Studio: international art (84.1922)

JOHN LITTLEJOHNS, R.B.A.,
LANDSCAPE PAINTER. BY W. H.
CHESSON. 0 0 a 0 a

THE fact that we so often apply to
paradox for relief from truism shows
the rarity of a stimulating element in
general conversation and explains why, on
a certain Wednesday in 1916, my attention
at a small social gathering was diverted
from the pictorial charm of a renowned
actress by the remark: " We overrate the
subtlety of mist." No doubt if the remark
had been : " We underrate the suavity of
a parterre of scarlet geraniums and
calceolarias on the sunny side of a red
brick villa in June," I should have been
even more inclined than I was to talk to
the man who made it, for I am one of
those rather lonely writers who delight

in Nature's major chords ; but the hint
of a disparagement of mist, that formless
idol of the super-refined, was enough to
draw me into the range of a pair of eyes
which seemed to sport like sunbeams on
telegraph wires. They were the eyes of
Mr. John Littlejohns, and I soon knew
much about their creative function, as the
artist availed himself of my substantial
existence to make several drawings and
at least one clay model of an individual
whose pen (alas !) is not the instrument
referred to in the proverb exalting the
writer above the soldier. The artist sur-
prised me by the precision and perfection
with which he set down his idea of my
physiognomy while conversing about life
and literature, and he also surprised me
by a series of disatisfactions, each one of
which was the parent of another portrait

A VALLEY IN THE SOUTH DOWNS "
BY JOHN LITTLEJOHNS, R.B.A.

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