ART AND ARTISTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 1912, 13 July 1888, Page 37

ART AND ARTISTS.

Miss Dora Wheeler is painting a series of portraits of American men and women of letters.

Forty-five thousand metal busts of Boulanger were made several years ago, to be ready in the event of his becoming the ruler of France. Ihey are still regarded as a good speculation.

Report comes from Spain that another Murillo has been discovered. It is said to be of the master's best period and represents the Christ-child sleeping on a cross surrounded by angels. The original of Sir John jE. Millais' charming painting, ".Bubbles," was purchased by Messrs Pears, of soap celebrity, for £2200, and the saponaceous firm have spent £20,000 in reproducing copies for advertising purposes. At some recent experiments made under the auspices of the aerostatic corps of the German army, good photographs were taken of the surrounding region while a balloon was poised 2500 metres — about one and a-half miles — in air.

• Miss Elena Blockman, who is a grandneice of the poet Keats and has herself attained distinction as a portrait painter, has received a commission from the QueenEegent of Spain to paint a life-size portrait group of her Majesty and the infant King.

A small brass statue was discovered recently near the Acropolis Museum, Athens. It is in a perfect state of preservation, and the figure bears a close resemblance to the Apollo of Canachos in the British Museum. This statue is the best specimen of workmanship in brass that has yet come to light in the course ot the excavations at the Acropolis.

A correspondent, writing from Constantinople to the Frankfurter Zeitung, states that a white marble bust of Apollo has arrived there lately from Smyrna along with other antiquities found in the course of excavations in the neighbourhood of this latter city. The bust is of about twice

the natural size, and of wonderful beauty. Contoisseurs assign, it to the school of Praxiteles. A head of Juno and one of a Horn an emperor are among the sculptures found.

Augustus St. Gaudens, one of the few sculptors whom America is proud of, is going to fashion the statue of Peter Cooper for the monument in New York. The boy St. Gaudens took his first lesson in art in Peter Cooper's school, and it will be a loving work which he will now do. A traveller to whom Sir Walter Scott gave a chance ride built Scott's monument. Bread is thrown on the waters even in the field of art.

' Messrs Griffith and Farran are proposing this year to give up resorting to Germany for coloured illustrations for their gift books, and they are preparing a series to be called "The St. Paul Series of Monotint Books," booklets jwhicb. will be entirely horne 1 productions, designed and illustrated by English artists, under the editorship of Mr G. G. Haite, author of "Plant Studies,", printed by English printers on English-made paper, and bound by' English *' binders. — Athenaeum,

Mrs Butterworth, an American lady who has made a name for herself by her skilful paintings of the rich-tinted foliage of her native land, and by the medium used, which is a secret known only to herself, has 1 presented a specimen of her work to the Rrince and Princess of Wales as a silver wedding gift. The offering consists of a long' strip designed for the centre of the table, or for wall-decoration, and is of gold and silver threaded tinsel, with most graceful delicate sprays of foliage, which look as if the 'wind had gently wafted them there.