Studio: international art (49.1910)

Studio-Talk

ceilings, windows and doors are kept perfectly
plain; stucco, carvings and intarsia being avoided.
Special care is devoted to the textiles which cover
the walls and furniture and to the carpets. The
atmosphere'js homely but refined; and is entirely
characteristic of the sturdy opponent of fraud and
sham in German culture.

STUDIO-TALK.

(From Our Own Correspondents.)

LONDON.—The death of Mr. John
Macallan Swan, R.A., which we regret
to record as having taken place in the
Isle of Wight on February 14, leaves a
gap in the ranks of members of the Royal
Academy, the “ Old ” Water-Colour Society, and
other bodies, which it will not be easy to fill. To
him belongs the distinction of having achieved
renown both as a painter and as a sculptor—a
combination of functions which is extremely rare
nowadays, wThen specialisation among artists is on
the increase rather than otherwise. Mr. Swan

himself specialised in one direction, namely, in
the portrayal of animal life, and here he was
without a rival, in this country at all events.

Mr. Swan, who was born at Old Brentford in
1847, began his art studies at the Worcester School
of Art, and continued them in London, first at the
Lambeth School of Art under Mr. J. L. Sparkes,
and then at the Royal Academy Schools. Later
he spent several years in Paris, where he studied
painting under J. L. Gerome, and modelling under
Fremiet, and it was here that he laid the founda-
tion for a brilliant career by his patient and per-
sistent attention to anatomy. His work in general
was discussed in these pages by Mr. Baldry in
March and April, 1901, and the numerous repro-
ductions of his animal studies and other works
which accompanied the article demonstrated the
artist’s versatile gifts; and now through the
courtesy of Mr. D. Croal Thompson we are able
to give our readers a reproduction in colours of a
very beautiful pastel study of a lion, which, like
the drawing of a leopard below, again testifies

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LEOPARD

BY J. M. SWAN, R.A.