Studio: international art (17.1899)

The Art of i8gg

preserving—but the nobility which belongs to a fine
and enduring piece of work. Few French painters
have enjoyed so large a measure of recognition in
England as M. Blanche, and assuredly the praise
accorded him, if it has erred a little on the side of
generosity, has been in the main well earned.
Still, the present writer, conscious though he is of
the technical merits of M. Blanche’s work, its
assurance, its fidelity, its reticence, its freedom
from all those tricks of workmanship by which a
cheap effectiveness is gained at the price of truth
and dignity, cannot deny that his canvases lack
something from the point of view of aesthetic
charm—a temperamental lack perhaps it is, which
leaves him cold in front of his canvases. It may
be confessed, heresy though it be to say so, that
Mr. Sargent’s work leaves the same uneasy sensation
of incomplete satisfaction. The pride of assured

PANEL (R.A.) by LEON V. SOLON

PANEL (R.A.) BY LEON V. SOLON

workmanship seems to arrogantly assert itself,
and to push aside, as unworthy of consideration,
those humbler qualities which find their expres-
sion in witchery of treatment. To say this is
not to say that M. Blanche’s Mrs. Cyril Mar-
titieau falls short of being a notable performance.

Mr. Francis Howard has also painted this
lady. Direct enough, Mr. Sauter’s portrait of
Mr. Henry Muhrman almost suggests that the
artist has attempted to emulate the rugged
virility of his sitter’s methods in this admirable
picture. Widely different, Mr. George Henry’s
George Burrell, Esq., may be said to have a
superficial resemblance to a cunningly-wrought
piece of needlework. This canvas is evidently
something of a tour de force. Mr. Henry is
more himself and more satisfying in The Pearl
(Continued page 121.)

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