File:American painters- with eighty-three examples of their work engraved on wood (1879) (14768226194).jpg

Identifier: americanpainters00shel (find matches)
Title: American painters: with eighty-three examples of their work engraved on wood
Year: 1879 (1870s)
Authors: Sheldon, George William, 1843-1914
Subjects: Painters Painting, American
Publisher: New York : D. Appleton and company
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Internet Archive

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wenty years English taste has retrograded rather than advanced. Theseeminent authorities may or may not be trustworthy ; certainly there is noth-ing in the London Athenaeums criticism of Mr. Gilfords picture to throwsuspicion upon the truth of their testimony. Neither the Cedars of NewEngland nor any other of Mr. Giffords riper works is or was intended to bean attempt at realization. Mr. Giftbrd does not make such an attempt.He knows that it would be in the first place* useless, because Art never cancompete with Nature, but always fails when trying to do so ; and, in the sec-ond place, foolish, because Art has a sphere of her own, in which she is greaterthan Nature. Madame Tussauds wax-figures are very earnest and laborious attempts at realization, but probably no adult human being who can readand write ever supposed that they are works of art. Mi. Giftbrd puts himself in his pictures. His landscapes are somethingmore than mere scenes in Nature. They are Nature, to be sure, but Nature
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THE PALMS OF BISKRA.From a Painting by Robert Swain Giffi»</. p. 95. ROBERT S WA IN 0 I FF RD. 95 as he views her, and Nature with a revelation of his own feelings toward her.The impress of the man is left upon the work, and the work is the measure ofthe man. He lias something fresh to tell us about what we already know agood deal, and, in addition, he explains to us how this something has gonestraight to his heart, and has stirred his emotions. In the last analysis theworth of an artists performance depends upon the worth of the artist himself;his character as well as his genius is displayed and defined in his works. Anordinary landscape, seen through his eyes, becomes full of mystery and ofmeaning; the meanest flower that blows can, when he has placed it on thecanvas, give thoughts that often lie too deep for tears. Mr. Gifford willpaint a barren moor under a leaden sky so that it shall almost palpitate withemotion. His vigorous, healthy, and educated mind is worth list

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