STUDY FOR A FIGURE IN "CAPTIVE ANDROMACHE"
STUDY FOR "ANDROMACHE"
"Such is the method by which Sir Frederic Leighton finds it convenient to build up his pictures. The labour entailed by such a system as this is, of course, enormous, more especially when the composition to be worked out is of so complex a character as the Captive Andromache of last year, every figure and group of which were treated with the same completeness and detail as we have seen to attend the production of so simple a picture as The Sibyl. Deliberateness of workmanship and calculation of effect, into which inspiration of the moment is never allowed to enter, are the chief characteristics of the painter's craftsmanship. The inspiration stage was practically passed when he took the crayon in his hand; and to this circumstance probably is to be assigned the absence of realism which arrests the attention of the beholder."
Mr. Spielmann has instanced, in the above account, the tragic and lovely Captive Andromache, exhibited in 1888; and we may further add that exquisite painting of Greek Girls playing at Ball, of 1889; or the still more exquisite Bath of Psyche, of the year following. All three are full of technical delicacy and finesse. For other qualities take that radiantly pictured myth, the Perseus and Andromeda, or the Return of Persephone (both of 1891); or the lovely Clytie of 1892, whose sunset background was painted at Malinmore, on the west coast of Donegal; or the Atalanta or the Rizpah of 1893.
STUDY FOR "PERSEUS AND ANDROMEDA"