Studio: international art (9.1897)

H. H. La Thangue and his Work

to a spot whose complete isolation was, perhaps, nature—is eminently rational, and, indeed, so far as
only possible to a man just beginning married life, it goes, is open to no question. The painter goes
After a time, on the invitation of Mr. James out into the world, country or town, according to his
Charles, he visited Bosham, in Sussex, and ulti- choice, and paints his subject in its own environ-
mately settled in a farmhouse near that ancient ment—the gleaner in the field, the shepherd in the
village, where he now lives and is likely to remain, fold, or, if you like, the laundress at her stove, or
Having followed Mr. La Thangue through the my lady in her boudoir. Truth of ensemble is, I
years of his hard-working studentship, and noted should say, the main aesthetic principle, and to
his early and confirmed conviction in favour of arrive at this it is necessary to have the dramatis

persona of the picture on the

r q scene where the action takes

place. It used to be said,
and some still repeat the
paradox, that a pupil can
paint a head, but only a
master can paint a back-
ground. It would be easy to
take such a statement more
seriously than it is intended,
but I often wonder whether
the main difficulty the para-
dox suggests is in painting a
background which is not
behind the figure—in adapt-
ing, or, as we say in the
studio, in " faking" it. How-
ever that may be, Mr. La
Thangue is free of any such
difficulty. He invariably
places his model by its back-
ground or surrounding —
barn or drawing-room, as the
case may be. He tells me
that he is now no nearer
doing anything chic than he
was at the earliest stages
of his career. If he had
elected to live in London or
any other city he would have

" gleaners." from an dnfinished painting by ii. h. la TiiAXGUK carried on his work in the

same way. That is to say,
he would have painted his

naturalism in art, it may be well here to say a word picture not in the studio, but wherever his subject
further as to that principle which he has held, in happened to be. He has never " faked " a subject
common with others of the group of men who in his life, and except for about a twelvemonth in
may be classed as belonging to the naturalistic Chelsea, has never had a studio. From kit-cat to
school of painters. The idea which inspires seven-foot canvas, they are all painted in the open
this school has, in one form or another, domi- air, every touch from Nature. In many cases, the
nated for a couple of decades the rising gene- painter has not seen his works under a roof until
ration of artists. There are the schools of Newly n, the varnishing day at the Royal Academy,
of St. Ives, and there is the work of a host ot When painting in the open air, not the least diffi-
men whose work is associated with no territorial culty is in knowing what colour one is putting upon
district in particular, but whose aims have much in the picture; the shine of the paint, and the warmth
common. The fundamental principle—fidelity to which reflected sunlight throws upon the canvas,
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