Studio: international art (20.1900)

Studio- Talk

trade standard; but Miss Smith complains that
insufficient time was allowed her, so that she could
not avoid several defects due to haste. This
accounts for the somewhat cramped letters of the
inscription. Why do sporting clubs forget that
metal-workers cannot possibly do their best
when hurried ? There are times, no doubt, when
cups have to be ordered in a hurry, but those
which are needed for the Cowes Regatta, or for
any other annual meeting, could and should be
commissioned six or seven months in advance.

Mr. Whiting's model for a yachting trophy,
represents an Elizabethan ship sailing over a
globe supported by mermaids. There is room

STATUETTE BY F. DERWENT WOOD

46

for criticism here, if no figure in decorative
art should be made to bear such a pressure
from above as seems crushing in its force; but
Mr. Whiting is free to say that he has many
ancient and great precedents to keep him in
countenance, and he certainly exhibits both
thought and vim in the realisation of his motif.
His trophy could be made entirely of silver, or the
globe could be fashioned out of agate or some
other beautiful stone.

The two designs by Mr. David Veazey are the
result of a " Studio " competition. They are full of
good intention, and should encourage Mr. Veazey
to persevere. The use of leafed branches for the
stems of cups needs reconsideration, as stems
formed in this way would probably look brittle in
silver.

Mr. F. Derwent Wood, in his model for a
challenge cup, is influenced by a good old tradition
of German silver-smithing. The base would no
doubt be better were it less complicated, but the
body and the lid are strong in character, and
afford plenty of scope to any skilled metal-worker
who sets adequate store by plain surfaces and
vigorous; lines.

(To be continued.)

STUDIO-TALK.

{From our own Correspondents})

LONDON.—AtJ the beginning of May the
Fine Art Society opened an exhibition
of Sir John Tenniel's drawings for
Punch cartoons. This was the second
show of similar works that had been held in the
same galleries, and its 161 pencil drawings formed
an invaluable commentary on the course of
events in European politics since 1S95. The
last drawing in the collection had appeared in
Punch on April 1 r, 1900, so that students of
Tenniel's art had an excellent chance of comparing
its present-day characteristics with those of five
years ago, when the great humorist was already
seventy-five years old. Here and there the touch
was not so strong as it had been, but in the most
recent cartoons of all, and especially in those
relating to the Transvaal, there was a second
youthfulness of vigour that surprised and delighted
everybody. If Sir John Tenniel had been affected
by what Carlyle described as "the sick senti-
mentalism " of the age, or if he had departed in
any way from his unimpassioned desire to see
things truly as well as humorously, his Punch