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EXPOSITION AT VIENNA.
material, the task of winnowing out the chaff and preserving the grain was a laborious one. To be sure it repaid the trouble, for there were some most excellent pictures with this mass of apprentice work ; but the trade of artist is too easily learned in Italy to warrant the expectation of an exhibit of a higher rjink than the one sent to Vienna. It may be that the proportion of meritorious works in the Italian department was not very much smaller than that in some other departments, but the range of mediocrity was much lower, and the evidences of artistic talent less marked in the general tone of the pictures. Motives were sought by the artists in the most trivial incidents, with here and there inspiration from modern history ; and even the ancient divinities were resurrected to furnish themes for a feeble brush. The general quality of color was, as might be expected, more florid than in the most of other exhibits, and the finer qualities of color or tone were rare.
In the attempts to paint the nude, the Italians are less successful than the French, and there were a great many meaningless nudities in the Italian department more vapid and more shallow than the weakest of the French poses. La Signora di Monza , by Moses Bianchi, was an oasis in the waste of feelingless illustrations that surround it. A young nun, her face full of anxious supplication, sits with her hands clasped in an attitude of earnest prayer ;—a very simple figure, delicate in expression, and a harmonious tone of rich sober grays in the picture. The powerful handling of the artist, and his fiue feeling for color, was equally well shown in The Prayer, a church interior with figures, and The Singing Lesson, a stupid set of choir boys practising their singing parts under the direction of a snuffy old master;—a picture with a beautifully managed effect. Another light effect, artistically handled, was seen in the Inspection of the Fiancée , by Robert Fontana. It illustrates the custom prevalent in some parts of Russia, of submitting the intended bride to the criticism of a sort of committee of women. The graceful young gM stands naked in the full light of the window, before a benchful of official looking matrons ;—a story told modestly and with taste. Antonio Rotta’s contribution was not one of his best efforts, and, judging from the Poor Mamma alone, a