Studio: international art (29.1903)

Reviews

of the afflicted patriarch and his friends with con-
siderable skill. Unfortunately, however, his illus-
trations are somewhat spoiled by the heavy masses
of ink and by the sharpness of the contrast between
black and white affected by the school to which he
belongs. This is very notably the case with the
fine design of the Frontispiece, and the same fault
is apparent in many of the minor decorations, the
black setting distracting the attention from the
really beautiful drawing. The remarkable inter
pretation of the words : " He has garnished the
heavens," which is a mere unrelieved mass of
black with a few white dots upon it, might well
have been omitted, and that of the "Son of man
which is a worm " has an almost comic effect.

The Sketch Book of Sir Anthony van Dyck. By
Lionel Cust, M.V.O., F.S.A. (London : Bell &
Sons.^) £2. 2S. net.—Although as a general rule
a completed picture from the hand of a master is
of greater value than any mere sketch can be, a
deep interest often attaches to the latter as a revela-
tion of individual character and mode of pro-
cedure. This is very notably the case with the
travelling Sketch-book of Van Dyck, intended, as it
was for no eye but his own, in which he jotted
down, sometimes with a pen in bistre-coloured ink,
sometimes with a black-lead pencil, the impressions
made on him by the work of other artists. The
Sketch-book, from which forty-seven pages have
been selected for facsimile reproduction by the
Director of the National Portrait Gallery, is not,
as its name would seem to imply, a collection of
original sketches from Nature by the great Flemish
painter, but of notes on the pictures in European
galleries that happened to take his fancy. Thus
they include a number of drawings after Titian ;
numerous characteristic groups from the paintings
of Paolo Veronese and the frescoes of Raphael;
quaint bits culled from the genre pictures of Breughel
and Lucas van Leyden; the religious engravings of
Albrecht Diirer, etc., all catching with rare skill
the peculiarities of each artist, and proving their
author's sympathy with styles quite unlike his own.

As remarkable in its way as Van Dyck's own
power of interpreting the work of others, is the
technical skill displayed in the fac-similes from his
Sketch-book, which brings within reach of all
students one of the greatest treasures of the Duke
of Devonshire's famous collection. Stolen from
Chatsworth in the eighteenth century, it was re-
stored to its rightful owner in 1898, by Mr. Herbert
C. Cook, who had bought it in ignorance of its
identity. A detailed description of all the con-
tents of this unique heirloom, proves how cosmo-

72 .

politan were the tastes of Van Dyck, and adds
greatly to the value of the reproduction of selected
leaves.

Antique Works of Art from Benin. Collected
by Lieutenant-General Pitt-Rivers, D.C.L., F.R.S.,
F.S.A. (London: Batsford.) 125-. 6d. net.—In
spite of all the progress recently made in the eluci-
dation of art history there still remain unsolved
certain problems connected with it which elude the
most skilful expert. No one has yet been able, for
instance, to explain the existence of a large number
of works of art in a town so degraded as Benin was
in 1897, when it was entered by an expedition sent
to exact satisfaction for the massacre of a party of
Englishmen. These extraordinary relics of an
advanced civilisation, of which no other traces are
left, were found buried beneath the king's com-
pound, or hidden in native houses, and were most
of them still covered with blood, probably from the
human sacrifices in which they had been used.
They consist of bronze plaques with admirably
designed figures in low relief, statues, bells, and
ornaments of a great variety, excellently cast in
bronze, utensils in various metals, carved ivory and
wood, etc., all executed with a technical skill such
as no native artist of Africa could surpass. Turn-
ing over the pages of the remarkable book issued
by the learned Inspector of Ancient Monuments it
is difficult to believe that the works represented in it
were really produced in Benin, or to accept the
theory that they were introduced by Portuguese
settlers. In fact the riddle remains a riddle, un-
paralleled even in America, that land of vanished
civilisations, where the life story of those who
preceded the present occupiers has at last been
pieced together into a consistent whole.

Buddhist Art in India. By Professor Albert
Grunwedel. Translated by Agnes Gibson. (Lon-
don: B. Quaritch.) 12.S. 6d. net.—Well translated
by Miss Gibson from the first German edition, and
revised and enlarged with the aid of the second by
Mr. James Burgess, formerly Director-General of
the Archaeological Survey of India, this fully
illustrated volume remains the chief authority on
the subject of which it treats. With infinite care
and patience Professor Griinwedel has sought out
the often widely scattered and mutilated relics of
Buddhist art, some still in situ, others dispersed in
public museums or private collections, piecing
them together wherever possible, and unravelling
their meaning with wonderful skill. Yet he con-
fesses that the work is as yet but begun, and
remarks that the solution of many difficulties will
only be reached when the history of the different