Art in April

SIR PHILIP CUNLIFFE-OWEN

In none of the many obituary notices on the late Director of the South Kensington Museum has justice been done to one side of his character, and that to which he owed most of his successes. His love of work and his whole-hearted sympathy with workers of all classes were expressed more in deeds than by words, and the notice of his loss will be a sorrow and a calamity to many, even in the most distant parts of the world, who will remember the advice and assistance ungrudgingly afforded by a large minded official upon whose kindness and time they had not the slightest claim. To some he appeared inconsistent or wanting in appreciation of culture in art. He seemed to care little whether it was for pure "Philistinism" or the most advanced "aestheticism" so long as an earnest worker required help. Entirely above the littleness of clique or party, whether artistic or political, he never lost all opportunity of assisting a designer or manufacturer who honestly intended to produce what appeared to him a work of art, and if ever Sir Philip Cunliffe-Owen expressed an unfavourable opinion it was directed against those who wished to narrow everything within the bounds of their own small horizon and prevent others, who did not agree with them, from practising what they might equally consider good work from another point of view. This broad-minded condition was owing as much to training as natural disposition, his early career belonging to the practical rather than the scientific. Commencing official life in 1840 as a midshipman on the flagship of the squadron which, later in the same year, reduced St. Jean d'Acre, he served under Sir Charles Napier, one of the most gallant and unscientific seamen who ever dragged a British-built wooden tub through certain destruction to glorious victory. Some years later, his health failing, he was placed in the newly formed “Department of Practical Art” then being established under the direction of the Board of Trade, and it was to this he owed the clear idea and perfect grasp of the situation ill advocating Industrial Art Museums as the base of all operations in educating and bringing together the public, the manufacturers, and their designers. The series of International Exhibitions commencing in 1851, and continued at Chicago last year, was to Philip Owen but a single book in whose pages from time to time were recorded the progress or retrogression of the nations in their Industrial Art manufactures; and amongst many valuable services there are few which will be better remembered than those occasions when, speaking at Schools of Art and other public institutions, he gave those assembled the benefit of his rare experience, and whilst not sparing our weaknesses did not fail in justice to our strong points, not the least of which is that honesty of purpose which he was always the first to recognise and assist.

THE GOVERNMENT AND THE NATIONAL GALLERY AGAIN

When the estimates were before the House of Commons, Sir JOHN HIBBERT, in reply to a question, said that the National Gallery could not be enlarged until the barracks are removed to Millbank. And, of course, the barracks cannot be removed until the new ones are built, so that all that is necessary to avoid any expense in connection with the National Gallery is to find some excuse to postpone the building of the new barracks. The most unsatisfactory part of it all is that Sir John Hibbert was perfectly well aware that the urgent representation of the trustees was directed towards the extension of the Gallery upon a portion of the drill-ground; for they knew well enough that the barracks difficulty would again be used if possible to postpone the necessary improvements. The affair is certainly not being treated in a proper manner, while the method of its misconduct seems to be founded on the immortal principles of the Circumlocution Office.

EXHIBITIONS

This year's exhibition of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers is one, perhaps, of more than average merit. Etchers of the now long-admitted capacity of Mr. WILLIAM STRANG and Mr. FRANK SHORT hold their own by their exhibits of the present season, and that is all that can be asked of them. Mr. LEGROS again ~ still more than these others ~ is at a period of his career at which, though excellence may be maintained, further development can hardly be expected. Mr. SEYMOUR HADEN has long ceased to etch; but there is exhibited from his hand the charming "Fragment" ~ for thus he calls it ~ with which, a dozen years ago, he finished his etched work. It is a plate showing vigorously the "behaviour" of a tree ~ if the word is permissible ~ in contrast to a plate of much earlier years (not exhibited) which shows its construction. But young artists like Mr. OLIVER HALL and Mr. CHARLES HOLROYD add appreciably to the strength of the season's exhibition. Not that Mr. Holroyd is altogether at his best. His miscellaneous contributions to the present show do not quite rival in impressiveness the admirable plates of the Monte Oliveto series; yet the notes of distinction and of dignity are not absent, and among his contributions of this year the "Landscape with Diana" and "The Monk at the Organ" hold the same place which, among the works of Mr. Strang, is held by the portrait of "Ian Strang " and of "Mr, Blomfield" ~ both of them suggesting, either by method or by spirit, the etched work of Vandyck. If Mr. Oliver Hall has no plate so dramatic in its rendering of natural "effect" as the "Windy Day" of last year, the range of his work is more considerable. If we had to name one of his plates as more attractive than the others, it would be the one entitled "On the Edge of the Forest." Colonel GOFF has perhaps no contribution that will make us forget the very popular "Summer Storm in the Itchen Valley" or the charming little plate of Brighton called "The Chain Pier," but the swing and volume of the waters in "The South Cone" is remarkable; he has, besides, a dry-point portrait, easy and natural in pose, and at least two plates of Shoreham, of which the most fascinating shows the bridge in the foreground ~ or in the middle distance rather ~ and the town massed dark behind it. The composition is quite admirable. "Moss Wood, Leith Hill," which has an out-of-doors freshness, is a charming contribution from Mr. HOLMES MAY. Miss MINNA BOLINGBROKE'S "Michaelmas" is a simple and admirable dry-point study of a woman plucking a goose. Mr. CHARLTON'S "Three Shies a Penny" ~ the fair beheld at night ~ is a bold effective treatment of illumination necessarily intricate.