International studio (34.1908)

Reviews and Notices


TILES BY K. ELEOD
(Burslem School of Art)

in the primary schools, and which will make
their teaching the more effective and the
more suited to the advanced instruction that
the student will subsequently receive.
Then as to the training of the ceramic
artist, the'provision for the teaching of design,
particularly as applied to pottery, is very
complete. The importance of the study of
plant, bird, and animal forms to the pottery
student has been fully recognised and pro-
vided for, whilst the necessity for practical
work has been equally realised, a pottery
decorating room, equipped with a gas oven
for the firing of trials and ware, and fitted
with other necessary apparatus, having been
provided. Modern commercial conditions,
generally speaking, confine the ceramic
worker to one branch of craftsmanship, but
by means of the tuition which the school
now gives, he will be able to extend his
knowledge beyond the limits of his own
particular occupation. Moreover, the tech-
nical knowledge which the student will thus
gain will make him a much more com-
petent designer, for the designer is only
successful in so far as he understands and
accepts the limitations, as well as the capa-
bilities, of the medium under consideration.
The study and practice of design must
necessarily go hand-in-hand, and for that
reason students are regularly encouraged to
execute their designs in the material for
which they are intended; indeed, the pro-

cesses of designing and executing are, in some cases,
so closely allied as to become inseparable.

Artistic education, such as is being provided at
Burslem, should certainly have a tendency to improve
the character of the ceramic products of the district,
and that there is need for such improvement—par-
ticularly from the aesthetic point of view—few will
deny. Several designs by students of the school are
here illustrated. E. N. S.

REVIEWS AND NOTICES.
Rembrandt: A Study of his Life and Work. By
G. Baldwin Brown, M.A. (London: Duckworth &
Co.) 7s. 6d. net.—For a book which exactly fills its
purpose, it would be difficult to supplant this one.
Professor Brown has ana-
lysed Rembrandt in it with
sympathy, with a light hand
touching those qualities of
his art which identify it with
modern feeling. The book
says all that can be said
about Rembrandt to the
student who is not prepared
to seek at its source the
meanings and the qualities
of an art that has always
been very eloquent to those
who are in sympathy. Rem-
brandt’s sense of beauty can-
not be underrated, since
the character of any line in
the simplest of his etchings,
no matter how unlovely the
subject, is one of beauty.
The Professor slights in one
part of his book this ever-
pervading sense of beauty
which held all ugly things in
its mesh. With this excep-
tion we have nothing but
praise for a work which ex-
plains this great art and its
side issues, such as the prin-
ciples of impressionism, so
simply that that clearness
about things which reigns in
the author’s own mind is
communicated to the reader.
by Alfred piper 1 he book is dignified and m-
(Burslem School of Art) teresting in appearance with
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