A Servant Girl,
In A Calico Gown, With A Broom, By The Same Artist, And A Young Woman
Standing At
A window, at which the light is streaming in, are as fine in
their way, and as perfect imitations of
Every-day nature, as you see in
the works of the best Flemish painters.
It is to landscape, however, that the artists in water-colors have
principally devoted their attention. There are several very fine ones in
the collection by Copley Fielding, the foregrounds drawn with much
strength, the distant objects softly blending with the atmosphere as in
nature, and a surprising depth and transparency given to the sky. Alfred
Fripp and George Fripp have also produced some very fine
landscapes - mills, waters in foam or sleeping in pellucid pools, and the
darkness of the tempest in contrast with gleams of sunshine. Oakley has
some spirited groups of gipsies and country people, and there are several
of a similar kind by Taylor, who designs and executes with great force.
One of the earliest of the new school of artists in water-colors is Prout,
whose drawings are principally architectural, and who has shown how
admirably suited this new style of art is to the delineation of the rich
carvings of Gothic churches. Most of the finer pieces, I observed, were
marked 'sold;' they brought prices varying from thirty to fifty guineas.
There is an exhibition now open of the paintings of Etty, who stands high
in the world of art as an historical painter. The "Society of the Arts" - I
believe that is its name - every year gets up an exhibition of the works of
some eminent painter, with the proceeds of which it buys one of his
pictures, and places it in the National Gallery. This is a very effectual
plan of forming in time a various and valuable collection of the works of
British artists.
The greatest work of Etty is the series representing the Death of
Holofernes by the hand of Judith. It consists of three paintings, the
first of which shows Judith in prayer before the execution of her attempt;
in the next, and the finest, she is seen standing by the conch of the
heathen warrior, with the sword raised to heaven, to which she turns her
eyes, as if imploring supernatural assistance; and in the third, she
appears issuing from the tent, bearing the head of the ravager of her
country, which she conceals from the armed attendants who stand on guard
at the entrance, and exhibits to her astonished handmaid, who has been
waiting the result. The subject is an old one, but Etty has treated it in
a new way, and given it a moral interest, which the old painters seem not
to have thought of. In the delineation of the naked human figure, Etty is
allowed to surpass all the English living artists, and his manner of
painting flesh is thought to be next to that of Rubens. His reputation for
these qualities has influenced his choice of subjects in a remarkable
manner.
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