[ click
here to see a larger image in a new tab/window ]
A Distinguished Member of the Humane Society (1838)
by
Sir Edwin Landseer
This is one of Sir Edwin Landseer's most famous dog painting, and is arguably the single most famous Newfoundland dog image, period.
A contemporary notice of A Distinguished Member appeared in New Sporting Magazine for June, 1838, in an article helpfully entitled "Exhibition at the Royal Academy":
No. 462, A distinguished member of the Humane Society, by Edwin Landseer, R.A. A large Newfoundland dog is seen lying on a quay or wall, just above the level of the water; his look is full of sagacity, and he seems as if on duty — keeping a look-out for such objects as may have an especial claim on his attention as a member of the Humane Society. This is certainly by much the best of the artist's animal paintings in the present exhibition. (426)
The following remark about Sir Edwin Landseer and his brother Thomas, a noted engraver who engraved many of Edwin's works for the mass market, appeared in the November 8, 1839, edition of The Times (London):
A bold and yet careful engravaing of a noble picture of a Newfoundland dog — the painter is Edwin, the engraver, Thomas Landseer — has just been published. All who love fine dogs and the fine arts — and there is no one with any claim to good taste or gentlemanly spirit who does not love both — will be delighted with this admirable specimen of animal excellence and human talent.
Oddly, the author of that brief note does not actually identify the specific work being discussed, but it surely must be A Distinguished Member, which was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1838. Presumably some time would be required for the work to be engraved, then published for sale. The only other Landseer painting of a Newfoundland from this time is Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge with 'Nelson', a Newfoundland Dog, which I believe was exhibited in 1839.
It may be worth noting that much of Edwin Landseer's fame during his life was, strictly speaking, due to the popularity not so much of his paintings but of the prints made from his paintings, which is how most British people would have encountered his work. Many of Edwin Landseer's most popular works were engraved (the first step in making a print) by his brother Thomas Landseer. The two of them made for a powerful combination, as this remark (not specifically about the Distinguished Member painting) from the January, 1838, issue of New Sporting Magazine indicates:
In an engraving by Thomas Landseer, from a picture by his brother Edwin, we always expect something more than usually good, for what painter represents animals with greater truth and feeling than Edwin Landseer, and what engraver understands such subjects so well or expresses them so correctly as his brother? We shall, without fear of contradiction, answer our own queries by a brief monosyllable — none! (60-61)
Some published works claim that A Distinguished Member commemorates a real Newfoundland dog that in the early C19 was awarded the Distinguished Member medal by the Royal Humane Society (a British organization devoted to water rescue and life-saving, not — as in The United States — to pet welfare), but when I queried the archivist of the RHS regarding this story (July 2007), she reported that no dogs are known to have been given the Distinguished Member medal. She did report that two Newfoundlands were given to the Society in the early C19, though neither was used for rescue.
The dog used as the model for this painting was, we know for sure, a black-and-white Newfoundland belonging to a Mr and Mrs Newman Smith. Some reports indicate Mrs. Smith was Edwin Landseer's cousin, and that visiting Mrs Smith one day, Landseer was captivated when the dog, named Paul Pry, trotted into the room with a basket of flowers hanging from his mouth (a stunt deliberately staged, according to some reports). "Paul Pry," by the way, was a common British slang term at the time for a person, or animal, who stuck his nose into other people's business.
This painting is briefly discussed in Landseer by Estelle Hurll, published in 1901 (New York: Houghton, Mifflin), whose account of the painting's origin confirms the dog's name and the basket of flowers, though Hurll reports that Landseer encountered the dog while walking in London, not at his cousin's house. Hurll's discussion also confirms that the dog belonged to a Mr. Newman Smith, though it says nothing about there being a connection between Landseer and the Smiths. The work is also mentioned briefly in Estelle Ross' 1922 The Book of Noble Dogs.
Of course, the black-and-white coat coloring of the subject of this painting, now found on some 15% of Newfoundland dogs today, is officially known as "Landseer" because of the popularity of this and other Sir Edwin Landseer paintings of black-and-white Newfoundlands.
This painting is now in the Tate Gallery, London, where it is not always on display. The buggers.