Original Letters and Biographic Epitomes

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Original Letters and Biographic Epitomes

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by J. Atwood.Slater This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: Original Letters and Biographic Epitomes
Author: J. Atwood.Slater
Release Date: August 17, 2004 [EBook #13203]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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ORIGINAL LETTERS
AND
BIOGRAPHIC EPITOMES
BY
J. ATWOOD.SLATER
PREMIUM HOLDER IN DESIGN, AND SILVER MEDALLIST OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARTS, LONDON,
SHARPE PRIZEMAN OF THE ROYAL INSTITUTE OF BRITISH ARCHITECTS, LONDON,
CERTIFICATED STUDENT OF THE SLADE SCHOOL OF FINE ARTS, UNIVERSITY COLLEGE.

LONDON:
SPRAGUE & CO., LIMITED, 4 & 5 EAST HARDING STREET, E.C.

_PAINTING._
From the WESTERN DAILY PRESS, _Feb. 20th_, 1901.
AN IMPRESSION OF "ECCE HOMO."
To the Editor of the Western Daily Press.
Sir,--First impressions forced upon me by an inspection of the picture, "Ecce Homo," by Mons. de Munkacsy, would be succinctly expressed in few words. It is haply, although not highly, inspired. It constitutes a work of laborious but of average ability, and descends to a lower technical state of imaginative eclecticism and expression than I had indeed expected to encounter in so lavishly-applauded a work. Let it be granted in the first instance that the theme is an onerous one; the problem afforded by the venture should have been met in a manner skilful in art, commensurate with its righteous obligations and its lofty demands by the artist. The one fine attribute conspicuously lacking in the work is its illumination, generally too yellow; the fine quality of light, naturally directing the hearts with the intelligences of the beholder to the central fact of the subject theme, "I am the Light of the World." The broad use and disposition of whitish pigment; I mean whitish, snowy light flecked, pimpled, dimpled with tints of orange and purple, like snow about to thaw, here and there, honeycombed or stippled to mark the intensity of its native regard for its own divine, suffering, martyred Lord, would have attracted the attention and won the curiosity, the sympathy, of many finer sensibilities. A dramatic and subtle sense of distance, such a powerful agent of spiritual injection in the hands of real artists is in this work absent; never skilfully employed either for negative or positive reflections of emotion. Linear perspective there is, and employed to much scenic advantage; but aerial perspective, utilised towards expressing overlapping figures, there is not, save in meagre degree. The canvas is too crowded, the sense of vision and admiration is nowhere at all lulled by repose. We may point to successful juxtaposition of individual figures, to masses of harmonious tones, but not to masterly composition. The mind of the artist is intent upon the bitterness of turmoil; it does not reach us directly by imperishably revealing or extolling the divine nature of "The Man," "Homo;" and is throughout the field of interest usually recognised in overstrained partiality for attitude and outline. Hence the title of the picture is almost sought for, expected in the multitude on the left, which should have been isolated. "Ecce Homo," briefly and emphatically, is not so suitable a title as I would suggest, with the utmost regard for reverence, might be described, as the interval between the two cries: "Away with Him," "Crucify Him," such intensely dramatic particles of time finding expression and vent throughout the work in coarse silhouetting.
The crowding of the lawless throng against the front of the tribune, on which the chief characters of the scene are portrayed, though not in a material sense wrong, must be open to much ?sthetic dispute; must mar the success and the action of reflex thought, the spiritual contest waging and recoiling between the Divine, meek victim and the surging rabble. At all events, it is sad to trace no direct or secret hint at new or transcendental methods conspicuous or even dimly apparent in the painter's art. Little there is in the effort to draw our finer instincts to spiritual truths. The utmost mechanical skill of the diligent artist is discernible, labouring incessantly without extraordinary or transcendental light to the appointed end, the goal accomplished. It should be understood that as spiritual Art of its own property and nature is beset, environed on all impinging sides with a multifold range, a series of difficult corners around which the sense cannot immediately travel, but would for the fructification or sustentation's sake of its etherealism, a process of counter argument may deduce this aphorism, that in works of art in which the eye travels quickly round all the