International studio (58.1916)

Water-Colours by E. M. Synge

WATER-COLOUR DRAW¬
INGS BY THE LATE
E. M. SYNGE, A.R.E.
The name of Edward Millington Synge is
associated with etchings chiefly of France, Italy,
and Spain. But he was also a water-colourist of rare
charm. Endowed with poetic vision and sentiment,
he chose his subjects from commonplace surround-
ings without ever yielding to the temptation of the
obvious and the picturesque : no small achievement
for a man who was practically self-taught, and
forced by ill-health to work a great deal abroad,
where the picturesque is rampant and insistent.
To this poetic vision was joined a subtle sense for
style and colour harmonies, combined with richness
and depth of tone. What could be more satisfy-
ing than the scheme of The Gateway, Tourettes,
reproduced here ? How rich and deep, yet lumi-
nous, the shadow colour around and under the
archway ! How inevitable seems the juxtaposition

of the two greens and the blue in the woman’s
dress ! It looks so easy to paint like that, but one
has only to consider whether a novice would have
got just that harmonious shade of green shutter,
or have placed his figures with the same feeling
for balance, to appreciate the world of difference
that lies between what is and what is not a work
of art.
The subtle gradation of shadows, so important
a feature of the etcher’s craft, is very noticeable
in Synge’s painting, especially in the La Gaud
drawing. The beautiful tone and quality of the
shadows on the near wall and inside the courtyard
are repeated in a different key in the mauve,
greys, and blues of the figures, and enhanced by
the pure colour in foliage and sky. It reminds
one of his wonderful treatment of shadow in his
etching The Gate of Justice, Granada. Or take
again the clever little sketch On the Zattere, Venice.
Its keynote is a patch of blue water surrounded
by mauve sky, black boats, and pale yellow quay,


BY E. M. SYNGE

“THE BRIDGE, VILLENEUVE-LOUBET, PROVENCE ’’
LVIII. No. 231.—May 1916

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