Medium: oil
Exhibited: Royal Academy, 1885
Athenaeum, 11 April 1885:
Mr. Eyre Crowe has finished, and will probably send to the Royal Academy … ‘Orisons’, a party of Sisters of Mercy kneeling in prayer before the chancel of an ancient Norman church; we see them from near the altar, while their figures and the time-worn interior and its furniture are illuminated by the afternoon sun.
Daily News, 21 May 1885:
Wanton Mischief at the Royal Academy. In Gallery No. 5 there are two examples close together. One of those is Mr. Eyre Crowe’s “Old Chantry at Auberville” which has a rather determined-looking diagonal scratch on the left side; the other is Mr. Pettie’s scene from “The School for Scandal”.
Daily News, 23 May 1885:
The Injuries to Pictures at the Royal Academy. The artists whose works have suffered from the mysterious scratches and scorings at the Royal Academy have, for the most part, availed themselves of opportunities afforded to them to paint out as far as possible those unsightly injuries. It would require sharp eyes indeed to discover now any remaining traces of mischief to … Mr. Eyre Crowe’s “Old Chantry”…
Daily News, 25 May 1885:
“The Injuries to Pictures at the Royal Academy” – reporting incidents of vandalism. As we saw [“The Old Chantry at Auberville” by Mr. Eyre Crowe] on Wednesday last it bore, as described in our columns on the next day, merely “a little double scratch on the left side.” This injury was at once repaired, and on Saturday last we specifically referred to this picture as one in which “it would now require sharp eyes indeed to discover any remaining trace of mischief.” [Since then, Mr Pettie’s neighbouring work was attacked again]
‘The Academy and the Salon’, Walter Armstrong, The National Review, 28 June 1885:
On the present occasion, seven pictures by Mr J.R. Herbert, three by Mr. Eyre Crowe, three by Mr. Frith, three by Mr. Oakes, six by Mr. Cooker, three by Mr. Storey, three by Mr. Armitage, four by Mr. Goodall, and one by Mr. Hodgson, or thirty-three in all, occupy places on the line; and, of the whole thirty-three, hardly one would have the slightest chance of admission to any show where merit was the test. A few of them, such as Mr. Herbert’s seven, Mr. Eyre Crowe’s three, Mr. Storey’s three, and a monstrous thing by Mr. Armitage, are such fatuous absurdities that, were it not for the harm they do to the general cause of art, one would pass them by with a shrug of the shoulders and a thought of pity for the men who had seriously to find them places…
Eyre Crowe (1824-1910) 