Studio: international art (86.1923)

SOME RECENT WORK BY MR. P. A. DE LASZLO

“THE RUINS OF THEBES **
OIL PAINTING BY BER-
NARDO BELOTTO CANALETTO
(National Gallery, Vienna)

SOME RECENT WORK BY MR. P. A.
DE LASZLO. 0000

IT is some years since Mr. de Laszlo has
held a collected exhibition of his works
in London, so his recent show of portraits
and studies, at the French Gallery, had a
particular interest because it afforded an
opportunity for judging the nature and
extent of his development and the degree
of progress which latterly he has made in
his art. For this show he brought together
a very considerable series of canvases which
illustrated well the variety of his per-
formance and gave an adequate idea of the
character and quality of his achievement.
Mainly, the collection represented him as
a portrait painter and did full justice to his
reputation as a distinguished exponent of
this type of art; but it included also a
number of open-air studies, very attrac-
tively treated, in which he appeared under
a less familiar aspect. The exhibition, there-
fore, was something more than a record of
his successes in an accustomed field of
practice ; it suggested that there are other
directions in which he might, if he were
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so disposed, attain as great a measure of
distinction. 000a

With regard to his portraits there are
certain points which call for special
attention. In the past his work was always
notable for its sureness of draughtsmanship,
its expressive directness of brushwork, and
its vigour of characterisation; it was
singularly convincing in its confidence and
it had an unusual air of vitality. It was,
perhaps, more forcible than subtle, more
concerned with robust actualities than with
delicate refinements of suggestion, and its
strength was asserted rather than quietly
implied ; but that it possessed the qualities
which only a master craftsman could give
is not to be disputed. 000
In his later works, however, Mr. de
Laszlo proves that he has been able to
associate with these qualities of technical
accomplishment others which mark de-
finitely a development in his powers as an
artist. He has lost none of his certainty,
none of his sureness of hand or of his
executive vivacity, but he has added greatly
to his acuteness of vision and he has
become much more shrewd in his percep-