Studio: international art (81.1921)

SOME PAINTINGS AND DRAW-
INGS BY MR. P. A. DE LASZLO.

THERE seems to have come into
existence during the last few years a
new conception of the aim and purpose
of drawing—a new view, that is to say,
of what draughtsmanship means and of its
function as a mode of expression. A
generation or so ago the student was
taught that the indispensable thing to seek
for was absolute accuracy in the statement
of fact, that he must set down what he saw
with the strictest regard for truth; and
that the faculty to represent realities with
painstaking elaboration was one which he
must sedulously cultivate. Any attempt on
his part to develop a style of his own or
to evolve a personal convention was
rigorously suppressed ; to give way to an
inclination of that sort was altogether
against the rules because it might lead to
looseness of method and to an evasion of
the draughtsman's strict responsibility.
Quality of line, it is true, was not ignored,
but it was accounted as a matter of second-
ary importance in comparison with the
exact presentation of every detail of the
subject; it was quite permissible to
sacrifice it if thereby greater correctness
could be ensured. 0000
Now, the theory of draughtsmanship is
almost entirely reversed ; strict accuracy
of statement is no longer insisted upon as
the one and only aim of the student, and
quality of line is put forward as a particular
consideration. A drawing has to be a kind
of decorative exercise, and even distortions
of natural form and perversions of fact are
allowed if the general decorative effect
satisfies the modern idea. Nature need not
be copied, but can be transcribed and
altered to suit the artist's scheme of
design ; and the characteristic details of
the subject can be emphasised and exag-
gerated to almost any extent, if by emphasis
that subject can be brought more fully up
to the latest standard of effectiveness—
and that standard is one which recognises
even caricature as legitimate. 0 0
Really, it cannot be said that either the
past or the present conception of the
draughtsman's obligations is to be accepted
as correct. Against the unnecessary
pedantry of the old days we have now a
LXXXI. No. 335.—February 1921

rebellion which to a considerable extent
has got out of hand ; instead of excessive
restrictions we have undisciplined freedom,
and there is some danger that in the
license of the moment we may forget
what was good in the more precise methods
of our predecessors. In most traditions
there is something worthy of respect amid
much that is out of date or obsolete, and
the wise man sorts out the odds and ends
which have come down to him from a
previous generation to see what he can
with advantage convert to his own uses. 0
For this reason the work of such an
artist as Mr. de Laszlo deserves to be held
up as an example to modern students. He
has sifted the dust of tradition and he has
found in it a good deal worth keeping.
Yet he is no pedant and no follower of
mechanical and stereotyped principles,

A. >£"np> ,5
• ■*■« r*«jf.

"beatrice phillips tr
drawing by p. a.
de laszlo, m.v.o.

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