The Forbes Collection is one of the most remarkable expressions of the revival of interest in Victorian art that took place in the later twentieth century. It was formed over three decades and consists of over three hundred and fifty works, including not only paintings but watercolors, drawings and sculpture. It is essentially the creation of one man, Christopher Forbes, a member of the well-known American publishing family; and until the present sale it was displayed at Old Battersea House, a Queen Anne mansion overlooking the Thames which the Forbeses restored and furnished. For those who saw it there (and the owners were always generous about access) it was an unforgettable experience.
This was never a conventional rich man's collection. It was put together with extensive knowledge and a real passion for the subject. Forbes was initially inspired by a chance encounter with Graham Reynold's Victorian Painting (1966) in a Bermuda bookshop, and the Collection has something of the comprehensiveness with which Reynolds treats his theme.
Every aspect of Victorian painting, from genre and social realism to fairy painting, religious subjects and illustrations to Shakespeare, is represented. A high percentage of Scottish pictures reflects the Forbeses' regard for their ancestral roots.
Yet the purchasing policy was never haphazard; there was always a strong sense of direction. The original idea was only to collect pictures which had either been shown at the Royal Academy during Queen Victoria's reign, or were studies for or versions of such exhibits. This placed the emphasis firmly on academic painting.
The Collection includes works by no fewer than six presidents of the RA (Eastlake, Grant, Leighton, Millais, Poynter and Dicksee), as well as by many stalwarts of the institution in its Victorian heyday.
Over the years the guidelines became less rigid. The cut-off dates were moved back to include a number of earlier masters (Fuseli, Wilkie, Martin, Danby, etc.), and brought forward to embrace some who were essentially Edwardians (Clausen, Tuke, La Thangue and others).
The emphasis on academic painting was also relaxed. In fact artists who deliberately challenged academic conventions, whether they were exponents of Pre-Raphaelitism or supported the Grosvenor Gallery a generation later, are now one of the great strengths of the Collection.
Here are paintings by some of the best-known names associated with these movements, including Millais, Holman Hunt, Rossetti, Madox Brown, Burne-Jones and Albert Moore, not to mention the cynical Frenchman who seemed so out of the place the high-souled ambience of the Grosvenor, James Tissot.
Every collection worthy of the name has to have its peaks, things which stand out and cast reflected glory over the whole ensemble. The Forbes Collection is no exception. John Martin's Pandemonium, the great Landseer, W.H. Deverell's masterpiece, Twelfth Night, John Phillip's Early Career of Murillo, G.F. Watt's Sir Galahad, Waterhouse's Mariamne, Dicksee's Chivalry, and the wonderful early La Thangue - all these are pre-eminent, although masterpieces by Linnell, Mulready, Maclise, Arthur Hughes, Orchardson, Herkomer and others run them close.
Ultimately, however, these are only the peaks. Equally remarkable is the preponderance of first-rate works by lesser artists - pictures like John Burr's The Peepshow, Edith Hayllar's Summer Shower, on his sister Jessica's Coming Event. Christopher Forbes had that essential requirement of the connoisseur, a good 'eye'.
Nor is it accidental that so many of these pictures are genre subjects, an area for which he has a special feeling. In fact if there is such a thing as a 'Forbes picture', it should be looked for here. As it happens, the impressive Frith was owned by the Forbeses before Christopher began buying, but he added to it works by Webster, Ritchie, Hicks, Collinson, Sophie Anderson, and many others. His approach to genre, moreover, was catholic.
There are fine examples of historical genre (by C.R. Leslie and James Archer, for instance), delightful scenes of childhood, and exceptional pieces of social realism (from the brushes of Redgrave, Holl and Thomas Faed, to name but three). Forbes was never afraid of a disturbing image.
All good collections have a definite character, a strong sense of being a personal creation. The emphasis on genre may be one such defining feature of the Forbes Collection, but it is not alone; equally typical of the owner's commitment is the interdependence of so many items.
The original plan to buy works related to RA exhibits has, like other aspects of the brief, been freely interrupted in the course of time, giving the Collection an astonishing complexity and richness.
We find, for example, not one version of Leslie's Sancho Panza or Dobson's David and the Children of Judah, but three. Frith's 'For Better, For Worse' and Poole's Scene from 'The Tempest' are accompanied by oil sketches; the Wilkie, the Poynter, the Dicksee and the Briton Riviere by drawn studies.
Sometimes the links are more general, as in the case of the two Val Prinseps, clearly put together because of a similarity of style, or the extraordinary series of twenty-two nudes by Etty.
And sometimes it is friendships rather than formal connections which are celebrated. Hence the presence of paintings both by William Bell Scott and his mistress, Alice Boyd, the fans signed by circles of artists, the cabinet of works by members of the St. John's Wood Art Club, or the panels contributed by Alma-Tadema's friends to the decoration of his house in Grove End Road.
The Forbeses were always generous leaders, and many of the pictures have been widely exhibited on both sides of the Atlantic and in Japan. Reproduced in countless catalogues, some have acquired almost iconic status through a combination of familiarity and merit. The Hayllars, the John Burr, or John Faed's distinctly sinister Boyhood are typical examples.
Although it was put together comparatively recently, the collection is already something of a period piece. When Forbes embarked on his quixotic venture, the revival of interest in all things Victorian was still in its infancy, and the interest in all things Victorian was still in its infancy, and the material for forming the kind of collection he has in mind was, by and large, available. But all this has changed.
As interest and demand have increased, so the supply of good Victorian pictures, drawings and sculpture has dwindled, leaving today's collector with far fewer choices and far less room for maneuver. In fact it is fair to say that to 'do a Forbes' now would be virtually impossible. Conversely, we are never again likely to see a collection of this range and scale on the market.
