Studio: international art (45.1909)

Art School Notes

PORCELAIN FIGURE BY HUGO F. KIRSCH

Vienna ; then, after practising at the Royal Porce-
lain Works at Nymphenburg, in Bavaria, and
passing through various other experiences, he
started his own kiln in Vienna, where he is now
exclusively concerned with the manufacture of
his own models. These he chooses from the rich
treasure of types, human and animal, offered to
him in the streets or markets of Vienna. With
Herr Kirsch, however, the “ baking ” is as impor-
tant as the making of the “dishes;” he allows
none to help him, and not a little of the artistic
quality of his creations is due to this fact and to
his even blending of his own colours. The fine
tones in grey, blues, and greens are only achieved
by very careful personal attention to every detail.
He fires his work at the highest possible tempera-
ture (1,400°), and in his glazing follows the
Copenhagen method, which he considers the best
possible, that is, of having an under-glaze at about
800° The soft blending of the colours, the beau-
tiful, smooth polish, and the artistic form and
finish, give distinction to his porcelain.

The medal of the Emperor Francis Joseph
here reproduced is a recent work of Prof. R.
Marschall, who has achieved a well-merited fame
in plastic art. A. S. L.

ART SCHOOL NOTES.

LONDON.—Nearly three hundred sketches
and studies by London art students were
included in the November exhibition at
South Kensington of the works submitted
for the Gilbert-Garret competition. This compe-
tition, long known as the “Gilbert,” originated in
the sketching club founded in 1870 by Mr. Seymour
Lucas, R.A., Mr. A. W. Mason, now headmaster
of the Birkbeck School of Art, and other enterprising
students of the St. Martin’s School, then under the
direction of Mr. John Parker, R.W.S. The success
of the club, of which Sir John Gilbert, that most
facile of sketchers, was president, led to the founda-
tion of similar institutions at other London art
schools, and later to competitions between the
clubs. For years these were confined to the St.
Martin’s, South Kensington, West London (a

MEDAL BY PROF. R. MARSCHALL

school that has long been extinct), and Lambeth,
but early in the eighties the Royal Academy and
the Slade Schools joined in, and the annual com-
petitions have since attracted gradually an ever-
widening circle. Practically all the students’
sketching clubs in the metropolis are now or have
been concerned in these annual contests, and most
contemporary artists of distinction have since 1870
been included among the judges. Unfortunately
no record has been preserved of the prizewinners,
but among them have been numbered Mr. Seymour
Lucas, R.A., Miss Montalba, Mr. H. G. Glindoni,
Mr. Walter Paget, Mr. Byam Shaw, Mr. Charles
Shannon, Mr. Charles Ricketts, Mr. Harold Speed,
and Mr. Frank Stuart Murray, the able decorative
artist whose interviews with emperors and kings

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