Studio: international art (67.1916)

Water-Colours by E. M. Synge

relieved by one small splash of luminous scarlet in
the figures which is repeated faintly in a bit of
sail. It is perfect in its realisation of the working
life of Venice. Just ugly, dirty black boats, and
a stretch of sunlit pavement—Venice of the
Venetians—full of light and colour, but no gon-
dolas or palaces to spoil its simplicity.

The Bridge, Villeneuve-Loubet, an early autumn
sketch, shows the Riviera in the gorgeous and
beautiful dress it wears when few visitors are there
to admire. Like other places, “ the back of
beyond ” in the Riviera is at its best for painters
then. After the torrents of rain that fall at the
Equinox there comes a spell of perfect painting
weather, while the trailing vines are slowly turning
to vivid reds and yellows. There is then generally
but little wind—that curse of Provence—so the
glory of autumn lingers long on the trees and the
vine terraces. The poplar
trees of Villeneuve mixed
with giant planes are a
dream of colour. Synge
loved the graceful branch-
ing of poplars, and he
rarely passed a group of
them without stopping to
make a note of their
possibilities.

The hill villages of
Provence were Synge’s
hunting ground during
the last years of his life,
and furnished more sub-
jects for his brush than
for his etching needle.

The first few weeks of
every tour abroad were
always given up to paint-
ing, and after months of
work on plates and at the
printing press, he just
revelled in the freedom of
brush work and the joy
of colour. To be away
from “ sending in ” days
and all the worry of
exhibitions added to his
sense of freedom too.

Those dreadful days when
the final prints were
seldom quite ready (for
the occasions when he
was satisfied with a plate
were few and far between)

146

and when the troubles of frames and mounts, of
backs and glasses, had to be faced, followed by a
journey up to town with the bulky parcel—those
were black days for Synge which it was a joy
to leave behind. His health, too, improved like
magic away from English damp, in the mountain
air and bright sun of those wonderful little towns
of the Alpes Maritimes. How he loved the old
grey houses built out of the debris of the
mountain side and roofed with the pale sun-baked
tiles, their unhewn stone, covered here and there
with patches of coloured plaster, their buttressed
walls rising sheer from the edge of the precipice,
broken only by the line of their rocky mule
tracks, the whole set off so well by its back-
ground of olives and grey mountain—equally
beautiful in sunshine or on the rare grey days
of winter, and all so absolutely unchanged

BY E. M. SYNGE