Austen Henry Layard

“ There are happily still left among us a few who follow painting and sculpture as lofty and ennobling pursuits, whether the influence they exercise be upon themselves or upon others—conscientious sensitive men, who dread the rude ordeal of the walls of the Royal Academy, and who shrink from that vulgar speculation which would by the meanest of artifices mislead public taste. Such men rather seek some quiet place where their works can be studied by those who are worthy to enter into their spirit, and can appreciate at their real value the labour and thought bestowed upon them. ”

“ He has not considered that ten years of thought and three years of labour have been thrown away upon this vase, if he should have attained excellence in it, and should have produced an object which may contribute to the elevation of public taste, and may extend the application of art.
Like every really great artist, who leaves nothing undone to render his work perfect, he has himself watched over every detail, designed the form, and superintended the casting of the metal, carved the ivory, and moulded the embossments of the bronze. ”

“ But the most remarkable object in the collection is a vase, on which the sculptor has lavished all his skill and all his thought. Those who feel the true end of art will not think that the labour and time he has bestowed upon this beautiful work have been thrown away, for it is not as a mere object of curiosity, but as a monument of art, that we must look at it. ”

“ When we look upon that exquisite surface in which the poet from the earliest times has sought his description of female charms; when we watch the varying play of lights, and the clear transparent shadows; we can scarcely marvel that the greatest sculptors of old should have chosen it for the representation of those gods whose chief attribute, as exalting them above man, consisted in perfect physical beauty. ”

“ Then the gratification of the feeling for the beautiful was as needful to men as those things which ministered to their necessities. Then it was that the most accomplished artists did not despise the humblest work which could be embellished by their genius and skill. The sculptors and painters of the golden age of Italian art, as of the golden age of Greek art, made designs for chests, or armour, or goblets, and frequently executed them with their own hands—chests, not to form part of a collection of curiosities, but to hold garments ”

“ The man of thought, in the fourth bas-relief, sees in his dream the hoped-for reward of those who toil, not with the hand but with the brain, for man’s instruction and elevation. As he bends in sleep over his tablets, Fame points heavenward, whilst the forms of the mighty dead rise before him. ”

“ All that is truly beautiful has its influence upon man, whether that influence be immediate and sensible or remote and imperceptible. This is especially the case when the element of beauty is introduced into that which belongs to everyday life, into that which we are in the habit of constantly using or of seeing about us. ”

“ Unmindful of blighted hopes that may await him, his ardent imagination is nourished by the promise of glory, and he lives, in the words of the poet inscribed beside him, on “this noble food, and envies not the nectar and ambrosia of the gods.” In contrast with the dreaming youth is the dreaming maiden. ”

“ A work carried out in this spirit and upon these principles, and with a conscientious care seldom equalled, cannot fail to be an object of value and interest deserving of serious study.
The tendency of the artist’s mind is to that chaste and severe treatment which distinguishes Greek or classic art. One simple idea pervades the whole work. ”

“ Were we disposed to criticise where there are so many beauties and so much poetry of conception, we might object to the attempt at foreshortening in some of the figures—an attempt which we believe to be wrong in principle and unknown in the best age of Greek art. The effects of shortening in painting are obtained by correct drawing and subtle gradations of colour and light and shade, means which are wanting altogether in sculpture. ”

“ That influence should especially consist in the chastening of the imagination and in the softening of the character. With most men art is looked upon as a thing altogether distinct from what belongs to everyday life—to be cared for and enjoyed of itself as a rare and costly luxury. ”

“ His vase may be open to criticism; opinions on matters of taste must of necessity be infinite in the absence of any recognised standard. Some may think the upper part too bald, others may desire even less ornament and a more simple shape; some may object to the introduction of ornaments too closely imitated from nature, others to the union of two substances so opposite in character as ivory and bronze. But the artist himself has duly weighed all these things, and has made up his own mind. ”

“ Not only is ivory not so liable to perish, but even when decay has commenced, and the very substance is crumbling away, it can be restored by a simple yet ingenious process to its original hardness. The ivories from Nineveh, which fell to dust almost at the touch, have been made solid again ”

“ In the locality to which we have alluded might have been seen not long ago, and may we believe still be seen, the noble dreamy head of the Poet-Laureate, by Watts—a work which proves that we have yet a living portrait-painter worthy to preserve for posterity the features of the eminent men of our day, and whose name, when his generation has passed away, will rank with those of Reynolds and of the first of the English school. ”

“ With such men as M. di Triqueti this is not so. He has felt, and rightly felt, that there is nothing so simple or of so little actual value in itself, that the highest principles of art may not be applied to it. ”

“ Colnaghi have now under their care a collection of sculptures in ivory by a refined and thoughtful French sculptor, already well known by his works in marble, the Baron Henri di Triqueti.
Ivory has been too long neglected as a substance for the production of the highest class of objects of art. This accomplished artist has sought to restore a material so precious and beautiful to the rank it bore in the best age of ancient Greece. ”

“ In each composition the dreamer occupies the chief place. In the first, a young man reclines in deep sleep; a maiden bending over him is about to press her lips upon his forehead; and lovely female forms hover above him. ”

“ Of the four compositions the vision of the young girl pleases us most, on the whole, from its simplicity of arrangement and the graceful treatment of the forms, although the youth’s dream is scarcely inferior to it. ”

“ These precious objects have always been considered the ornament of the public museum and the pride of the private collection. But, although abundantly employed for mere useful purposes during the last century, ivory seems to have been unaccountably neglected for the higher purposes of art. ”