Art in America: A Critical and Historial Sketch

An equestrian statue that is destined to occupy a high position in our native art is that of General Thomas, by J. Q. A. Ward. It is of colossal size, and has been cast in bronze at Philadelphia. There is a force in the action, an originality in the pose, a justness in the proportions of both horse and rider, that render it exceptionally excellent. In Mr. Ward we see one of the most vigorous and individual sculptors of the age. As an influence in our art his example is of great importance, because while placing at its true value the good that may be obtained by familiarity with the models of classic art, whether by the study of casts at home or abroad, he recognizes the basal principle of all true art – that its originating force must proceed from within, and that culture can only supplement, but cannot supply the want of, genius in the artist or the people. And thus, while thoroughly conversant with foreign and antique art, Mr. Ward has worked at home, and drawn the sources of his inspiration from native influences. He has a mind overflowing with resources; his fancy is never still; he is ever delighting to sketch in clay, if the term may be so used. Many are familiar with the noble statue of Shakspeare and the "Indian Hunter" in the Central Park. The latter, although not in all respects anatomically correct, is in spirit and design one of the most notable works produced by American plastic art. But the bronze statue of Washington recently set up at Newburyport is, perhaps, the best existing specimen of Mr. Ward's skill. The subject is not a new one; in fact, it has been treated so many hundred times in one form or another that especial originality was needed to render it again with any degree of freshness and interest. But the effort has been crowned with success. There is in this statue, which is of colossal size, a sustained majesty, dignity, and repose, and a harmony of design rarely attained in modern sculpture.

Among the foremost of American sculptors in point of native ability we must accord a place to Benjamin Paul Akers, of Portland. He was indeed a man of genius, of a finely organized temperament; but he died before the maturity of his powers, ere he was able to achieve little more than a promise of immortality. His "Pearl Diver," which is indeed an exquisite creation, original, and tenderly beautiful, represents a youth whose corpse the tide has washed on the rocks, where it lies wrapped by the sea-weed, and tranquil in the repose of death. The anatomy and composition of this work are evidently the offspring of a finely-organized mind well grounded in the principles of his art, and inspired by tender sympathies and a strongly creative imagination; and his "St. Elizabeth" is also a lovely piece of sculpture. The noble ideal bust of Milton, and the "Pearl Diver," are grandly described by Hawthorne in the "Marble Faun." The admirable description of Kenyon, the young sculptor mentioned in that weird romance, is intended for a likeness of Akers.

Edward S. Bartholomew, of Connecticut, who died in his thirty-sixth year, was another of our most gifted sculptors. There was an affluence of fancy in his art, rare in our sculpture, which needed pruning rather than urging by foreign study. Naturally his works are unequal in merit; but the "Eve Repentant," "Ganymede," and "Hagar and Ishmael" will long perpetuate his fame. It is a noteworthy circumstance that Bartholomew was totally color-blind. This, in the opinion of many, is no disqualification in a sculptor; but some sculptors not only think otherwise, but are also conscious of a sense of color when creating a work.

Italy, which has been the home and second mother to most of the artists we have named, has long given a home to and inspired the art of a number of our most prominent sculptors, who are now permanently residing in Florence and Rome – Randolph Rogers, Story, Rinehart, Meade, Gould, Thompson, Miss Hosmer, and several others, all of whom merit more than a passing notice. Rogers, who has executed many exquisite works indicating fine sentiment and fancy, is most favorably known for the bronze doors in the Rotunda of the Capitol at Washington. Eight panels, representing scenes in the history of Columbus, have afforded abundant scope for the exhibition of a genius which, while it borrowed the idea from Ghiberti, had yet ability sufficient to give us an original work. The "Angel of the Resurrection," for the monument of Colonel Colt at Hartford, is also an important and beautiful creation by this artist. Larkin J. Meade, of Vermont, has justly won a wide reputation for portrait and monumental works, like that to Abraham Lincoln at Springfield, Illinois. It is of colossal dimensions, costing nearly $300,000, and in size and importance ranks with the majestic monument at Plymouth designed by Hammatt Billings. One of the noblest art opportunities of the century was offered when that monument was proposed. If Mr. Billings's original design had been fully carried out a work would have been erected of which the country might justly be proud. Lack of funds and a pitiful lack of enthusiasm resulted in reducing the dimensions of the work by half. Martin Milmore has also executed some very important civic monuments, and has turned the late war to account by numerous military memorials erected to our dead heroes. The one recently finished at Boston is the most noteworthy. The art represented in these works is, however, not of a high order, perhaps because such subjects are so trite that even an artist of very unusual ability would be staggered in treating them. Franklin Simmons, whose abilities have been chiefly devoted to a similar class of works with those of Meade and Milmore, often exhibits true art feeling, and a sense of the beautiful that makes his art exceptionally attractive. The monument to the Army and Navy, at Washington, which he has designed, is not wholly satisfactory, but it contains some effective points. One of his best works is the statue of Roger Williams. Another Americo-Florentine artist who has created some remarkable and beautiful ideal works is Thomas R. Gould. Among these may be mentioned "The Ascending Spirit," at Mount Auburn, "The Ghost in Hamlet," and "The West Wind." The latter is fascinating rather for the delicate fancy it shows than for technic knowledge, for it is open to criticism in the details; the drapery, for example, is so full as to draw away the attention from the figure. This is a blemish quite too common even in our best sculpture. Mr. Gould has also been very successful in portraiture, and is now engaged on a full-sized statue of Kamehameha, late King of the Sandwich Islands. In the ideals of this artist we notice a powerful originality, and an attempt to render in marble effects usually left to the higher orders of pictorial art. Allegory he treats with marked power, and such ideal conceptions as the heads of Christ and of Satan suggest possibilities scarcely yet touched by sculpture.

Another of our sculptors, working near the quarries whence comes the marble into which he stamps immortality, was W. H. Rinehart, of Baltimore, one of the truest idealists whom this country has produced. Criticism is almost disarmed as one gazes at his "Sleeping Babes," or the tender grace of "Latona and her Infants."

In all these artists we find more or less dexterity of execution and delicacy of sentiment, but are rarely impressed by a sense that any of them indicate great reserve force. In William W. Story this idea is more clearly conveyed. No American in the art world now occupies a more prominent position or shows greater versatility. Possessed of an ample fortune, and originally a lawyer, and preparing legal tomes, he then devoted himself to poetry, the drama, and general literature, and has succeeded as a sculptor to a degree which has caused a leading London journal to call him the first sculptor of the Anglo-Saxon race since the death of Gibson. He certainly occupies a commanding place, fairly won, among the prominent men of the age. But here our praise must be qualified; for it may be seriously questioned whether we are not dazzled by the sum of his abilities rather than by any exceptional originality and daring in anything Story has done. Of his sculpture it may be said that it indicates the work of a rich and highly cultivated mind; it is thoughtful, thoroughly finished, and classically severe. But it commands our respect rather than our enthusiasm. There is in it nothing inspirational. It is talent, not genius, which wrought those carefully executed marbles – talent of a high order, it is true. "Jerusalem Lamenting," "The Sibyl," and "Cleopatra" and "Medea," are works so noble, especially the first, that one is impatient with himself because he can gaze upon them so unmoved. The "Salome" is, perhaps, the most perfect work of this sculptor, who might have done greater things if he had not depended so exclusively upon foreign inspiration.

Miss Hosmer, who has resided in Italy ever since she took up art, has achieved a fame scarcely less than that of Mr. Story. This has doubtless been owing in part to her sex, for from the time of Sabina Von Steinbach until this century it has been exceedingly rare to see a woman modelling clay. But Miss Hosmer has a strong personality, and if her creations are not always thoroughly successful as works of art, they bear the vigorous impress of individual thought and imagination. She is best known in such versatile works as "Puck," "The Sleeping Sentinel," "The Sleeping Faun," and "Zenobia," in whose majestic proportions the artist has sought to express her ideal of a woman and a queen. Miss Hosmer took her first lessons in sculpture with Peter Stephenson, an artist who died too early to achieve a national reputation, although not too soon to be esteemed by his fellow-artists for his abilities. He studied awhile at Rome, and left a number of portrait busts, and a group of "Una and the Lion," which indicate undoubted talent. Other ladies who have essayed sculpture with success are Miss Stebbins, the biographer of Charlotte Cushman, and Mrs. Freeman, of Philadelphia, who has executed some beautiful works. Miss Whitney, who studied abroad for a time, but has wisely concluded to continue her work in this country, has shown a careful, thoughtful study of the figure, and is moved by a lofty idea of the position of sculpture among the arts. Among her more important works is an impressive statue of "Rome," in her decadence, mourning over her past glory; a statue of "Africa;" and one of Samuel Adams, in the Capitol at Washington.

There are other American sculptors deserving more than mere allusion, like Dexter, Richard Greenough, Barbee, Volk, Edmonia Lewis, Van Wart, Ives, Macdonald, Kernys, Ezekiel, Calverly, and Haseltine, who in portraiture or the ideal have won a more than respectable position; but our space limits us to a notice of several artists who, like Ward, combine great natural ability with traits distinctively American. One of these is Erastus D. Palmer, of Albany, who has won transatlantic fame by the purity and originality of his art. The son of a farmer, and exercising the calling of a carpenter until nearly thirty, Palmer did not yield to the artistic yearnings of his nature until comparatively late in life. When he at last took up the pursuit of art, it was in his own town that he studied and sought fame, and his success was rapid and entirely deserved. Few of our sculptors have been such true votaries of the ideal, few have been able better to give it expression, and none have shown a type of beauty so national, or have more truly interpreted with an exquisite poetic sense the distinctive domestic refinement or religious thought of our people. It is beauty rather than power that we see expressed in the works of this true poet – moral beauty identified with a type of physical grace wholly native. It is an art which finds immediate response here, for it is of our age and our land. Among the notable works of Palmer are his "Indian Captive," "Spring," "The White Slave," and "The Angel of the Sepulchre;" but we prefer to these the exquisitely beautiful bass-reliefs in which he has embodied with extreme felicity the domestic sentiments or the yearnings and aspirations of the Christian soul. The radical fault of Palmer's art is that he has depended more on his fancy than upon a direct study of nature for his compositions. The natural result has been that he soon began to lapse into mannerism, which has become more and more prominent in his later works.

Another sculptor of great ability owes his first instruction in the plastic art to Palmer – Launt Thompson. He was a poor lad who early showed art instincts, but was employed in the office of Dr. Armsby, until Palmer stated one day that he was in search of an assistant, and asked Dr. Armsby if he could recommend any one. The doctor suggested Thompson (who was in the room) as a youth who had a turn that way, but had been unable to find opportunity to gratify his art cravings. Thus began the career of one of our strongest portrait sculptors. In the modelling both of the bust and the full figure, Thompson has been equalled by very few American sculptors. Among many successful works may be mentioned his Napoleon, Edwin Booth, General Sedgwick, at West Point, and President Pierson, at Yale College. It is a cause for just regret that, after having achieved such success at home, Thompson should have deemed it necessary to take up his residence permanently in Italy.

Another artist whose work is entirely native to the soil is John Rogers, whose numerous statuette groups in clay have made him more widely known in the country than any other of our sculptors. A native of Salem, Massachusetts, and for awhile engaged in mechanical pursuits, this artist was at last able to turn his attention to plastic art, and went to Europe, where he seems to have gained suggestions from the realistic and impressional school of the later French sculptors; but this was rather as a suggestion than an influence, and, finding his mind more in sympathy with home life, he soon returned, and has ever since worked here, and from subjects of homely every-day genre around him. The late war has also furnished Rogers with material for many interesting groups. The art of Rogers is to the last degree unconventional, and in no sense appertains to what is called high art, but it springs from a nature moved by correct impulses, beating in unison with the time, and occupying the position of pioneer in the art of the future, because he has been true to himself and his age.

Daniel C. French, a pupil of Ward and Ball, is a young sculptor who, like Rogers, finds inspiration for his ideals in his native land, and gives promise of holding a prominent position in the field of American sculpture. He made a sudden and early strike for fame when, with scarce any instruction, he modelled the spirited and original, although anatomically imperfect, statue called the "Minute Man," which is at Concord.

Another strong representative of the new realistic school of sculpture that is gradually springing up in the community is W. R. O'Donovan, of Richmond, Virginia. Fighting sturdily on the side of the South during the late war, he as earnestly gives himself now to the pursuit of the arts of peace. He is not a rapid worker, but handles the clay with thoughtful mastery, and the results are stamped with the freshness and individuality of genius. Mr. O'Donovan's efforts have been most successful in portraiture, of which a striking example is given in the bronze bust of Mr. Page, the artist. Another bust, of a young boy, is as full of naïve beauty and refined sentiment and character as this is vigorous and almost startling in its grasp of individual traits.

The transition stage through which our plastic art is passing is also indicated by the stirring, realistic, and sometimes sensational art of a number of earnest and original young sculptors who have studied abroad, but have wisely concluded to return home, and to found, and grow up with, a new and progressive school of sculpture. One of these was the late Frank Dengler, of Cincinnati, who had studied at Munich, and was professor of sculpture at Boston; and others are Olin M. Warner, of New York, and Howard Roberts, of Philadelphia, who made the singularly bold statues of "Hypatia" and "Lot's Wife." To these may be added J. S. Hartley, who was recently Professor of Anatomy at the Art Students' League, and is now president of that flourishing institution. He began his career in Palmer's studio, and afterward studied in London and Paris. The art of these young sculptors is still immature and highly emotional or lyrical, and often verges on the picturesque rather than the severely classic. But if it lacks repose, on the other hand it is imaginative and powerful; its faults are those of an exuberant fancy that teems with thought; and these artists are undoubtedly the forerunners, if not the creators, of a thoroughly national school of sculpture. Superior in technic skill, moved by a genius thoroughly trained in the best modern school of plastic art, that of Paris, St. Gaudens, a native of New York, has given us, in the exquisite groups called "The Adoration of the Cross by Angels," in St. Thomas's Church, New York, one of the most important and beautiful works in the country. The Astor Reredos behind the altar at Trinity Church, designed by Mr. Withers, and partly executed here, is also a very rich addition to our plastic art, and is another sign that it is taking a direction little followed heretofore on this side the Atlantic. Dr. William Rimmer, who has recently died, powerful in modelling, a master of art anatomy, and author of a valuable work on that subject, also exerted an important influence in directing the studies of our rising sculptors. Having little sense of beauty, he understood art anatomy profoundly, and modelled with energy if not with grace. His statue of "The Gladiator" aroused astonishment in Paris; for as it is impossible for a living man to keep a falling position long enough for a cast to be taken, this masterly composition was necessarily a creation of the imagination based upon exhaustive knowledge of the figure.

Wood and stone carving and monumental work, and the decoration of churches and civic structures, have rarely been satisfactorily attempted here until recently. A curious paper and design left by Thomas Jefferson, of which we give a reduced fac-simile, is one of the earliest attempts at original monumental art in the United States. Here and there one of our sculptors has executed some good work in this field, but costly monuments have too often been erected in the country without much pretension to art. The increasing attention given to wood and stone carving, as in the new Music Hall at Cincinnati, the State Capitols at Albany and Hartford, and in some of our later churches, is a favorable sign that a broader field is opening at last for the fitting utterance of the rising genius of sculpture; while the numerous schools for instruction in this art that have been founded within the last decade, and the well-stored galleries of casts of the masterpieces of antiquity, are increasing the facilities for the growth of a home art. Enough has been said in this brief sketch to show that sculpture, if one of the latest of the arts to demand expression in the United States, has yet found a congenial soil in the New World.

VI.

PRESENT TENDENCIES OF AMERICAN ART

AT the close of the fourth chapter of this volume it was briefly stated that new influences and forms of art expression have recently become prominent in our art, and are rapidly asserting their growing importance. With perhaps one or two exceptions, these new influences so gradually shade out of our former art that it is difficult to tell the exact moment when they assume an individuality of their own, and appear as new and distinct factors in the æsthetic culture of our people.

It is only when we take a retrospect of the whole field, and compare one generation with another, that we discern the vanishing point of one set of influences and the genesis of new schools, with the introduction of new branches of art culture in the community. Considering the progress of American art from this point of view, we find it divided most decidedly into periods, advancing with regular pace from one phase to another like the tints of a rainbow, shading off at the edges, but gradually becoming more intense. Thus we are able to trace in geometrical ratio the progress from primitive silhouettes and rude carvings up to the present comparatively advanced condition of the arts in this country.

And yet a closer inspection into the history of American art enables us to detect in its growth the same rapid spasmodic action, when once a start is made in a certain direction, as in other traits of our national development. There is a tropical vivacity in the manner in which with us bloom and fruition suddenly burst forth after a period of apparently unpromising barrenness. Thus West and Copley appeared almost full-fledged in art genius and capacity to adapt themselves to occupy prominent positions in Europe, and yet there were but few premonitory signs to indicate that the country was prepared for the advent of such artists.

Until recently, also, owing to some cause yet unsolved, we have not seemed able to develop more than one or two forms of art at once. At one period it was historic painting and portraiture; then portraiture, including for a time very marked success in miniature painting, headed by Fraser and Malbone, and continued by such able artists as T. S. Cummings, J. H. Brown, Miss Goodrich, and Mrs. Hall; then, all at once, landscape-painting made its appearance, and almost at a bound reached a good degree of merit. Hand in hand with landscape art came remarkable facility in line engraving. How rapidly excellence in this art was achieved in this country may be judged from the fact that in 1788 the editor of the American Magazine said apologetically, in presenting an incredibly rude plate of a dredging-machine in the magazine, "The editor has given the plate of the new machine for clearing docks, etc., because he had promised it. The want of elegant plates in a work of this kind is extremely regretted, and will, if possible, be supplied. If it cannot, the editor flatters himself that the infancy of the arts in America will be accepted as an apology for the defect." And yet not twenty years from that time Peter Maverick was doing good steel-engraving in New York; and scarce ten years later Durand was executing the masterly engravings of Trumbull's "Declaration of Independence" and Vanderlyn's "Ariadne." And from that time until recently engravers like James Smillie, senior, A. H. Ritchie, and John Marshall have carried this art to a high degree of excellence; while John Sartain has attained celebrity in mezzotint.

Strange as it may seem, while portraiture, landscape, and steel engraving were pursued with such success by our artists, a feeling for the other arts could hardly be said to exist. A sympathy with form, generally the earliest art instinct to show itself, was long in awakening, as proved by the tardiness of the plastic arts to demand expression among us; while to the resources of black and white, or camieu, or a perception of the matchless mystery and suggestiveness of chiaro-oscuro, the people have, until within a very short time, seemed altogether blind. Water-colors, also, were almost hooted at; wood-engraving was for long in a pitiful condition; and as for architecture and the decorative arts, nothing worthy of the name, and scarcely a sign of a perception of their meaning, could be said to exist on this side of the Atlantic.

Some years ago W. J. Linton, one of the most distinguished wood-engravers of the century, came to this country to live. Whether that had anything to do with the very rapid development of wood-engraving here since that time cannot be stated with certainty; but, judging from analogy, we should say that he has exerted a marked influence in stimulating the remarkable progress already reached by our engravers within a very few years. A.V.S. Anthony was one of the first to respond to the awakening demand for good wood-engraving here, and has shown great delicacy and skill in interpreting the drawings of our very clever artists in black and white. Charles Marsh is also an engraver of remarkable character and originality of style. In the rendering of a decorative or highly ideal class of subjects he brings to his aid an artistic genius not surpassed by any engraver we have produced. Messrs. Morse, Davis, Hoskin, Wolf, Annin, Juengling, Kingsley, Müller, Cole, Smithwick and French, Kreul, Dana, Andrew, and King, among a number who have distinguished themselves in this art, are especially noteworthy, not only for correct rendering of the spirit of a drawing, but often for individuality of style.