DOI Heft:
No. 340 (July 1921)
DOI Artikel:Reviews
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21393#0058
REVIEWS.
Four Irish Landscape Painters. By
Thomas Bodkin. (Dublin : Talbot Press;
London: T. Fisher Unwin.) " Irish
people," says Mr. Bodkin, " distrust their
instinct woefully in matters of art, though
Dublin must be one of the best places
on earth in which to sell Worthless old
paintings," and " they will back their
fancy for anything but a modern picture."
Hence, as he points out with regret, most
of the Irishmen who have won distinction
as artists in the course of the past century
or so have had to make their way on alien
soil, and while this has been especially
the case with portrait painters, it is also
in the main true of the chief landscape
painters of Irish birth, such as the four
whose lives and works are set forth in this
volume. These are George Barret, R.A.,
a Foundation member of the English
Royal Academy and father of the better
known water-colour painter, George
Barret, junior ; James Arthur O'Connor
(1792-1841); Walter Frederick Osborne,
R.H.A. (1859-1903); and Nathaniel Hone,
R.H.A. (1831-1917), a distant relative of
another Foundation member of the R.A.
The first two left Ireland early and never
returned ; Hone spent much of his time
abroad, and Osborne, who refused a
Knighthood, was the only one who
elected to live and work mainly in his own
country, which, as the author remarks,
provides almost every form of landscape
dear to the painter. It is to be hoped that
Mr. Bodkin's effort to arouse interest
among his countrymen in the work of their
artist-kinsmen may bear fruit. He gives
a large number of reproductions of pictures
by these four painters, and in the seven-
teen appendices, to which he modestly
assigns the chief importance, complete
lists of their productions as exhibited or
sold at auction are given. 000
Drawing. By A. S. Hartrick, R.W.S.
(London: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons,
Ltd.) Printed on the title-page of this
little book is a pithy and significant saying
by Ingres, often quoted but in these days
more often ignored—" Le Dessin, c'est
a probite de l'Art." This motto gives
a clue to the contents of the book, which,
stated briefly, is a plea for the adoption
42
of rational methods of teaching drawing
based on the experience of the great
masters, and it is, therefore, as Mr.
Clausen remarks in his foreword, in the
best sense academic. Intended for teachers
rather than the student, it is to be heartily
commended as an earnest and well-
substantiated plea for a wider outlook
than that which prevails in the majority
of our art schools, where, as Mr. Clausen
again points out, the studies are too much
restricted to certain aspects of Greek and
Roman art and to the posed model, and
the neglect to pay due regard to the general
development of art has begotten a narrow-
ness which repels the student even from
whatever good there is in the training.
Mr. Hartrick records his conviction that
with the adoption of a simple and sound
system of teaching drawing in our primary
and secondary schools the problem of the
art and technical schools would solve itself
—a system, however, in which " short
cuts " find no place, and he urges that any
tendency in that direction should be
discouraged, while on the other hand he
speaks with almost unqualified approval
of the memory training system of Lecoq
de Boisbaudran. The book, every page
of which is pregnant with thoughtful
observation and instructive information,
concludes with reproductions of drawings
by the great masters and others by high
school girls with comments thereon. 0
Looking at Pictures. By S. C. Kaines
Smith, M.A (London: Methuen and
Co., Ltd.) This handy volume is ap-
parently the outcome of Mr. Kaines
Smith's experience as official guide-
lecturer at the National Gallery in London.
He discovered that the majority of visitors
were afraid to form, and much more
afraid to express, a preference for any
picture for fear of exposing themselves to
ridicule or to the accusation of being in-
artistic, and his aim in writing his book
is to lift from the minds of such as these
the " burdensome superstition " that to
enjoy pictures it is necessary to be a judge
of painting. What he has here written
is so clear and so much to the point that
it cannot fail to help those who visit the
public collections to understand and ap-
preciate the great works of art they see.
Four Irish Landscape Painters. By
Thomas Bodkin. (Dublin : Talbot Press;
London: T. Fisher Unwin.) " Irish
people," says Mr. Bodkin, " distrust their
instinct woefully in matters of art, though
Dublin must be one of the best places
on earth in which to sell Worthless old
paintings," and " they will back their
fancy for anything but a modern picture."
Hence, as he points out with regret, most
of the Irishmen who have won distinction
as artists in the course of the past century
or so have had to make their way on alien
soil, and while this has been especially
the case with portrait painters, it is also
in the main true of the chief landscape
painters of Irish birth, such as the four
whose lives and works are set forth in this
volume. These are George Barret, R.A.,
a Foundation member of the English
Royal Academy and father of the better
known water-colour painter, George
Barret, junior ; James Arthur O'Connor
(1792-1841); Walter Frederick Osborne,
R.H.A. (1859-1903); and Nathaniel Hone,
R.H.A. (1831-1917), a distant relative of
another Foundation member of the R.A.
The first two left Ireland early and never
returned ; Hone spent much of his time
abroad, and Osborne, who refused a
Knighthood, was the only one who
elected to live and work mainly in his own
country, which, as the author remarks,
provides almost every form of landscape
dear to the painter. It is to be hoped that
Mr. Bodkin's effort to arouse interest
among his countrymen in the work of their
artist-kinsmen may bear fruit. He gives
a large number of reproductions of pictures
by these four painters, and in the seven-
teen appendices, to which he modestly
assigns the chief importance, complete
lists of their productions as exhibited or
sold at auction are given. 000
Drawing. By A. S. Hartrick, R.W.S.
(London: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons,
Ltd.) Printed on the title-page of this
little book is a pithy and significant saying
by Ingres, often quoted but in these days
more often ignored—" Le Dessin, c'est
a probite de l'Art." This motto gives
a clue to the contents of the book, which,
stated briefly, is a plea for the adoption
42
of rational methods of teaching drawing
based on the experience of the great
masters, and it is, therefore, as Mr.
Clausen remarks in his foreword, in the
best sense academic. Intended for teachers
rather than the student, it is to be heartily
commended as an earnest and well-
substantiated plea for a wider outlook
than that which prevails in the majority
of our art schools, where, as Mr. Clausen
again points out, the studies are too much
restricted to certain aspects of Greek and
Roman art and to the posed model, and
the neglect to pay due regard to the general
development of art has begotten a narrow-
ness which repels the student even from
whatever good there is in the training.
Mr. Hartrick records his conviction that
with the adoption of a simple and sound
system of teaching drawing in our primary
and secondary schools the problem of the
art and technical schools would solve itself
—a system, however, in which " short
cuts " find no place, and he urges that any
tendency in that direction should be
discouraged, while on the other hand he
speaks with almost unqualified approval
of the memory training system of Lecoq
de Boisbaudran. The book, every page
of which is pregnant with thoughtful
observation and instructive information,
concludes with reproductions of drawings
by the great masters and others by high
school girls with comments thereon. 0
Looking at Pictures. By S. C. Kaines
Smith, M.A (London: Methuen and
Co., Ltd.) This handy volume is ap-
parently the outcome of Mr. Kaines
Smith's experience as official guide-
lecturer at the National Gallery in London.
He discovered that the majority of visitors
were afraid to form, and much more
afraid to express, a preference for any
picture for fear of exposing themselves to
ridicule or to the accusation of being in-
artistic, and his aim in writing his book
is to lift from the minds of such as these
the " burdensome superstition " that to
enjoy pictures it is necessary to be a judge
of painting. What he has here written
is so clear and so much to the point that
it cannot fail to help those who visit the
public collections to understand and ap-
preciate the great works of art they see.