I seek to learn my trade by my own hand not at some pretense to any system that is better than nature herself. Reynolds on the other hand seeks to understand art by some compass that is supposed to refine his hand and eye. He is also much keener on watching and learning from other men of letters and this is not my desire or my goal. I care only about the nature of my art, does it build on or represent the value in the object?
Waterhouse 11) Reynolds, has also been described as my chief nemesis, even though our work has hung opposite one another in many shows. We are contemporaries with different styles, nothing more. I harbor no animosity toward him, nor do I wish to be continually compared to him as if we were separated twins seeking out completely different fortunes in the same art. The last thing I will say about Reynolds and then I will say no more is that the only thing that makes us rivals in the least is the fact that we are two skilled artists who were born in the same century. Had we been born and worked in different centuries our works would never have been compared, nor our lives or our goals.
The Royal Academy of the Arts, has been a mainstay in my life for many years and it was many a time that I looked at my membership there as a point of pride, as a mark of success. I have been a founder-member since I was 41 years old and yet they have given me no special care or concern, other then demanding that I produce for their yearly exhibition and then hang my paintings as they see fit.
Waterhouse 8-9) it is sad to say that this membership and mark of progress turned away from me in a dire manner. It is so simple a thing to grant the artist the right to hang his works as he sees fit, rather than by some other designers compositional eye and yet the Academy denied me this simple right and created animosity in a previously fruitful relationship. It was in part the rift between myself and the Academy that drew me out of Bath and back to London.
Waterhouse 9) Demand and necessity had forced serious increases in my sitting fees, as I began to be so well-known that I had not a moments rest in bath and had to charge more simply to keep from working all the day and night.
Waterhouse 24-25)
London again in 1775, did not suit me entirely but it was where I needed to be at this time in my life. I sought refuge by taking leave of my commissioned work to paint my beloved nature, if a bit different than before I would hope still as memorable. Bath had afforded me the luxury to delve into a variety of art I have not seen before, experimenting with medium and content and expressing my less contrived nature. A sea of faces has always left me feeling like I wanted something more organic, something with a peculiar view and possibly something less rigid and formed. (Art Encyclopedia NP) as most my sitting clients prefer to have themselves characterized by the utmost realism (excluding the downplay of their overarching flaws) the abstract paining is few and far between and much to my liking.
Waterhouse 29) in a sense the Cottage Door Is an idyllic scene to me,...
The painting captures a very specific kind of aristocratic pastoral leisure, and it accomplishes this by insinuating a number of activities without actually showing them. Firstly, while Mr. Andrews holds his gun, he does so comfortably as he leans against a bench, seemingly indifferent to the prospect of hunting. Mrs. Andrews holds a quill, but she is not paying attention to whatever she might be writing, instead choosing to glance
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