DOI article:
Wood, T. Martin: The paintings of Wilfrid G. von Glehn
DOI Page / Citation link: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.43450#0022
II7. G. von Glehn
ancient aim of art. The aim to-day has been to
show that real things are beautiful.
Mr. von Glehn, in practising one of the methods
that can do most in the way of suggesting sunlight
in paint, strikes a rather light-hearted note in his
pictures instead of the note of concealed depres-
sion which is the characteristic of the laughter
and music in a Watteau painting. Eighteenth-
century people, trying to keep their illusions, feared
everything ; twentieth-century people, having parted
with all theirs, fear nothing. Eighteenth-century
people seeking happiness found a revolution, twen-
tieth-century people giving up the search are found
by happiness. The sunlight then in Mr. von
Glehn’s pictures is of the spirit as well as of the
problem of them.
The artist’s first tendencies owe much probably
to his long apprenticeship in Paris. That patently
easy way of painting which a long period of study
are one thing and titles another, until they come
together in an exhibition. But that it should seem
so points to absence of sense in modern pictures.
The first thing a picture has to tell us, if it has
anything to tell us at all, is its title.
The picture Neiv England is very characteristic
of the quality of Mr. von Glehn’s colour, and of the
whole aspect of that side of his work of which it is
so fine a specimen. The characteristic of his colour-
schemes in this class of work is a suggestion of the
vibration of sunny atmosphere. As was indicated
at the beginning of this article, the technique he
employs was brought into practice by the desire of
modern artists to secure the note of Nature’s rest-
lessness, the general sense of life everywhere; the
desire to give in a picture the sense of movement
not only of a figure, but of leaves stirring and
whispering, the sun going in and the sun coming out.
And reverting to what was said at the outset of
there seems able to produce
is of especial service to a
portrait-painter. It has been
thought to quench originality.
But what is the “ original ”
note in an exhibition to-day ?
Surely the well-executed
picture ! This might so well
be called an age of amateurs,
that we sometimes find it
more refreshing than anything
else to encounter certainty of
touch.
Residence in England has
since restored to Mr. von
Glehn’s art its English flavour.
Not the surroundings in
which he learns, but those in
which he lives give the
character to a painter’s ex-
pression, the key to the artistic
nature being always an in-
tense responsiveness to sur-
roundings. What, now, could
be happier, as an exposition
of such response, than the
picture of New England, re-
produced in colour with these
pages ? Surely it is a genuine
souvenir of a visit to the
States! We shall be told
that this rests with its title.
But how few pictures take so
well their titles ! It is true
that for the most part pictures
PORTRAIT OF MISS GLADYS STEWART RICHARDSON
BY W. G. VOX GLEHN
ancient aim of art. The aim to-day has been to
show that real things are beautiful.
Mr. von Glehn, in practising one of the methods
that can do most in the way of suggesting sunlight
in paint, strikes a rather light-hearted note in his
pictures instead of the note of concealed depres-
sion which is the characteristic of the laughter
and music in a Watteau painting. Eighteenth-
century people, trying to keep their illusions, feared
everything ; twentieth-century people, having parted
with all theirs, fear nothing. Eighteenth-century
people seeking happiness found a revolution, twen-
tieth-century people giving up the search are found
by happiness. The sunlight then in Mr. von
Glehn’s pictures is of the spirit as well as of the
problem of them.
The artist’s first tendencies owe much probably
to his long apprenticeship in Paris. That patently
easy way of painting which a long period of study
are one thing and titles another, until they come
together in an exhibition. But that it should seem
so points to absence of sense in modern pictures.
The first thing a picture has to tell us, if it has
anything to tell us at all, is its title.
The picture Neiv England is very characteristic
of the quality of Mr. von Glehn’s colour, and of the
whole aspect of that side of his work of which it is
so fine a specimen. The characteristic of his colour-
schemes in this class of work is a suggestion of the
vibration of sunny atmosphere. As was indicated
at the beginning of this article, the technique he
employs was brought into practice by the desire of
modern artists to secure the note of Nature’s rest-
lessness, the general sense of life everywhere; the
desire to give in a picture the sense of movement
not only of a figure, but of leaves stirring and
whispering, the sun going in and the sun coming out.
And reverting to what was said at the outset of
there seems able to produce
is of especial service to a
portrait-painter. It has been
thought to quench originality.
But what is the “ original ”
note in an exhibition to-day ?
Surely the well-executed
picture ! This might so well
be called an age of amateurs,
that we sometimes find it
more refreshing than anything
else to encounter certainty of
touch.
Residence in England has
since restored to Mr. von
Glehn’s art its English flavour.
Not the surroundings in
which he learns, but those in
which he lives give the
character to a painter’s ex-
pression, the key to the artistic
nature being always an in-
tense responsiveness to sur-
roundings. What, now, could
be happier, as an exposition
of such response, than the
picture of New England, re-
produced in colour with these
pages ? Surely it is a genuine
souvenir of a visit to the
States! We shall be told
that this rests with its title.
But how few pictures take so
well their titles ! It is true
that for the most part pictures
PORTRAIT OF MISS GLADYS STEWART RICHARDSON
BY W. G. VOX GLEHN