Seven Discourses on Art | Page 5

each other
which shall have the readiest band, should be taught to contend who
shall have the purest and most correct outline, instead of striving which
shall produce the brightest tint, or, curiously trifling endeavour to give
the gloss of stuffs so as to appear real, let their ambition be directed to
contend which shall dispose his drapery in the most graceful folds,
which shall give the most grace and dignity to the human figure.
I must beg leave to submit one thing more to the consideration of the
visitors, which appears to me a matter of very great consequence, and
the omission of which I think a principal defect in the method of
education pursued in all the academies I have ever visited. The error I
mean is, that the students never draw exactly from the living models
which they have before them. It is not indeed their intention, nor are
they directed to do it. Their drawings resemble the model only in the
attitude. They change the form according to their vague and uncertain
ideas of beauty, and make a drawing rather of what they think the
figure ought to be than of what it appears. I have thought this the
obstacle that has stopped the progress of many young men of real
genius; and I very much doubt whether a habit of drawing correctly
what we see will not give a proportionable power of drawing correctly
what we imagine. He who endeavours to copy nicely the figure before
him not only acquires a habit of exactness and precision, but is
continually advancing in his knowledge of the human figure; and
though he seems to superficial observers to make a slower progress, he
will be found at last capable of adding (without running into capricious
wildness) that grace and beauty which is necessary to be given to his
more finished works, and which cannot be got by the moderns, as it
was not acquired by the ancients, but by an attentive and
well-compared study of the human form.

What I think ought to enforce this method is, that it has been the
practice (as may be seen by their drawings) of the great masters in the
art. I will mention a drawing of Raffaelle, "The Dispute of the
Sacrament," the print of which, by Count Cailus, is in every hand. It
appears that he made his sketch from one model; and the habit he had
of drawing exactly from the form before him appears by his making all
the figures with the same cap, such as his model then happened to wear;
so servile a copyist was this great man, even at a time when he was
allowed to be at his highest pitch of excellence.
I have seen also academy figures by Annibale Caracci, though he was
often sufficiently licentious in his finished works, drawn with all the
peculiarities of an individual model.
This scrupulous exactness is so contrary to the practice of the
academies, that it is not without great deference that I beg leave to
recommend it to the consideration of the visitors, and submit it to them,
whether the neglect of this method is not one of the reasons why
students so often disappoint expectation, and being more than boys at
sixteen, become less than men at thirty.
In short, the method I recommend can only be detrimental when there
are but few living forms to copy; for then students, by always drawing
from one alone, will by habit be taught to overlook defects, and mistake
deformity for beauty. But of this there is no danger, since the council
has determined to supply the academy with a variety of subjects; and
indeed those laws which they have drawn up, and which the secretary
will presently read for your confirmation, have in some measure
precluded me from saying more upon this occasion. Instead, therefore,
of offering my advice, permit me to indulge my wishes, and express my
hope, that this institution may answer the expectations of its royal
founder; that the present age may vie in arts with that of Leo X. and
that "the dignity of the dying art" (to make use of an expression of
Pliny) may be revived under the reign of George III.

A DISCOURSE Delivered to the Students of the Royal Academy, on
the Distribution of the Prizes, December 11, 1769, by the President.
Gentlemen,--I congratulate you on the honour which you have just
received. I have the highest opinion of your merits, and could wish to
show my sense of them in something which possibly may be more

useful to you than barren praise. I could wish to lead you into such a
course of study as may render your future progress answerable to your
past improvement; and, whilst I