The Fraud (29 page)

And I was there, back at the dinner-table of my brother, the food purchased as usual, making sure all was well as usual, pulling the curtains, sometimes closing the shutters if the afternoon was raw, and Roberto fixing me with his beady eye. I understood that my brother had told his guests that I had been ill: if they knew further of my illness never for one moment did anyone ask inquisitive questions or make me feel uncomfortable.—All over again I listened to the Artists talk at the table, it was as if nothing had changed - but everything had changed in me; I saw that kind, wise Miss Ffoulks was so glad that I was there again and although I was just living from day to day (for that was enough, just now), I knew that one day, somehow, I would give Miss Ffoulks that Painting of the black man in Bedlam I had just finished, and tell her what I had learned from her; and Angelica was especially loving to me; all was well again, and the talk was of Line and Colour and, in particular, the exciting new premises that were being designed inside Somerset House, for the Royal Academy of Arts.

There was very much talk now of the new America, John Palmer told us what he had heard of Artists lives there painting pictures on the floors - on the
floors!
- of the new houses, for there were few carpets; going round the new settlements on horse-back with their tools of trade in their saddle bags, painting portraits and signs and wardrobes and fire-screens, earning their livings like gypsies.

‘I should like to go to America and try my luck’, said John Palmer, ‘now that they have won the War to be themselves,’ and his eyes were old and wistful.—John Palmer treated me with special, unobtrusive kindness, once he bought me some unexpected flowers, and sometimes I wondered again about his home in Spitalfields: he would go off in his cloak, so threadbare now as darkness fell on these cold, wintry nights, with just a small lantern to guide him, and would simply disappear from our lives until next time.—How I would have liked to speak to him and Miss Ffoulks truthfully at last, and show them my own work, I wanted to have friends to whom I could speak openly, because I had learned, at last, what it was to share and Mary-Ann was only me, after all (it was of course James Burke that I longed for. But I had cut him out in little stars, for I could do no other.)

But in the night I painted with a new, quite different confidence.

 

Mr Thomas Gainsborough was the Portraitist everybody spoke of these days; he and Sir Joshua Reynolds were the fashionable Painters now, their names on people’s lips now; Mr Hartley Pond however disparaged Mr Gainsborough’s work, and his odd habit of dressing people in modern-day clothes.

‘His paintings will be out of Fashion in a year, mark my words!’ said Mr Hartley Pond. ‘He seems to know nothing at all of the History of Art: in Portraits clothes should be above fashion, timeless. Reynolds has the sense to often put his subjects in the eternal clothing of the Ancient Greeks - those Paintings will never age.’

But Mr Thomas Gainsborough, we knew, had moved to a house in Pall Mall: how could he not become one of our dinner guests?—He did not come often (it was said he was not much interested in his fellow Artists) but when he did come he added great gaiety to the table - amusing and full of life and full of drink - and I noticed that Mr Hartley Pond continued to attend, charmed as we all were.

‘Do you hear my ducks and my hens?’ Mr Gainsborough enquired of the di Vecellio family, his neighbours. ‘Do they disturb you?’

‘You keep such animals in your garden, Mr Gainsborough?’ Angelica asked him in surprise (she obviously had not acquainted herself with the crowing of the rooster).

‘In my garden,
Signora
, and indeed in my house when my Wife can be persuaded, for I prefer to draw them rather than people, that is the Truth of it!’ and we did not believe him, and we laughed. ‘I do also have pigs on occasion, but not regularly: my Wife will not abide pigs. It is only unfortunate that Nature does not sell,’ he added, ‘but I must of course make the pot boil!’ and dock leaves and nettles that he had picked by Millbank fell from his jacket, and I saw that Philip could not help liking him despite being jealous of his success, for it soon became abundantly clear that Mr Gainsborough (although he too of course was a Member of the Royal Academy) cared not a fig for the Art World, made his success in his own way.

And then one day I heard them speak of the two Woman Academicians that James Burke had told me of.

‘Tell me, how did women become Academicians?’ I asked the table in general. ‘And might there not soon be, therefore, Women students at the Royal Academy School?’ and if my brother looked at me I did not look at him.

Mr Gainsborough was there again that day, I remember, and he answered my questions in his usual gay manner. ‘One of the Woman Academicians is married to a Painter,
Signorina
. And the other has covered herself twice: she is the daughter of a Painter and she is -’ and he suddenly laughed, ‘let us say she is given very much attention by Sir Joshua Reynolds - and how else, for a Woman, after all?’ and he leaned back in his chair with a glass of rum and turned it so that it caught the late afternoon light coming through the window, for I had not yet lit the candles. He was still smiling. ‘It does not show us well, I suppose, but no Woman could survive without a male Painter either in the Family, or in love, to plead her Cause.’

‘Then I should have been a Painter too,’ said Angelica, laughing too. ‘For Filipo would have assisted me!’ For a split second then I was aware of my brother: I stared at him: I suddenly felt as if old, old anger would choke me and I wondered: if my brother had supported me and encouraged me, would there be three Women Academicians now? I saw Philip look away from my fierce eyes (presumably he thought I might again throw something) and I quickly moved to light the candles.

‘As we always say, Women must paint Countryside views if they
must
paint, for it is not becoming for Women to paint Portraits,’ and Mr Hartley Pond took a pinch of snuff as I went about the table with my taper. ‘It is simply not seemly that a Woman should stare so openly at another person in that way - mind, they stare at
themselves
, I believe!’ and he laughed his thin laugh. ‘Their Self-Portraits, incidentally, are execrable!’ and Roberto the parrot laughed too from Angelica’s shoulder, copying Mr Hartley Pond and ruffling up his feathers.

‘And Signorina Francesca,’ continued Mr Gainsborough, ‘the Royal Academy classes are only open to Male Students of course!’ and I thought he spoke mockingly, for he was not (I had already heard from Miss Ffoulks) a friend of Sir Joshua Reynolds (I believe they were jealous of each other) who was the President and presumably made the rules (as well as encouraging suitable Lady Painters). ‘And even the Male Students may not attend the modelling classes when a Female is modelling, unless - and I assure you I quote from the Prospectus exactly:
unless they are over twenty; or Married; or a member of the Royal Family
- who presumably are Unshockable, unlike mere Mortals.’ And the assembled gentlemen round the table laughed, for there were many very young royal children, and then they began to create with the pencils they always carried wild (somewhat intoxicated) pictures among themselves , passing a paper to each other, of royal Progeny running about a nude Female model, and throwing balls.

And then Mr Gainsborough, a good deal inebriated I should say by now, said simply, ‘I never had Formal Training. I never went on the Grand Tour. Joshua Reynolds may pontificate and palaver forever , but I just look at the World about me.’

I was lighting the candles on the sideboard now, and I actually dropped one, I picked it up quickly and only smiled, I went on making sure the glasses were full around our hospitable table and everybody was comfortable and I was silent as usual but I wanted to sing loudly!—I had worried
so much
that I never had Formal Training, that I had never gone on the Grand Tour, and suddenly Mr Thomas Gainsborough, revered and admired and successful Portraitist, told the world
he had not had any Formal Training either
.

Never again was there ever the slightest sign of the
travail
that had afflicted me.

I had acquired at last, from everything that had happened, the thing which I had admired so long ago in Miss Ffoulks.

It was not from books, but I had acquired Learning.

The bustling carriages and carts fought their way through the rest of the traffic on the Strand to deliver their valuable (or worthless, depending on your point of view) cargo at the magnificent Italianate portals of the new entrance: they were delivering Art to the illustrious, British, ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARTS, for its grand opening in its new, glorious premises in Somerset House on the Strand. There was shouting and laughing and yelling and much slipping on piles of soft, steaming manure as carriage after cart dropped its parcels of paintings at the gates.

America may have been lost; business-men may have panicked; Mr Garrick the famous actor may have died; that claimer of continents for Britain, Captain Cook, may have been murdered in the South Pacific but all was back to normal, business was booming, and the Painters with their wares were salesmen like everyone else beneath all their talk of Art: they had to share the Strand with spice-sellers and gown-sellers and book-sellers and milliners and wine-sellers and print-shops and street-criers and gun-suppliers and hostelries and star-gazers and purveyors of fine cloths and boot-makers. The Strand was over-flowing with carriages and people and bustled skirts and big boots and small link-boys; the smell of food permeated the air and also the smell of horses, and outside the church opposite a band was playing valiantly, the trumpet sadly somewhat off the note.

Footmen and servants ran and carried (it was raining slightly, April showers); some painters carried their big canvases, carefully wrapped, under their own arms, not trusting any carrier. Hundreds of paintings were being received to be judged by the Royal Academicians for their worthiness: worthiness for inclusion in the first Royal Academy Exhibition in the beautiful new premises in this magnificent building, once a ruin of a palace, now completely rebuilt. No matter that the Navy was near and Admirals passed importantly in their hats and their bright blue jackets and muttered of the French. The new Royal Academy premises, with the support of King George III, at last were completed for all to see, just inside the porticos. To the right of the entrance pillars, just as important as the Navy, stood this new beacon for English painting: Michelangelo might be sculpted over the door but there were real, valued
British
painters now to follow in the footsteps of the Old Masters. Most of the Academicians had of course been to Europe and seen the Old Masters but here was proof at last: Art no longer began at Calais. O the excitement! There was very much to-ing and fro-ing and fevered conversations and the sound of boots ringing on the stone cobbles as the canvases were rushed in to be observed, and judged, by the Royal Academicians.

And such decisions to be made! And not only which paintings to be shown: this Official Opening was to be one of the most important days in the London social calendar. The King and Queen of England would arrive along the Strand in their golden carriage; they would face their own recently-painted portraits by the President of the Academy, Sir Joshua Reynolds, as they climbed the new, high, terrifying winding staircase. Past the sculptures on the ground floor; past the library and the Antique Academy on the first floor (with more sculptures); further and further up to the proudly-named Great Room - the gallery at the top of the new building with its large glass cupola enabling light to come in from the sky to shine upon the new and illustrious glories of British Art.

There was much discussion as to whether Queen Charlotte would be able to advance to the very top, up the steep winding staircase. Did she, God forbid, suffer from vertigo? Gold thrones were finally placed on the landings, to allow her to rest from her exertions.

Gossip and tittle-tattle swirled: in the newspapers, in the coffee houses. It was rumoured that their Majesties had not taken to Sir Joshua and did not wish to be painted by him again. It was rumoured that Mr Thomas Gainsborough and Sir Joshua, the Kings of the Portrait Painters, would not speak to each other. It was rumoured that nude models ran up the new spiralling staircase.

And the Academicians had themselves been painted: a group portrait of the famous artists, surrounded by paintings and sculptures from abroad: from Europe: that is, from the Classical Tradition. The Academicians looked calm: no hint in the painting of the fights and the back-stabbings, of artists betrayed and excluded and friendships ruined that lay behind the forming of this Academy. The gentlemen stared out at the world serenely. However, the nude sculptures shown in the painting posed a problem for the artist: there were two Lady members of the Academy, they could
not possibly
be seen with nude men, albeit in marble. The problem was solved by making the two women
into paintings themselves
: their likenesses hung upon the wall in the group male portrait - there but not there - and thus protected from nakedness.

All the excitement in the newspapers meant that the next five weeks would see the new rooms thronging with people talking at last (it was hoped) about the Art of England instead of the Art of Rome or Venice or the Netherlands. There was continual discussion of the newly-painted ceilings of gossamer-draped goddesses (very flimsy gossamer) representing such esoteric subjects as the Theory of Painting, and Design, and Colouring, and it was scurrilously hinted at in the newspapers that at some time in the past Sir Joshua Reynolds may well have tarried with one of the lady Academicians, gossamer-draped herself.

With such publicity crowds of visitors were inevitable (and crowds of visitors were much to be desired) but the usual problem reared its troublesome head: the
right
crowds were wanted. It was certainly unacceptable for unwashed people to attend. But how could a British Institution, paid for by public funds, set up with the gracious acquiescence of the King of England, be closed to some of his subjects because there was an entrance fee that some may not afford? It was obviously out of the question that there would be an entrance fee. They had tried to deal with this problem at past, less illustrious, exhibitions by charging for a programme but people merely bought one and shared it with their acquaintances. But now it was accepted that either catalogues or constables were required, to keep out undesirables. Catalogues were therefore deemed compulsory, price one shilling, and the following Public Announcement appeared: