Studio: international art (70.1917)

The Art of George Harcourt

“A LADY AND HER CHILDREN”

OIL PAINTING BY GEORGE HARCOURT

ance at the Royal Academy with a picture,
which at once attracted wide attention, entitled
At the Window, with the quotation from Keats's
“ Ode to the Nightingale ” :

The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown.

In this picture, presenting artistic problems
which were distinctly new in those days, the
figure of a girl in evening dress is standing by
a window in a lamp-lit room, and her face,
sharply silhouetted against the deep blue of
the night, is wonderfully expressive of the
meditative mood aroused by the poet's words
and their coincidence with the chanting of the
nightingales in the distant woods.

A more ambitious attempt expressing human
emotion, combined with the beauty of natural
effect, was to be made in view of the Royal
Academy of the following year. On this
occasion Mr. Harcourt attained, with his
Psyche : Farewell, a veritable triumph. Lines
164

from William Morris's “ Earthly Paradise ’
were expressive of the moment represented :

Farewell,

O fairest lord ; and since I cannot dwell
With thee in heaven, let me now hide my head
In whatsoever dark place dwell the dead.

Psyche, with raised arms and uplifted face
full of despair, is standing at the edge of the
water in the full sunlight. The beautiful nude
figure, goddess-like in its idealization, stands
out against flower-gemmed meadows, bounded
in the middle distance by trees, and beyond
by a range of blue hills. The manner in which
both the subtle colour-scheme and the emotional
side of the subject are worked out came as a
surprise to many well-known judges of art.
As one of them said : “ There are drawing,

colour, and sentiment here in a degree which,
displayed by so young a painter, prophesy
as clear as paint can speak, a striking career
in achievement and success.''

In order to seize the truth of this prediction