DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61252#0338
294
LANSDOWNE COLLECTION.
painter; and the peculiar difficulties such a one has to
encounter, will perhaps balance what he is excused from.
He is chiefly concerned with the noblest and most beautiful
part of nature, the face, and is obliged to the utmost exact-
ness. The historical painter is allowed vast liberties: if he
is to give life, and greatness, and grace to his figures, and
the airs of his heads, he may choose what faces and figures
he pleases; but the other must give all that (in some
degree, at least,) to subjects where it is not always to be
found; and must find, or make variety in much narrower
bounds than the historian has to range in. Add to all this,
that the works of the portrait-painter must be seen in all
periods of beginning, and progress, as well when finished as
when they are not, oftener than when they are fit to be
seen, and yet judged of, and criticised upon, as if the artist
had given his last hand to them, and by all sorts of people;
nor is he always at liberty to follow his own judgment.
He is, moreover, frequently disappointed; obliged to wait
till the vigour of his fancy is gone off, and to give over
when it is strong and lively. These things, and several
others, which I forbear to mention, oftentimes try a man’s
philosophy and complaisance, and add to the merit of him
that succeeds in this kind of painting.”
What renders these passages more striking, is the fact
that they were written at a time when the best portrait
painters, including Richardson himself, could not get
beyond the head of a sitter, and were obliged, one and all,
to employ hired workmen to paint the attitudes and dra-
peries, always in the most monotonous and wretched taste,
and after a certain pattern. To avoid the “ tremendous”
difficulty of painting the hand, it was usually stuck in the
waistcoat, or concealed by a nosegay. When Sir Joshua
redeemed the art from this vulgar insipidity, he did not
so much improve as create. His own exquisite sense of
LANSDOWNE COLLECTION.
painter; and the peculiar difficulties such a one has to
encounter, will perhaps balance what he is excused from.
He is chiefly concerned with the noblest and most beautiful
part of nature, the face, and is obliged to the utmost exact-
ness. The historical painter is allowed vast liberties: if he
is to give life, and greatness, and grace to his figures, and
the airs of his heads, he may choose what faces and figures
he pleases; but the other must give all that (in some
degree, at least,) to subjects where it is not always to be
found; and must find, or make variety in much narrower
bounds than the historian has to range in. Add to all this,
that the works of the portrait-painter must be seen in all
periods of beginning, and progress, as well when finished as
when they are not, oftener than when they are fit to be
seen, and yet judged of, and criticised upon, as if the artist
had given his last hand to them, and by all sorts of people;
nor is he always at liberty to follow his own judgment.
He is, moreover, frequently disappointed; obliged to wait
till the vigour of his fancy is gone off, and to give over
when it is strong and lively. These things, and several
others, which I forbear to mention, oftentimes try a man’s
philosophy and complaisance, and add to the merit of him
that succeeds in this kind of painting.”
What renders these passages more striking, is the fact
that they were written at a time when the best portrait
painters, including Richardson himself, could not get
beyond the head of a sitter, and were obliged, one and all,
to employ hired workmen to paint the attitudes and dra-
peries, always in the most monotonous and wretched taste,
and after a certain pattern. To avoid the “ tremendous”
difficulty of painting the hand, it was usually stuck in the
waistcoat, or concealed by a nosegay. When Sir Joshua
redeemed the art from this vulgar insipidity, he did not
so much improve as create. His own exquisite sense of