Studio: international art (2.1894)

The Society of Scottish Artists' Exhibition

deeper purple, but otherwise the same qualities
aru apparent. Mr. Sainton prefers to use a white
ground, but examples of tinted grounds are not
infrequent in older work, which are not without
charm, but on the whole one is glad that the
artist has obeyed the broader convention of black
and white, which, after all (if we take black to in-
clude the various shades from sepia to lamp-black,
or to grey), has an overwhelming array of precedents
in its favour. A limited number of portfolios of
fifteen drawings in facsimile will be shortly issued
at ten guineas each.

HE SOCIETY OF SCOTTISH
ARTISTS' EXHIBITION. BY
DAVID MARTIN.

The second annual exhibition of

this the newest of our Art Societies, at present on
view in the National Galleries, Edinburgh, cannot,
artistically considered, be said to bear out the
promise or rival the success of its first display given
by the Society last year. In the present exhibition
there is excellent work, no doubt, by some of the
younger men, and many notable pictures have been
lent, but the general average is lost by too many
mediocre pictures. The hanging, especially of the
loan pictures, is far from good, as neither harmonies
nor colour sympathies seem to have been studied.
That a little good will leaven a show is bad policy for
an exhibition, and the selecting committee might
easily have used more strenuously one of the best
rules the Society has—viz., that all works, whether
by members or outsiders, are subject to approval or
rejection. It is surely better to have the general
average high, even if the exhibits be few, than have
a few gems with a crowd of pictures two-thirds of
which hardly rise above the dull level of the
commonplace.

With another year, however, and the Society
stronger, as it annually is becoming, one may look
for the exhibitions under its auspices being away
from the ordinary rut and accomplishing correctly
the laudable aim of the Society, " to stimulate the
younger artists to produce more original and im-
portant works."

The exhibits number more than 500 works in
oil, water-colour, sculpture, and black and white.
The most important are paintings by Corot,
Daubigny, J. Maris, Monticelli, Rousseau, Mauve,
Duran, Constable, Cox, Paul Chalmers, Pettie,
Albert Moore. There are three portraits by Sir
John Millais, but only one, Mrs. Louise Jopling,
is the least creditable to the artist. Of J. F.
Millet, there are four characteristic chalk-drawings
that are superb, and a fine Matthew Maris. When
one has gone carefully through these there is not
much inclination to linger before the ordinary con-
tributions, excepting a few to which I would briefly
draw attention. One of the finest pictures in the
exhibition, not excepting the loan pictures, is Mr.
James Guthrie's portrait of a young lady seated on
a couch. It is most painter-like and ranks with
the best he has done : beautiful in colour scheme,

design, and spontaneity of treatment. Another
distinguished work in portraiture is Mr. John
Lavery's Portrait Group—a full-length of a lady
and child—charming in the natural pose and dis-
playing a refined colour scheme of grey, blue and
white. Also in portraiture there is much that is
excellent and of pure artistic quality in the exhibits
of Messrs. W. J. Yule, D. Y. Cameron, Austen
Brown, Robert Brough, and A. G. Sinclair. Mr.
Hugh Cameron's Portrait of Mrs. Cottier is so
reticent, the fine quality of the work is apt to be
overlooked. Mr. Thorburn Ross exhibits a
number of capital little pictures ; the one titled A
Turkish Bath is the best, but in his large subject-
picture the colour and composition, though daring
and free, are very unpleasant, and bordering on
crudity. At the Ferry, by Mr. Robert Noble, is a
pleasing and effective picture, though the same
artist's Reflections is preferable, being more vital.
In Evening, Mr. Grosvenor Thomas shows vigorous
artistic work and good colour. It has a true
poetic feeling. The picture should have been
better hung. Mr. Robert Macgregor's Building
Stacks—Sussex, is a pleasing bit of landscape of
good colour, and the same may correctly be said
of Mr. Mason Hunter's Morning in the Glen.
Mr. Joseph Farquharson's Eastern subjects are in-
teresting. For work that is notable both on
account of good painting and colour, Mr. Pirie's
Outpost, Miss M. Govan's Primroses, and Miss
Preston Macgoun's Burdens, deserve attention.

In the water-colours exhibited there are few of
outstanding merit, except the loan drawings and
Mr. R. B. Nisbet's Breezy Landscape, and Mr.
Macaulay Stevenson's Moonrise. The sculpture
includes contributions from Messrs. Onslow Ford,
Frampton, Macgillivray, and Rengel d'lllzach.

In connection with their pictures at the Munich
Exhibition—Returning before the Storm, by Mr. J.
Denovan Adam, R.S.A., and A Pastoral, by Mr.
R. M. Stevenson—they have received first, and
second-class gold medals respectively.

The Dundee Art Institute Committee have
decided not to hold an exhibition this year. The
prospects of success financially are so remote that
the step is a wise one.

Mr. Joseph Henderson has completed the por-
trait and replica of ex-Lord Provost, Sir John Muir,
commissioned by the Corporation of Glasgow.
The picture is a success both in portraiture and
artistic work.

A series of Art Lectures will be given this
season in Glasgow, under the auspices of the Town
Council and the Glasgow School of Art. In
previous times these lectures dealt principally with
artists and pictures. This season they will deal
more with the Arts and Crafts.

Art circles in Scotland, more especially in Edin-
burgh, have had quite an unusual excitement by
the resignation of the Presidentship of the Royal
Scottish Academy by Sir George Reid. The exact
reasons for the resignation have not been made
public, but it is understood that Sir George is not
satisfied with the workings of the new charter.

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