DOI Heft:
No. 166 (January, 1907)
DOI Artikel:Reviews and notices
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20716#0383
Reviews and Notices
REVIEWS AND NOTICES.
The Life, Letters, and Work of Frederic, Baron
Leighton of Stretton. By Mrs. Russell Barring-
ton. (London : George Allen.) 2 vols. £2 2s.;
or edition de luxe, ^5 5*. net.—Standing as he
does comparatively alone amongst English artists,
for his work resembles rather that of the French-
men, Cabanal and Bougereau, than of any of his
fellow-countrymen, Lord Leighton was also ex-
ceptionally fortunate in his circumstances and early
environment. He had absolutely none of the
difficulties to contend with which beset the path
of so many of his contemporaries, and his success
was secured from the first. Moreover, so far as
the general public is allowed to know, there was
throughout his brilliant career no element of
romance to make up for the absence of the interest
associated with the struggle for daily bread and
the final triumph over apparently insurmountable
difficulties. For all that, the many who knew and
loved the accomplished President of the Royal
Academy—who made that institution more of a
social success than any of his predecessors—will
welcome eagerly the richly illustrated volumes pre-
pared by Mrs. Russell Barrington, who was his
intimate friend for many years and has been
allowed the privilege of including many letters not
previously published. True, the ground had
already been to a great extent covered by the
masterly biography written with the sanction and
co-operation of Leighton two years before his death
by Ernest Rhys, and prefaced by a scholarly essay
from the pen of F. G Stephens; but the lapse of
time since then has of course, to a certain extent,
rendered it possible to judge more clearly what
will be the ultimate position occupied by an
artist whose personal charm had so much to do
with his popularity during his lifetime, and the fact
that he has passed away has rendered it possible
to tell certain anecdotes of his generosity towards
others that might have wounded his keen sus-
ceptibility had they come under his personal notice.
Such anecdotes strike the keynote of Leighton's
character and do more to reveal his true nature
than even the many long letters from him to his
parents that form the bulk of the first volume, all
marked by unusual restraint and typical of the
reserve that from first to last characterised the
writer, a reserve with which his new biographer is
evidently in thorough sympathy, so careful is she
to tell nothing that could wound the most sensitive
of her subject's relations and friends. It is, perhaps,
in his correspondence with his beloved master,
Eduard von Steinle—on whom he seems to have
lavished all the hero-worship of his youth, and for
whom he retained the greatest admiration to the
end—that Leighton most clearly reveals himself,
appearing not as the triumphant artist, but as the
revering pupil eager to convince his teacher that
he has done his best. That Steinle returned to the
full the younger painter's affection is proved by
many beautiful letters here admirably translated,
and his death, in 1866, was the one great grief of
the future President's life. In the arduous task of
preparing for the press the vast mass of material
placed at her disposal, Mrs. Russell Barrington,
who intends to give all the profits of the work to
the Leighton House Endowment Fund, has had
the assistance of Lord Leighton's only surviving
sister and of his friends, Sir W. B. Richmond,
Briton Riviere, Walter Crane, and Sir W. Thiselton
Dyer, all of whom have contributed reminiscences
specially written for her. The one hundred and
forty illustrations, many of which are in colour and
photogravure, are, moreover, thoroughly represen-
tative, including, with several of the best known
completed masterpieces, many drawings and
sketches, some of which have never before been
reproduced, so that they form a fairly complete
epitome of their author's life-work.
The Art of Landscape Painting in Oil Colour.
By Alfred East, A.R.A. (London: Cassell & Co.,
Ltd.) \os. 6d. net.—Mr. East has not attempted in
this book to write of landscape painting in its ele-
mentary stages. His aim has been rather to give the
already qualified student an insight into certain
truths which have been revealed to him in
his own practice of the art. To correct a false
attitude towards nature, and to help the reader to
understand the importance of technique, has been
the aim of the book. It is illustrated by eight
landscapes and a page of studies of effects in
colour, and many half-tone pictures, chiefly from
the painter's works; also an admirable selection
from those pencil sketches in which he excels.
In referring the student constantly back to nature,
in striving to lead him away from the false path
of affected style and of an imitative, superficial
study of other people's pictures, Mr. East's book
should serve a high purpose. The useful chapter
on " Equipment" will be of the utmost value to
the student. There are chapters specially devoted
to composition, trees, skies, grass, reflections, and
every student finds his supreme difficulty according
to his nature in one of these. The author goes
carefully and scientifically over the ground in each
case, with the great resources of knowledge which
363
REVIEWS AND NOTICES.
The Life, Letters, and Work of Frederic, Baron
Leighton of Stretton. By Mrs. Russell Barring-
ton. (London : George Allen.) 2 vols. £2 2s.;
or edition de luxe, ^5 5*. net.—Standing as he
does comparatively alone amongst English artists,
for his work resembles rather that of the French-
men, Cabanal and Bougereau, than of any of his
fellow-countrymen, Lord Leighton was also ex-
ceptionally fortunate in his circumstances and early
environment. He had absolutely none of the
difficulties to contend with which beset the path
of so many of his contemporaries, and his success
was secured from the first. Moreover, so far as
the general public is allowed to know, there was
throughout his brilliant career no element of
romance to make up for the absence of the interest
associated with the struggle for daily bread and
the final triumph over apparently insurmountable
difficulties. For all that, the many who knew and
loved the accomplished President of the Royal
Academy—who made that institution more of a
social success than any of his predecessors—will
welcome eagerly the richly illustrated volumes pre-
pared by Mrs. Russell Barrington, who was his
intimate friend for many years and has been
allowed the privilege of including many letters not
previously published. True, the ground had
already been to a great extent covered by the
masterly biography written with the sanction and
co-operation of Leighton two years before his death
by Ernest Rhys, and prefaced by a scholarly essay
from the pen of F. G Stephens; but the lapse of
time since then has of course, to a certain extent,
rendered it possible to judge more clearly what
will be the ultimate position occupied by an
artist whose personal charm had so much to do
with his popularity during his lifetime, and the fact
that he has passed away has rendered it possible
to tell certain anecdotes of his generosity towards
others that might have wounded his keen sus-
ceptibility had they come under his personal notice.
Such anecdotes strike the keynote of Leighton's
character and do more to reveal his true nature
than even the many long letters from him to his
parents that form the bulk of the first volume, all
marked by unusual restraint and typical of the
reserve that from first to last characterised the
writer, a reserve with which his new biographer is
evidently in thorough sympathy, so careful is she
to tell nothing that could wound the most sensitive
of her subject's relations and friends. It is, perhaps,
in his correspondence with his beloved master,
Eduard von Steinle—on whom he seems to have
lavished all the hero-worship of his youth, and for
whom he retained the greatest admiration to the
end—that Leighton most clearly reveals himself,
appearing not as the triumphant artist, but as the
revering pupil eager to convince his teacher that
he has done his best. That Steinle returned to the
full the younger painter's affection is proved by
many beautiful letters here admirably translated,
and his death, in 1866, was the one great grief of
the future President's life. In the arduous task of
preparing for the press the vast mass of material
placed at her disposal, Mrs. Russell Barrington,
who intends to give all the profits of the work to
the Leighton House Endowment Fund, has had
the assistance of Lord Leighton's only surviving
sister and of his friends, Sir W. B. Richmond,
Briton Riviere, Walter Crane, and Sir W. Thiselton
Dyer, all of whom have contributed reminiscences
specially written for her. The one hundred and
forty illustrations, many of which are in colour and
photogravure, are, moreover, thoroughly represen-
tative, including, with several of the best known
completed masterpieces, many drawings and
sketches, some of which have never before been
reproduced, so that they form a fairly complete
epitome of their author's life-work.
The Art of Landscape Painting in Oil Colour.
By Alfred East, A.R.A. (London: Cassell & Co.,
Ltd.) \os. 6d. net.—Mr. East has not attempted in
this book to write of landscape painting in its ele-
mentary stages. His aim has been rather to give the
already qualified student an insight into certain
truths which have been revealed to him in
his own practice of the art. To correct a false
attitude towards nature, and to help the reader to
understand the importance of technique, has been
the aim of the book. It is illustrated by eight
landscapes and a page of studies of effects in
colour, and many half-tone pictures, chiefly from
the painter's works; also an admirable selection
from those pencil sketches in which he excels.
In referring the student constantly back to nature,
in striving to lead him away from the false path
of affected style and of an imitative, superficial
study of other people's pictures, Mr. East's book
should serve a high purpose. The useful chapter
on " Equipment" will be of the utmost value to
the student. There are chapters specially devoted
to composition, trees, skies, grass, reflections, and
every student finds his supreme difficulty according
to his nature in one of these. The author goes
carefully and scientifically over the ground in each
case, with the great resources of knowledge which
363