Studio: international art (28.1903)

Reviews

placed his very informing dissertation on Method
in the fore-front, instead of the rear, of the present
battle with ignorance. Written many years ago,
but never published, it was but the initial step in
what would have been an exhaustive guide to the
science and art of connoisseurship, which Mr.
Berenson considers distinct from each other,
although to the uninitiated they would appear to
be one and indivisible.

Nineteenth Century Art. By D. S. MacColl.-
(Glasgow: Maclehose & Sons.) £2 2s. net.—With
rare skill Mr. D. S. MacColl, who is justly looked
upon as one of the leading art-critics of the day, has
converted what might have been a merely ephemeral
memorial of a passing event into a masterly review
of the painting and sculpture of the nineteenth
century. Written in the somewhat rugged yet
incisive style peculiar to him his various essays
define with unhesitating fidelity the characteristics
of the new art that has arisen not out of the ashes
but out of the still glowing embers of the past,
which seem likely to burst into new life in the
century just begun. Mr. MacColFs opening chap-
ters on the "Vision" and the "Imagination" of
the period under review are a masterly examination
into all the tendencies developed in it, and to the
lay reader, driven almost to desperation by the
ever changing technicalities of art nomenclature,
they will be found a most useful guide. Even with-
out the illustrations the book would be a most
interesting one, but enriched as it is with a great
number of fine reproductions of typical examples
of the masterpieces collected for the first and last
time at the Glasgow Exhibition of 190 r, it will
take rank as a classical history of nineteenth cen-
tury art, more valuable even to those who were
unable to avail themselves of the privilege of
studying the original works of art, than to those
who actually examined them on the spot. It is
indeed impossible to over-estimate the educational
advantage of studying side by side the productions
of the so-called Titans and Olympians, such as
David, Goya and Blake ; the exponents of land-
scape pure and simple, such as Crome, Turner,
Corot, and Rousseau, or of what Mr. MacColl
calls "heroic art fused with landscape," such as
Millet and Chassereau, and of comparing the
very latest developments of impressionism with
the early work of the Pre-Raphaelites and the
Realists.

Measured Drawings of Old Oak English Fur-
niture. By John Waymouth Hurrell. (London :
B. T. Batsford). Price 2 guineas nttt. Mr.
Hurrell's volume contains no plates of imperial

quarto size, in which he gives drawings of Old
English Furniture in oak, as well as of certain
architectural features, such as panelling, ironwork,
lead glazing, etc. The book sets forth with a
commendable simplicity of draughtsmanship, the
profiles and mouldings to which the charm of the
old craftsmen's work in these directions was so
largely due. We hardly think, however, that the
author states the case as it ought to be put when
he says in his brief introductory note that it is the
business of the Architect, Designer, and Craftsman
of to-day " to produce similar work in modern
times." We hope that such volumes as his are
rather put forward as showing the means by which
the old men arrived at their delightful results than
as offering us models which we are to copy. De-
sign in a world dominated by that system of
evolution which obtains in art, as in everything else,
cannot proceed by going backward. But, from the
proper point of view, Mr. Hurrell's book is, as we
say, interesting and valuable to the designer, as
showing not only the honest use of material with
due regard to its nature, but the care and discretion
with which the old craftsman introduced his orna-
ment as a well thought out contrast to his plain
surfaces.

Ancient Coffers and Clipboards. By Fred Roe.
(London: Methuen & Co.)—As is pointed out by
Mr. Roe, the well-known artist, the subject of ancient
furniture is a very complex one, but at the same
time it well repays those who care to give it the
attention it deserves, reflecting, as it does, the
various influences brought to bear upon the people
for whom the quaint old relics which have been
preserved to the present day were originally pro-
duced. The researches, of which the results are
embodied in this very fascinating volume, occupied
no less than seven years; but that they were a
labour of love is proved by the enthusiasm per-
vading every page of the interesting narrative.
Beginning with the Dark Ages, Mr. Roe passes in
exhaustive review the chief examples of coffers and
cupboards in the various museums and churches of
Great Britain and Europe or in private possession,
illustrating his descriptions with many reproduc-
tions, the greater number after drawings by his own
hand. He concludes his work with an earnest wish,
that will be echoed by many, that the present guar-
dians of treasures of incalculable value could be
brought to appreciate their responsibilities more
fully. Suffolk, he says, owns a notable fourteenth-
century coffer, which is degraded into a receptacle
for paint-pots ; Hants possesses a tilting coffer, one
of the rarest forms of decoration, which is exposed