International studio (20.1903)

fnr^HEWORK OF ALBERT PAUL
] BESNARD. BY MRS. FRANCES
1 KEYZER.
A FRENCHMAN every inch of him, and essentialiy
French as an artist is M. Albert Paul Besnard,
although the English influence during his two
years' sojourn in the land of Turner and Rossetti
has left its mark upon his work, and this influence
is especially noticeable in his marine pieces and his
studies of Algerian life. It is interesting to know
something of the man who has succeeded in im-
pressing us with the charm of his colouring, with
those delightful pastels that recall a glorious sunset
with the eyes of a woman gleaming through the
purples and gold, the mauves, and the luminous
pinks; and it was with something that savoured
of a sensation that I approached M. Besnard,
expectant of a strong personality, of an originality
that would explain this wonderful conception of
colour so brilliantly transmitted to his canvases.
I found a largely-built man with a pleasant, good-
humoured expression, a man of some fifty years
of age. A husband and a father—a family man
in every sense of the term—living at his ease in a
" hotel" constructed after his own plans, with

commodious studios and unpretentious sitting-
rooms. A man with a pronounced taste for sport,
outwardly translated in checks of huge dimensions
in place of the traditional velvet; to be met on
days with the reins between his talented
fingers, with his wife beside him and children in
the rumble overweighting a light cart, smiling
his content at the good things it has pleased
Providence to send him.
I also found originality, but not where I expected
it. To quote his own words : " I paint while I
sing canons and fugues." Need it be said that
M. Besnard is no musician ? He has the power
of hearing without noticing sound; a fact that
is singular. This he explained by saying that he
does not listen, and is, therefore, no more affected
by music than by any other noise. From an
artistic point of view it seems extraordinary that a
man who paints with such brilliant arrangement
of colour, with the softly-blended tones that are
so admirable in his work, should be devoid of the
sense of music; that the Mass in D, Fidelio,
Orpheus, the weird passion of Chopin, should be
a dead language to him ! A man's eye may be
more developed than his ear, but to be deaf
to the symphony of sound is a loss that appears


"PONIES WORRIED BY FLIES"
XX. No. 78.—AUGUST, 1903.

BY ALBERT PAUL BESNARD