DOI Heft:
No. 322 (January 1920)
DOI Artikel:Taylor, Ernest Archibald: J. Hamilton Mackenzie: Painter and etcher
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21359#0159
J. HAMILTON MACKENZIE, PAINTER AND ETCHER
days, and the most lasting military deco-
ration allotted to him is a riveted silver
plate uniting a twice-broken leg. While
in East Africa he let no opportunity for
sketching escape, and with what slight
materials he had provided himself he
managed to bring back many charming
drawings. Of these a selected few have
been shown at the Glasgow Art Club, and
some were reproduced in The Studio
Special War Number, 1918, the accom-
panying illustration, Herald of the Evening
Wind, Morogoro, E. Africa, being from one
of the series. But to turn one's back on
these years of uncertainty and pick up
afresh the current of pre-war enthusiasm
is no easy task, though in some the
endeavour has undoubtedly produced a
more virile technique and a less stupid
sentimentality of subject. Mackenzie's
outlook, however, was not one that could
be easily wavered ; his mind contained too
many sane roads of appreciation in which
the paths of decadence had no place. In
which medium his work makes the widest
appeal it is difficult to say. From a purely
personal point of view, I favour his water-
colours, chalk drawings, etchings, and
pastels, yet without in any way wishing
to disparage his oil portraiture and land-
scapes. Technically, the quality of his
line in his chalk drawings has a charm-
ing fascination, especially in subjects deal-
ing with long stretches of road, hills, and
moorlands ; and of his pastels those of
sheep and low-lying landscapes with wind-
swept skies have always a luminous indi-
viduality which is arresting. His water-
colours, again, reveal a rare intimacy with
things, and a certain love in his having
done them for themselves. He is not
self-satisfied, however, and to hear him
expatiate on his own work is to hear
no affected dissatisfaction with it. He
"HERALD OF THE EVENING WIND, MORO-
GORO, EAST AFRICA ” WATER-COLOUR BY
J. HAMILTON MACKENZIE, R.S.W., A.R.E.
153
days, and the most lasting military deco-
ration allotted to him is a riveted silver
plate uniting a twice-broken leg. While
in East Africa he let no opportunity for
sketching escape, and with what slight
materials he had provided himself he
managed to bring back many charming
drawings. Of these a selected few have
been shown at the Glasgow Art Club, and
some were reproduced in The Studio
Special War Number, 1918, the accom-
panying illustration, Herald of the Evening
Wind, Morogoro, E. Africa, being from one
of the series. But to turn one's back on
these years of uncertainty and pick up
afresh the current of pre-war enthusiasm
is no easy task, though in some the
endeavour has undoubtedly produced a
more virile technique and a less stupid
sentimentality of subject. Mackenzie's
outlook, however, was not one that could
be easily wavered ; his mind contained too
many sane roads of appreciation in which
the paths of decadence had no place. In
which medium his work makes the widest
appeal it is difficult to say. From a purely
personal point of view, I favour his water-
colours, chalk drawings, etchings, and
pastels, yet without in any way wishing
to disparage his oil portraiture and land-
scapes. Technically, the quality of his
line in his chalk drawings has a charm-
ing fascination, especially in subjects deal-
ing with long stretches of road, hills, and
moorlands ; and of his pastels those of
sheep and low-lying landscapes with wind-
swept skies have always a luminous indi-
viduality which is arresting. His water-
colours, again, reveal a rare intimacy with
things, and a certain love in his having
done them for themselves. He is not
self-satisfied, however, and to hear him
expatiate on his own work is to hear
no affected dissatisfaction with it. He
"HERALD OF THE EVENING WIND, MORO-
GORO, EAST AFRICA ” WATER-COLOUR BY
J. HAMILTON MACKENZIE, R.S.W., A.R.E.
153