The quotations at the head of each section are taken from Graves' list of Royal Academy exhibitors, and represent the inspiration for the painting, as submitted to the Academy's catalogue by Eyre Crowe.

Title: Charles II Knighting the Loin of Beef (1867)

Medium: oil

Exhibited: Royal Academy, 1867

Illustrated London News, 25 May 1867:

Mr. Eyre Crowe's large picture, 'Charles II knighting the loin of beef' (435), noticeable for some of the artist's best painting, but a subject (of small dignity had it been founded on fact) that assumes for true the vulgar error of the origin of sirloin - the joint was called surloin long before..

Athenaeum, 25 May 1867:

Mr. Eyre Crowe's Charles II knighting the Loin of Beef (435) tells a false story capitally, and has a striking design. The King stands before the meat and gives the accolade; a server has mounted on a stool, and lifts the gigantic cover from the joint. This picture is inconsiderately and unworthily hung where it cannot be fairly seen; nevertheless, its apparent hardness will not stand against the applause which is due to its sound and careful painting and great spirit.

Art Journal, 1867, p. 139:

E. CROWE has not obtained the favour he might expect from the hangers, yet his 'Charles II knighting the Loin of Beef' (435) is one of his best pictures. The work, indeed, like several of the artist's previous contributions to the Academy, comes close to positive success. One reason why this composition and several of its predecessors have not obtained more favour, doubtless, is a want of beauty of form in conspicuous figures. Why on earth, for instance, in this picture of Charles II, seated at a banquet-table filled with guests, should the eyes of all the world be irrestibly drawn to the dish-cover and the bent-backed butler standing almost on the table? By this one incident the dignity of the whole composition is gone. It is as if the artist designed to turn the proceeding into a comedy. The arrangement of colour, if not wholly successful, has obviously been carefully considered. Perhaps the brilliancy of certain passages has not been judiciously sobered down by neutrals. The colours, indeed, while distributed by rule, are not always composed under innate sense of harmony. It would appear, also, as if the faces were less well painted than the draperies. This inequality imports a decorative and costume aspect to a picture which, in some respects, reaches historic worth.

Eyre Crowe commenced sketches for this painting as early on as April 1862, according to his diary entries. He took the opportunity of a visit to Haddon Hall in Derbyshire in February 1863 to sketch an outline of the Banqueting Hall, which he thought would do well for the picture.

Title: Robespierre Looking at the Guillotine Carts Passing (1867)

Medium: oil

Exhibited: Dudley Gallery, 1867

This painting was exhibited by Crowe at the first annual exhibition of cabinet oil paintings at the Dudley Gallery in the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, in November and December 1867. According to diary entries in January 1868, it was part-exchanged with a painting by another exhibitor, a Dutchman named Mr Drommersen, with Drommersen paying Crowe £29 for the difference in value between the two pictures.

It is perhaps the same painting which was auctioned, as 'Robespierre watching his victims', at Sotheby's on 24 November 1987, reaching $2,000 (US).

Title: Eyre Evans Crowe (c.1868)

Size: 40 x 24 inches

Exhibited: International Portrait Exhibition, 1868

Title: A Chiffonier (1868)

Medium: oil

Exhibited: Royal Academy, 1868

This painting was the only one of Eyre Crowe's paintings exhibited at the Royal Academy in the 1860s not to be mentioned in reviews in any of the Art Journal, Athenaeum, The Times or the Illustrated London News. The attention of the critics was drawn to his other exhibited work, Mary Stuart (for which see below), suggesting that A Chiffonier was far inferior and of little interest.

The painting was chosen by a lady of the name of Moses, who had won the £40 prize in the Art Union lottery of 1868, according to a letter from Crowe to his brother Joseph (University of Wales, Bangor: Garthewin Additional collection, 1623).

Title: Mary Stuart, February 8th, 1586 (1868)

Medium: oil

Size: 40 x 56 inches

Exhibited: Royal Academy, 1868; Guildhall, London, 1897

Athenaeum, 16 May 1868:

Mr E. Crowe's Mary Stuart, February 8th, 1586 (673) ... may now be critically applauded on account of its highly-dramatic qualities, careful painting and breadth of effect. The body of the Queen lies on the floor of the Presence Chamber at Fotheringay, and is uncovered by the Sheriff of Northamptonshire to the surgeon who came to perform his office on the corpse. The painful suggestion of this incident has been very skilfully masked by the artist, whose best picture this is.

Illustrated London News, 30 May 1868:

The sequel of Mary's fate forms the theme of Mr. Eyre Crowe's meritorious picture (673) on the usual genre scale, where her body is seen lying with a billiard-cloth for a pall, and a favourite little dog as the only mourner.

Art Journal, 1868, p. 104:

E. CROWE has rectified faults which proved somewhat fatal in his recent pictures. 'Mary Stuart, February 8th, 1586' (673) is painted with more delicacy and finish than usual to the artist. We again think that this composition, in common with some of its predecessors, is unfortunate in its lines. The poor queen lies diagonally across the canvas, an object painful to behold, whether in humanity or in Art. The manipulation, however, shows decided advance on the artist's recent efforts; the surface of paint is smooth, perhaps too smooth; and the light somehow caught on the figure is eminently effective. It is evident that Mr. Crowe has made considerable effort to correct the faults which have proved to the prejudice of his admitted talents.

The Times, 2 June 1868:

Mr. Eyre Crowe has been happier in subject than this year; the official visit of the Sheriff of Northampton and the surgeon to identify the body of Mary Queen of Scots ... is not a pleasant theme for eye or mind to dwell on. Has Mr. Crowe expressed the colour of a body suddenly drained of its blood through the great arteries of the neck? Surely this is hardly the hue of ordinary death, much less death by decapitation. More might have been made by the dog. As we infer it was meant to point the moral of fidelity, it should have been painted on the near side of the dead Queen, not, as now, on the far side, with only the little head visible, and requiring some seach before it is seen at all. There is good drawing in the foreshortened body, and the painting is solid, careful and workmanlike.

Mary Stuart was exhibited at the Guildhall in 1897, when it was still in Crowe's own possession. The painting did not form part of the auction of his remaining works after his death, suggesting that he had sold it in the last few years of his life. It was offered for auction on 25 January 1974, but found no buyer; and auctioned again at Christie's in May 1979.

The criticism by The Times concerning Crowe's rendering of a decapitated body was echoed by the artist-surgeon Sir Henry Thompson, who informed Crowe (according to Crowe's diary entry of 1 January 1869) that she would have lost at least a pound and a half of blood, and offered to let him know when a dead woman was brought into University College Hospital so that he could study the skin tone!

Title: A Sculptor with a Nude Model and Two Pupils (1868)

Current owner: Victoria and Albert Museum, London

This lunette decoration was produced for arched niches in the National Competition Gallery in the South Kensington Museum (now the V&A). It was removed and put into storage in 1868, but is reproduced in John Physick's, The History of the Victoria and Albert Museum: The history of its Building (V&A, 1982), p. 84

Title: Frères Ignorantins (1868)

Medium: oil

Size: 33 x 43 inches

Exhibited: Dudley Gallery, 1868

Athenaeum, 14 November 1868:

Mr E. Crowe's Frères Ignorantins (139) is incomparably his best picture, whether as regards colour, lighting or character: a long line of black-robed brethren defiles through the street at Chatenay, the birthplace of Voltaire, the peculiar enemy of their order, and, as they go, regard, or obliquely disregard, the high placed bust of the philosopher of Ferney. Their expressions of disgust, contempt, shame, anger and pain are given with remarkable power and wealth in studies. The whole work is admirably contrived.

Art Journal, December 1868:

Eyre Crowe is another painter who, in this gallery [The Dudley Gallery], struggles laudably into better courses. 'Frères Ignorantins', by this artist of eccentricity, is a work of mitigated horrors. Nothing more dreadful than the bust - almost out of sight - of the infidel Voltaire, horrifies the pious minds of 'The Brethren of the Congregation of Saint Yon'. The situation is strained and overdone, in order that the artist may make his picture ... This objection would have less relevance, had it not been the habit of the artist to force his subject beyond the bounds of moderation. The painter has certainly made the most of his original and impossible thought. The mode in which he has wrought up the expression of the individual heads is beyond praise; each figure is marked in character, and pushed even to the verge of caricature. Even the attitudes of the three-cornered hats speak volumes; the church denounces heresy through the hatmaker and the tailor. It is a pity that the shadows are so black, that the harsh monotony of the lines is so unbroken, and that the background is not more varied; but these traits are the artist's manner, and we accept it as not only peculiar, but original and strong.

Copyright (c) 2005 Kathryn J. Summerwill. All rights reserved.