Studio: international art (79.1920)

STUDIO-TALK.

(From our own Correspondents.)

LONDON.—At a General Assembly of
j the Royal Academy on January 21,
Mr. George Henry and Mr. D. Y. Cameron
were elected Royal Academicians. Mr.
Henry became an Associate in 1907, and
Mr. Cameron as recently as 1916. Both
are Scotsmen and members of the Royal
Scottish Academy, and the art of both has
been the subject of articles in this magazine
at various times. 0000
Almost simultaneously with these elec-
tions came the announcement of the death
of Mr. Alfred Parsons, R.A., at the age
of 72. Mr. Parsons, who was a native of
Somerset and was a clerk in the General
Post Office before he took to painting as a
profession, began to exhibit at the Royal
Academy in 1871, but his election as
Associate did not take place till more than
twenty years later ; he was made a full
member in 1911, just forty years after his
debut as an exhibitor. He succeeded his
fellow-Academician, the late Sir Ernest
Waterlow, as President of the Royal Society
of Painters in Water Colours in 1914. He
was famous as a painter of gardens and
flowers, and besides being an ardent horti-
culturist was noted as a mountain climber
and as a waterman. 0000
The Academy has suffered a further loss
this year by the death of Mr. Andrew
Carrick Gow, R.A., who died on February 1,
at Burlington House, his official residence
as Keeper of the Royal Academy, which
office he held since the death of Mr.
Ernest Crofts in 1911. Mr. Gow was a
Scotsman born in London, and was a few
months younger than Mr. Parsons ; his
first appearance at Burlington House as an
exhibitor was, however, a year earlier—
1870. Showing at the outset of his career
a special predilection for the u subject ''
picture, he especially distinguished himself
in the role of historic painter, his most
notable work being the picture of Cromwell
at Dunbar, painted while he was an
Associate and acquired for the nation under
the Chantrey Bequest. 000
Many who practise the craft of wood-
carving in this country will learn with
regret of the death of Miss Eleanor Rowe,
for many years in charge of the School of
34

Wood Carving, which was organized on a
sound footing mainly through her instru-
mentality. Miss Rowe was the author of a
manual of wood-carving which has had a
considerable vogue among students of the
craft. She was herself an earnest student
of architecture, and it was due to her
initiative that women were admitted to the
course of training in that faculty at
University College. 000

One by one the art societies which have
been in a state of suspended animation
since 1914 are resuming their pre-war
activities. The Pencil Society is one of
these and its first post-war show was held
at the exhibition gallery of Messrs. Derry
and Toms at Kensington at the end of
January. Some fifteen artists were repre-
sented by drawings revealing a very con-
siderable diversity in the use of the medium
employed—charcoal or pencil in most
cases—as well as in the subject-matter.
Among them were drawings of the Western
Front by Mr. Gilbert Holiday, figure
studies by Mr. Joseph Simpson, Mr. Ross
Burnett, and others, animal and bird
drawings by Mr. Warwick Reynolds and
Mr. J. A. Shepherd, maritime and land
drawings by Mr. Cecil King, impressions
of prominent personalities by Mr. Bert
Thomas, architecture by Mr. Hanslip
Fletcher, and a set of 44 Masks '' and other
drawings by Mr. Vernon Hill. 0 0

The recent acquisition of the business
of Messrs. Derry and Toms by the firm of
John Barker and Co. has, we regret to
learn, put an end to the excellent exhibi-
tion gallery at the top of the former firm's
premises, which during the past two or
three years has been devoted to various
manifestations of modern art. 0 0

The Modern Society of Portrait Painters
is another society which has this year
resumed its exhibitions after an interval of
several years, owing, in this case, to many
of the members being on active service.
Though the display presented by the
society at the Institute Galleries in Picca-
dilly last month contained little that could
be described as of unusual significance, the
average quality of the work was far from
mediocre. Most of the Society's twenty-
five members were ably represented,
notably Mr. Glyn Philpot, Mr. Fiddes
Watt, Mr. Eric George, Mr. F. H. S.