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UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE T Thomas Gainsborough. Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, 1787, oil on canvas an elegant portrait inspired by van Dyck/ a pastoral, “natural” setting/ David Hume‟s “natural man” 1. “A number of British patrons… remained committed to the kind of portraiture Van Dyck had brought to England in the 1620s, which had featured more informal poses against natural vistas. Thomas Gainsborough achieved great success with this mode when he moved to Bath in 1759 to cater to the rich and fashionable people who had recently begun to go there in great numbers. A good example of this mature style is the Portrait of Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, which shows the professional singer and wife of a celebrated playwright seated informally outdoors” (Stokstad, Art History 933-4). 2. With the aid of his light, Rococo palette and feathery brushwork, Gainsborough displays an ability to integrate his sitter into the landscape. “The effect is especially noticeable in the way her windblown hair matches the tree foliage overhead. The work thereby manifests one of the new values of the Enlightenment: the emphasis on nature and the natural as the sources of goodness and beauty” (934). 3. “Elizabeth Linley‟s beauty and exceptional soprano voice brought her professional success in concerts and festivals in Bath and London. After marrying Sheridan in 1773 she left her career to support and participate in her husband‟s activities as politician, playwright, and orator. Sheridan‟s work was immensely popular, and his witty plays, A School for Scandal and The Rivals, are a beloved part of today‟s theatrical repertoire. Mrs. Sheridan is shown here at the age of thirty-one, a mature and elegant woman. Merged into the landscape, her gracious form bends to the curve of the trees behind her. Light plays as quickly and freely across her dress as it does across the clouds and the sky. The distinct textures of rocks, foliage, silk, and hair are unified by the strong, animated rhythms of Gainsborough‟s brush. The freely painted, impressionistic style of Mrs. Sheridan‟s costume and the windblown landscape reflect the strong romantic component in Gainsborough‟s artistic temperament. However, his primary focus remains on his sitter‟s face and on her personality. Her chin and mouth are firm, definite, and sculptural, and her heavily drawn eyebrows give her a steady, composed, and dignified expression. There is a hint of romantic melancholy in her eyes, with their slightly indirect gaze” (Anderson 152). “Thomas Gainsborough prospered greatly from the portrait trade, but both he and his patrons preferred a light and airy version of the sentimental portrait, what Joshua Reynolds in not very complimentary terms called „fancy pictures‟. Because he objected to the great height at which pictures were hung in the Royal Academy, Gainsborough quarreled with the organizers of the exhibition in 1784 and refused thereafter to participate, preferring to show his paintings at his own home, where he had control over the lighting and display. He insisted upon a close view: his conception of a picture was of something delicate and fine, not ponderous and dense” (Minor 235). U Sir Joshua Reynolds. Mrs. Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse, 1784, oil on canvas Sir Joshua Reynolds/ Discourses on Art/Sarah Siddons/ portrait in the grand style (or “grand manner” portraiture) 1. “While the burgeoning middle classes in France and England were embracing the work of Greuze and Hogarth, their upper-class contemporaries continued to commission flattering portraits. The leading portrait painter in late-eighteenth century England was probably Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), the inaugural president of the Royal Academy (established in 1768). His Fifteen Discourses to the Royal Academy (1769- 1790) set out his theories on art: Artists should follow the rules derived from studying the great masters of the past, especially those who worked in the classical tradition; art should generalize to create the universal rather than the particular; and the highest kind of art is history painting” (Stokstad, Art History 933). “Because British patrons preferred portraits of themselves to scenes of classical history, Reynolds attempted to elevate portraiture to the level of history painting by giving it a historical or mythological veneer” (933). “We now tend to prefer the fresher brush of his rival Gainsborough to Reynold‟s contrivances. A restless and indiscriminate experimenter with media and pigments, imitating the surface effects of Old Master paintings without an understanding of their methods, he saw his pictures fade, flake and crack, so that portraits „died‟ before their sitters. Even his contemporaries protested at his technical shortcomings. Yet the more we look at Reynolds, in the prodigious variety which Gainsborough rightly envied, the more we see that he indeed achieved what he defined as‟ that one great idea, which gives to painting its true dignity… of speaking to the heart.” (Langmuir 316). 2. Unlike Reynolds, “Gainsborough did little reading, had few intellectual interests, shunned the circle of wits that gathered around [Samuel] Johnson.” (Durant, Rousseau and Revolution 757) “Reynolds was a man; of the world, ready to make the obeisances required for social acceptance; Gainsborough was a passionate individualists who raged at the sacrifices demanded of his personality and his art as the price of success” (755). “Reynolds‟ Grand Style did not exclude the sense of play and sentiment typical of the age. Sarah Siddons was the most famous tragic actress of her time, especially renowned for her portrayal of Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare‟s play Macbeth… Yet her pose here is nonchalant- it gives an appearance of being effortless or unposed. One of the stories associated with the painting tells us that Sarah Siddons, late for her sitting, rushed into Reynolds‟ studio, threw herself on the throne, removed her bonnet, rested her head momentarily in her hand, then turned to the painter and asked, „How shall I sit?‟ „Just as you are,‟ Sir Joshua replied. Mrs. Siddons also related to another painter that the pose came from an idle moment when Reynolds was preparing some colors and she happened to turn and look at another of the artist‟s paintings hanging on the wall. He saw the expression and pose, and asked that she hold it” (Minor 233). 30
UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE Sir Joshua Reynolds. Mrs. Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse, 1784, oil on canvas (CONTINUED) 3. Gainsborough also “painted Mrs. Siddons in a conscious attempt to outdo his great rival on the London scene, Sir Joshua Reynolds, who had portrayed the same sitter as the Tragic Muse. Reynolds, a less adept painter, had to rely on pose and expression to suggest the aura of character that Gainsborough was able to convey through color and brushwork alone. Reynolds, who had been president of the Royal Academy since its founding in 1768, championed the academic approach to art, which he had acquired during two years in Rome” (Janson 601). “In his Discourses he set forth what he felt were necessary rules and theories. His views were essentially those of Lebrun, tempered by British common sense, and like Lebrun, he found if difficult to live up to his theories in practice. Although he preferred history painting in the grand style, most of his works are portraits „enabled‟ by allegorical additions or disguises like those in his picture of Mrs. Siddons. His style owed a good deal more to the Venetians, to the Flemish Baroque, and even to Rembrandt (note the lighting in his Mrs. Siddons) than he was willing to admit, although he often recommended following the example of earlier masters” (601). 4. “Reynolds was generous enough to praise Gainsborough, whom he outlived by a few years, and whose instinctive talent he must have envied. He eulogized him as one who saw with the eye of a painter rather than a poet, even if the compliment was left-handed. Gainsborough‟s painters epitomized the Enlightenment philosopher David Hume‟s idea that painting must incorporate both nature and art. Gainsborough himself was a simple and unpretentious person who exemplified Hume‟s „natural man‟, free of excessive pride and humility. Reynolds‟ approach, on the other hand, as stated in his Discourses, was based on Horace‟s saying, ut pictura poesis. His use of poses from the antique was intended to elevate the sitter from an individual to a universal type through association with the great art of the past and the noble ideals it embodied. This heroic model was closely related to the writings of the playwright Samuel Johnson and the practices of the actor David Garrick, both of whom were friends of Reynolds. (Garrick sat for portraits by Hogarth and Gainsborough, as well as Reynolds.) In this, Reynolds was the opposite of Gainsborough. Yet, for all the differences between them, the two artists had more in common, artistically and philosophically, than they cared to admit” (601). 5. “Testimony of Reynolds‟ devotion to the Grand Tradition is that he went deaf from spending too much time in the frosty rooms of the Vatican while sketching the Raphaels that hung there. While on the continent, he also caught a lifelong dose of „forum fever‟, thereafter littering his portraits with Roman relics and noble poses. His dilemma was that, although he could get rich at „face painting‟, only history painters were considered poets among artists. Reynolds tried to combine the two genres, finding fault with Gainsborough for painting „with the eye of the painter, not the poet‟. Reynolds was a champion of idealizing reality. In separate portraits both he and Gainsborough did of the actress Mrs. Siddons, Gainsborough showed her as a fashionable lady, while Reynolds portrayed here as a Tragic Muse enthroned between symbols of Pity and Terror. He so idolized such masters as Raphael, Michelangelo, Rubens, and Rembrandt he even painted his self-portrait costumed as the latter. His portraits succeeded in spite of his pedantic self. „Damn him! How various he is!‟ Gainsborough exclaimed of this artist who could paint imposing military figures, genteel ladies, and playful children with equal skill. Ironically, in his best portraits Reynolds ignored his own rules. Instead of idealizing what he termed „deficiencies and deformities‟, he relied on an intimate, direct style to capture the sitter‟s personality” (Strickland 58). Gainsborough “painted landscapes for his own pleasure, constructing miniature scenes in his studio of broccoli, sponges, and moss to simulate unspoiled nature. These did not sell, so Gainsborough had to content himself with inserting landscape backgrounds in his portraits” (58). 31 V The Scottish Intellectuals: David Hume and Adam Smith 1. “In the eighteenth century, all the thinkers who rooted their work in empiricism owed something to the English philosopher John Locke (1632-1704)… Locke‟s originality lay in the modesty of his approach. For him, human knowledge necessarily fell short of what exists in reality but remains generally sufficient for human purposes. Our ideas- he defined an idea as „whatever it is the mind can be employed about in thinking‟- are not born with us, but come from experience” (Lucie-Smith 323). “For Locke, property was the foundation of society, and it was therefore one of the primary ends of government to preserve property rights, as well as to regulate the ways in which it could be used, distributed, or transferred. It was for this reason, he said, that men gave up certain individual rights and freedoms, though sovereignty remained with them. The notion of a „social contract,‟ posited as an alternative to a state of nature where all human beings were at war with one another, was to be hugely influential among Locke‟s eighteenthcentury successors” (323). 2. “David Hume (1711-76), one of a remarkable band of eighteenth-century Scottish intellectuals, pushed Locke‟s ideas further in A Treatise of Human Nature (1739) and Philosophical Essays Concerning the Human Understanding (1748-53). He was far more consciously skeptical than Locke, and hostile to revealed religion. For Hume, all our ideas come either from sensory impressions or from inner feelings. In addition, we can never discover a matter of fact through reasoning along; it can be discovered, or at least inferred, only from experience. He divided the reasoning process into two parts – „abstract‟ reasoning concerning quantity and number, and „experimental‟ reasoning, which concerned itself with matters of fact. As for moral decisions, these were a matter of sentiment- they depended on what people felt about them, not on some external imperative, such as religion” (323). 3. “Adam Smith (1723-90) was a close friend of Hume, and a member of the same Scottish intellectual circle. His main impact was in the sphere of economic theory, and his most influential publication was The Wealth of Nations (1776). Until this appeared, there had still been an inclination to believe that wealth consisted simply of a stockpile of possessions, land or money. Smith‟s definition of wealth operated on a national rather than personal level; he argued that a country‟s wealth and potential for economic growth depended on the amount of consumable goods which were circulated in trade, and which were continually replaced as they were used. Since, he said, „every individual is continually exerting himself to find the mast advantageous employment for whatever capital he can command,‟ the general welfare is best served by allowing each of these individuals to pursue his or her own interest, since, though intending only their won personal gain, the capitalists contribute to the general welfare by continually increasing the stock of consumable goods. Smith was thus the father of the policy of economic laisser faire- the doctrine of placing minimum restrictions on capitalist enterprise and trade- which influenced governments well into the nineteenth century” (323-3).
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