International studio (25.1905)

Nyla.nd exhibited black-
and-white drawings—still-
life and illustrations for a
book. The still-life was
characterised by strongly-
marked form: by deep
blacks against the white of
the paper — strong in a
sense they were, but lacking
in life and vibration. The
best things were two draw-
ings of a still-life of
and one of the
portraits of ^4 the
most impulsive of the two
he exhibited.

The name of Gabriel
is rising. There Me
painters whose pictures
are more charming ; their
colour is, perhaps, louder
or more musical; even
story-telling pictures are as
always in fashion. The
beauty of Maris' paint-
ings is the beauty looked
for, worked for, by a host
of younger painters, as not
so long ago it was Israel's
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FURNITURE

DESIGNED BY MAX LAUGEK


views in the neighbourhood of Katwijk—houses,
parts of the dunes, with few figures. His colour
is flower-like, but it misses passion. All his
pictures are too much alike. How could it be
otherwise ? He has made too many of them in
the three or four years he has been painting.
Before being a painter he was a policeman; before
that a working man, it seems, in Rotterdam.
And these things are to many people in Holland
more interesting nowadays than the beauty of
works. People are told these things, and then
they begin to look at his art. And this is, of
course, wrong. Wassenaar has still to learn
everything. His bright colour has not yet any
deep feeling; his figures are lines and colours,
not yet living bodies. All this is less the fault of
the talented Wassenaar than his friends, who caused
him to do too many pictures in so few years. And
all his faults might be mitigated by smaller pro-
duction and more earnest
work : that he will ever be
a great painter I cannot
think.

dark colour. But we shall come to understand
Gabriel's way of looking and his way of feeling.
His art is characterised by quietness; by the
clearness of his skies; by quiet atmospheric
effects, not effects of rain, or snow, or violent storm.
In the beginning Gabriel was undoubtedly in-
fluenced by Koekkoek, of whom he was a pupil
for a short time, and by some of the great French
painters. Then his originality developed. Gabriel
is now talked about. He is not yet so well known
as he ought to be, but the rest will come. His
fame will increase because his works are simple
yet deep, sober yet not poor, without any desire
but for breadth, and yet full of fine detail.

The recent death of Theophile de Bock has been
followed by a series of exhibitions of his works at
The Hague and Amsterdam. These will be dealt
with next month. P.