Studio: international art (35.1905)

Reviews

Figure Drawing. By Richard G. Hatton.
(London : Chapman & Hall.) js. 6d. net.—All
students, and indeed many professional artists and
craftsmen, will owe a debt of gratitude to Mr.
Hatton for his valuable, original and exhaustive
handbook. It forms a complete guide to figure
drawing, supplying just the information required,
with just the practical aid that is so often sought
in vain, yet it refrains from useless and bewildering
details that would serve but to embarrass the
worker. “ The artist studies anatomy,” says Mr
Hatton, “in order that he may the better under-
stand what the form of the figure is,” adding, what
many a student will sadly endorse, “ not infre-
quently he finds, however, that his anatomy has
not helped him very much . . . but asserts itself in
a manner that does not improve his work.” He
feels overborne by the mass of “origins” and
assertions, and endeavours to learn by heart lists
of muscles and bones, and feels the disgrace of not
knowing like a schoolboy all the facts exhibited in
the book he happens to be studying. The reason
for this unfortunate waste of labour is not, in this
shrewd observer’s opinion, far to seek, for he
remarks, “ the very accuracy of the knowledge won
robs it of its value.” In his own truly instructive
text it may justly be claimed that he fully remedies
the evil. Beginning with a series of brief but very
lucid essays on “ Method and Proportion,” he pro-
ceeds to treat the various portions of the human
form in detail, elucidating his text with a very great
number of excellent illustrations, and concluding
with some very useful advice on the true principles
of the treatment of drapery.

The Art Decorator. Sixty designs in colour.
(London: H. Grevel.) 155-.net.—There are, it is
true, some few fairly satisfactory designs in this
volume of coloured plates, but the book is scarcely
likely to appeal to a wide circle in England, where
the beautiful decorative work of William Morris,
Sir Edward Burne-Jones, Voysey, and many others
has been brought within reach of all who are able
to appreciate it. Perhaps the best of the illustra-
tions in the new volume are those after Menzel and
Professor Sturm, but even these are wanting in the
spontaneity that is one of the chief charms of really
effective decoration. They are laboured and heavy
compared with the bright and playful fancies of the
poet-painter Morris, or the magician of the nursery,
Walter Crane.

Handbook of Lithography. By David Gumming.
(London : A. & C. Black.) 65-. net.—Although
there are many publications in the market dealing
with lithographs and lithographers, an authoritative
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history of the art, and an account of the mysteries
of its many processes, have long been needed.
The well-illustrated little volume, by a member
of the successful firm of chromo-lithographers,
McLagan & Cumming, will therefore probably re-
ceive a hearty welcome. Mr. Cumming writes with
the authority of a man who has a practical know
ledge of his subject; and his careful account of
the origin and development of the art under notice
is succeeded by an exhaustive treatise on every-
thing connected with its practice. The author of
the valuable treatise is a true teacher. He avoids
the mistake of so many experts of assuming elemen-
tary knowledge in his pupils, and considers no
detail, however apparently unimportant, too trivial
for full explanation.

Chefs Loeuvre d'Art Japonais. By Gaston
Migeon. (Paris : D. A. Longuet.) This album
contains nearly 1,200 collotype reproductions of
Japanese objects of art selected with excellent
judgment from the principal private collections in
Paris, by the Keeper of art works at the Louvre
museum. Care has been taken in the choice of
objects that only those should be figured which
have not hitherto been published in books relating
to the subject. Some fine examples from the
collections of Messieurs Bing, Gonse, Haviland,
Vever, Riviere, Kcechlin, Hoentschel, and many
others, are illustrated; and in each department of
Japanese art—in painting, wood engraving, sculp-
ture, lacquer, pottery, bronzes, arms and armour,
embroidery—specimens are figured of the highest
excellence and of great interest to the collector.

Author and Printer. By F. Howard Collins
(London: Henry Frowde.) 55-.net.—-The vagaries
of English orthography and typographical usage
are notorious, yet no serious effort seems to have
been made hitherto to give us an authorita-
tive guide to the correct forms to be employed.
This task has now been undertaken by Mr. Collins,
the epitomiser of Spencerian philosophy; and a
handy book of rather more than 400 pages is
the outcome of a great amount of labour ex-
pended by him and his collaborators. Arranged
in the form of a dictionary, the book contains a
whole mine of information which cannot fail to be
of service to every one who has occasion to write
for the press ; the aim being to represent the
language as it is now used by the people most
capable of writing it. Amongst special features
we note an extensive series of abbreviations, foreign
phrases rendered into English, place-names, notes
on punctuation, typographical terms and directions.
It should form a useful companion to the dictionary.