Studio: international art (60.1914)

Reviews and Notices

the Victoria and Albert Museum. This useful
compendium is now supplemented by an equally
useful and interesting set of diagrams, prepared
with great care and contained in a dainty portfolio,
showing the multifarious stitches used in em-
broideries emanating from countries bordering on
the Mediterranean and other regions of the Near
East contiguous thereto, as well as Persia. Some
of the stitches are, of course, akin to those met with
in European work, but there are others which are
peculiar to the localities where the embroidery was
executed, such as the “overcast Bokhara stitch,”
the “ Cretan feather stitch,” &c. Miss Pesel has
rendered a real service to needleworkers by demon-
strating so clearly the technique employed by those
of other countries and our own in past times.

Forty-three Drawings. By Alastair. With a
note of exclamation by Robert Ross. (London :
Lane.) 42s. net.—Alastair’s art is witty, dainty and
fantastic. The Beardsley school has acquired
a distinct place in the last few years, but no artist
of the school has had quite so much of the vitality
of the master as Alastair. There are disciples of
Beardsley both masculine and feminine; on the
feminine side probably Miss Annie French preserves
the spirit of Beardsley’s conventions most success-
fully, while among men they seem safest with the
new-comer Alastair. This artist perceives, as did
his master, that realism is an essential of beauty,
and he works within the limitations he has accepted
as if in them he possessed the freedom of the
whole world, and since exquisiteness of craft is
always found to be practised within strict limitations
we suffer no disappointment in looking for it in this
volume. Alastair again, like his master, can
successfully conceal from our first glance the
sinister implication of some of his designs. His
draughtsmanship, however, is much more ephemeral
in character than was Beardsley’s, and far less
masculine in touch, and there is constant repetition,
showing a narrow range, but the vitality of the
work is such that this book of drawings is not one
to be lightly pushed aside.

Arthur Rackhartis Book of Pictures. (London :

Heinemann.) 15A.—This book is quite charac-

teristic of the versatility and humour of its gifted
maker. It contains between forty and fifty of his
most elaborate tinted drawings, and nothing that is
not ingenious and skilful to an extraordinary degree.
Many of the plates show the most admirable side
of the artist’s work. It is impossible, indeed, to
imagine anything more delightful in illustration
than On the Beach, The Broad Walk, Cupid's Alley,
Butterflies—the style in them is perfect.

The Tale of Lohengrin. After the drama of

Richard Wagner by T. W. Rolleston. Presented
by Willy Pogany. (London : G. G. Harrap and
Co.) 15J. net.—The drawings decorative and
illustrative made by Mr. Pogany for this volume
exhibit all the exuberance of fantasy which has
characterised most of the work he has done. Save
for a few illustrations in colour which, having been
reproduced by the colour-block process, have been
printed hors texte on white paper and mounted, the
entire contents are printed on a thick grey paper,
apparently by what is known as the “ litho-offset ”
process. The drawings in colour which are pre-
sented in this way look dull and somewhat lifeless
in immediate juxtaposition with those reproduced
by the block process; but those which are printed
in black lose little if anything by this method of
reproduction.

Dress Design: An account of Costume for
Artists and Dressmakers. By Talbot Hughes.
(London : John Hogg.) 7a. 6d. net.—The

publishers have issued this volume in continuation
of their admirable aim of providing in their “Artistic
Craft Series of Technical Handbooks” trustworthy
text-books of workshop practice and of good design.
Mr. Talbot Hughes, whose own fine collection of
costumes has been recently acquired by the firm of
Harrods for presentation to the Victoria and Albert
Museum, can write with authority upon this fasci-
nating subject. His historical survey of dress and
fashions in Great Britain from earliest times up to
the Victorian Era, is fully illustrated by numbers of
line drawings made by the author and thirty-five
pages of collotype reproductions of photographs of
costumes, shown for the most part, as is surely the
only really satisfactory way, upon the person. A
number of patterns drawn to scale and reproduced
at the end of the volume add practical and technical
value to this useful handbook.

More About Collecting. By Sir James Yoxall,
M.P. (London : Stanley Paul.) 5a. net.—Once
more Sir James Yoxall has laid the beginner and
amateur in collecting under an obligation by the
production of this new book on a subject about
which he can write so authoritatively. In an easy
and somewhat rambling style he pleasantly dis-
cusses almost all the varied ramifications of the
curio-hunter’s quest. Here is great store of hints
for the tyro and much that the more experienced
collector may read with advantage. The volume
contains a number of illustrations which have,
however, only occasionally intimate relation with
the text, and the index is hardly as comprehensive
as it might be.

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