Studio: international art (41.1907)

Grosvenor Thomas

~This own practice. During
'•kg^^^ftfctttai^ the time he spent in Scot-

MSHF 9|^^^|K^flk^^ land he fell under the spell

of the art which has grown
up in that country during

/, the last hundred years or

JmO so> and t0 its traditions he

• has remained more or less

faithful ever since.

Yet in responding thus
readily to the influence of
his surroundings he has not
surrendered his liberty to
s think for himself, and he

has certainly not sacrificed
his individuality. The senti-
ment of his work is Scottish

"on the ouse" ky grosvenor tiiomas but with a difference, and

for that difference his per-

has added more explanatory touches and has made sonal preferences are accountable. His colour
more concessions to the popular demand for sense is purely his own, his instinct for choice of
actuality, but his love of studied design has kept subject is natural to him, and even his romanticism,
him just as surely from
obviousness and from the
bald commonplaces of the
unthinking and uninspired
painter.

If, however, his art owes
much of its persuasiveness
to his decorative sense, it
owes hardly less to his ap-
preciation of the subtleties
of romanticism. He pos-
sesses an ample measure of
that romantic sentiment so
characteristic of the Scot-
tish school to which he
belongs by association,
though not by birth. A
self-taught painter, trained
in no school, and developed
under no guidance save
that of his own intelligence,
he gathered his knowledge
of art when and where he
could. He has studied
Corot and Daubigny and
the other Barbizon masters;
he has looked long and
closely at the modern Dutch
painters, but he has found
in the earnestness and ster-
ling sincerity of Scottish
painting the best model for "evening" by grosvenor thomas

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