Studio: international art (60.1914)

Sketching Notes in Tunis and Gabes

The town of Tunis, where the visitor lands,
contains an embarrassing wealth of paintable sub-
jects. The street scenes are busy pictures of
Oriental life, and every corner with its native types
clamours for a sketch. There is every opportunity
of working out of doors in winter, as it is nearly
always fine, and the brilliant sunshine of the early
mornings affords ideal conditions for sketching.

A walk through the souks, the covered-in native
bazaars, all composed of narrow alleys, and cover-
ing acres and acres of ground, will be a revelation
of Oriental life in its primitive simplicity. The
craftsman works at his trade, squatting in his little
den of a shop, and turns out strangely beautiful
ware in leather, embroidery, and jewellery. Here
is the favourite resort of artists, who delight in the
Oriental picturesqueness of the scene, but the
distraction of the noisy populace and the diffused
glow of sunlight on whitewashed walls and columns,
with bright spots of sunlight on the ground, coming
through crevices in the roof, make it no easy
matter to sketch.

The variety of native types is astonishing.
Everywhere one encounters Arabs, Berbers, Moors,
Bedouins, Jews and many another race, all dressed

in flowing robes of brilliant colour. The negroes,
too, are interesting, and of many different hues
ranging from browny black to a slaty blue. Then
the fair-haired Berber, who represents the old
aboriginal population of the Barbary States, is
still the predominant type to-day in North Africa.
Oftentimes, however, the race is intermixed with
Greek or Roman, and this accounts for many of
the very beautiful classic types that one sees.

The women of the country are scarcely seen at
all in the town, and the few that venture out of
doors are closely veiled, so that except as studies
in drapery they do not interest the artist. The
men, too, object to being drawn or painted. Of
course in a street scene small figures are easily
put in from passers-by or from memory, but the
native has a marked aversion to being sketched or
having his portrait taken. There is one class,
however, that is a boon to the artist—the Bedouins,
women and girls. They will pose for a few pence
and some are extremely graceful, making excellent
models. A French artist, Monsieur Pinchart, who
has a studio in Tunis, sends some charming pictures
of them to the Paris Salon every year. For outdoor
sketching the artist accustomed to northern climes

A LANE JN THE OASIS OF GABES

294

PHOTO LEHNERT