Studio: international art (54.1912)

Studio- Talk

PLAQUETTE : LEWIS WALLER

BY PBRCIVAL M. E. MEDLEY

is in her women a certain foreign air, an expression
which only those who have been in Japan can
understand. It is due, perhaps, to this fact that
those of her prints which give us rear views of
girls and women as they pass before our eyes are
particularly pleasing and effective. In these the
contradictions referred to, of Oriental forms and
Western spirit, are not apparent, and we take all
the more delight in their harmonic lines and
exquisite colour.

A word as to the colours employed. Miss
Hyde has always shown an unusual sense for
colour, and this makes itself felt in her maturer
work. The " white light " of Japan is found in
her prints. Like many of the older artists, she
has marked preference for certain colours; but
like them, she, too, shows admirable judgment in
their use. She seems particularly fond of a deep
rich green, which, however, is never allowed to
become obtrusive, and of a delicate rose tint that
speaks of spring blossoms under a sunny sky.
Then, too, she generally follows the older masters
in eliminating all cast shadows, thereby enhancing
the flat decorative effect, so much to be desired.

But when the petals of the early blossoms ot

Tokyo have fallen in a fairy-like shower, and the
voice of the "singing" insect is heard in the glow
of a red sun, Miss Hyde exchanges her Tokyo home
for one, if possible, more dear to her, in that
loveliest of lovely spots, Nikko, favoured of gods
and men. There the gorgeous red and gold of
the magnificent temples, the purple shadows
stealing out of the darker recesses of the wooded
hills, the bright shafts of golden sunlight piercing
the eddying stream in sparkling dimples, or
multiplied in rainbow hue in countless waterfalls,
quicken her heart-beats, and her brush throws
aside all restraint, and revels in light and colour.

(From Our Own Correspondents.)

IONDON.—We reproduce this month two
portraits by Mr. Percival M. E. Hedley,
who has been enjoying some success for
-J the portraits he has executed of celebrities
in this country. Our illustrations are from a plaque
in relief of Mr. Lewis Waller, the actor ; and Mr.
Wilhelm Backhaus, the pianist. Mr. Hedley was a
student of the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna. He
assisted in monumental work on the buildings of

PORTRAIT OF WILHELM BACKHAUS

BY PERCIVAL M. E. HEDLEY

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STUDIO-TALK.