Page:An Elementary History of Art.djvu/660

630 Painting life as a scene-painter, stands at the head of the English realistic school of landscape painting. His works are chiefly characterised by the entire absence of any attempt to produce effect by artificial means; they are simple, faithful renderings of actual scenes, and if sometimes wanting in vitality, they are, many of them, valuable as exact copies of foreign localities and buildings of note. Of this class are the Castello oVIschia from the Mole ; the Isold Bella, Lago Maggiore ; Mount S. Michael, Cornwall, in the South Kensington Museum, and many other similar works. Stanfield took especial pleasure in painting the open sea when unruffled by storms, and has admirably rendered it in all its moods of calm. His sea-pieces with shipping are too numerous to be mentioned here, but we may add that the Entrance to the Zuyder Zee — Texel Island, and the Lake of Como, the Canal of the Giudecca with the Church of the Jesuits, all in the National Gallery, are fine examples of his manner ; and that works such as The Day after the Wreck, and A Butch East Indiaman on Shore in the Scheldt prove that he was not unable to do justice to scenes of a less peaceful character. John Martin (1789 — 1854) was in every respect a contrast to Stanfield ; he adopted the grand style, both in landscape and architecture, and idealised all he touched. His works exhibit great dramatic power, and in the words of Wilkie, " his great element seems to be the geometrical properties of space, magnitude, and number — in the use of which he may be said to be boundless." The Belshazzar's Feast and the Fall of Nineveh are considered his best works, but some idea of his peculiarities may be gathered from his Destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum in the National Gallery. Martin's large subjects are painted in oils,