DOI Heft:
No. 64 (July, 1898)
DOI Artikel:Baldry, Alfred Lys: The work of Bertram Priestman
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21969#0098
Bertram Priestman
relation between the sensibility of a clever artist to
early impressions and the extent of the influence
exercised over him by the work of the leaders of
the profession. If he has been fortunate enough
to acquire his first experiences in a good school, he
escapes many of the dangers which beset a youth
at the outset of his career, and begins his period of
production without having to struggle to free him-
self from fallacies which he has innocently accepted
because he lacked the experience necessary for
proper discrimination. Having nothing to unlearn,
he need waste no time in casting about to find the
right road. That is already marked out plainly for
him, and he can follow it without hesitation or
doubt, confident that the education of his judgment
has taught him, even before his hand was capable
of response to his mind, to choose the material
which he can deal with in the way that suits him
best. He is not likely to waver in his course, and
he will not fail for want of knowledge.
How early associations will help a young artist to
understand what is essential in the practice of art,
and will save him from mistakes that would be
likely to delay the maturing of his power, is very
significantly shown in the case of Mr. Bertram
Priestman. He is essentially a painter who takes
an intelligent view of his professional responsi-
bilities, and aims at something more than the literal
interpretation of fact with which so many men are
seemingly content. Obvious realism, without poetry
and without sympathy, is the last thing which
appears to commend itself to him as suited for
pictorial treatment. What he desires, and what he
gains, is a far more subtle and abstract quality : the
charm of poetic suggestion, delicately implied and
thoughtfully hinted at. In his pictures there is no
bald assertion, no emphatic insistence upon com-
monplaces which are easy to appreciate, because
they make no demand upon the intelligence ; and,
best of all, there is no shirking of the obligation
which lies upon every artist to make his work a
sincere expression of his own personal conviction.
His preference is for pictorial romance, for that view
of Nature which will allow him scope for fancy
without leading him into bombastic exaggeration
or theatrical display ; but he is completely con-
trolled by the best considerations of style.
The real secret of his artistic power lies in the
fact that he knows exactly what to select and what
to leave out. In a professional career of barely
ten years, he has grasped the importance of sub-
duing that inclination which usually marks the
young painter, to crowd on to a canvas more detail
than the subject needs, and to sacrifice reticence
relation between the sensibility of a clever artist to
early impressions and the extent of the influence
exercised over him by the work of the leaders of
the profession. If he has been fortunate enough
to acquire his first experiences in a good school, he
escapes many of the dangers which beset a youth
at the outset of his career, and begins his period of
production without having to struggle to free him-
self from fallacies which he has innocently accepted
because he lacked the experience necessary for
proper discrimination. Having nothing to unlearn,
he need waste no time in casting about to find the
right road. That is already marked out plainly for
him, and he can follow it without hesitation or
doubt, confident that the education of his judgment
has taught him, even before his hand was capable
of response to his mind, to choose the material
which he can deal with in the way that suits him
best. He is not likely to waver in his course, and
he will not fail for want of knowledge.
How early associations will help a young artist to
understand what is essential in the practice of art,
and will save him from mistakes that would be
likely to delay the maturing of his power, is very
significantly shown in the case of Mr. Bertram
Priestman. He is essentially a painter who takes
an intelligent view of his professional responsi-
bilities, and aims at something more than the literal
interpretation of fact with which so many men are
seemingly content. Obvious realism, without poetry
and without sympathy, is the last thing which
appears to commend itself to him as suited for
pictorial treatment. What he desires, and what he
gains, is a far more subtle and abstract quality : the
charm of poetic suggestion, delicately implied and
thoughtfully hinted at. In his pictures there is no
bald assertion, no emphatic insistence upon com-
monplaces which are easy to appreciate, because
they make no demand upon the intelligence ; and,
best of all, there is no shirking of the obligation
which lies upon every artist to make his work a
sincere expression of his own personal conviction.
His preference is for pictorial romance, for that view
of Nature which will allow him scope for fancy
without leading him into bombastic exaggeration
or theatrical display ; but he is completely con-
trolled by the best considerations of style.
The real secret of his artistic power lies in the
fact that he knows exactly what to select and what
to leave out. In a professional career of barely
ten years, he has grasped the importance of sub-
duing that inclination which usually marks the
young painter, to crowd on to a canvas more detail
than the subject needs, and to sacrifice reticence