Studio: international art (6.1896)

The Work of Edward Stott

to indicate briefly what he was called upon to go small yearly allowance, to be supplemented from
through before he could vindicate himself. Born other sources, in order that he might study in
at Rochdale, the birthplace of John Bright, Mr. Paris. The supplementary aid failed him, but Stott,
Stott was the son of a wealthy merchant of that loyal to himself and confident of his ultimate
town, the representative of one of its oldest and best success, made his way to the Mecca of the art-
respected firms. When he was still a boy, how- world. There he maintained himself on an income
ever, that terrible crisis in the cotton trade which which most of the young men sent to Paris by
brought ruin upon Lancashire, involved Edward indulgent parents to be manufactured into artists,
Stott's father in the general catastrophe. The son would consider inadequate to meet their yearly
had already displayed no little artistic aptitude; but scores for cafe noir, cognac and cigars. At Paris,
despite this fact and the encouragement of friends Stott worked at the Beaux Arts, and under Carolus
—Mrs. J. E. Taylor being among his early patrons Duran and Cabanel. For Cabanel he had the
—it was not unnatural that Mr. Stott, senior, in his highest regard. "He was," he says, "a charming

old man, sympathetic and patient. He always
tried to guide the student, instead of endeavour-
ing to mould him. He discovered where the
strength and aptitude of the particular pupil
lay, and administered a stimulant. I consider
him an ideal master; he was academic, of
course, but he had a fine sensitive taste, and
a more liberal-minded man could not be."
At Cabanel's Stott was associated with some
strong men—men who have since made names
for themselves. Among these were Bastien
Lepage, Collin, Benjamin Constant, Henri
Regnault, Chatrain, Solomon J. Solomon, and
Herbert Dalziel. In the monthly Concours de
Place he did very well, and in his second year
he gained the second recompense. , During this
time, too, he sold two studies to the New
York Art League, and a few months after this
he had an offer to go to St. Louis to found an
art school on the Parisian system. But the
young painter was no more tempted by this
somewhat flattering suggestion than he would
have been had he had the refusal of a lucrative
post in a dry-goods store. Between the arid
academic work of instructing dullards in the
ABC of art, and painting pictures which have

BOY FISHING FROM A PENCIL SKETCH BY EDWARD STOTT ...

their birth in the imagination—pictures in-
spired by emotion and ballasted by knowledge

altered circumstances, and bearing in mind the —there is as much difference as there is between

extremely precarious nature of an artist's life, op- a Mozart and the musical instructor at a ladies'

posed his son's desire to become a painter. But seminary. Stott knew what he wanted (to do—

the young man was not to be daunted by opposition. what he meant to do—or perish in the attempt :

He had done much at school, and more at the and through good report and evil report he has

night classes at Manchester, to educate himself in remained true to his first love,

the rudiments of art-knowledge, and it was his It is true that before Edward Stott was six

practice to rise early on Sundays and spend the months older he had occasion more than once to

whole day in the fields, sketching and studying, take himself severely to task on the score of his

He made, too, the most of his holidays, working refusal to sell his birthright for a mess of pottage,

in Wales and elsewhere. Presently a gentleman, The hard realities of life pressed severely upon him.

almost a stranger to the young painter, perceiving During his second and third year in Paris he had

his promise, offered to guarantee him a certain exhibited two pictures, each year, at the Salon, and
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