DOI Heft:
No. 351 (June 1922)
DOI Artikel:French, Cecil: The later work of F. Cayley Robinson, A.R.A., R.W.S.
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21395#0310
“ THE BALCONY.” WATER-COLOUR
BY F. CAYLEY ROBINSON, A.R.A.
THE LATER WORK OF F. CAYLEY
ROBINSON, A.R.A., R.W.S. BY
CECIL FRENCH. * a a
THOSE who can recall Mr. Cayley
Robinson's early appearances at the
Royal Society of British Artists can have
had but little idea of the development that
was to follow ; and yet the history of this
artist is not unlike that of certain other
well-known imaginative creators. The
almost defiant note of the youthful roman-
ticist will often yield to something not far
distant from classical serenity. Burne-Jones
is a good example ; Rossetti—though the
later, Romanesque, Rosetti fell speedily into
decay—is another example, perhaps ; in a
parallel art, Maeterlinck. It is the old
story : the intensity of youth — its
“ ardours and endurances," its imperfec-
tions, often lovable—cannot be maintained.
Art, assuredly, has its spring, its summer,
Vol. LXXXIII.—No. 351. June 1922.
its autumn. Woe to the artist, no matter
of what assured brilliance, who would stay
the course of the seasons, or who is not
continually striving toward whatever
unfolding may be possible to him. a
I would record—with no disrespect, I
hope, to the other members of that Society
—that it was the infrequent appearance cf
Cayley Robinsons at the British Artists that
drew me, as a boy, to those exhibitions.
The potency of spell, the visionary
strangeness, the almost desperate sincerity,
of the new, mysterious, isolated artist
brought to mind the first strenuous
beginnings of the English Pre-Raphaelite
group. In his earlier efforts two distinct
strains are to be found in Cayley Robinson's
outlook. The methods of the then pre-
vailing ** Newlyn school "—the searching
study of values rendered by means of a
somewhat heavy, square brush-work —
were tempered (nay, opposed) by a very
293
BY F. CAYLEY ROBINSON, A.R.A.
THE LATER WORK OF F. CAYLEY
ROBINSON, A.R.A., R.W.S. BY
CECIL FRENCH. * a a
THOSE who can recall Mr. Cayley
Robinson's early appearances at the
Royal Society of British Artists can have
had but little idea of the development that
was to follow ; and yet the history of this
artist is not unlike that of certain other
well-known imaginative creators. The
almost defiant note of the youthful roman-
ticist will often yield to something not far
distant from classical serenity. Burne-Jones
is a good example ; Rossetti—though the
later, Romanesque, Rosetti fell speedily into
decay—is another example, perhaps ; in a
parallel art, Maeterlinck. It is the old
story : the intensity of youth — its
“ ardours and endurances," its imperfec-
tions, often lovable—cannot be maintained.
Art, assuredly, has its spring, its summer,
Vol. LXXXIII.—No. 351. June 1922.
its autumn. Woe to the artist, no matter
of what assured brilliance, who would stay
the course of the seasons, or who is not
continually striving toward whatever
unfolding may be possible to him. a
I would record—with no disrespect, I
hope, to the other members of that Society
—that it was the infrequent appearance cf
Cayley Robinsons at the British Artists that
drew me, as a boy, to those exhibitions.
The potency of spell, the visionary
strangeness, the almost desperate sincerity,
of the new, mysterious, isolated artist
brought to mind the first strenuous
beginnings of the English Pre-Raphaelite
group. In his earlier efforts two distinct
strains are to be found in Cayley Robinson's
outlook. The methods of the then pre-
vailing ** Newlyn school "—the searching
study of values rendered by means of a
somewhat heavy, square brush-work —
were tempered (nay, opposed) by a very
293