Some Glasgow Designers
advertises it; green, as in the green baize of com- of a sunset sky, and has dreamed (if not seen) the
merce ; or the "pink" of lawyers tape, are all magic phosphorescence of midnight seas in the
fairly well defined ; hut if you wish to convey a tropics. This in cold print seems to he merely
"journalese," yet if you try to set down in simple
English the play of light in a piece of opalescent
glass, you (as I who write) will find it a somewhat
tedious matter. All the same the curious milky
white which flashes out the most vivid colours of
the prism is as common as a soap-bubble and as
complex. To say that some of Mr. Oscar Pater-
son's glass is wrell-nigh as delightful as a soap-
, 1.....1
H______£_-J
BL
staircase window in white and lemon glass
by oscar paterson
by harry thomson
meaning of so popular a dye as that used for
certain Liberty silks—flame colour, salmon, apricot,
even terra-cotta, and a dozen other substantives
ordinarily employed in describing fire, fish or baked
clay, are borrowed to confuse the reader. For door panel in lustred and
"flame "is as vague a term as "red"; salmon is white glass
not an exact adjective, if a well-defined noun;
terra-cotta may include everything from dull drab
to rusty iron, and yet escape the particular shade bubble is really not a very undignified short cut to
you wish to distinguish. the truth. In comparison with even his best
Therefore the mere effort to talk of colour in a efforts the soap-bubble wins easily, but to have
way clear to the speaker, much less to his audience, come into close rivalry with that common miracle
is a foregone failure. All we can say of Mr. Oscar implies a certain touch of nobility.
Paterson's colour must be limited to a few com- Mr. Oscar Paterson's glass has more poetry in it
paratively simple assertions. He has realised the than many lyrics display, but this is not to be urged
secret mystery of an opal, he has caught the amber against him. Reckoning from the premisses of the
18
advertises it; green, as in the green baize of com- of a sunset sky, and has dreamed (if not seen) the
merce ; or the "pink" of lawyers tape, are all magic phosphorescence of midnight seas in the
fairly well defined ; hut if you wish to convey a tropics. This in cold print seems to he merely
"journalese," yet if you try to set down in simple
English the play of light in a piece of opalescent
glass, you (as I who write) will find it a somewhat
tedious matter. All the same the curious milky
white which flashes out the most vivid colours of
the prism is as common as a soap-bubble and as
complex. To say that some of Mr. Oscar Pater-
son's glass is wrell-nigh as delightful as a soap-
, 1.....1
H______£_-J
BL
staircase window in white and lemon glass
by oscar paterson
by harry thomson
meaning of so popular a dye as that used for
certain Liberty silks—flame colour, salmon, apricot,
even terra-cotta, and a dozen other substantives
ordinarily employed in describing fire, fish or baked
clay, are borrowed to confuse the reader. For door panel in lustred and
"flame "is as vague a term as "red"; salmon is white glass
not an exact adjective, if a well-defined noun;
terra-cotta may include everything from dull drab
to rusty iron, and yet escape the particular shade bubble is really not a very undignified short cut to
you wish to distinguish. the truth. In comparison with even his best
Therefore the mere effort to talk of colour in a efforts the soap-bubble wins easily, but to have
way clear to the speaker, much less to his audience, come into close rivalry with that common miracle
is a foregone failure. All we can say of Mr. Oscar implies a certain touch of nobility.
Paterson's colour must be limited to a few com- Mr. Oscar Paterson's glass has more poetry in it
paratively simple assertions. He has realised the than many lyrics display, but this is not to be urged
secret mystery of an opal, he has caught the amber against him. Reckoning from the premisses of the
18