Author Goodman Walter

scendants. One of Goodman's earliest recorded works is his depiction of the 1858 trial of Dr Simon Bernard over the attempted assassination of Napoleon III. The painting hung in the Tavistock Square home of Goodman's uncle, Sir John Simon (1818–1897), who worked on the trial [1] as Edwin James' junior[2]. The same year The Liverpool Academy exhibited Doctoring The Cane[3], which was then exhibited the following year by The British Institution on Pall Mall in London[4]. The British Institution also exhibited Bible Stories in 1861 [4]. In 1861 Goodman's painting of the Interior of The Cathedral of San Lorenzo, Genoa was exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy [5]. In 1862 The Liverpool Society of Fine Arts exhibited Il Monte della Croce, San Miniato, Florence and Interior of The Cathedral of San Lorenzo, Genoa)[3]. A publication of 1859 refers to Goodman as a scene painter and goes on to describe Goodman's (and various siblings') appearance in an amateur play staged at the Baker Street, London home of another uncle, the composer Charles Kensington Salaman (1814–1901). The production received glowing reviews [6]. A somewhat comical flyer from the same year, of a production at the Goodman family home at Mabledon Place in London, describes Goodman as a hammerteur artist (alluding to the fact that he also constructed the scenery). Beginning in 1860 Goodman undertook extensive travel to France, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and Spain [7]. He spent almost three years in Florence, beginning in 1861, refining his skills by copying Old Master paintings at the Uffizi and Pitti palaces. There he met fellow artist, Joaquín Cuadras, whom he painted several times. One of Goodman's favourite destinations was Spain - he was fluent in Spanish[8]. He travelled with Cuadras to Barcelona in 1862, where he spent almost a year, before returning alone to England and, later, Scotland. In Edinburgh, he resided for a short time during 1864 with his journalist brother, Edward, then an assistant to Edinburgh Courant publisher, James Hannay, whom he painted (exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy in 1864 [5]), as well as author David Smith. Another work, entitled Head was also exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy the same year [9]. In 1864, now rejoined by Cuadras, Goodman travelled to Rome[10] and then on to Saint-Nazaire in France where they set sail on a French steamer to the West Indies[11], arriving in Santiago, Cuba on May 9 1864. Most of Goodman's time in the West Indies was spent in Santiago and Havana, Cuba, working as an artist and journalist and painting theatrical sets. He also appeared in at least one stage production, putting his fluency in Spanish to good use[12]. Goodman and Cuadras were imprisoned for a short time in the Morro Castle in Santiago[13]. During his time in Cuba, Goodman contributed articles and letters to the New York Herald, using the nom de plume el Caballero Inglese. In this capacity he travelled to Port Royal in Jamaica in August 1868 in connection with the laying of the undersea cable between Cuba and Jamaica[14]. Eventually civil unrest forced him to flee to New York in January 1870 [15] on board the American steamer Morro Castle[16]. He spent only a few months in the United States before returning to London in the first half of 1870[17] when he painted portraits of Sir Thomas Brassey MP, his wife, Lady Anna Brassey, their children, and Mr. Brassey senior. The Brassey portraits were hung at the Brassey estate at Normanhurst Court in Sussex[18]. In 1871 he exhibited a portrait of Evelyn, Daughter of G.J.Reid, Esq. of Tunbridge Wells at the Royal Academy and his portrait of his uncle, Serjeant Simon M.P. was displayed at the Royal Oak Hotel in Simon's constituency of Dewsbury, Yorkshire[19][20]. Photographic evidence exists of three portraits from 1871-1872, entitled Master Nicholls, Mr N Birkenruth, and Mrs N Birkenruth. In 1872 Goodman contributed a piece entitled A Cigarette Manufacturer At Havana to the London Society magazine. In 1873 he published an account of his years in Cuba, entitled The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba, to favorable reviews (reprinted in Cuba in 1986). The book was based upon a series of humorous sketches first published in Charles Dickens' periodical All the Year Round. The same year he contributed some sketches of Santiago to The Graphic magazine. The February, 1874 issue of Cassell's Magazine included two articles by Goodman titled "Saved From a Wreck" and "Cuba Without a Master." In April of that year he wrote another article for the same magazine called "A Holiday in Cuba", which he illustrated with a pretty Cuban girl looking through a barred window[21]. That winter also saw the exhibition of oil paintings titled Young Castile[22] and Voices of the Sea at London's Dudley and French Galleries, respectively. In 1876 he exhibited a drawing, The Language of the Face at The Black and White Exhibition at The Dudley Gallery and Morning Work at the London Exhibition of Fine Arts[23]. The latter work was probably a trompe l'oeil painting, as it is described in a publication of the day as a housemaid is cleaning a window, which the spectator is meant to be looking through. The Mail describes it as a pretty housemaid cleaning a window, and seen through the plate glass, a novel idea cleverly worked out[23]. The painting was sold during the exhibition[24]. In 1877 two pages of drawings of Russian peasantry by Goodman appeared in the Illustrated London News, as well as an illustration for a Wilkie Collins story, "A Bit for Bob" in the magazine's Christmas Number, entitled "A Little Baggage." Around this time, Goodman moved to Bradford, Yorkshire and lived with his sister, Alice for several years. Goodman contributed the same drawing to two books in 1879 - God is taking care of me to the Ellen Haile children's book Three Brown Boys and other Happy Children (the other main contributing artist was the renowned children's book illustrator Kate Greenaway) and Floy's first flight to The One Syllable Book. The same drawing appeared again, in 1885, as Obedient Bessie in a children's book called Little Ramblers and Other Stories. In 1877 he exhibited A Factory Girl [25][26][27] depicting a northern England factory girl returning home from work, at The Dudley Gallery[28]. That same year Goodman scored two coups involving the new Chinese diplomatic missions to Europe. Liu Hsi-Hung, Chinese minister to the Court of Berlin, commissioned him to copy the National Gallery's Madonna in Prayer by Sassoferrato, reputedly the first commission given by a Chinese to an English artist[29]. The painting was subsequently dispatched to Germany. He also painted His Excellency Kuo Ta-Jen (Kuo Sung-Tao), Chinese Minister to the Court of St. James (China's first such ambassador), initially exhibited in 1878 at the Royal Academy[30] and later at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool. The same year Goodman sent another full-length portrait of a A Chinese Lady of Rank (the sitter was Kuo Tai-Tai - the wife of Kuo-Ta-Jen) to the Royal Academy, after first previewing a preliminary study for Queen Victoria in March 1879 at Windsor Castle[31][32]. Kuo Tai-Tai also featured in a group portrait by Goodman, together with her young child and child's nurse. This painting was later taken back to China by the ambassador[33]. Goodman's trip to Windsor might have led to The Queen's son, Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, sitting for Goodman (The Prince never sat for another artist). His portrait was submitted to the Royal Academy in 1881. A court circular from Marlborough House dated July 28 1884 notes that Goodman submitted the portrait of The Duke of Albany to the Prince and Princess of Wales, from where it was currently displayed at The Guildhall[34]. The painting was purchased sometime between 1881 and 1884 by The National Hospital in Queen Square, London[35][36]. The hospital has no record of the present whereabouts of the painting. In the summer of 1883 Goodman sold two oil paintings at J.P. Mendoza's St. James's Gallery at King Street in London - Fresh and Pure (also known as Pure and Undefiled) and Candidate For The Front Row (also known as First at the Gallery Door). Goodman was a member of London's Savage Club and in 1883 submitted a drawing of the club president, Andrew Halliday, to the club tombola[37]. In 1884 Goodman offered a water colour, Longing Eyes, for 10 guineas, at the Liverpool Autumn Exhibition[38] and the same year submitted two paintings to the City of London Society of Artists - Idle Dreams and In Possession. The latter work was of the two playing children of the artist and illustrator Harry Furniss. In a departure from painting portraits, around October 1884 Goodman moved to Chalford in the Cotswolds to paint two landscapes of the valley below from the brow of a hill at Cowcombe Woods overlooking the village. He stayed in Chalford for at least five months[39][40]. Goodman contributed at least four essays to The Theatre during 1885 and 1886, entitled An English Ballet in Spain, Art Behind the Curtain, An Englishman on the Spanish Stage, and "Box and Cox" in Spanish. Goodman is also credited with a portrait of the then Duke of Edinburgh (Victoria's second son Alfred). His last Royal Academy submission (1888) was a portrait entitled Mrs. Keeley in her 83rd Year which is recorded as having subsequently found its way to London's bohemian Savage Club, of which the artist was a member from 1873 to 1894 and where his brother Edward was chairman of the committee[41]. Another Keeley painting, Mrs. Keeley At Fourscore (now housed at the Garrick Club) was exhibited at Institute of Oil Painters and Bond Street's Burlington Gallery[42] in 1885. Goodman was an admirer of Mary Anne Keeley and her acting family, publishing an appreciation in 1895 entitled The Keeleys on the Stage and at Home, which contains engravings of several of his portrait paintings. Goodman's life interest in the theatre culminated in an appearance with Mrs. Keeley in a full-scale production on the stage of the Prince of Wales theatre on the night of January 16, 1884. At about the same time he painted the actress, Mrs. Alfred Mellon (née Sarah Woolgar) . Another actress whose portrait Goodman painted was Amy Sedgwick. A year after her death in 1897, her third husband presented the portrait to the Garrick Club, where it remained until 1969 [43]. Other arts-related personalities who were captured by Goodman's brush included Negro Delineator, E. W. Mackney, the dramatist Henry Pettitt and composer Sir George A. MacFarren (who also sat for Goodman's mother Julia).