Part 1

ART IN AMERICA

A CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL SKETCH

BY

S. G. W. BENJAMIN

AUTHOR OF "CONTEMPORARY ART IN EUROPE" "WHAT IS ART" &c.

_ILLUSTRATED_

NEW YORK

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS

FRANKLIN SQUARE

1880

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1879, by

HARPER & BROTHERS,

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

ERRATUM.

The cut on page 28, attributed to Rembrandt Peale, should be credited to John T. Peele.

PREFACE.

The aim of this book has been to give a historical outline of the growth of the arts in America. But while this has been the dominating idea in the mind of the writer, criticism has necessarily entered, more or less, into the preparation of the work, since only by weighing the differences or the comparative merits of those artists who seemed best to illustrate the various phases of American art has it been possible to trace its progress from one step to another.

It is from no lack of appreciation of their talents that the author has apparently neglected mention of the American artists resident in foreign capitals--like Bridgman, Duveneck, Wight, Neal, Bacon, Benson, Ernest Parton, Millet, Whistler, Dana, Blashfield, Miss Gardner, Miss Conant, and many others who have done credit to American æsthetic culture. But it was necessary to draw the line somewhere; and to discuss what our artists are painting abroad would have at once enlarged the scope of the work beyond the limits of the plan adopted. An exception has been made in the case of our sculptors, because they have so uniformly lived and wrought in Europe, and so large a proportion of them are still resident there, that, were we to confine this branch of the subject only to the sculptors now actually in America, there would be little left to say about their department of our arts.

The author takes this occasion cordially to thank the artists and amateurs who have kindly permitted copies of their paintings and drawings to be engraved for this volume.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

I.

EARLY AMERICAN ART 13

II.

AMERICAN PAINTERS (1828-1878) 39

III.

AMERICAN PAINTERS (1828-1878) 66

IV.

AMERICAN PAINTERS (1828-1878) 97

V.

SCULPTURE IN AMERICA 134

VI.

PRESENT TENDENCIES OF AMERICAN ART 164

ILLUSTRATIONS.

SUBJECT. ARTIST. PAGE.

PORTRAIT OF A LADY _John Singleton Copley_ _Frontispiece_

FAMILY OF BISHOP BERKELEY _John Smybert_ 16

DEATH ON THE PALE HORSE _Benjamin West_ 19

DEATH OF MONTGOMERY _John Trumbull_ 23

GENERAL KNOX _Gilbert Stuart_ 25

"BEGGAR'S OPERA" _G. Stuart Newton_ 27

"BABES IN THE WOOD" _Rembrandt Peale_ 28

FANNY KEMBLE _Thomas Sully_ 29

ARIADNE _John Vanderlyn_ 30

THE HOURS _E. G. Malbone_ 32

JEREMIAH _Washington Allston_ 34

DYING HERCULES _Samuel F. B. Morse_ 35

"MUMBLE THE PEG" _Henry Inman_ 40

PORTRAIT OF PARKE GODWIN _Thomas Le Clear_ 43

PORTRAIT OF FLETCHER HARPER _C. L. Elliott_ 45

AN IDEAL HEAD _G. A. Baker_ 48

THE JUDGEMENT OF PARIS _Henry Peters Grey_ 50

MIRANDA _Daniel Huntington_ 53

A SURPRISE _William Sidney Mount_ 55

TAKING THE VEIL _Robert Weir_ 57

DESOLATION. FROM "THE COURSE OF EMPIRE"_Thomas Cole_ 59

A STUDY FROM NATURE _A. B. Durand_ 61

NOON BY THE SEA-SHORE.--BEVERLY BEACH _J. F. Kensett_ 63

ALTORF, BIRTH-PLACE OF WILLIAM TELL _George L. Brown_ 64

BROOK IN THE WOODS _Worthington Whittredge_ 67

LANDSCAPE COMPOSITION _R. W. Hubbard_ 70

"THE VASTY DEEP" _William T. Richards_ 72

HIGH TORN, ROCKLAND LAKE _Jasper F. Cropsey_ 74

THE PARSONAGE _A. F. Bellows_ 75

LANDSCAPE WITH CATTLE _James Hart_ 77

SUNSET ON THE HUDSON _Sandford R. Gifford_ 80

A COMPOSITION _Frederick E. Church_ 82

A WINTER SCENE _Louis R. Mignot_ 84

SHIP OF "THE ANCIENT MARINER" _James Hamilton_ 85

"WHOO!" _William H. Beard_ 87

LAFAYETTE IN PRISON _E. Leutze_ 89

PORTRAIT OF A LADY _William Page_ 91

THE REFUGE _Elihu Vedder_ 93

CARTOON SKETCH: CHRIST AND NICODEMUS _John Lafarge_ 95

VIEW ON THE KERN RIVER _A. Bierstadt_ 99

THE YOSEMITE _Thomas Hill_ 100

THE BATHERS _Thomas Moran_ 101

LANDSCAPE _Jervis M'Entee_ 104

COUNTY KERRY _A. H. Wyant_ 105

THE ADIRONDACKS _Homer Martin_ 107

A LANDSCAPE _J. W. Casilear_ 109

SHIP ASHORE _M. F. H. De Haas_ 111

A FOGGY MORNING _W. E. Norton_ 112

A MARINE _Arthur Quartley_ 114

ARGUING THE QUESTION _T. W. Wood_ 116

THE ROSE _B. F. Mayer_ 118

DRESS PARADE _J. G. Brown_ 120

A BED-TIME STORY _S. J. Guy_ 121

THE MOTHER _Eastman Johnson_ 123

SAIL-BOAT _Winslow Homer_ 124

THE SCOUT _Wordsworth Thompson_ 126

ON THE OLD SOD _William Magrath_ 127

"A MATIN SONG" _Fidelia Bridges_ 129

STUDY OF A DOG _Frank Rogers_ 130

LOST IN THE SNOW _A. F. Tait_ 132

EVE BEFORE THE FALL _Hiram Powers_ 135

ORPHEUS _Thomas Crawford_ 137

COLUMBUS BEFORE THE COUNCIL. } FROM THE BRONZE DOOR } _Randolph Rogers_ 139 OF THE CAPITOL AT WASHINGTON }

THE GHOST IN "HAMLET" _Thomas R. Gould_ 141

GEORGE WASHINGTON _J. Q. A. Ward_ 143

MEDEA _William Wetmore Story_ 146

THE PROMISED LAND _Franklin Simmons_ 147

LATONA AND HER INFANTS _W. H. Rinehart_ 150

ZENOBIA _Harriet Hosmer_ 152

EVENING _E. D. Palmer_ 153

BUST OF WILLIAM PAGE _William R. O'Donovan_ 155

ABRAHAM PIERSON _Launt Thompson_ 157

THE CHARITY PATIENT _John Rogers_ 158

THE WHIRLWIND _J. S. Hartley_ 159

ADORATION OF THE CROSS BY} ANGELS. ST. THOMAS'S } _Augustus St. Gaudens_ 160 CHURCH, NEW YORK }

THOMAS JEFFERSON'S IDEA OF A MONUMENT 162

THE MOWING _Alfred Fredericks_ 165

BIRDS IN THE FOREST _Miss Jessie Curtis_ 169

REPRESENTING THE MANNER OF PETER'S COURTSHIP _Howard Pyle_ 171

SOME ART CONNOISSEURS _W. Hamilton Gibson_ 173

WASHINGTON OPENING THE BALL _C. S. Reinhart_ 175

MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, BOSTON 178

THE ASTONISHED ABBÉ _E. A. Abbey_ 181

A CHILD'S PORTRAIT _B. C. Porter_ 184

A BIT OF VENICE _Samuel Colman_ 185

THE OLD ORCHARD _R. Swain Gifford_ 187

A LANDSCAPE _George Inness_ 188

LA MARGUERETTE--THE DAISY _William M. Hunt_ 189

MOONLIGHT _John J. Enneking_ 191

HAVING A GOOD TIME _Louis C. Tiffany_ 192

SOUTHAMPTON, LONG ISLAND _C. H. Miller_ 193

A STUDY _Frederick Dielman_ 195

THE BURGOMASTER _H. Muhrman_ 197

BURIAL OF THE DEAD BIRD _J. Alden Wier_ 200

THE APPRENTICE _William M. Chase_ 201

THE PROFESSOR _Thomas Eakins_ 204

THE GOOSE-HERD _Walter Shirlaw_ 205

A SPANISH LADY _Mary S. Cassatt_ 208

STUDY OF A BOY'S HEAD _W. Sartain_ 209

ART IN AMERICA.

I.

_EARLY AMERICAN ART._

The art of a nation is the result of centuries of growth; its crowning excellence does not come except when maturity and repose offer the occasion for its development. But while, therefore, it is yet too soon to look for a great school of art in America, the time has perhaps arrived to note some of the preliminary phases of the art which, we have reason to hope, is to dawn upon the country before long.

As the heirs of all the ages, we had a right to expect that our intellectual activity would demand art expression; while the first efforts would naturally be imitative rather than original. The individuality which finds vent in the utterance of truth under new conditions is not fully reached until youth gives place to the vigorous self-assertion of a manhood conscious of its resources and power. Such we find to have been the case in the rise of the fine arts in this country, which up to this time have been rather an echo of the art of the lands from which our ancestors came, than distinctively original. Our art has been the result of affectionate remembrance of foreign achievement more than of independent observation of nature; and while the number of artists has been sufficiently large, very few of them stand forth as representatives or types of novel methods and ideas; and those few, coming before their time, have met with little response in the community, and their influence has been generally local and moderate, leading to the founding of nothing like a school except in one or two isolated cases. But many of them, especially in the first period of our art, have shared the strong, active character of their time; and, like the heroes of the Revolution, presented sturdy traits of character. And thus, while the society in which they moved was not sufficiently advanced to appreciate the quality of their art, they were yet able to stamp their names indelibly upon the pages of our history. But within the last few years the popular interest in art has grown so rapidly in the country--as indicated by the establishment of numerous art schools and academies, art galleries, and publications treating exclusively of art subjects, together with many other significant proofs of concern in the subject--that it seems safe to assume that the first preparatory period of American art, so brilliant in many respects, is about closing, and that we are now on the threshold of another, although it is only scarcely three centuries since the first English colonists landed on our shores. The first professional artist of whom there seems to be any record in our colonial history was possessor of a title that does not often fall to the lot of the artist: he was a deacon. This fact indicates that Deacon Shem Drowne, of Boston town, was not only a cunning artificer in metals and wood-carving, as the old chronicles speak of him, but also a man addicted to none of the small vices that are traditionally connected with the artistic career; for people were very proper in that vicinage in those days of austere virtue and primness, and deacons were esteemed the very salt of the earth.

During the first century of our colonial existence local painters, often scarcely deserving the name, are also known to have gained a precarious livelihood by taking meagre portraits of the worthies of the period, in black and white or in color. We should know this to have been the fact by the portraits--quaint, and often rude and awkward--which have come down to us, without anything about them to indicate who the artists could have been who painted them. Occasionally a suggestion of talent is evident in those canvases from which the stiff ruffles and bands of the Puritans stare forth at us. Cotton Mather also alludes to a certain artist whom he speaks of as a limner. But in those times there was, however, at best no art in this country, except what was brought over occasionally in the form of family portraits, painted by Vandyck, Rembrandt, Lely, or Kneller. These precious heirlooms, scarcely appreciated by the stern theologians of the time, were, however, not without value in advancing the cause of civilization among the wilds of the Western world. Unconsciously the minds of coming generations were influenced and moulded by these reminders of the great art of other lands and ages. No human effort is wasted; somewhere, at some time, it appears, as the seed sown in October comes forth anew in April, quickened into other forms, to sustain life under fresh conditions.

The first painter in America of any decided ability whose name has survived to this day was John Watson, who executed portraits in Philadelphia in 1715. He was a Scotchman. It is to another Scotchman, who married and identified himself with the rising fortunes of the colonies, that we are perhaps able to assign the first distinct and decided art impulse in this country. And for this we are directly indebted to Bishop Berkeley, whose sagacious eye penetrated so far through the mists of futurity, and realized the coming greatness of the land.

Berkeley is associated with the literature and arts of America in several ways. He aided the advance of letters by a grant of books to Yale College, and by founding the nucleus of what later became the Redwood Library at Newport; thus indirectly suggesting architectural beauty to a people without examples of it, for in 1750 a building was erected for the library that sprang from his benefactions. The design was obtained from Vanbrugh, one of the greatest architects of modern times; and although the little library is constructed only of wood and mortar, its plan is so pleasing, tasteful, and harmonious, that it long remained the most graceful structure in the colonies; and even at this day is scarcely equalled on the continent as a work of art by many far more costly and ambitious constructions after the Renaissance order. And, finally, we owe to Bishop Berkeley the most notable impulse which the dawning arts received in this country when he induced John Smybert, the Scotchman, to leave London in 1725 and settle in Boston, where he had the good fortune to marry a rich widow, and lived prosperous and contented until his death, in 1751. Smybert was not a great painter. If he had remained in Europe his position never would have been more than respectable, even at an age when the arts were at a low ebb. But he is entitled to our gratitude for perpetuating for us the lineaments of many worthies of the period, and for the undoubted impetus his example gave to the artists who were about to come on the scene and assert the right of the New World to exercise its energies in the encouragement of the fine arts. It is by an apparently unimportant incident that the influence of Smybert to our early art is most vividly illustrated. He brought with him to America an excellent copy of a Vandyck, executed by himself; and several of our artists, including Allston, acknowledged that a sight of this copy affected them like an inspiration. The most important work of Smybert in this country is a group representing the family of Bishop Berkeley, now in the art gallery at New Haven. A flock of foreign portrait-painters, following the example of Smybert, now came over to this country, and rendered good service in perpetuating the faces of the notable characters and beauties of the time; but none of them were of special moment, excepting, perhaps, Blackburn and Alexander. But their labor bore fruit in preparing the way for the successes of Copley. The first native American painter of merit of whom there is any authentic record was Robert Feke, who was of Quaker descent, and settled in Newport, where portraits of his are still to be seen, notably that of the beautiful wife of Governor Wanton, which is preserved in the Redwood Library. What little art-education he received resulted from his being taken prisoner at sea and carried to Spain, where he contrived to acquire a few hints in the use of pigments. Feke was a man of undoubted ability; and the same may be said of Matthew Pratt, of Philadelphia, who was born in 1734, in respect of age antedating both Copley and West, although not known until after they had acquired fame, because for many years he contented himself with the painting of signs and house decorations.

But the latent æsthetic capacity of the colonies displayed itself suddenly when John Singleton Copley, at the early age of seventeen, after only the most rudimentary instruction, adopted art as a profession. But, although a professional and successful artist at so early an age, Copley seems to have been preceded in assuming the calling of artist by a Quaker lad of Pennsylvania, one year his junior, but evincing a turn for art at an earlier age, when hardly out of the cradle.

The birth of a national art has scarcely ever been more affecting or remarkable than that recorded in the first efforts of Benjamin West. He was born at Springfield, Pennsylvania, in 1738, a year after Copley. The scientist of the future may perhaps show us that it was something more than a coincidence that the six leading painters of the first period of American art came in pairs: Copley and West in 1737 and 1738; Stuart and Trumbull were born in 1756; Vanderlyn arrived in 1776; and Allston followed only three years later.

The descendants of the iconoclasts who had beaten down statues and burned masterpieces of art, who had cropped their hair and passed sumptuary laws to fulfil the dictates of their creed, and had sought a wilderness across the seas where they could maintain their rigid doctrines unmolested, were now about to vindicate the character of their fathers. They were now to prove that the love of beauty is universal and unquenchable, and that sooner or later every people, kindred, and tongue seeks to utter its aspirations after the ideal good by art forms and methods; and that the sternness of the Puritans had been really directed, not so much against art and beauty legitimately employed, as against the abuse of the purest and noblest emotions of the soul by a debasing art.

As if to emphasize the truth of these observations, as well as of the famous prophecy of Bishop Berkeley, the artist to whom American art owes its rise, and for many years its greatest source of encouragement, was named West, and was of Quaker lineage. Such was the rude condition of the arts in the neighborhood at that time that the first initiation of West into art was as simple as that of Giotto. At nine years of age he drew hairs from a cat's tail and made himself a brush. Colors he obtained by grinding charcoal and chalk, and crushing the red blood out from the blackberry. His mother's laundry furnished him with indigo, and the friendly Indians who came to his father's house gave him of the red and yellow earths with which they daubed their faces. With such rude materials the lad painted a child sleeping in its cradle; and in that first effort of precocious genius executed certain touches which he never surpassed, as he affirmed long after, when at the zenith of his remarkable career.

How, from such primitive efforts, the Quaker youth gradually worked into local fame, went to Italy and acquired position there, and then settled in England, became the favorite _protégé_ of the king for forty years, and the President of the National Academy of Great Britain--these are all matters of history, and, as West never forgot his love for his native land, entitle him to the respectful remembrance not only of artists, but of all his countrymen. American art has every reason, also, to cherish his memory with profound gratitude, for no painter ever conducted himself with greater kindness and generosity to the rising, struggling artists of his native land. No sooner did our early painters reach London but they resorted, for aid and guidance, to West, and found in him a friend who lent them his powerful influence without grudging, or allowed them to set up their easels in his studio, and gave them all the instruction in his power. Trumbull, Stuart, Dunlap, and many others, long after they had forgotten the natural foibles of West, had reason to remember how great had been the services he had rendered to the aspiring artists of his transatlantic home.

Since the death of West--whom we must consider one of the greatest men our country has produced--it has become the fashion to decry his art and belittle his character. This seems to be a mistake which reflects discredit upon his detractors. Men should be judged not absolutely, but relatively; not compared with perfection, but with their contemporaries and their opportunities. In estimating men of the past, also, we need to put ourselves in their places, rather than to regard them by the standard of the age in which we live. In no pursuit are men more likely to be misjudged than in art; for artists are liable to be guided by impulse rather than judgment, and the very vehemence of their likes and dislikes renders their opinions intense rather than broad and charitable. Benjamin West appears to have been born with great natural powers, which matured rapidly, and early ceased to develop in excellence proportionate to his extraordinary industry and fidelity to art.