雙語+MP3|美國學生藝術史28 早期美國畫家

 
這批畫的顏色都非常絢麗，極具熱帶風情，向我們展示了島上人娛樂、休息和工作時的場景。這批南太平洋繪畫使高更一舉成名。 
28 EARLY AMERICANS早期美國畫家
 
NOW we come to painting in America. I’ll have to tell you right at the beginning that there is much more American painting, and that there are many more American artists, than I have room to tell you about in this book. America has had artists since before the American Revolution and to–day we have as many good painters at work as any country in the world—perhaps more. 
The first American artist to become really famous was Benjamin West. Benjamin West’s family lived in Pennsylvania when the woods were still full of Indians. There he was born and there he grew up. As his family were Quakers, the Indians were friendly to them, for the Quakers had made a treaty with the Indians to buy their land from them instead of just taking it by force or by cheating. 
When Benjamin West was a boy he loved to draw pictures. The Indians were pleased when he drew pictures of them. Of course he didn’t have any paints or paint brushes nor even any pictures to look at. There weren’t such things in the little frontier village where he lived. So the boy was delighted one day when the Indians gave him some of the yellow and red paint that they used to paint their faces with. Benjamin ran home and showed the paints to his mother. Then his mother gave him some bluing which she used in washing clothes. Now he had yellow, red and blue paint, but no paint brushes. How do you think he got a brush? He used the cat! 
Yes, he cut some hairs off the cat’s tail and made them into a paint brush. When the first brush wore out, he got some more hairs from the cat. After a while the poor cat had hardly any hair left on her tail and was beginning to look very ragged in other places. Benjamin’s father thought the cat had the mange. 
When Benjamin West grew up he went to live in Philadelphia, and there he worked hard to become a good painter. Then he decided to go to Europe where he could see and study famous paintings. When he reached Rome he was taken to see a statue of a Greek god called the Apollo Belvedere. (See the picture NO.39–1 in Chapter 39) 
“It looks like a Mohawk warrior,” he said, thinking of the strong and graceful Indian braves of Pennsylvania. 
West then went to England and settled in London. He became a very popular painter. The king, George Ⅲ, liked him and his work so much that he made him court painter. And so Benjamin West never returned to America. But he always welcomed American artists who came to London and was very generous and helpful to them. In fact, his studio was a kind of school for young men learning to paint, and many well–known American painters studied there. He was like a father to them all. 
West’s pictures often were very large and generally were filled with many figures, though some were smaller portraits. They were admired by every one and some people even said they promised to be as great as the paintings of Michelangelo. Nowadays we think West’s paintings are not really very great paintings, but isn’t it pleasant to hear of an artist’s pictures being so well thought of while he was alive, and could enjoy their success? Many painters have had to struggle all their days as nobodies, with their pictures not admired until after those painters died, so that I’m glad the opposite happened to this painter. 
One of West’s best–known paintings is “The Death of General Wolfe.” General Wolfe was leader of the British soldiers when they fought the French at Quebec to decide whether France or England should own Canada. The British won, but General Wolfe was shot. Both the French and English were helped by Indian warriors. Notice the Indian in the picture. West grew up with Indians and so could paint them even in England with the nearest Indian three thousand miles away. 
 
No.28-1　THE DEATH OF GENERAL WOLFE（《沃爾夫上校之死》）　　　　　WEST（韋斯特　作） 
The picture caused a great stir in London, because the soldiers in it are dressed in their regular uniforms. In England it was thought that all pictures of history should show people dressed as Greeks or Romans. Even the king told West he oughtn’t to put his figures in such modern costumes. But when the picture was finished every one, including the king, said West was right. After that, artists painted their figures in the clothes the people they painted really wore. 
One of the young Americans who studied under West in London was Gilbert Stuart. He was born and raised in New England before the Revolution. He thought he could do better in old England, so he traveled to London. There he became a painter of really fine portraits. People then thought Benjamin West a much better painter than we now think he was, but Gilbert Stuart’s paintings are just as well thought of to–day as they were when he painted them. 
After living many years in England, Gilbert Stuart came back to America. It was now the United States of America, for the Revolution had been fought and won. Stuart had come back, he said, to paint the portrait of George Washington, whom he greatly admired. 
Washington posed for three portraits by Gilbert Stuart. The last of these three is the most famous and best–loved picture of Washington that we have. It is called the Athenaeum portrait because it belongs to the Athenaeum Club in Boston. You can see a small copy of it on many of our postage stamps, for instance on the three–cent stamp of 1932 and 1933. 
You may wonder why this portrait on the next page seems unfinished. The reason is that Gilbert Stuart liked it so well that he wanted to keep it. He had promised the portrait to Washington when it was finished, but it was never finished. The artist couldn’t bear to finish it! Instead of the original, Washington agreed to take a copy that Stuart made of it for him. As a matter of fact the artist painted about fifty copies of the portrait from time to time and sold a copy whenever he needed money. 
Gilbert Stuart went to live in Boston and never returned to England. He painted five other Presidents besides Washington and so is sometimes called the Painter of Presidents. 
Now, there were, of course, other American painters in the early days of the United States. Most of them were portrait painters, because so many people wanted portraits. There were still no cameras to take photographs. It is from the portraits of these early painters that we know what the famous Americans and beautiful women of those days looked like. 
These early portraits have become very valuable, so that many of them are now in museums. Some, however, still belong to the families whose ancestors had their portraits painted. If some one ever shows you a portrait by Copley, Sully, Malbone, Trumbull, or one of the Peales be sure to look at it carefully and with respect, for it is the work of one of the famous early painters of America. 
 
No.28-2　THE ATHENÆUM PORTRAIT OF WASHINGTON（《雅典娜的華盛頓畫像》）STUART（斯圖爾特　作） 
Courtesy of The University Prints