Peter Mclntyre’s Pacific

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31239, 10 December 1966, Page 4

Peter Mclntyre’s Pacific

Pacific. By Peter Mclntyre. Reed. 56 full-colour plates, 75 line drawings. Peter Mclntyre has acknowledged that he is not yet formed as an artist and that, in his own words, he was brought up as a representational painter. In his latest book, “Pacific,” however, he has shown how much further along the road to “formation” he has progressed since the publication, two years ago, of his “New Zealand.” His latest book, whose format is the same as that of “New Zealand,” reveals a much more mature Mclntyre. He has achieved a more controlled use of colour and there is also greater depth and contrast of light and shade than he has shown hitherto. There is also less reliance on the use of impasto and occasional daub of vividly contrasting colour which in the past have led to a somewhat distracting impressionism. The new Mclntyre is more effective, the paintings being integrated and having strength and, at the same time in most instances, a sense of restfulness. It might have been thought that, working in the colourful tropical islands of the Pacific or in Hong Kong—a veritable kaleidoscope—the temptation would have been to create paintings from a bizarre palette. Peter Mclntyre has, however, chosen a narrower range of colours—browns,

soft greens and. yellows varying in intensity from dull gold, light gold, to the deft use of chrome for highlights. The strident greens and blues of his earlier book have gone, together with the bare patches of the ground which gave an unfinished look to so many of his earlier works. Orange is used extensively and with great effect as an accent colour in his latest paintings. In addition to the oils, there are a number of line and wash paintings which have a delicacy and appealing restraint. These show particularly the artist’s careful draftsmanship. Plate 26—Miyajima in the Rain—is perhaps the best and certainly the most striking example of the paintings in this style. Mr Mclntyre is not consistent, however, in his use of this medium, as can be seen in Plate 44 King’s Cross, Sydney—which is jejeune with its rather wooden figures. As in his “New Zealand,” there are line drawings concerned with the same subject of the coloured print on the adjacent page. These are less stark than in the earlier book and, while again, they demonstrate Mr Mclntyre’s draftsmanship and varied techniques, many of them could be regarded as over-detailed. With less “filigree” they would have been easier on the eye. That of Kiri Te Kanawa in the New Zealand section brings out depth of character and dignity. Perhaps the most appealing in its charming naturalism and delicacy of execution is Plate 32—Chinese Girl. This painting alone underlines the artist’s mastery of portraiture, in spite of his known disinclination for this particular field of art. Another satisfying quality in all these paintings is the artist’s treatment of the sky. Gone are the heavy, intruding splodges of his earlier book. Now we have skies that harmonise with the mood of the paintings as a whole. Peter Mclntyre set out to record something of the colour and customs of what he calls the original cast in the Pacific —in New Zealand he is concerned with the Maori, in Australia with the Aboriginal, and so on. In Japan he and his wife stayed at a “real” Japanese hotel,

while in Australia he was fortunate in being able to capture with his brush a burial ritual dance. The animals are not well drawnmost have elongated snouts with * blunted ends one associates with peasant carvings—and the hands and arms of a few humans irritate by their unnatural posture. Mr Mclntyre has said that he only paints portraits of people who interest him—by this one assumes he means that he does so when the portrait is not commissioned. His sitters for the portraits in this book must, then, have interested him, for one of its notable features is the number of superb portraits it contains. He obviously enjoyed painting those unsophisticated women from many parts of the Pacific and has succeeded in portraying their characters and individuality in such a way that one can almost see life through their eyes. In this respect it can be said that Peter Mclntyre has taken an impressive leap forward during the last few years, as in his earlier book there was a mere handful of portraits or groups of little appeal. In this book there are over a score of portrait paintings of great interest. Throughout his travels Mr Mclntyre sought to record the unspoiled, be it human or landscape, before it disappears “under the creeping mass of Sameness that we call Progress.” His tour embraced Fiji, Tahiti, Mexico, Hawaii, Japan, Formosa, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Australia, New Guinea and the Antarctic, in addition to New Zealand. For some his achievement will be best exemplified in Plate B—Nets on a Tahitian Beach. This wellcomposed painting with its soft, muted colourings and perception of detail has a surrealist dream quality about it. Peter Mclntyre is, of course, not only artist but writer as well, and in his introduction and notes on his paintings he has set out simply and with candour the reasons why this or that appealed to him and made many other interesting comments. “Pacific” is a beautiful book, rich in colour and variety of subject and style.