DOI Heft:
Nr. 158 (April 1910)
DOI Artikel:Baldry, Alfred Lys: The art of Mr. Albert Goodwin, R.W.S.
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19866#0139
Albert Goodwin, R.W.S.
knows it would not be wise for him to stray. capable of receiving fully the stamp of his person-
Within these boundaries there is ample room for ality and of conveying a clear impression of some
the full growth of all that is best in his art; they one of nature's moods; it must have adaptability
do not cramp him, they do not shut him off from and be susceptible of a considerable degree of
anything that he needs for the proper evolution of imaginative treatment.
his artistic intention ; all that they do is to guard Indeed, in all Mr. Goodwin's paintings the sub-
him from that purposeless wandering to and fro ject, as it is popularly understood, is of compara-
which so many artists mistake for freedom and ttve unimportance; it is the way in which he deals
which leads them often into utter waste of their with it that counts. His real motive may be an
powers. effect of quiet sunlight or of misty half-veiled
Mr. Goodwin's art, however, restrained as it is in illumination, it may be a grey dawn or a stormy
manner and controlled as it is by wholesome and sunset, or again it may be the working out of a
well-balanced sentiment, is markedly free from decorative pattern of lines and masses which has
mere conventionality. He is a painter with an been suggested to him by something he has seen ;
unusual breadth of view and with an exceptional it is always something beyond the mere arranging
willingness to handle any sort of material that of plain facts that he is striving after—some touch
nature may offer him if it will afford him sufficient of poetry, romance, or drama, some quality of
chances of gratifying his desire for a particular decoration or some manifestation of his aesthetic
kind of achievement. That he prefers one class perception of nature's meaning. The subject is
of subject to another, or that he wishes to sped- only a framework which he fills up and overlays;
alise in any one aspect of nature, no one who it is the premise upon which he builds the argu-
knows his work would ever feel inclined to suggest; ment that leads him to his artistic conclusion,
he is, on the contrary, extraordinarily catholic in The way in which he uses a subject is particu-
his selection and surprisingly impartial in his judg- larly well shown in the three examples of his work
ment of pictorial motives. But the material must be which are reproduced here in colour—and it is
"the tower of london" (water-colour) bv albert goodwin, r.w.s.
(By permission of the Fine Art Society)
90
knows it would not be wise for him to stray. capable of receiving fully the stamp of his person-
Within these boundaries there is ample room for ality and of conveying a clear impression of some
the full growth of all that is best in his art; they one of nature's moods; it must have adaptability
do not cramp him, they do not shut him off from and be susceptible of a considerable degree of
anything that he needs for the proper evolution of imaginative treatment.
his artistic intention ; all that they do is to guard Indeed, in all Mr. Goodwin's paintings the sub-
him from that purposeless wandering to and fro ject, as it is popularly understood, is of compara-
which so many artists mistake for freedom and ttve unimportance; it is the way in which he deals
which leads them often into utter waste of their with it that counts. His real motive may be an
powers. effect of quiet sunlight or of misty half-veiled
Mr. Goodwin's art, however, restrained as it is in illumination, it may be a grey dawn or a stormy
manner and controlled as it is by wholesome and sunset, or again it may be the working out of a
well-balanced sentiment, is markedly free from decorative pattern of lines and masses which has
mere conventionality. He is a painter with an been suggested to him by something he has seen ;
unusual breadth of view and with an exceptional it is always something beyond the mere arranging
willingness to handle any sort of material that of plain facts that he is striving after—some touch
nature may offer him if it will afford him sufficient of poetry, romance, or drama, some quality of
chances of gratifying his desire for a particular decoration or some manifestation of his aesthetic
kind of achievement. That he prefers one class perception of nature's meaning. The subject is
of subject to another, or that he wishes to sped- only a framework which he fills up and overlays;
alise in any one aspect of nature, no one who it is the premise upon which he builds the argu-
knows his work would ever feel inclined to suggest; ment that leads him to his artistic conclusion,
he is, on the contrary, extraordinarily catholic in The way in which he uses a subject is particu-
his selection and surprisingly impartial in his judg- larly well shown in the three examples of his work
ment of pictorial motives. But the material must be which are reproduced here in colour—and it is
"the tower of london" (water-colour) bv albert goodwin, r.w.s.
(By permission of the Fine Art Society)
90