Page 42 - The Studio First Edition - April 1893

The Newlyn Point of View

older examples which supply hints for modern then give to the world his friend's point of view.
adaptation is a superb Spanish coffer, which, by At least, that must be the spirit of these lines, in
the courtesy of the publishers, we reproduce here. which I fear there can be neither smart writing nor
critical superiority—you see, perceptive reader, my
Although it would be unwise to hold it up as
glass house cannot afford it.
a good model to imitate blindly, the treatment of What would be called, in the language of official
its wrought-iron work and the general structure criticism, the most important picture from Newlyn
are worth study. The connecting rails, mortised is undoubtedly Mr. Bramley's large canvas, whereon
into spirally turned pillars, hardly harmonise with he has poured out all the purple and gold of a
refulgent autumn evening; the sun streams in even-
the rectangular idea elsewhere preserved.
ing glory over the same bay which two years ago
Another example we are allowed to include is a formed the grey background to the sad procession
chair that once belonged to Theodore Hook ; if of a child's funeral. This year the heavens and
it be a little more massive than modern taste the earth are called upon to rejoice over a jubilee
requires, it is not so archaic but that a facsimile of married happiness—the golden wedding of an
ancient village couple, to whom flowers and good
would go well with many styles in use to-day.
wishes are being offered by children and children's
A volume covering so much ground cannot be children. But it is the decorative and impression-
hastily noticed ; indeed a whole number of THE istic problem that Mr. Bramley has set himself to
STUDIO might be filled with criticism directly bear- solve more even than the dramatic or story-telling
ing upon it, without adequately describing a tenth side. His artistic motive lies in the apparently
paradoxical effect which his vehemently golden
of its contents. The notes on pianofortes, in the
background has in creating purple in his fore-
appendix, covering but a couple of pages, would ground. Thus, Nature and Mr. Bramley can set
provoke columns of annotations. All we can say at naught the most hoary traditions of advancing
here is, that so far as it goes it is marvellous and retiring colour.
how much Mr. Litchfield has brought together Mr. Stanhope Forbes, A.R.A., perhaps ought to
have come first because of the dignity attached to
in this most useful book. Not merely should those
his association, but his picture is several inches
concerned in the manufacture of furniture have smaller than Mr. Bramley's, and then, criticism
a copy always near at hand, but the artist, the being governed primarily by the science of mensu-
stage-manager—even the working journalist who ration, he must accept my apologies. Mr. Forbes
has once seen it—will not be content until he also set himself a difficult problem, and, as all
its difficulty does not set itself forth in this pic-
places it among those books which are even more
ture, it is but justice that it should be recorded.
valuable for the ideas they suggest indirectly than Mr. Forbes, like Mr. Noah, had in the first place
for those they actually record and illustrate. to build him an ark, from the unstable deck of
which he has painted a sea-scape looking land-
wards. It is the evening of a grey day ; the sun
HE NEWLYN POINT OF VIEW. has passed behind a sombre hill ; the light at
BY A NEWLYN PAINTER. the pier-head is just beginning to assert itself
through the gathering twilight ; a boat is entering
THOSE who live in glass houses are the harbour propelled by the occult lurching of a
T warned that they should not throw stalwart lad in the manner known to mariners
stones ; therefore, what should be said to those as sculling ; another man is winding in his line.
who paint in them, that they may order their speech Over the whole the blue veil of evening is falling.
so that no hard word of petrified criticism may crash And now I am not sure that Mr. John Da Costa's
through the frail crystal shelter such as that each picture is not larger than Mr. Forbes's. Really this
Newlyn artist hath set up over him wherewith to system of criticism would almost want a surveyor,
keep him from the bitter east wind when it comes but then it is so necessary that "important pictures"
shod with knives and razors or when the western have their proper position assigned to them. Any-
gales seek to empty the Atlantic on him. how, this only represents a marriage hymn, picto-
But if the weather-proof artist that I have de- rially rather than allegorically considered. Two
scribed be impervious to the rude attacks of Nature, little flower-bearing damsels in white precede,
he is obviously the more susceptible to the rude down some marble steps, a white-robed and veiled
attacks of man ; he is a beacon upon a hill, the bride.
focus of critical eyes, and this would or might dis- Mr. Chevalier Tayler relaxes his mind from the
concert him were it not for that widely comforting strain of painting a spiritual picture by giving to
thought that, after all, we are all in the same box, the world a representation of the masculine resi-
or at least under similar bell glasses. Beneath all duum of a dinner-party—discussing wine, shall we
of which there lieth an obvious allegory- that hath say? It is a summer evening and the azure grey
for its practical moral the reflection that the artist twilight makes the candles ruddy, and there is a
who would speak of his neighbour's works must pleasant sparkle of glass and silver between the
first seek to enter into sympathy therewith, and sable-coated diners.
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