DOI issue:
No. 174 (September, 1907)
DOI article:The landscape paintings of Mr. Grosvenor Thomas
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20775#0298
Grosvenor Thomas
with the intellectual developments of the present so as to keep the unessentials from becoming
day. obtrusive.
Among the more distinguished members of this As examples of this restraint, such pictures as
school Mr. Grosvenor Thomas takes a position that Evening, The Road to Chagford, On the Ouse, and
is indisputable. He is a romanticist painter in the Cluden Waters, are of particular importance. In
best sense of the term, and in his work he observes them everything is subordinated to the main
admirably those principles which have guided in design, to the expression of a large idea of nature,
the past the better exponents of imaginative land- and to the broad statement of a decorative .inten-
scape painting. Plain and simple realism he tion. The same spirit is evident in more compli-
avoids; the recording of every-day facts he never cated motives like The River, and Ravey's Mill :
attempts, and he does not pretend to be interested they are carried further and they have less simpli-
in those minor details which are, so to speak, the city of arrangement, but the placing of the
embroidery on nature's robes. He has a larger component parts of the composition is quite as
aim, an intention to express the sentiment of his deliberate, and the absence of any jarring or rest-
subjects by showing their decorative capabilities' less note is equally perceptible. When he goes
and by presenting broadly and simply those aspects further still into work of a more realistic type, and
of them which are most susceptible of rhythmical deals with such definite facts as he has set down in
arrangement, and which lend themselves best to A Devonshire Cottage, Cluden Mill, and Houghton
studied design. If any comparison were needed Mill, he remains still true to the principles which
between him and his predecessors it would pro- govern his entire practice. In these last pictures
bably be most correct to speak of him as a follower he has filled in his pattern more elaborately ; he
of Corot, for he has learned some-
thing from the French romanticist
master. But what he owes to
Corot is very far from being the
greater part of his equipment; it
amounts to little more than a
certain elegant facility in the put-
ting together of the component
parts of his pictorial scheme. What
is most interesting and remarkable
in his pictures comes from Mr.
Thomas himself.
He is first of all a decorator, who
seeks and finds in landscapes which
are frankly natural special oppor-
tunities for carrying to completion
a logical design. About the pattern
of each of his pictures he greatly
concerns himself; he adjusts lines
and masses and harmonises forms,
and he plans his colour with the
closest consideration for its balance
not only of area but also of degree.
As a consequence, his work has
definitely the charm of suavity
and reticence and is attractive
both in its grace and its repose;
it bears the stamp of scholarly
consideration and matured judg-
ment, and there is in its restraint
evidence that he has mastered
that most perplexing of artistic
problems, how to use his material "the road to chagford" by grosvenor thomas
260
with the intellectual developments of the present so as to keep the unessentials from becoming
day. obtrusive.
Among the more distinguished members of this As examples of this restraint, such pictures as
school Mr. Grosvenor Thomas takes a position that Evening, The Road to Chagford, On the Ouse, and
is indisputable. He is a romanticist painter in the Cluden Waters, are of particular importance. In
best sense of the term, and in his work he observes them everything is subordinated to the main
admirably those principles which have guided in design, to the expression of a large idea of nature,
the past the better exponents of imaginative land- and to the broad statement of a decorative .inten-
scape painting. Plain and simple realism he tion. The same spirit is evident in more compli-
avoids; the recording of every-day facts he never cated motives like The River, and Ravey's Mill :
attempts, and he does not pretend to be interested they are carried further and they have less simpli-
in those minor details which are, so to speak, the city of arrangement, but the placing of the
embroidery on nature's robes. He has a larger component parts of the composition is quite as
aim, an intention to express the sentiment of his deliberate, and the absence of any jarring or rest-
subjects by showing their decorative capabilities' less note is equally perceptible. When he goes
and by presenting broadly and simply those aspects further still into work of a more realistic type, and
of them which are most susceptible of rhythmical deals with such definite facts as he has set down in
arrangement, and which lend themselves best to A Devonshire Cottage, Cluden Mill, and Houghton
studied design. If any comparison were needed Mill, he remains still true to the principles which
between him and his predecessors it would pro- govern his entire practice. In these last pictures
bably be most correct to speak of him as a follower he has filled in his pattern more elaborately ; he
of Corot, for he has learned some-
thing from the French romanticist
master. But what he owes to
Corot is very far from being the
greater part of his equipment; it
amounts to little more than a
certain elegant facility in the put-
ting together of the component
parts of his pictorial scheme. What
is most interesting and remarkable
in his pictures comes from Mr.
Thomas himself.
He is first of all a decorator, who
seeks and finds in landscapes which
are frankly natural special oppor-
tunities for carrying to completion
a logical design. About the pattern
of each of his pictures he greatly
concerns himself; he adjusts lines
and masses and harmonises forms,
and he plans his colour with the
closest consideration for its balance
not only of area but also of degree.
As a consequence, his work has
definitely the charm of suavity
and reticence and is attractive
both in its grace and its repose;
it bears the stamp of scholarly
consideration and matured judg-
ment, and there is in its restraint
evidence that he has mastered
that most perplexing of artistic
problems, how to use his material "the road to chagford" by grosvenor thomas
260