DOI Heft:
No. 134 (May, 1904)
DOI Artikel:Housman, Laurence: The work of Mr. Herbert Alexander
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19881#0322
Herbert Alexander
insular accent. Constable's influence passed easily serenity would be the nearest word for expressing
and beneficently into France; Preraphaelitism, it. He sees Nature in her most equable and
with all that followed from it, seems to have had a flower like aspect; his search is for congruity and
vital influence only in England; and some of the idyllic harmony; youth and blossom and soft sun-
most beautiful and sincere work that this country shine give the quickening touch to, and form, as it
has produced has about it almost a note of dialect, were, the genius loci of his gardens, orchards, and
so much is it bound to the land of its origin and homesteads ; and though he has a sentiment for old
by local colour. buildings, perhaps because of the growth that hangs
This peculiarly English way of looking at things upon their walls, I do not recall a single instance,
marks and classifies the work of Mr. Herbert where any figure of old age has been introduced.
Alexander, an artist who, though still young and of It is here and in his studies of English pastoral
barely matured power, has for a number of years scenery that one detects, because rather wilfully
been steadily developing a style of his own, little emphasised, that sympathy with beauty of form
affected by outside influences, and who now makes rather than with character which has drawn him
his first bid for recognition in a show of about fifty so often to Italy for his subjects, and has made
water-colours, held this month at Mr. John Baillie's statuary in one or two instances the central motive
Gallery, i, Princes Terrace, Bayswater. What will for a picture; and perhaps it is just here that a
no doubt surprise many who thus come upon his shortcoming makes itself felt—the figures in his
work for the first time is the variety and high tech- foregrounds have a plastic not a human interest:
nical accomplishment which it displays ; yet a no culminating note of intention is there expressed ;
greater attraction lies in the fact that this skill is the eye passes over them and finds that the real
secondary to the charm of a quietly possessed but interest lies in the background, and that the figures
clearly defined temperament. Were it possible to are mere accessories, though in size and elabora-
convey by a single phrase the artist's personal note, tion and titular claim they pose as being something
" MY HOME"
302
FROM THE WATER-COLOUR BY HERBERT ALEXANDER
insular accent. Constable's influence passed easily serenity would be the nearest word for expressing
and beneficently into France; Preraphaelitism, it. He sees Nature in her most equable and
with all that followed from it, seems to have had a flower like aspect; his search is for congruity and
vital influence only in England; and some of the idyllic harmony; youth and blossom and soft sun-
most beautiful and sincere work that this country shine give the quickening touch to, and form, as it
has produced has about it almost a note of dialect, were, the genius loci of his gardens, orchards, and
so much is it bound to the land of its origin and homesteads ; and though he has a sentiment for old
by local colour. buildings, perhaps because of the growth that hangs
This peculiarly English way of looking at things upon their walls, I do not recall a single instance,
marks and classifies the work of Mr. Herbert where any figure of old age has been introduced.
Alexander, an artist who, though still young and of It is here and in his studies of English pastoral
barely matured power, has for a number of years scenery that one detects, because rather wilfully
been steadily developing a style of his own, little emphasised, that sympathy with beauty of form
affected by outside influences, and who now makes rather than with character which has drawn him
his first bid for recognition in a show of about fifty so often to Italy for his subjects, and has made
water-colours, held this month at Mr. John Baillie's statuary in one or two instances the central motive
Gallery, i, Princes Terrace, Bayswater. What will for a picture; and perhaps it is just here that a
no doubt surprise many who thus come upon his shortcoming makes itself felt—the figures in his
work for the first time is the variety and high tech- foregrounds have a plastic not a human interest:
nical accomplishment which it displays ; yet a no culminating note of intention is there expressed ;
greater attraction lies in the fact that this skill is the eye passes over them and finds that the real
secondary to the charm of a quietly possessed but interest lies in the background, and that the figures
clearly defined temperament. Were it possible to are mere accessories, though in size and elabora-
convey by a single phrase the artist's personal note, tion and titular claim they pose as being something
" MY HOME"
302
FROM THE WATER-COLOUR BY HERBERT ALEXANDER