ART AND ARTISTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2810, 22 January 1908, Page 85

ART AND ARTISTS.

_ "THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD." -'Hunt" and Millais had "come out into th« „ 'light of .things'' amid * the green beaut j " ! pE r Sjrr'ey in v 1-851. : searched Uw '"^t'reaias idP'tVe- wild, roses 'tit his '"Ophelia." 1 Huiit/m.sde sttfdiea.r.for "The- Light- of -^the *; -World;' \ and "painted 'the^ orchard seen be"rfiind 'tK6*'^igure' j Vith'th < c Danip"-ffom : th* .orchard "of 'the 'farmh'o'u'ae 'Whe^e"'thej ' "staged: "' Re" painted 'Wery-^fuil' mcdn*-froni- " "nine"' at night 'till 'five, in the, mbl-ning'light-ing his canvas wifclf a candle find farming "his £eet"'in a. S^ck "of straw. ■"'•Everything '-.'ca^re^sir'aigfh'fij-frpm Nature '■to 'the canvas. '. the background "painted, the artist v returned to" London,' Jantern jVja model ctisrfA^ 87 ' 3 m& ite^iWife), ',ahd began on' the rest 'of the picturS.; "H« I tells in "Pre-Raphaelitism *and' N "the ' 3?re.",'ftaphaelite Brotherhood" ".how-. Mi^s' Sicldal r ,'(aftcr\ya"rdA Rossetti's "wife) came to his .^Chelsea snidio "to'lef K 'h'ihi"study the effects * jjf "the. light" and shade " on her beautiful . rcogper-cqjoured He , brought with KitS" tendtils, of ivy from a lizard-kept, desolate doorway in' 'Surrey, and began hia v . nocturnal work 'again on the balcony of the, - house". \ ' '"' "",-.*■ : * „,,j It^ivraa'at this^ time that a chatty 'bu?dnvec entertamed him with atones of nic eccentric characfce'rs".^o.f Chelsea. Having -Jnoked-'fun.a.t Carlyle's broad-brimm&cl hat, .' ne , mentioned Ibther odd persons. . "But." .sayVhe, "I'll show" you "another queer cove ,'j\|i£,vyp'u're coming round the corner. You ' ( ',csih ise.e him well from the 'bus. He's on the first-floor, and seemingly is a_-draw"ng of somefliink." ' The "oueer cove" was Holrnan\Hunt painting: "The Light of the ? t j Wor'd.'^' Here^ the picture .w.as finished.' | Another and smaller version, was painted as a "workinjr design." though it was not (l „cpinoleted until 'after tfie " large picture wa? 1 "finished. "When the picture .appeared at the .Royal Academy of 1854 it raised a storm of pro- , test and criticism." One critic called tho Figure a "wild fantasy." Mr Hunt thought Thackeray regarded- it as -"promtsted b? [ narrow sectarianism or insincerity." King«ley, with Carlyle, .saw in it "only a proclamation of ecclesiastical dogma.'" Some '- people' "even .had tho -suspicion that ft was X \feint,©d, to support ,the P»j=pj?ite movement." *, Gambart, (^he print publisher, had sonio • doiibt a ■> to "whether ' the mihlic would like .^i/he, .jprints- from "they pictiiFeT~J---J3ut__.the Jptiblic., did like them. " It liked them ' so ' well that the ,*'dealer made" '£10,000 out , of them, '■^■t Hunt's old friend, Mr Combe, " of f the Clarendon-?: Press,, bought it in ,* accordance with,,nn old%co,inpact. Hjs ~ f widow gave it to Keble Oxford. ,Here : it: frizzled for -years 'over hot-air pipes. : ; andlMf'-HuntKad to testoje it. It. .is now r-.', ps jSerfept as when it was fitet shown in the faT t -off dayaof its struggle. for a hen ring. , , —Christmas Graphic v • ' PAGE FROM' HA7J,TTT'9 LIFE. - — Three Years as an Itinerant ''. * . .».' Painter. — '" For three years after his retun trom -, Pifrisj- in 1802, 'Hazlitt led the" life of an '"^tinewint portrait" painter. He had' a capital" - pair of !egs,- loved the roadi. and wielded the brush /with" 1 great- cotirage. - He" was -" not a timid painter. A "man who could '"■ J gafat ;a- recognisable portrait in<-oils, with -an s undoubted suggestion 'of Rembtaiidt about it, and would da ' for five guineas, was 1 not likely to be without work in" the north 'of-'TEiigland. > "Kings lay aside,-their" crowns .to sit for-. their portraits, and poets their to sit ,for 'their busts. The be^g ir in the street is 'prou\f to have his" picture painted, arid will Almost sit : for nothing." [ ';Hazlitt begam'-' with - the' poets — the -f.o '? finest" ia- Ensrland,'"if not 'in Europe—Cole--''ridgo and Wordsworth; - whose e.quine"^}- ' .eiognomy ' Hazlitt' greatly admired.' TJn- *" luckily,^neither picture- was a euccess. ?*c cording to Soiithey, Hazlitt made Coleridga loot like' a. hovse-stoaler on his trial, evidently guilty, but clever enough to have a -'chanfe of getting off; whilst 'he "Wcids"•woirbh^ - 'according to affother -cr'tic,' t'op.rcsented a man' upon the Rallows-iree dccfjlf - affected by a fate he felt, to, be deserved. ' Failurei ho" doubt, 'but not insipid failures. '^''Haalitt also" painted" the little Hart]ev ' Qoleridge, reserved for an unkind fa.te t> but who lives" for ever "a happy child" in '■ "Wordsworth's' 'verse. From Kes wick 7 the painter prneoa ■ «.l to . .Manchester/where he had friends and ac'"'quaintahces. Here he painted a half-length ''portrait of a J manufacturer,"w"ho died. worth \"'& plum"; and a§*.the artist had been liv- ' jirisr, as an experiment, 60 he-.assures us, lot J a fortnight on, coflFee, and was very hungry, ; he 'rather slurred over the ■ coat, which mi a reddish rown, in" order .that he^ mighf feeji the manufacturer's five guineas in trie "^pocket. As fidon as'the^iineas were safe, -* Hazlitt Hurried to " the market-place and '"dined on sausages and ifiashed potatoes, "* ', noble dish for strong stomachs: and while .'they "were' getting ready, and I could hea* ,'them hissing on the.i pin, 1 react a volume of 'Gil Bias,' containing the aooount of'th* fair Aurora." Already was Literature bs' ginninar " to reassert herself. _ v j" 'Hjb "iasfr pbrtraft known to fame is ,th« - one "of Charles Lamb, which. >fter th« i vicissitudes* o£" the, auction-room, is no* safely lodged in' the National. Portrait Gal lerr". It is a capital specimen of Ha* jlitt'f style. ' ' . .- I^lßos Hazlitt abandoned painting a« » 'profession He never scaled as a painter tht steep staircase that leads to the mastery of [any art.— Augustine Bitrell-' , ' } "Ar« there any talking-machines itt -this flat?" — "Six of them— four married and I two singlet" " . _

— The Metropolitan police protect an ten of 699 square miles; that is, a circle t» radi\js of 15 miles, but not_ iitg the City of London. The Tatable of the property they guard 's

— Next to London, Manchester has the largeet Jewish population of any -English town. There are 28,000 Jews " in- Manchester, an<3 20,000 in j*9e<j6. Liverpool has 7000. There ar« SwUSo Jews in Great Britain.

.*-<•' i >'10.*h-.