLEY.]]
[Illustration: "ADORATION OF THE CROSS BY ANGELS." ST. THOMAS'S CHURCH,
NEW YORK.--[ST. GAUDENS.]]
Another artist whose work is entirely native to the soil is John Rogers,
whose numerous statuette groups in clay have made him more widely known
in the country than any other of our sculptors. A native of Salem,
Massachusetts, and for awhile engaged in mechanical pursuits, this
artist was at last able to turn his attention to plastic art, and went
to Europe, where he seems to have gained suggestions from the realistic
and impressional school of the later French sculptors; but this was
rather as a suggestion than an influence, and, finding his mind more in
sympathy with home life, he soon returned, and has ever since worked
here, and from subjects of homely every-day _genre_ around him. The late
war has also furnished Rogers with material for many interesting
groups. The art of Rogers is to the last degree unconventional, and in
no sense appertains to what is called high art, but it springs from a
nature moved by correct impulses, beating in unison with the time, and
occupying the position of pioneer in the art of the future, because he
has been true to himself and his age.
Daniel C. French, a pupil of Ward and Ball, is a young sculptor who,
like Rogers, finds inspiration for his ideals in his native land, and
gives promise of holding a prominent position in the field of American
sculpture. He made a sudden and early strike for fame when, with scarce
any instruction, he modelled the spirited and original, although
anatomically imperfect, statue called the "Minute Man," which is at
Concord.
Another strong representative of the new realistic school of sculpture
that is gradually springing up in the community is W. R. O'Donovan, of
Richmond, Virginia. Fighting sturdily on the side of the South during
the late war, he as earnestly gives himself now to the pursuit of the
arts of peace. He is not a rapid worker, but handles the clay with
thoughtful mastery, and the results are stamped with the freshness and
individuality of genius. Mr. O'Donovan's efforts have been most
successful in portraiture, of which a striking example is given in the
bronze bust of Mr. Page, the artist. Another bust, of a young boy, is as
full of _naïve_ beauty and refined sentiment and character as this is
vigorous and almost startling in its grasp of individual traits.
[Illustration: THOMAS JEFFERSON'S IDEA OF A MONUMENT.]
The transition stage through which our plastic art is passing is also
indicated by the stirring, realistic, and sometimes sensational art of a
number of earnest and original young sculptors who have studied abroad,
but have wisely concluded to return home, and to found, and grow up
with, a new and progressive school of sculpture. One of these was the
late Frank Dengler, of Cincinnati, who had studied at Munich, and was
professor of sculpture at Boston; and others are Olin M. Warner, of New
York, and Howard Roberts, of Philadelphia, who made the singularly bold
statues of "Hypatia" and "Lot's Wife." To these may be added J. S.
Hartley, who was recently Professor of Anatomy at the Art Students'
League, and is now president of that flourishing institution. He began
his career in Palmer's studio, and afterward studied in London and
Paris. The art of these young sculptors is still immature and highly
emotional or lyrical, and often verges on the picturesque rather than
the severely classic. But if it lacks repose, on the other hand it is
imaginative and powerful; its faults are those of an exuberant fancy
that teems with thought; and these artists are undoubtedly the
forerunners, if not the creators, of a thoroughly national school of
sculpture. Superior in technic skill, moved by a genius thoroughly
trained in the best modern school of plastic art, that of Paris, St.
Gaudens, a native of New York, has given us, in the exquisite groups
called "The Adoration of the Cross by Angels," in St. Thomas's Church,
New York, one of the most important and beautiful works in the country.
The Astor Reredos behind the altar at Trinity Church, designed by Mr.
Withers, and partly executed here, is also a very rich addition to our
plastic art, and is another sign that it is taking a direction little
followed heretofore on this side the Atlantic. Dr. William Rimmer, who
has recently died, powerful in modelling, a master of art anatomy, and
author of a valuable work on that subject, also exerted an important
influence in directing the studies of our rising sculptors. Having
little sense of beauty, he understood art anatomy profoundly, and
modelled with energy if not with grace. His statue of "The Gladiator"
aroused astonishment in Paris; for as it is impossible for a living man
to keep a falling position long enough for a cast to be taken, this
masterly composition was necessarily a creation of the imagination based
upon exhaustive knowledge of the figure.
Wood and stone carving and monumental work, and the decoration of
churches and civic structures, have rarely been satisfactorily attempted
here until recently. A curious paper and design left by Thomas
Jefferson, of which we give a reduced fac-simile, is one of the earliest
attempts at original monumental art in the United States. Here and there
one of our sculptors has executed some good work in this field, but
costly monuments have too often been erected in the country without much
pretension to art. The increasing attention given to wood and stone
carving, as in the new Music Hall at Cincinnati, the State Capitols at
Albany and Hartford, and in some of our later churches, is a favorable
sign that a broader field is opening at last for the fitting utterance
of the rising genius of sculpture; while the numerous schools for
instruction in this art that have been founded within the last decade,
and the well-stored galleries of casts of the masterpieces of antiquity,
are increasing the facilities for the growth of a home art. Enough has
been said in this brief sketch to show that sculpture, if one of the
latest of the arts to demand expression in the United States, has yet
found a congenial soil in the New World.
VI.
_PRESENT TENDENCIES OF AMERICAN ART._
At the close of the fourth chapter of this volume it was briefly stated
that new influences and forms of art expression have recently become
prominent in our art, and are rapidly asserting their growing
importance. With perhaps one or two exceptions, these new influences so
gradually shade out of our former art that it is difficult to tell the
exact moment when they assume an individuality of their own, and appear
as new and distinct factors in the æsthetic culture of our people.
It is only when we take a retrospect of the whole field, and compare one
generation with another, that we discern the vanishing point of one set
of influences and the genesis of new schools, with the introduction of
new branches of art culture in the community. Considering the progress
of American art from this point of view, we find it divided most
decidedly into periods, advancing with regular pace from one phase to
another like the tints of a rainbow, shading off at the edges, but
gradually becoming more intense. Thus we are able to trace in
geometrical ratio the progress from primitive silhouettes and rude
carvings up to the present comparatively advanced condition of the arts
in this country.
And yet a closer inspection into the history of American art enables us
to detect in its growth the same rapid spasmodic action, when once a
start is made in a certain direction, as in other traits of our national
development. There is a tropical vivacity in the manner in which with us
bloom and fruition suddenly burst forth after a period of apparently
unpromising barrenness. Thus West and Copley appeared almost
full-fledged in art genius and capacity to adapt themselves to occupy
prominent positions in Europe, and yet there were but few premonitory
signs to indicate that the country was prepared for the advent of such
artists.
[Illustration: "THE MOWING."--ALFRED FREDERICKS.]
Until recently, also, owing to some cause yet unsolved, we have not
seemed able to develop more than one or two forms of art at once. At one
period it was historic painting and portraiture; then portraiture,
including for a time very marked success in miniature painting, headed
by Fraser and Malbone, and continued by such able artists as T. S.
Cummings, J. H. Brown, Miss Goodrich, and Mrs. Hall; then, all at once,
landscape-painting made its appearance, and almost at a bound reached a
good degree of merit. Hand in hand with landscape art came remarkable
facility in line engraving. How rapidly excellence in this art was
achieved in this country may be judged from the fact that in 1788 the
editor of the _American Magazine_ said apologetically, in presenting an
incredibly rude plate of a dredging-machine in the magazine, "The editor
has given the plate of the new machine for clearing docks, etc., because
he had promised it. The want of elegant plates in a work of this kind is
extremely regretted, and will, if possible, be supplied. If it cannot,
the editor flatters himself that the infancy of the arts in America will
be accepted as an apology for the defect." And yet not twenty years from
that time Peter Maverick was doing good steel-engraving in New York; and
scarce ten years later Durand was executing the masterly engravings of
Trumbull's "Declaration of Independence" and Vanderlyn's "Ariadne." And
from that time until recently engravers like James Smillie, senior, A.
H. Ritchie, and John Marshall have carried this art to a high degree of
excellence; while John Sartain has attained celebrity in mezzotint.
Strange as it may seem, while portraiture, landscape, and steel
engraving were pursued with such success by our artists, a feeling for
the other arts could hardly be said to exist. A sympathy with form,
generally the earliest art instinct to show itself, was long in
awakening, as proved by the tardiness of the plastic arts to demand
expression among us; while to the resources of black and white, or
_camieu_, or a perception of the matchless mystery and suggestiveness of
_chiaro-oscuro_, the people have, until within a very short time, seemed
altogether blind. Water-colors, also, were almost hooted at;
wood-engraving was for long in a pitiful condition; and as for
architecture and the decorative arts, nothing worthy of the name, and
scarcely a sign of a perception of their meaning, could be said to exist
on this side of the Atlantic.
Some years ago W. J. Linton, one of the most distinguished
wood-engravers of the century, came to this country to live. Whether
that had anything to do with the very rapid development of
wood-engraving here since that time cannot be stated with certainty;
but, judging from analogy, we should say that he has exerted a marked
influence in stimulating the remarkable progress already reached by our
engravers within a very few years. A.V.S. Anthony was one of the first
to respond to the awakening demand for good wood-engraving here, and has
shown great delicacy and skill in interpreting the drawings of our very
clever artists in black and white. Charles Marsh is also an engraver of
remarkable character and originality of style. In the rendering of a
decorative or highly ideal class of subjects he brings to his aid an
artistic genius not surpassed by any engraver we have produced. Messrs.
Morse, Davis, Hoskin, Wolf, Annin, Juengling, Kingsley, Müller, Cole,
Smithwick and French, Kreul, Dana, Andrew, and King, among a number who
have distinguished themselves in this art, are especially noteworthy,
not only for correct rendering of the spirit of a drawing, but often for
individuality of style.
One of the most interesting phases of the development of wood-engraving
in this country has been the discussion as to its position among the
arts, and the merits of the recent method of engraving drawings or
paintings photographed directly on the wood. This discussion has been
interesting and valuable as another evidence of the activity and
importance which the art question has already assumed in the community.
That engraving is an art, one would think could never be disputed, if
the question had not already been raised with a certain degree of
acrimony on the part--strange as it may seem--of those who are often
dependent upon the genius of the engraver for the recognition of their
abilities by the public--the artists themselves. It seems to us to be
sufficient answer to those who consider it purely a mechanical pursuit,
that the simple fact that the higher the artistic perceptions of the
engraver the better is the engraving he does, proves it to be a work of
art.
[Illustration: "BIRDS IN THE FOREST."--[MISS JESSIE CURTIS.]]
On the other hand, it appears that the engraver may in turn assume too
much when he claims to improve upon an illustration, or objects _per se_
to cutting photographs on wood. While granting to engraving the rank of
art, it cannot justly be forgotten that it is, after all, a means to an
end,--an art, it is true, but an art subordinate to other arts which it
is designed to interpret. Once this is allowed, it follows, as a matter
of course, that it is the duty of the engraver to render faithfully the
drawing or painting that is to be cut; and to magnify himself not at the
expense of the artist who made the drawing, but by rendering, as nearly
as possible, a fac-simile of the original picture. If this be granted,
then is it not clear that, instead of opposing, he should hail with
satisfaction any new process which enables him to give on wood or any
other material a closer copy of the style and spirit of the artist whom
he is interpreting. That this can be done by a clever engraver by
photographing a pen-and-ink drawing or painting directly on the wood,
and then studying also the original work as he cuts it, seems to be no
longer an open question. It has been demonstrated by too many excellent
engravers within the last five years.