Studio: international art (84.1922)

REVIEWS

Shakespeare. The Winter's Tale. With
coloured pictures painted in tempera by
Maxwell Armfield. (London: J. M.
Dent & Sons, Ltd.). 18s. net. One of the
tempera paintings, of which reproductions
have been made for this edition of " The
Winter's Tale," is also reproduced (by
courtesy of the publishers) as an accom-
paniment to Mr. Batten's paper on " The
Practice of Tempera Painting " in our
present issue, and the reader is referred to
it as exemplifying the artist's method.
There are in all twelve full-page pictures—
four single subjects and four pairs ; and at
the end of the volume Mr. Armfield ap-
pends some notes on the genesis of the
series and the aims he had in view. These
paintings, he says, " have been done with
the aim of presenting a series of pictures
such as take place on the stage in an actual
production. . . . They aim at expressing
the action of the characters in the medium
of the stage and not in that totally different
one of illustration." He goes on to say :

The production which these pictures record was
made by my wife, Constance Smedley—in a method
we have evolved during ten or twelve years. She
made some hundreds of small drawings of move-
ments and groupings, crystallising the continuous
rhythmic structure of the play. In the coloured
pictures these compositions have been retained, and
only amplified to the extent which was intended in
the production. 0 0 a a a

The colour symbolism employed in the
production, and accordingly represented in
the reproductions, has evidently been the
outcome of very close study, as these ap-
pended notes clearly imply. Its fons et
origo was that line of Autolycus's ; " The
red blood reigns in the winter's pale."
(Act iv., scene Hi.) 0000

The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault.
Illustrated by Harry Clarke. With an
Introduction by Thomas Bodkin. (London:
George G. Harrap & Co.) 15s. net.—
Someone was remarking the other day
what a great improvement has taken place
in the illustration of children's books in
recent years. In bygone generations
publishers of such literature (with a few
notable exceptions) were content with
mediocre and often very crude pictures,
but nowadays they want the best they can
get, and fortunately there are artists of

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repute who are ready to give them what
they want. The beautiful illustrations with
which Mr. Harry Clarke has embellished
this collection of Perrault's fairy tales,
consist of a dozen colour plates and the
same number of full-page black-and-white
drawings, supplemented by numerous
decorative adjuncts. He has entered
thoroughly into the spirit of the tales, and
his drawings are also in keeping with the
period of their production—the age of
Louis XIV (" Le Roi Soleil"). It is
strange, by the way, that though most of
these fairy tales—such as Red Riding Hood,
Cinderella, Blue Beard, and Puss in Boots
—reappear from year to year in number-
less editions, the name of their author
is more often ignored than acknowledged.
He was a remarkable man in his day, and
deserves to be remembered quite as much
as the Brothers Grimm and Hans Andersen.
Mr. Bodkin's brief biographical sketch of
him is a timely reminder of his genius. 0

HALF-TITLE DRAWING TO "LITTLE
THUMB." BY HARRY CLARKE

(From "The Fairy Tales of Perrault"
G. G. Harrap and Co.)