Studio: international art (48.1910)

Mme. Debillemont-Chardon s Miniatures

tiousness. Felicite Sartori, Marie Tibaldi, Jacques light and coarse shadows of the corporal body
Christophe Le Blond, the inventor of the method of the sitter, without colour and devoid of every
of colour engraving, J. A. Arlaud, all working in delicate nuance of tone. But it is hopeless to
the first half of the eighteenth century, have left fight against the spread of such a useful invention,
us adorable evidences of their delicate and rare As soon as one could have one's likeness by the
talent. To the work of Rosalba Camera, who dozen, with such deplorable adjuncts as back-
was born at Chioggia, near Venice, and came to grounds decorated to imitate nature, the exquisite
Paris about 1720, we may apply a new descrip- art of painting in miniature was abandoned as old-
tive phrase of finesse and distinction—to coin a fashioned, particularly when the cost of a minute
new expression, one may say, she pastelled on and finished production by a talented artist was
ivory. The elder Urouais, Joseph Ducreux, placed in the balance against the low price of the
Mile. Labille-Guiard, Fragonard himself, Mme. mechanical operation. The miniature ceased to
Vigee-le-Brun, Joseph Camerata, Ismael Mengs, interest its last devotees, and, indeed, there seemed
Baudouin, Jeanne Etienne Liotard, Daniel Chlo- no reason for the art to survive longer. In con-
dowiecki, Charlier, Guerin of Strasbourg, Jean sequence, artists found themselves obliged to re-
Augustin, and also Isabey, Aubry, Pierre Violet, linquish practising in this wonderful method, since
and Dumont acquired equally great reputations the work no longer attracted the attention save
as miniaturists in the eighteenth century. Under of a few amateurs of leisure who thought little of
the Directory, the First Empire and the Restora- gaining profit by their patronage of the art.
tion the celebrated miniature painters are again From the reign of Louis Philippe onward this
numerous, though besides Daniel Saint and art, once so highly esteemed, so refined, so superior,
Isabey, Mme. de Mirbel alone need be men- fell from its high estate, and became a mere
tioned here. After this there is hardly any one recreation, a pastime, or was debased to the level
save Mme. Herbelin who enjoyed an assured re- of mere copyists' work. Yet there remained a few
putation in the nineteenth century, and at the gifted women who signed some artistic achievements
close of the last century the decadence of the which serve to link up the chain of fine traditions,
miniature was complete. but for the most part the productions were pitiable.

It is hardly necessary for me to recapitulate the
names of that great series of masters of the
miniature in England from Bernard Lens to -
Richard Cosway, Engleheart, the brothers Plimer,
John Smart, Samuel Cote, John Donaldson, the
Hones, father and son, James Nixon, William
Wood, Andrew Anderson, Ch. William Ross and
so many others. One must have seen the collection
of miniatures of the late Queen Victoria in the Royal
Libraryat Windsor Castle in order to understand and
appreciate all the resource, the variety, the delicacy,
the elegance, the power and the infinite charm

of these wonderful paintings of and by women. 'U ;/ ,

The serious decadence of the art of miniature
painting is attributed generally to the invention of
photography, and this widely accredited opinion

seems to be in principle indisputable. Photo- I • '

graphy has vulgarised the taste in portraiture, \
making us content with a dull, grey, unidealised \\
likeness. When the daguerreotype was put on J- . \\ 'lis V ,;.

the market the public went mad over the new
process. The portrait remained no longer a
rare work, a charming interpretation of the expres-
sion of features seen through the sensitive eye of
a painter who knew how to harmonise the character
of a face and to extract its essential qualities : it

1 . miniature portrait

now became a mere deceptive reproduction in by gabriblle debillemont-chardon

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