But his
greatest and best teacher was the quiet Norfolk country; and the
environs of Norwich, from which he seldom strayed, found in him an
earnest student.
[Illustration: GEORGE ROMNEY, PAINTER OF "THE PARSON'S DAUGHTER,"
SHOWN ON PAGE 257. FROM A MEDALLION BY THOMAS HALEY.]
In 1805, in conjunction with his son (the younger Crome) and Cotman,
Stark, and Vincent, Crome founded at Norwich an artists' club, where
the members exhibited their pictures and had a large studio in common.
Some of the members of the Norwich "school," a title to which none of
them in their own time pretended, left their native town, and went to
London; but its founder remained true to the city of his birth, where
he died April 22, 1821. Late in life he visited Paris, where the
Louvre still held the treasures of Europe, garnered after every
campaign by Napoleon; and his enthusiasm for the great Dutch painters
found fresh nourishment.
It is by this link in the great chain of art that Crome gained his
first consideration in the world's esteem; but more important to us of
to-day is the fact that he was the first of his century to return to
nature.
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