DOI Heft:
No. 71 (february 1899)
DOI Artikel:Wilfrid Ball, etcher and water-colour painter
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19231#0011
Wilfrid Ball
Happily his influence is still active to guide the It follows almost necessarily that the English
painters of our own time in their use of materials, water-colour school, with its traditions and the
The tradition which he helped to establish remains circumstances of its development, is eminently a
to prevent modern workers from wasting their school of landscape. For one thing, the medium
energies in useless efforts to make their materials itself is less well adapted than oils for the treat-
do what is impossible, and is still powerful to save ment of the figure; and, for another, our artists
many a capable artist from the disappointment of have so many excellent reasons for preferring out-
ineffectual labour. To his example, and that of of-door subjects that they have generally set them-
other art leaders like himself, is due the thoroughly selves, at all events in water-colour work, to
wholesome appreciation of technical necessities interpret landscape rather than the human subject,
which distinguishes our water-colourists as a class. Yet, widespread as this preference is, it cannot be
They have an admirable authority to follow in said that there is any unpleasant monotony in their
their professional practice ; and in dealing with the general practice. There are so many methods of
wealth of subject-matter, of the kind that suits using even the same medium open to men who
them best, which is accessible in the country in have the courage to look at Nature in their own
which they live, they are encouraged to study the way, that the temptation to copy any particular
necessary correctness of relation between the mode master can be resisted without a very serious
of interpretation and the type of nature they wish struggle. We have, as a consequence, in the
to illustrate. By this very useful training, and by output of our contemporary water-colourists almost
the number of chances which they have of learning all the possible phases of expression, and the very
to make distinctions between motives, they have widest range of executive manner from the mascu-
gained a breadth of view which no other school line suggestions of Mr. Arthur Melville to the
can boast, and have justified themselves as the precise and pedantic realities of Mr. Birket Foster,
exponents of a national art, created and maintained But we have, also, much work that steers the safe
by their shrewd understanding of natural condi- middle course between splendid eccentricity and
tions. tame commonplace; work that shows legitimate
" ELSTEAD BRIDGE" FROM A CHARCOAL SKETCH BY WILFRID BALL
4
Happily his influence is still active to guide the It follows almost necessarily that the English
painters of our own time in their use of materials, water-colour school, with its traditions and the
The tradition which he helped to establish remains circumstances of its development, is eminently a
to prevent modern workers from wasting their school of landscape. For one thing, the medium
energies in useless efforts to make their materials itself is less well adapted than oils for the treat-
do what is impossible, and is still powerful to save ment of the figure; and, for another, our artists
many a capable artist from the disappointment of have so many excellent reasons for preferring out-
ineffectual labour. To his example, and that of of-door subjects that they have generally set them-
other art leaders like himself, is due the thoroughly selves, at all events in water-colour work, to
wholesome appreciation of technical necessities interpret landscape rather than the human subject,
which distinguishes our water-colourists as a class. Yet, widespread as this preference is, it cannot be
They have an admirable authority to follow in said that there is any unpleasant monotony in their
their professional practice ; and in dealing with the general practice. There are so many methods of
wealth of subject-matter, of the kind that suits using even the same medium open to men who
them best, which is accessible in the country in have the courage to look at Nature in their own
which they live, they are encouraged to study the way, that the temptation to copy any particular
necessary correctness of relation between the mode master can be resisted without a very serious
of interpretation and the type of nature they wish struggle. We have, as a consequence, in the
to illustrate. By this very useful training, and by output of our contemporary water-colourists almost
the number of chances which they have of learning all the possible phases of expression, and the very
to make distinctions between motives, they have widest range of executive manner from the mascu-
gained a breadth of view which no other school line suggestions of Mr. Arthur Melville to the
can boast, and have justified themselves as the precise and pedantic realities of Mr. Birket Foster,
exponents of a national art, created and maintained But we have, also, much work that steers the safe
by their shrewd understanding of natural condi- middle course between splendid eccentricity and
tions. tame commonplace; work that shows legitimate
" ELSTEAD BRIDGE" FROM A CHARCOAL SKETCH BY WILFRID BALL
4