DOI Heft:
No. 58 (January, 1898)
DOI Artikel:Wedmore, Frederick: Mr. Francis E. James's water-colours
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18390#0312
Mr. F. E. James s Water-Colours
his work. Its business is to recall an impression- we shall never therefore take his measure by an in-
artistic always, whether beautiful or quaint—it is spection of work like this. Some quaint line it
not generally its business to be imitative, strictly possesses, and to the interest of quaint, as well as
imitative, of actual object or scene. Quite an of lovely, combinations of line, Francis James is
infinity of detail is pleasantly suggested by that quite alive. But it is where the combinations of
drawing of the Grocer's Shop at Bewdley—the line may be lovely—where they may have their
post-office of the country town—and just as much highest quality herein—and yet more where with
by Shop Front, Bewdley, which shows us the beautiful line there must (to do justice to the theme)
deep bow-window of Mr. Bryan, the bookseller; be associated beautiful colour ; it is here that
a background before which some quiet figure out Mr. James is most characteristic. Autumn, Asolo,
of Jane Austen might conceivably have passed. shows this to some extent ; and so do other land-
But it is not obtruded. If you peer closely into scapes in which the world to which he has addressed
the paper, it is not actually and dryly made out. himself, whether of Lombard or Venetian plateau
In a sense, il ny a 7-ien. Stand away a little, and or Alpine height, is dealt with with intrepidity,
then again ily a tout. But it is to churches and flowers—or sometimes to
But, of course, Mr. James's preoccupation with a the interiors of drawing-rooms or bedrooms lived in
quaint little world of the provinces, whose combina- by tasteful people, and full therefore of objects that
tions of colour, as he here shows us them, are must gratify the eye in their happy union—it is to
curious rather than lovely—that preoccupation of churches and flowers in the main, and most of all
his, I say, is occasional rather than constant; and flowers, that we must come back, to find Mr.
James quite at his most exquisite,
quite at his most characteristic.
Perhaps it is hardly possible
nowadays to paint flowers without
submitting to some extent to the
influence of the Japanese. From
them, whatever else you learn,
you learn freedom of treatment
and a concentration upon essen-
tials. The limitations of Japan-
ese art it does not happen just
now to be the fashion to recog-
nise ; though every one who is
really educated—every one who
has at his fingers' ends the
Classics of art, the immense
achievements of Europe from
Holbein to Turner—must know
of these limitations and must feel
them. That does not prevent the
perception of the value of those
things wrhich Japanese art (among
the arts of other peoples indeed)
has had some capacity for teach-
ing us. And when Mr. James
makes his pink and white roses
trail over the paper, with tints so
pale and delicate, I think of the
Japanese. I think of these much
less when he sets a whole posy—a
whole group at least—in a tum-
bler, and has his massive colour,
his rich, great colour, his fearless
san pierro in grado" from a water-colour by f. e. james juxtapositions. And then, perhaps,
264
his work. Its business is to recall an impression- we shall never therefore take his measure by an in-
artistic always, whether beautiful or quaint—it is spection of work like this. Some quaint line it
not generally its business to be imitative, strictly possesses, and to the interest of quaint, as well as
imitative, of actual object or scene. Quite an of lovely, combinations of line, Francis James is
infinity of detail is pleasantly suggested by that quite alive. But it is where the combinations of
drawing of the Grocer's Shop at Bewdley—the line may be lovely—where they may have their
post-office of the country town—and just as much highest quality herein—and yet more where with
by Shop Front, Bewdley, which shows us the beautiful line there must (to do justice to the theme)
deep bow-window of Mr. Bryan, the bookseller; be associated beautiful colour ; it is here that
a background before which some quiet figure out Mr. James is most characteristic. Autumn, Asolo,
of Jane Austen might conceivably have passed. shows this to some extent ; and so do other land-
But it is not obtruded. If you peer closely into scapes in which the world to which he has addressed
the paper, it is not actually and dryly made out. himself, whether of Lombard or Venetian plateau
In a sense, il ny a 7-ien. Stand away a little, and or Alpine height, is dealt with with intrepidity,
then again ily a tout. But it is to churches and flowers—or sometimes to
But, of course, Mr. James's preoccupation with a the interiors of drawing-rooms or bedrooms lived in
quaint little world of the provinces, whose combina- by tasteful people, and full therefore of objects that
tions of colour, as he here shows us them, are must gratify the eye in their happy union—it is to
curious rather than lovely—that preoccupation of churches and flowers in the main, and most of all
his, I say, is occasional rather than constant; and flowers, that we must come back, to find Mr.
James quite at his most exquisite,
quite at his most characteristic.
Perhaps it is hardly possible
nowadays to paint flowers without
submitting to some extent to the
influence of the Japanese. From
them, whatever else you learn,
you learn freedom of treatment
and a concentration upon essen-
tials. The limitations of Japan-
ese art it does not happen just
now to be the fashion to recog-
nise ; though every one who is
really educated—every one who
has at his fingers' ends the
Classics of art, the immense
achievements of Europe from
Holbein to Turner—must know
of these limitations and must feel
them. That does not prevent the
perception of the value of those
things wrhich Japanese art (among
the arts of other peoples indeed)
has had some capacity for teach-
ing us. And when Mr. James
makes his pink and white roses
trail over the paper, with tints so
pale and delicate, I think of the
Japanese. I think of these much
less when he sets a whole posy—a
whole group at least—in a tum-
bler, and has his massive colour,
his rich, great colour, his fearless
san pierro in grado" from a water-colour by f. e. james juxtapositions. And then, perhaps,
264