DOI Heft:
No. 263 (February 1915)
DOI Artikel:Furst, Herbert E.: The paintings of Leonard Campbell Taylor
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21212#0010
The Paintings of Leonard Campbell Taylor
An unusual amount of “ high finish ” (for which
dreadful expression, reeking of french-polish, we
apologise) first drew the critics’and thepublic’s atten-
tion to the work of Leonard CampbellTaylor. Pains-
taking finish of such quality one hardly expected
to find in a fin de sidle exhibition. The fact is
Campbell Taylor’s “ finish” is a personal achieve-
ment, worth closer study and analysis ; but before
■we proceed to discuss it from a point of view more
likely to interest the readers of this article (if there
be any such : the writer himself generally prefers to
study the excellent reproductions in The Studio
and to make up his own explanatory text) it is
worth while inquiring why “ highly finished stuff,”
as painters sometimes call such work, generally
appeals to the lay mind much more than “ slick”
painting. Mr. Taylor admits, for instance, that it
is the highly finished work which the
public demand of him. This is
natural: to an eye not trained to
see beyond subject-matter the high
finish of a picture bears all the signs
of patient labour. Time is, as every-
body knows, money; consequently
a work upon which much time has
been spent (thought rarely being a
marketable item) must necessarily,
thinks the man of commerce, be
worth much money. Nevertheless,
the man of commerce is not so
wrong as some would like him to
be. From time immemorial artists
have considered “finishing” the
most difficult part of their trade,
and Manet’s method of visualising
has probably been the cause of
more bad painting than Van
Eyck’s.
The informed eye admires in
Campbell Taylor’s work not so
much the finish as its discreetness.
Where the layman’s mind sees a
polished mahogany table with a
Chinese vase and flowers the ex-
perienced eye distinguishes a con-
cert of colour, admires both melody
and accompaniment, traces with
Appreciation the rise and fall of
light, the little episodes of local
colour, the quiet, unifying passages
of shade, and the symphony of the
tout ensemble. There is no attempt
to deceive the eye. The artist
knows that this means, not a minute
4
representation of isolated facts, but a discreet
selection and arrangement of such facts as the
painter deems both presentable and representable.
In other words, instead of painting all his eyes can
see, he endeavours rather to suppress what he
knows would destroy the unity of his picture. In
his picture Reminiscences he has a convex mirror in
the approved Van Eyck manner with minute
representation of the objects it reflects, and yet
the picture suppresses many facts which the eye of
the artist saw but did not require. In this way
the interest is concentrated on the most important
part of the painting—the heads of the two old
people. All serious modern artists work on these
well-known principles laid down for them by such
great painters as Fantin-Latour, Manet, Chardin,
and Vermeer. The latitude of selection accounts
“the grey shawl”
BY L. CAMPBELL TAYLOR
An unusual amount of “ high finish ” (for which
dreadful expression, reeking of french-polish, we
apologise) first drew the critics’and thepublic’s atten-
tion to the work of Leonard CampbellTaylor. Pains-
taking finish of such quality one hardly expected
to find in a fin de sidle exhibition. The fact is
Campbell Taylor’s “ finish” is a personal achieve-
ment, worth closer study and analysis ; but before
■we proceed to discuss it from a point of view more
likely to interest the readers of this article (if there
be any such : the writer himself generally prefers to
study the excellent reproductions in The Studio
and to make up his own explanatory text) it is
worth while inquiring why “ highly finished stuff,”
as painters sometimes call such work, generally
appeals to the lay mind much more than “ slick”
painting. Mr. Taylor admits, for instance, that it
is the highly finished work which the
public demand of him. This is
natural: to an eye not trained to
see beyond subject-matter the high
finish of a picture bears all the signs
of patient labour. Time is, as every-
body knows, money; consequently
a work upon which much time has
been spent (thought rarely being a
marketable item) must necessarily,
thinks the man of commerce, be
worth much money. Nevertheless,
the man of commerce is not so
wrong as some would like him to
be. From time immemorial artists
have considered “finishing” the
most difficult part of their trade,
and Manet’s method of visualising
has probably been the cause of
more bad painting than Van
Eyck’s.
The informed eye admires in
Campbell Taylor’s work not so
much the finish as its discreetness.
Where the layman’s mind sees a
polished mahogany table with a
Chinese vase and flowers the ex-
perienced eye distinguishes a con-
cert of colour, admires both melody
and accompaniment, traces with
Appreciation the rise and fall of
light, the little episodes of local
colour, the quiet, unifying passages
of shade, and the symphony of the
tout ensemble. There is no attempt
to deceive the eye. The artist
knows that this means, not a minute
4
representation of isolated facts, but a discreet
selection and arrangement of such facts as the
painter deems both presentable and representable.
In other words, instead of painting all his eyes can
see, he endeavours rather to suppress what he
knows would destroy the unity of his picture. In
his picture Reminiscences he has a convex mirror in
the approved Van Eyck manner with minute
representation of the objects it reflects, and yet
the picture suppresses many facts which the eye of
the artist saw but did not require. In this way
the interest is concentrated on the most important
part of the painting—the heads of the two old
people. All serious modern artists work on these
well-known principles laid down for them by such
great painters as Fantin-Latour, Manet, Chardin,
and Vermeer. The latitude of selection accounts
“the grey shawl”
BY L. CAMPBELL TAYLOR