DOI Heft:
No. 135 (June, 1904)
DOI Artikel:Wedmore, Frederick: The art of Thomas Collier
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19882#0019
THE STUDIO
THE ART OF THOM COLLIER. I have mentioned—a likeness that is for them too
BY FREDERICK WEDMORE. clearly noticeable The second, what they think
i3i some want of variety ; and, superficially too, that
Coli ier-the great water-colour painter, opinion may be justified. Connoisseurs, however
who was born (in spite of Manchester "tradition"), as -the real connoisseurs, who have at all attended
I understand, at Glossop, in Derbyshire, and who to the matter-are of a different way of thinking,
died twelve years ago at Hampstead, fifty-one years The person who with sensitive eye has studied, and
old-was akin in some respects to David Cox has lived with, Thomas Collier's work recognises
and Constable • and in his vision of Nature and in the individuality, the originality much more than
his practice in recording her, he may have been the likeness to any other artist. The sense of his
influenced by both But to submit to a particular originality is the sense that grows on you. Also
influence is, to a certain extent, to prove yourself the close and genuine student recognises, that, while
to have affinity with the personality that exer- Collier's work does necessarily submit to the limi-
cises it In this sense it is true-the phrase of tations of the landscape painter whose theme is
Coleridge-that "we receive but what we give." always England-and whose method is, when beheld
In making this contention I am not, it will be in its maturity, quite uniformly one of breadth,
understood, claiming for a pupil a Master's great- economy, selection-witmn those necessary bounds,
ness. We have not to do with pupils. Collier those bounds which circumstance or choice may
was no pupil. He was quietly, unobtrusively, but have laid down for him, 1 homas Collier has variety
very certainly, a Master. indeed.
Two things, as far as I know, tell a little against And, be it noted, it is variety of the best kind :
him with that part of the large public that takes not merely obvious var.ety-rap.d transition, rather-
some interest in art The first is just this point that ot theme; but subtle change of effect and of
"a heath" fr0m the water-colour by thomas col]
XXXII. No. 135.—Tune, 1904. 3
THE ART OF THOM COLLIER. I have mentioned—a likeness that is for them too
BY FREDERICK WEDMORE. clearly noticeable The second, what they think
i3i some want of variety ; and, superficially too, that
Coli ier-the great water-colour painter, opinion may be justified. Connoisseurs, however
who was born (in spite of Manchester "tradition"), as -the real connoisseurs, who have at all attended
I understand, at Glossop, in Derbyshire, and who to the matter-are of a different way of thinking,
died twelve years ago at Hampstead, fifty-one years The person who with sensitive eye has studied, and
old-was akin in some respects to David Cox has lived with, Thomas Collier's work recognises
and Constable • and in his vision of Nature and in the individuality, the originality much more than
his practice in recording her, he may have been the likeness to any other artist. The sense of his
influenced by both But to submit to a particular originality is the sense that grows on you. Also
influence is, to a certain extent, to prove yourself the close and genuine student recognises, that, while
to have affinity with the personality that exer- Collier's work does necessarily submit to the limi-
cises it In this sense it is true-the phrase of tations of the landscape painter whose theme is
Coleridge-that "we receive but what we give." always England-and whose method is, when beheld
In making this contention I am not, it will be in its maturity, quite uniformly one of breadth,
understood, claiming for a pupil a Master's great- economy, selection-witmn those necessary bounds,
ness. We have not to do with pupils. Collier those bounds which circumstance or choice may
was no pupil. He was quietly, unobtrusively, but have laid down for him, 1 homas Collier has variety
very certainly, a Master. indeed.
Two things, as far as I know, tell a little against And, be it noted, it is variety of the best kind :
him with that part of the large public that takes not merely obvious var.ety-rap.d transition, rather-
some interest in art The first is just this point that ot theme; but subtle change of effect and of
"a heath" fr0m the water-colour by thomas col]
XXXII. No. 135.—Tune, 1904. 3