DOI Heft:
No. 256 (August 1914)
DOI Artikel:Salaman, Malcolm C.: The etchings of E. S. Lumsden, A.R.E.
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21210#0205
The Etchings of E. S. Lnmsden, A.R.E.
HE ETCHINGS OF E. S. LUMS-
DEN, A.R.E. BY MALCOLM C.
SALAMAN.
In the last exhibition of the Royal Society of
Painter-Etchers my eye was happily arrested by a
couple of etchings which appealed with a refresh-
ing sense of originality in vision and treatment.
Here were pictorial impressions rendered with
delicate selective vision, and magic of etcher's art
and printer's craft, that held the eye as they
brought to the responsive imagination the very
sense of the Far East. Jeypore—livening, and
Benares, No. j, these prints were called, and
further along on the same wall were hanging two
others, feyport—Morning, and Udeyporc—Morning,
by the same artist, Mr. E. S. Lumsden. No other
prints that I can recall had ever brought India close
to me as these four etchings did. Here was not
merely the "informing expression of passing light,''
such as makes a classic of a Rembrandt or Legros
landscape, but the artist had seen his pictorial
subject saturated typically with tropical sunlight
and an air of languorous heat, so that his needle
touched the very spirit and essence of the scene to
life in his lines. With a very subtle feeling for
tone, too, he had aided the atmospheric sugges-
tiveness of his etching by printing his plates with
ink of warmer tone than usual, mixing doubtless
a larger proportion of Burnt Umber with his
Frankfort Black, and wiping the copper with
remarkable sensitiveness and craft of hand. So the
sunlight seems here more truly tropical, and one
feels the actual heat making heavier the air over
the Ganges, as one looks across the Holy River at
the " Sacred City " of Benares, or where in the hazy
morning light the natives of Udeypore or of
Jeypore are going stolidly about their business.
Again I saw these Indian etchings, with many
more, in a representative exhibition of Mr.
Eumsden's etched work recently held at Messrs.
DowdeswelPs gallery, his etched work, that is to
say, done prior to his latest visit to India. Here
one was able to note the development of his art
and technique, with his growing independence in
expression, since he did his impressive Paris in
Construction set in 1907, etchings which, with fine
precision of draughtsmanship and etching quality,
tub indian reserve, victoria, british columbia" by e. s. lumsden, a.u.k.
(Reproduced with the other etchings by permission 0/Messrs. Dowdeswell and Dowdeswells Ltd.)
l8S
HE ETCHINGS OF E. S. LUMS-
DEN, A.R.E. BY MALCOLM C.
SALAMAN.
In the last exhibition of the Royal Society of
Painter-Etchers my eye was happily arrested by a
couple of etchings which appealed with a refresh-
ing sense of originality in vision and treatment.
Here were pictorial impressions rendered with
delicate selective vision, and magic of etcher's art
and printer's craft, that held the eye as they
brought to the responsive imagination the very
sense of the Far East. Jeypore—livening, and
Benares, No. j, these prints were called, and
further along on the same wall were hanging two
others, feyport—Morning, and Udeyporc—Morning,
by the same artist, Mr. E. S. Lumsden. No other
prints that I can recall had ever brought India close
to me as these four etchings did. Here was not
merely the "informing expression of passing light,''
such as makes a classic of a Rembrandt or Legros
landscape, but the artist had seen his pictorial
subject saturated typically with tropical sunlight
and an air of languorous heat, so that his needle
touched the very spirit and essence of the scene to
life in his lines. With a very subtle feeling for
tone, too, he had aided the atmospheric sugges-
tiveness of his etching by printing his plates with
ink of warmer tone than usual, mixing doubtless
a larger proportion of Burnt Umber with his
Frankfort Black, and wiping the copper with
remarkable sensitiveness and craft of hand. So the
sunlight seems here more truly tropical, and one
feels the actual heat making heavier the air over
the Ganges, as one looks across the Holy River at
the " Sacred City " of Benares, or where in the hazy
morning light the natives of Udeypore or of
Jeypore are going stolidly about their business.
Again I saw these Indian etchings, with many
more, in a representative exhibition of Mr.
Eumsden's etched work recently held at Messrs.
DowdeswelPs gallery, his etched work, that is to
say, done prior to his latest visit to India. Here
one was able to note the development of his art
and technique, with his growing independence in
expression, since he did his impressive Paris in
Construction set in 1907, etchings which, with fine
precision of draughtsmanship and etching quality,
tub indian reserve, victoria, british columbia" by e. s. lumsden, a.u.k.
(Reproduced with the other etchings by permission 0/Messrs. Dowdeswell and Dowdeswells Ltd.)
l8S