DOI Artikel:
Manson, James Bolivar: Mr. Geoffrey Blackwell's collection of modern pictures
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.43455#0286
Mr. Geoffrey Blackwell's Collection of Modern Pict tires
MR. GEOFFREY BLACKWELL’S
COLLECTION OF MODERN
PICTURES. BY J. B. MANSON.
The collector of works of contemporary art is
unusual enough to be a study of interest in him-
self. Art, that is to say, which is the painter’s
personal expression, born of his emotion, and not
the organised production of pictures by popular
painters with which most of our art institutions are
associated. To have the courage of one’s con-
victions is but one degree more remarkable than,
in these days, to have convictions at all; but it is
surely the salient characteristic of the kind of
collector we have in mind. It may prove a force
leading to dubious investment from the vulgar
point of view, but it has, anyhow, recurring
moments of ample recompense and occasionally,
as in the case of Durand-Ruel and the French
Impressionists, a quite solidly substantial reward.
It is only some five years since Mr. Geoffrey
Blackwell took the first step on the path which
leads to distinction. His preliminary tentative
movement was on familiar ground, though even
then of a higher kind
than usual, eluding the
mediocre. It resulted at
the outset in the acquisition
of a Stark and a Vicat
Cole from the Cuthbertson
collection. He was then
regarding pictures from the
familiar point of view
merely as things painted ;
as an exercise, that is, of
the craft of painting with¬
out regard to the degree
of truth, or intimacy of
feeling which might be ex¬
pressed in them; or to
the particular harmonious
felicity of manner in which
might be conveyed a con¬
ception of life as to make
it more definitely communi¬
cable. But his first de¬
cidedly personal step was
immediately to follow
this. And it was the
courage of it as well as
the frank openness of
mind, unmoulded in con-
vention, which was chiefly
remarkable.
A critique of Mr. Wilson Steer’s exhibition at
the Goupil Gallery in 1909 aroused Mr. Blackwell’s
curiosity. He went. He responded to the call of
nature, as expressed in the pictures. He felt in
them an intenser quality of light and air than he
had previously experienced in any of the ordinary
paintings which are commonly to be met with in
the social world, decorating the drawing-rooms
of Mayfair with their empty triviality. He ac-
quired two of the pictures, and henceforth he was
launched on a troublous sea, the mere charting
and navigation of which were a joy not unmingled
with difficulties. He relied, as the genuine col-
lector in such a case must rely, on his own feelings.
Being on the threshold of a larger tuition he
wisely contented himself with advancing for awhile
on the course he had already chosen, with the
result that the Blackwell collection now contains
a remarkable number of the finer paintings of
Mr. Wilson Steer.
A collection of contemporary art is, according
to the degree of catholicity of the collector, an
epitome in some measure of the art of the time;
or, it is more specially a presentation of the work
PORTRAIT OF GEOFFREY BLACKWELL, ESQ. OIL PAINTING BY GLYN PHILPOT
MR. GEOFFREY BLACKWELL’S
COLLECTION OF MODERN
PICTURES. BY J. B. MANSON.
The collector of works of contemporary art is
unusual enough to be a study of interest in him-
self. Art, that is to say, which is the painter’s
personal expression, born of his emotion, and not
the organised production of pictures by popular
painters with which most of our art institutions are
associated. To have the courage of one’s con-
victions is but one degree more remarkable than,
in these days, to have convictions at all; but it is
surely the salient characteristic of the kind of
collector we have in mind. It may prove a force
leading to dubious investment from the vulgar
point of view, but it has, anyhow, recurring
moments of ample recompense and occasionally,
as in the case of Durand-Ruel and the French
Impressionists, a quite solidly substantial reward.
It is only some five years since Mr. Geoffrey
Blackwell took the first step on the path which
leads to distinction. His preliminary tentative
movement was on familiar ground, though even
then of a higher kind
than usual, eluding the
mediocre. It resulted at
the outset in the acquisition
of a Stark and a Vicat
Cole from the Cuthbertson
collection. He was then
regarding pictures from the
familiar point of view
merely as things painted ;
as an exercise, that is, of
the craft of painting with¬
out regard to the degree
of truth, or intimacy of
feeling which might be ex¬
pressed in them; or to
the particular harmonious
felicity of manner in which
might be conveyed a con¬
ception of life as to make
it more definitely communi¬
cable. But his first de¬
cidedly personal step was
immediately to follow
this. And it was the
courage of it as well as
the frank openness of
mind, unmoulded in con-
vention, which was chiefly
remarkable.
A critique of Mr. Wilson Steer’s exhibition at
the Goupil Gallery in 1909 aroused Mr. Blackwell’s
curiosity. He went. He responded to the call of
nature, as expressed in the pictures. He felt in
them an intenser quality of light and air than he
had previously experienced in any of the ordinary
paintings which are commonly to be met with in
the social world, decorating the drawing-rooms
of Mayfair with their empty triviality. He ac-
quired two of the pictures, and henceforth he was
launched on a troublous sea, the mere charting
and navigation of which were a joy not unmingled
with difficulties. He relied, as the genuine col-
lector in such a case must rely, on his own feelings.
Being on the threshold of a larger tuition he
wisely contented himself with advancing for awhile
on the course he had already chosen, with the
result that the Blackwell collection now contains
a remarkable number of the finer paintings of
Mr. Wilson Steer.
A collection of contemporary art is, according
to the degree of catholicity of the collector, an
epitome in some measure of the art of the time;
or, it is more specially a presentation of the work
PORTRAIT OF GEOFFREY BLACKWELL, ESQ. OIL PAINTING BY GLYN PHILPOT