DOI Heft:
Nr. 219 (May, 1915)
DOI Artikel:Anna Airy's drawings of fruit, flowers, and foliage
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.43458#0280
Drawings by Anna Airy
“the split quince”
BY ANNA AIRY
attempt to preserve this relationship, though such
perfection as Miss Airy’s studies would then attain
might invite the anger of the envious gods and
draw down upon them some pitiless process of
destruction. The artist herself has in any case
her own views on the matter, with which many
with qualifications as critics will agree. She would
in every picture throw her drawing into relief
against the most carefully contrasted light back-
ground, her intention being to concentrate our
attention on a set of truths selected from others,
and the negative background is her only means of
isolating those particular truths, and the beauty
that is peculiar to them.
One has to know something of the mediums this
190
artist employs to appreciate to the full the measure
of her success in a method of work that is her own.
Few, indeed, are the artists, as is patent to visitors
to exhibitions and students of contemporary illus-
tration, who can employ undiluted black ink lines
over colour while keeping the colour pleasantly
glowing through them.
An artist has not such a conscience for truth to
nature as Miss Airy’s for nothing; not a line is
drawn by her except in the presence of nature.
The pen-work is done out of doors direct from the
“ model” branch as it grows on the tree, and the
colouring is done in the same circumstances. A
whole summer, with hours from six until sunset,
has been spent in an orchard by the artist.
“the split quince”
BY ANNA AIRY
attempt to preserve this relationship, though such
perfection as Miss Airy’s studies would then attain
might invite the anger of the envious gods and
draw down upon them some pitiless process of
destruction. The artist herself has in any case
her own views on the matter, with which many
with qualifications as critics will agree. She would
in every picture throw her drawing into relief
against the most carefully contrasted light back-
ground, her intention being to concentrate our
attention on a set of truths selected from others,
and the negative background is her only means of
isolating those particular truths, and the beauty
that is peculiar to them.
One has to know something of the mediums this
190
artist employs to appreciate to the full the measure
of her success in a method of work that is her own.
Few, indeed, are the artists, as is patent to visitors
to exhibitions and students of contemporary illus-
tration, who can employ undiluted black ink lines
over colour while keeping the colour pleasantly
glowing through them.
An artist has not such a conscience for truth to
nature as Miss Airy’s for nothing; not a line is
drawn by her except in the presence of nature.
The pen-work is done out of doors direct from the
“ model” branch as it grows on the tree, and the
colouring is done in the same circumstances. A
whole summer, with hours from six until sunset,
has been spent in an orchard by the artist.