International studio (53.1914)

John Lavery, R.S.A., A.R.A.

which some critics consider Mr. Lavery’s greatest
achievement. His landscapes, like his sitters,
bring their own message and Lavery gives the
answer on the spot. His power of grasping a
passing mood of nature is little short of astounding.
In his Skating, where the first breath of the
coming snow wraps a delicate envelope of grey
white on the landscape, he not only captures
the moment and gives it its true values, but he is able
to translate the change in the values of snow, ice and
hillside in the terms of the metamorphosis. All this
is placed on the canvas without hesitation and with
a knowledge of the capacities of paint, which in Mr.
Lavery’s case never fails. Like all artists he is
selective, but not in the sense of avoiding an essential
which presents an intricate problem. Carrying his
own artistic distance with him, the problems of
perspective present no
dilemma. Nature may
weave a tangled web—but
he is quick to unravel it.
And in blending figure
studies into landscape he
homologates his distin¬
guished powers, and pro¬
duces such a thing of
charm as Japanese Switzer¬
land, one of the most
poetically conceived things
that modern art has pro¬
duced.
Of other aspects of the
painter’s genius we may
make a passing note of his
effective interiors such as
The Grey Drawing-Room
and The Greyhound. Apart
from all other qualities
fit for our admiration the
great Royal group brings
out the painter’s greatness
as an interior painter. Note
the subtle blending of
colour in the atmosphere,
the full grasp of the per¬
spective values, the un¬
erring chiaroscuro. The
same is seen in his great
studio group now on exhi-
b i t i o n at the Royal
Academy, which only the
ineffectiveness of Burling¬
ton House to display to
advantage such a large “lady diana’manners

canvas prevents the “ rough ” observer from ade-
quately appreciating.
Mr. Lavery’s output has been As o generous that
this summary of his achievement may seem
inadequate and cursory. It cannot profess to be
anything else. One would like to dwell on well-
remembered canvases, such as his study in the
nude from Mr. Robert Strathern’s collection and
called Ariadne, a delicately treated study of a
female facing the waves on a wind-swept shore.
Primarily a painter of women, one cannot forget
some of his male portraits, of which Mr. P. J.
Ford as a Royal Archer is a notable example, while
quite recently he has given us his friend and
admirer, Auguste Rodin; but of all his portraits of
men none can compare with his superb R. B.
Cunninghame Graham, which is one of the

(IQIJ) BY JOHN LAVERY, R.S.A., A.R.A.*

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