* LANCE, GEORGE, the most successful recent painter of fruit, and what is technically called still life,' was born at Little Easton, a village near Dunmow, Essex, on the 24th of March 1802. An early inclination for art was carefully fostered, and in good time he was placed as a pupil with Hayden [1-Lernorr, BENJAMIN], then in the full flush of his popularity. Under him of course the youth's attention was directed to 'high' or 'historical' art. The Elgin marbles had been recently brought to this country, and Haydon was earnest in season and out of season in directing public attention to them as exhibiting the noblest and most perfect examples of artistic skill. Haydon's pupils were set to make large finished drawings from them, and from the life, and at the same time to go through a course of careful anatomical studiee in the dissecting room. These varied studies laid the foundation of Lance's future success as an artist, though that suceese was achieved in a line very different from that which his master contemplated. But during his pupilage his progress was far from rapid. It was not indeed till the accidental copying of some groups of fruit as a study in colour that the bent of his genius displayed itself. Still it was some time before the young artist could bring self to abandon his dreams of ' high art,' or bo content to givo up his hopes of uniting in himself the excellence, of Raffaelle and Titian. While pursuing his historical .undies, and when thrown on his own resources, be copied, as is usual, a geed deal after the leading painters of varieua sohools; and it may be mentioned as a proof of his dexterity in this craft that Mr. Lance claims to have repainted entirely certain considerable portioua of the large 'Boar Hunt' by Velaequez, now In the National Gallery, it having while it was the property of Lord Cowley, been inadvertently damaged by the restorer' to whom it bail been entrusted to clenn.
As soon as Mr. Lance fairly gave up his lofty notions and devoted himself in earnest to painting fruit, dead birds, and the like, his rare ability began to make itself felt. Before hie time !molt subjects had in England been left to painters whose artlstio education bad been of the most imperfect kind, and whose taste was usually on a level with their education. Lance brought to bear on this lower walk of art the technical knowledge and manual skill ho lied acquired in studying for the highest; and along with this he combined a natural aptitude for colour and a cultivated taste. Year after year as Le continued to rend to the exhibitions of the Royal Academy and the British Institu tion (where his works were always seen to the most advantage), his pictures displayed growing power. it was soon perceived that a really orielnal painter had arisen, one as original in his line, and as thoroughly independent in his course, ae Etty or Landse,r in theirs; and while the uninitiated stayed to gaze with unquestioning admiration at the rare truth with which the luscious grapes and melons and other dainty fruit, or birds, were spread out on the cleverly copied piece of baseematting. or piled on the costly plate, the students and practitioners
of art looked with equal delight and almost equal wonder at the painter's perfect mastery over his materials, his skill in composition, and the exquisite arrangement of his colour, by which, while preserving to each peach or plum or grape ita exact degree of light and shadow, of opacity or eemiarnnsparency, its peculiar surface, and its most delicate bloom, as well as its precise colour, the whole( was wrought into admirable harmony and unity of effect. In minute elaboration Mr. Lance has not attempted to rival some of the famous Dutch and Flemish fruit and flower painters, but for that he fully atones by a more manly style of execution ; and where he has been tempted to finish more minutely than usual his pictures have certainly not gained by the additional labour. For many a year Mr. Lance seldom varied much in the titles of the pictures he sent to the British lostitution they were called either ' Fruit' or ' Game,' or by some equally general term : at the Academy he perhaps assumed the more sounding phrase of ' Preparation for a Banquet,' or Fresh from tho Lake,' or 'Just Shot,' or ',lust Gathered. But of late years he has occroionally enlarged his canvass and introduced into his composition, a figure' (as artists somewhat irreverently designate the 'human form divine'), and added some such title as ' The Seneschal,' without either figure or fruit benefiting by the conjunction. He has also coquetted, without much succese, with history, as in 'atelancthen," The Duc de Biron and his Sister' (1845); with genre, as ' The Grandmother's Blessing' (1844), 'The Blonde,' and 'The Brunette,' &e. But from these harmless aberrations Mr. Lance always returns with renewed power to his still life ; and in that clue some of his more recent works as 'Modern Fruit—Medimval Art,' and 'Harold,' as he quaintly termed a gorgeous composition of fruit and flowers, with a peacock in all the glory of its expanded plumare, are in their way for truth to nature and glow of colour almost without a rival.
air. Lance is neither member nor associate of the Royal Academy, nor does the National Gallery contain any of his works. There are however in the Vernon collection two or three good examples from his pencil—' Fruit,' painted in 1832, ' Fruit,' 1848, and Red Cap,' a duplicate slightly varied from a picture originally painted for Mr. Broderip.