ART IN ENGLAND

NOTES AND STUDIES

BY

DUTTON COOK.

LONDON

SAMPSON LOW, SON, AND ARSTON

MILTON HOUSE, LUDGATE HILL.

1869.

EDINBURGH: T. CONSTABLE, PRINTER TO THE QUEEN, AND TO THE UNIVERSITY.

CONTENTS.

PREFACE.

It will be readily understood that this little volume does not affect to set forth anything like a formal history of the rise and progress of Art in England. The fitting treatment of such a theme would need much more space—not to mention other requirements—than I have here at command. I have designed merely to submit in a manner that may, I trust, be acceptable to the general reader, and not wholly without value to the student, some few excerpts and chapters from the chronicles of the nation's Art, with biographical studies of certain of its artists.

In this way I have felt myself bound so to select my materials as to avoid more travelling over familiar ground than seemed absolutely necessary. I have therefore assumed the reader's acquaintance with the lives and achievements of the great leaders of native Art—Hogarth, Reynolds, Gainsborough, for instance—and have forborne to occupy my pages with directly rehearsing their famous memoirs. It seemed to me desirable rather to call attention to the stories of artists who, though less renowned, less prominent in popular estimation, were yet of mark in their periods, and had distinct influence on the character and progress of Art in England. Many of these artists were contemporaries, however, and in dealing with their careers severally, it has hardly been possible to escape repetition of the mention of incidents pertaining to the times in which they conjointly 'flourished,'—to employ the favourite term of Biographical Dictionaries. I must ask the reader's pardon if he should find these repetitions intrusively frequent. But the papers herein contained have, for the most part, already appeared in print, when it was deemed advisable to make each as complete in itself as was practicable. They are now reproduced after revision, and, in some cases, considerable extension, but their original form cannot be wholly suppressed or vitally interfered with. I can only hope that what was a merit in their isolated state may not be accounted too grievous a defect now that they come to be congregated.

Finally, I would suggest—referring with all due modesty to my own efforts in this direction—that the lives and labours of our Art worthies form wholesome as well as curious subjects for popular study. I do not desire to set up the artist—merely in right of his professing himself an artist—as peculiarly or romantically entitled to public regard. But a nation's Art is, in truth, an important matter. To its value and significance the community is more awake than was heretofore the case, and what was once but the topic of a clique has become of very general concern and interest. Sympathy with Art must necessarily with more or less force extend to the professors and practisers of Art. Surveying the past, one cannot but note that often patronage and public favour have been strangely perverted—now cruelly withheld, now recklessly bestowed. Here genius, or a measure of talent nearly amounting to genius, has languished neglected and suffering—here charlatanry has prospered triumphantly. Something of this kind may be happening now amongst us, or may occur again by and by. Acquaintance with the past history of native Art—its struggles, trials, troubles, and successes—will surely prove of worth in considering its present and future position and prospects. As some slight aid to the diffusion of information on the subject, these otherwise unpretending pages are respectfully submitted to the reader.

D.C.

EARLY ART SCHOOLS IN ENGLAND.