DOI Heft:
No. 93 (December, 1900)
DOI Artikel:Hiatt, Charles T. J.: The work of Carton Moore Park
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19786#0197
Carton Moore Park
really dogs, and not human beings masquerading impossible to name an artist from whom Moore
as dogs, and he is able to make them absorbingly Park has derived his style, though one might easily
interesting without endowing them with sentiments mention a score of men whose methods he has
and emotional qualities which they do not possess. attentively studied with distinct advantage to his
Mr. Moore Park followed his Alphabet of Animals own work. From this close study of what is sanest
with the no less delightful Book of Birds. In the and finest in the art of the past, he has acquired
latter volume the old qualities were still there, but a degree of restraint and reticence that is as
the touch was surer, the decoration of finer and welcome as it is unusual in the productions of so
more subtle quality. The second book was dis- young a man. It seems to me worthy of note that
tinctly an advance on the first. Early in the Moore Park was never, even at the outset of his
present year, Moore Park and " Norman" pub- artistic life, so completely under the influence of
lished A Book of Elfin Rhymes, with forty any one artist that he could be properly described
drawings in colour, by the former. These illustra- as his disciple. He seems very early to have found
tions are amusingly fantastic, and the end-papers, a way for himself, and to have kept in that way
title-page, and typographical ornaments prove that with remarkable fidelity. He has made many
Carton Moore Park understands the difficult art experiments, but all his experiments have been
of decorating a book. made, so to speak, in a single direction. His
Several of the illustrations which accompany energies have been expended more in developing
this article prove that it would be unfair to Mr. his technical resources than in restlessly seeking
Moore Park to dismiss him as an "animal painter." new points of view. The expression of his
While it is true that hitherto he has devoted him- own personality has rightly been his chief con-
self chiefly to the delineation of animals, it has been sideration, and he has left to others the business of
his ambition, not so much to make pictures of startling and bewildering the beholder. It should
animals, as to use them as the motives of various be added that he has ever disdained anything in
schemes of decoration. It is by his genuine decora- the nature of technical trickery,
tive instinct, added to minute and extraordinary Carton Moore Park's achievement is already of
knowledge of animals and their ways, that all his definite interest and importance, and it holds out
work, whether on a large
or on a small scale, is
distinguished. His nice
sense of the appropriate
enables him to adapt his
pattern to a large wall-
space or to the back of a
playing-card with results
equally happy. It must
be counted to him for
righteousness that he never
condescends to eccentricity
on the one hand or to
triviality on the other. His
work is never intentionally
ugly for the mere sake of
ugliness, nor pretty for the
sake of prettiness. What-
ever its shortcomings, it
is sincere; and for this
reason, if for no other, it is
entitled to respect. And
Moore Park sees with his
own eyes, and represents
what he sees in his own
manner. He is innocent
of imitation. It would be "the dressing-room." by carton moore park
174
really dogs, and not human beings masquerading impossible to name an artist from whom Moore
as dogs, and he is able to make them absorbingly Park has derived his style, though one might easily
interesting without endowing them with sentiments mention a score of men whose methods he has
and emotional qualities which they do not possess. attentively studied with distinct advantage to his
Mr. Moore Park followed his Alphabet of Animals own work. From this close study of what is sanest
with the no less delightful Book of Birds. In the and finest in the art of the past, he has acquired
latter volume the old qualities were still there, but a degree of restraint and reticence that is as
the touch was surer, the decoration of finer and welcome as it is unusual in the productions of so
more subtle quality. The second book was dis- young a man. It seems to me worthy of note that
tinctly an advance on the first. Early in the Moore Park was never, even at the outset of his
present year, Moore Park and " Norman" pub- artistic life, so completely under the influence of
lished A Book of Elfin Rhymes, with forty any one artist that he could be properly described
drawings in colour, by the former. These illustra- as his disciple. He seems very early to have found
tions are amusingly fantastic, and the end-papers, a way for himself, and to have kept in that way
title-page, and typographical ornaments prove that with remarkable fidelity. He has made many
Carton Moore Park understands the difficult art experiments, but all his experiments have been
of decorating a book. made, so to speak, in a single direction. His
Several of the illustrations which accompany energies have been expended more in developing
this article prove that it would be unfair to Mr. his technical resources than in restlessly seeking
Moore Park to dismiss him as an "animal painter." new points of view. The expression of his
While it is true that hitherto he has devoted him- own personality has rightly been his chief con-
self chiefly to the delineation of animals, it has been sideration, and he has left to others the business of
his ambition, not so much to make pictures of startling and bewildering the beholder. It should
animals, as to use them as the motives of various be added that he has ever disdained anything in
schemes of decoration. It is by his genuine decora- the nature of technical trickery,
tive instinct, added to minute and extraordinary Carton Moore Park's achievement is already of
knowledge of animals and their ways, that all his definite interest and importance, and it holds out
work, whether on a large
or on a small scale, is
distinguished. His nice
sense of the appropriate
enables him to adapt his
pattern to a large wall-
space or to the back of a
playing-card with results
equally happy. It must
be counted to him for
righteousness that he never
condescends to eccentricity
on the one hand or to
triviality on the other. His
work is never intentionally
ugly for the mere sake of
ugliness, nor pretty for the
sake of prettiness. What-
ever its shortcomings, it
is sincere; and for this
reason, if for no other, it is
entitled to respect. And
Moore Park sees with his
own eyes, and represents
what he sees in his own
manner. He is innocent
of imitation. It would be "the dressing-room." by carton moore park
174