Studio: international art (17.1899)

The Art of i8gg

Necklet, and in the portraits of Mr. Justice Darling
and Mr. Arthur Brogan. Mr. C. W. Furse
never falls short of being dignified, and his art
frequently attains distinction. He has an eques-
trian picture of his father, the Archdeacon of
Westminster. To specialise the foregoing portraits
does not necessarily connote that all that is best in
the department of portraiture has been mentioned.
There are Renoir’s Madame Maitre; an excellent
portrait by Harrington Mann, and a still more
excellent portrait group; a cleverly-painted and
eminently satisfactory representation of a lady
holding a black hat in her hand by Mouat Loudan ;
a delicate and, for all its finesse, sprightly portrait
by W. G. von Glehn. Gustav Klimt is far more
acceptable in A Lady in Pi?ik than in Pallas
Athetie. This distinctly uninviting creature might
stand as a symbol for many a goddess, but not for
the omniscient Minerva. Albert Andre’s La Pro-
menade and David Muirhead’s Vanity are practi-
cally portraits — the first represents a vivacious
young woman on the path of conquest, the second
a young woman preparing herself to take that
path. In dismissing portraiture I will say that it
would be impossible to gather so interesting a
group of pictures from any exhibition of the
Academy, New Gallery, or Society of Portrait
Painters.

Then as to landscapes. At the Academy land-
scape scarcely exists this year, and there is little
enough in this branch of art at the New—by
which, of course, I mean landscape which has any
interest for the amateur. At the International,
despite many unaccountable omissions, the case
is different. The Glasgow men, to the fore in
portraiture, are also well represented in landscape.
They have been called the tapisserie school, and
there is just enough truth in the implied reproach to
give it piquancy. Nevertheless, the landscapes of
such men as James Paterson, Grosvenor Thomas,
J. Reid Murray, J. Whitelaw Hamilton, E. A.
Walton, are distinctly refreshing productions, none
the less so because the art of this school, speak-
ing generally, seems to transport us to the old
Champ de Mars Salon—that is to say, to an Ex-
hibition of the Societe des Beaux-Arts. But apart
from this clever school, so well able to look after
itself, several of the best of the Southrons are
represented—men, too, who have followed in their
art a more eclectic standard than their Northern
rivals.

The development of modern landscape has, of
course, been marked by a seesaw movement be-
tween this country and France and the Netherlands.

Now it is England which is uppermost, as in the
days of Constable and the Norwich school; then
it is France, the Barbizon men to wit; and again it
is the Netherlands and Scandinavia, as at the pre-
sent moment. But such a painter as Mark Fisher,
seen in a magnificent example of his virile art,
Chalk Cliffs, Sussex, and T. Austen Brown, whose
entirely delightful At the Farm Ferry is among
the triumphs of the show; and Julian Olsson, whose
Winter Landscape runs Fritz Thaulow hard;
James Aumonier, not quite at his best in An Old
Chalk Cliff, but admirable for all that; Alfred
Withers, a coming man; Henry Muhrman, a
painter of exceptional insight and assured perform-
ance, who has not yet come by his own ; James
Charles, of whom the like may be said; Leslie
Thomson, a poet if I know one; Charles J.
Watson, Oliver Hall, Macaulay Stevenson, G.
Wetherbee, Alfred Hartley, Herbert Goodall, Wil-
liam Padgett, Bertram Priestman, Robert W. Allan,
Arthur Tomson, A. S. Hartrick, J. S. Hill—each in
his degree, though manifestly not each in an equal
degree so far as power and capacity go, carries on
the best traditions of landscape art without bowing
to the shibboleth of any school or passing fashion,
and each, while reserving to himself independence
of thought and freedom of treatment, acknow-
ledging a becoming obligation to the achieve-
ments of the great masters who have gone
before.

The landscape art of the Continent is fairly re-
presented. Fritz Thaulow, well to the fore, with
interesting and agreeable work by Menard, Baert-
soen, Pissaro, Grasset, Fromuth, Fragiacomo,
Zugel, and others. There are two Sisleys which,
in common with several canvases and drawings, one
has seen before. There are two oil-paintings by
Monet, sufficiently representative of that master’s
style. It is taking one’s life in one’s hands to say
so, but for my part I am extremely glad that Monet
and his numerous artistic progeny are not rampant
at Knightsbridge. Monet, like Manet, deserves
all honour for having discovered, or rather redis-
covered, certain elemental truths about the science
of painting; but one Monet, pure and undefiled,
is enough. His pictures belong to students,
not to amateurs. Fantin-Latour’s Roses ; Oppler’s
Mt/sic ; Vallotton’s Selling Fruit; Neven du Mont’s
Piccadilly; Vuillard’s Coin d’Lnti?-ieur; Charles
Cottet’s Le pour de Deuil, are all works demanding
detailed notice. But my space is well-nigh ex-
hausted, else I might repeat what all the world
agrees upon, and sing once again the praises of
Mr. Whistler. There is no necessity. Mr. Whistler

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