George C. Williamson

“ At the same time, the subtlety of this draughtsmanship cannot be denied. For complexity and difficulty, portraiture takes a supreme place, and yet, on the other hand, as the Frenchman points out in his antithetical sentences, it is to a certain extent a simple art, and we all know artists who are able with a piece of chalk to suggest an even startling likeness which they would be quite unable to complete into the form of a perfect portrait. ”

“ Many a painter thinks at first that portraiture is simple and easy, in fact he finds it so, but the older he grows, the more does he realise that the human features are complex in the extreme, and that the variations of expression make the difficulties in the task of portraying them enormous. ”

“ It is more especially an English art, because, although for exquisite grace, charming colouring, and dainty conception, the works of the French miniature painters take a high rank, even they must yield the palm for representation of character to the greatest English painter of miniatures, Samuel Cooper. Moreover, in no country but England has there been such a long series of painters in miniature, extending from the sixteenth-century down to comparatively recent times. ”

“ As a rule, each painter was individual and characteristic. He allowed the personal equation to take an important part in his work, and when the expert is once familiar with the characteristics of the painter, his miniatures can be found quite readily whether signed or not. It is this special personal quality which distinguishes the painters of the period from the host of miniature painters of the present day who have striven to revivify the art, but who in many cases have become mere copyists, and have not allowed personal characteristics to distinguish their work. ”

“ Of the earlier men there is not much chance of obtaining new information now, but there is always a possibility that letters or sketches by such a painter as Cooper may again come to light, and if such so fortunate a circumstance were to take place we should delight to learn more of the greatest of our British miniature painters, whose portraits were for so many years ignored in favour of the more brilliant, but far less important, works of the painters who exhibited in the early days of the Royal Academy. ”

“ It has been the fashion to commence a survey of English miniature painters by reference to Holbein, and it is not altogether an unsatisfactory manner in which to start (although Holbein was not an Englishman) , because so many of his best works were painted in this country. It must not, however, be forgotten that portrait painting was practised by native English artists in the early part, or at least in the middle, of the fifteenth-century, and although we know very little indeed about these English painters, yet we have many works remaining which must be attributed to them. ”

“ The quality of the material had, of course, an intimate connection with the art of the painter. The seventeenth-century artists knew nothing of the brilliant surface of ivory, although it is possible that one at least of them had an inkling that a more luminous material than vellum, cardboard, or chicken-skin, could be found. There are two miniatures in existence, one of which is in the possession of the author of these pages, the work of Cooper, which are not painted on any of the materials usually adopted by him. ”

“ The work of Peter Oliver cannot readily be distinguished from that of the father, save for the signature, and is as worthy of praise in every respect, even if it is not more so. That of the father is a little sterner and more forcible than the work of the son, but Peter Oliver is not only known by his delightful miniatures, but also by the copies in miniature size and style which he prepared for Charles I., and which represented some of the great pictures in the King's collection. ”

“ In two countries especially, the art of painting miniatures has flourished, England and France, and in these two countries there have been schools of miniature painters, and a succession of great exponents of the art, while in the other countries of Europe there have only been now and again painters who have devoted especial attention to this branch of their art, and have taken high position in it. ”

“ There was a regular tradition of miniature painting in France, extending from the times of the Clouets down to those of the great painters Isabey and Augustin. The works by Jean Clouet were, of course, more of the nature of paintings in manuscripts, and if we are accurate in attributing one of the great gems of Mr. Morgan's collection to Jean Clouet himself, it adds one to the only other seven portraits which have been, with any amount of accuracy, given to this painter. ”

“ For the works of Faithorne or Loggan, Flatman or Lens, we must refer our readers to more elaborate books on miniature painting, and hasten forward towards the eighteenth century. Before we do so, however, it may be of interest that we should refer to an illustration in colour of a miniature which has not hitherto been represented in any book on this subject. It is a portrait which has been bequeathed through various owners as a likeness of John Milton (Plate X.) , and there is a good deal of evidence to support this very interesting attribution. ”

“ There is hardly a miniature by this eminent man which is not worth careful consideration, and in the power of delineating character and setting before us the actual feelings of his sitters, Cooper had no rival, while one of the great features of his work is its amazing variety. Moreover, the manner in which he adapted his technique, his colour scheme, and his ideas of composition to the special circumstances of the person whom he had to delineate, is very remarkable. ”

“ Time would fail to describe the host of minor men who exhibited at the Academy, and it would be impossible to illustrate works by even the chief of them. We have selected just a few; first, an example of the work of John Smart the younger, who is especially well known for his fine pencil work, and for some wonderful copies from drawings by Holbein. There are very few of his miniatures in existence; and the one of Lieutenant Lygon (Plate XXXI.) , in the collection of Lady Maria Ponsonby which is signed and dated, is a good, natural, life-like portrait, well drawn and composed. ”

“ Engleheart's work has a certain resemblance to that of Reynolds, and the devotion which Engleheart felt towards the President of the Academy had an evidently strong effect upon his own art. He copied Sir Joshua's works over and over again, and gradually a good deal of the influence of the great master permeated the work of his follower. His miniatures were nobler, broader, and far better set upon the oval of the ivory than were those of many of his contemporaries, his draughtsmanship was excellent, and there was a brilliance about his painting of the eyes which is particularly attractive. ”

“ It is quite true that to draw a portrait was the aim of the very earliest of draughtsmen, whether it was that of his companion or of one of the beasts of chase, and whether he carved it on a bone, or daubed it on the wall of his dwelling. ”

“ In Holbein we have, therefore, a fitting master, from whom to start the long series of miniature painters, which in England extended away down to the beginning of the nineteenth century, or even perhaps a little later, and in his successor, Nicholas Hilliard, we find the first of the masters who was actually an Englishman born and bred. ”

“ To a certain extent he has been overshadowed by the extraordinary merit of his nephew and pupil, Samuel Cooper, but Hoskins was a very great painter himself, and his work marks the beginning of the broader and more powerful English miniature portraiture, as distinguished from the minute work of the men who had been trained under the influence of illuminators, and whose miniatures were too full of detail to be entirely satisfactory. ”

“ Special attention has been given in our illustrations to the work of the great Viennese miniature painter Füger, because very little is known of his work in England, and there are so few examples of it to be found in English collections. The Viennese collectors seem determined that all the finest works by Füger shall remain in their own city, and they are prepared to give high prices in order that they may carry out this desire. ”

“ Daffinger admired his work immensely, and undoubtedly some of his best miniatures are reminiscent of Lawrence. Especially is this the case with a beautiful girl's portrait from the collection of another Viennese collector, Gräfin Emma Wilczek-Emo-Capodilista; and for permission to illustrate this delightful miniature (Plate LIV.) we are particularly grateful, as it is a [Pg 32] charming specimen of the best work of the nineteenth century, a pleasing portrait, and very agreeable in its colour scheme. ”

“ The painter himself has been led to make little changes in their costume in order that each girl's identity should be preserved, and our remark respecting the exaggeration of the eyes is exemplified in these three very beautiful portraits. By the same painter is the charming representation of Selina Plimer, the artist's youngest child, from the collection of the writer of this essay (Plate XXVI.) . This miniature came from Plimer's own portfolio, and bears his handwriting upon it. It is very graceful and light in its treatment. ”

“ When we come to the later Clouets, François especially, we have actual miniatures, and in several instances the drawings for the portraits exist, also enabling us to identify whom the miniatures represent. It would be impossible within the limits of this short essay to deal with all those who succeeded the sixteenth-century men, and we have to make a big jump to the eighteenth century, because it was during that time that the most notable of the French miniature painters flourished, and their works are by far the most important. ”

“ There is little need for us here to do more than define enamel work as a vitreous glaze attached by fusion to a metallic ground, but only those who have attempted to paint portraits in enamel can have any idea of the enormous difficulty of this method of portraiture when fine results are desired. ”

“ His two sons each had replicas, and the remaining one went to his granddaughter, the Baroness Hell, who left it to the museum. One of the replicas which came into the possession of his sons is now a great treasure in Mr. Pierpont Morgan's collection. The portrait from that of Dr. Figdor, which we illustrate in colour, represents Lampi himself (Plate LIII.) , and is not only a fine example of the artist's work, serious, and almost solemn in its aspect, but also peculiarly interesting as showing us what the painter himself was like. ”

“ Cosway is said to have experimented in enamel, and certainly one enamel portrait, with his initials, is in existence. He drew very skilfully on paper, and a few of his miniatures are on that material. One of his works, signed and dated, is on silk, but all these were only experiments, and the greater number of his miniatures are on ivory, which material lends itself perfectly to his craft. In our opinion the finest miniature Cosway ever produced was his unfinished sketch of Madame du Barry, one of the greatest treasures of Mr. ”

“ George of Denmark, the consort of Queen Anne (Plate XI.) from the Hodgkins collection, setting forth his characteristics in a satisfactory fashion.
The catalogues of the Royal Academy are full of the names of miniature painters. The period of its foundation was prolific in the number of limners it produced. Miniature painting was the fashion. There were half-a-dozen important painters, and two or three hundred lesser men. The greater men stand out distinctly. Of the lesser men, many are only names to us. ”

“ After his time and that of his contemporaries Sir William Ross, J. D. Engleheart, Robertson, Newton, and Thorburn, the art of miniature painting died away until its revival in recent times.
The painters who worked in enamel occupy a section of miniature work apart, although in many instances the best known enamellers painted portraits also on ivory or on vellum, but they are especially known for their works in enamel. ”

“ That he began painting as quite a boy constitutes almost our first fact respecting him, and that is proved by his own portrait at the age of thirteen, signed with the young painter's initials in the usual conjoined form, and dated 1550. Of his history we know that Hilliard was the son of a man who was the High Sheriff of Exeter in 1560, Richard Hilliard by name, and that his mother was Laurence, the daughter of John Wall, a goldsmith of London. ”

“ His portraits of men are perhaps more attractive than those of women, although he was well able to convey the fascination of a woman's face; but the strong, rugged men of his period were portrayed by him with quite extraordinary power, and he created a method of portraiture entirely his own, and filled it with individual characteristics. ”

“ In it his accuracy of draughtsmanship is seen to perfection, and the modelling on the face is so dainty and delicate that the miniature is quite a little gem full of life and vivacity, while the child is represented with a demure, amused look, which is refreshing and natural. There is [Pg 22] a very interesting history connected with this miniature. It was painted in Rome in 1773, when Humphry was there with Romney, and it eventually belonged to Horace Walpole, and was in his collection at Strawberry Hill. ”