File:Famous painters and paintings (1876) (14781765245).jpg

Identifier: famouspainterspa00shed (find matches)
Title: Famous painters and paintings
Year: 1876 (1870s)
Authors: Shedd, Julia Ann Clark, 1834-1897
Subjects: Painters Painting
Publisher: Boston, J. R. Osgood and Company
Contributing Library: New York Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
am Palace. Many of Reynoldss pictures are hastening to decay,owing to the introduction of wax and other incongruousmixtures, and the use of asphaltum glazes. It is saidthat he believed in the Venetian secret as firmlyas ever alcliemist did in the philosopliers stone, and he was so anxious to combine the luminous qualitiesof the Venetian style with the rich transparency ofCorreggio and Rembrandt, that half his life was spentin trying experiments on the various modes of pro-ducing this union, which has occasioned the decay anddestruction of many of his works. However, it mustbe confessed that in some instances these experimentsin vehicles produced effects so beautiful as to atone insome degree for the ruin caused in other cases. SirJoshua himself says: I had not an opportunity ofbeing early initiated in the principles of coloring; noman, indeed, could teach me. If I have never beensettled with respect to coloring, let it at the same timebe remembered that my unsteadiness in this respect
Text Appearing After Image:
THE NEW YORK■UBLIC LIBRARY ASTOR. LENOXTILDtN FOUNDATIONS 1723.) REYNOLDS. 225 proceeded from an inordinate desire to possess everykind of excellence that I saw in the works of others. In his representations of children Reynolds is espe-cially successfid. Leslie says, Reynolds never appears more in his glory than in his paintings of children He presents them to ns in their games, their pnrsuits,their glee and their gravity, their archness and theirartlessness, their spirit and their shyness ; the serious-ness with which they engage in their little occupations,and their sweet and holy innocence, are embodiedwith unrivalled felicity. No one ever surpassed himin his love for children, and here is the secret of hissuccess. He was in the habit of sending picturesque beggarsto his house, to await his leisure for sketching them.On one occasion one of his sitters, a child, fell asleepin so beautiful an attitude that he put away the picturehe was working upon, and, taking a fresh canvas,sket

Note About Images