THE AFFECTED SITTER.
When a lady whose portrait he was painting was mustering all her smiles to look charming, the irritated artist could endure the constrained and affected features no longer; but starting up, and throwing down his brush, exclaimed, in his broad style, “I tell ye what it is, ma’am, if ye grin so I canna draw ye.”
REYNOLDS (SIR JOSHUA), P.R.A.
JOSHUA REYNOLDS was born in July, 1723. His father, the Rev. Samuel Reynolds, was much esteemed for his urbane and benevolent disposition, and possessed much keen humour. At the early age of eight years, Joshua gave promise of that genius which in subsequent life gained him such eminence, and so well entitled him to be regarded as “the Founder of the British School of Painting.” It was in 1735, when the young artist was but eleven years of age, that he painted his first portrait, that of the Rev. Thomas Smart. This portrait is represented to have been painted from a drawing taken in church on the artist’s thumbnail. The celebrated portrait painter, Hudson, had Joshua for his articled pupil, with whom he received a premium of £120, and who soon displayed signs of his after excellence in the line of face painting. He started for Rome in the year 1749. Afterwards he visited Bologna, Genoa, Parma, Florence, and Venice, returning to and establishing himself in England in 1752. From this time Reynolds had abundant employment, and his celebrity advanced in proportion. Although since his return from his travels, Hudson, the former master of Reynolds, with many others, expressed the opinion that he did not paint so well as before he left England, they all candidly confessed within a very short time the error of their opinion. After enjoying a career of unusual success and prosperity, this eminent artist, after a long illness, died on the 23rd of February, 1792, in the 69th year of his age.
ASTLEY.
John Astley was a fellow-pupil of Reynolds in the school of Hudson. They were also companions at Rome. Being very poor and proud, Astley suffered much through his sensitive temperament in trying to conceal from his companions his narrow circumstances. Being one of a party, which included Reynolds, on a country excursion, it was agreed through the heat of the weather to relieve themselves by walking without their coats. After much persuasion, poor Astley removed his coat with considerable reluctance, when it was discovered he had made the back of his waistcoat out of one of his own landscapes; and his coat being taken off, he displayed a foaming waterfall, which gave much mirth to his companions, though to the poor artist much pain.
REYNOLDS ON ART.
Dr. Tucker, Dean of Gloucester, observed in the great artist’s hearing that a pin-maker was a more useful and valuable member of society than Raffaelle. “That,” retorted Reynolds, “is an observation of a very narrow mind,—a mind that is confined to the mere object of commerce,—that sees with a microscopic eye but a part of the great machine of the economy of life, and thinks that small part which he sees to be the whole. Commerce is the means, not the end, of happiness or pleasure; the end is a rational enjoyment by means of the arts and sciences.”
JOHNSON’S PORTRAIT.