Studio: international art (85.1923)

ETTY'S PICTURES IN LORD LEVERHULME'S COLLECTION

u VENUS AND CUPID”
OIL PAINTING BY
WILLIAM ETTY, R.A.

painted such women as the great modern
French master painted in the naive awk-
wardness of their ablutions. In his pure-
minded joy of the human form he made
no deliberate search for originality, but
was content to find beauty in traditional
poses and movements. So, as we see here
in his larger compositions, the pictorial
arrangements are in the tradition of the
great masters, while for their illustrative
significance Etty, whose imagination de-
pended on literal suggestion and was
rarely kindled to emotion, went to the
poets and as nearly as possible translated
their words into the language of design and
pigment. And a serene beauty may be
found in these translations because the

painter addressed his art only to the texts
that offered such pictorial motives as
favoured his passion for the nude. Here,
then, is that sumptuous picture which
made a sensation in the Royal Academy of
1821, known variously as Cleopatra on the
Cydnus, Cleopatra's arrival in Cilicia, and
now, in Lord Leverhulme's catalogue, as
The Triumph of Cleopatra. Look at our
reproduction with Shakespeare's play in
your hand, and the poet's magic words
through the mouth of Enobarbus will help
you to see the picture—a “ delicious
bouquet of colour," Gautier called it. But
what are we to think of that Secretary to
the Post Office, who commissioned the
picture, and later induced the painter to

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