PORTRAITS FOR ROYAL FAMILY

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXVI, Issue 147, 6 June 1936, Page 15

PORTRAITS FOR ROYAL FAMILY

Duchess of York’s Patience and Generosity

JAMES Quinn, the Aus--3 X / R tralian artist, has painted j * vY S the portraits of many Engi »U lish notabilities, including I || members of the Royal Family. Tessa Fubbs in the Melbourne Argus relates some interesting stories of Mr. Quinn and his Royal sitters. When the Duchess of York was sitting for her portrait to Mr. Quinn, who returned this year after 36 years abroad, several telephone calls came to the studio from a London newspaper which wanted a photograph of Mr. Quinn standing in front of the picture. At last the Duchess overheard one of Mr. Quinn’s refusals. “Why don’t you let them have it?” she asked. “Firstly, because the picture is unfinished,” said Mr. Quinn, “and then because I thought you might not like it.” “Oh, I don’t mind,” said the Duchess, “but if you do have it taken take care that when you stand in front of the picture you do not look at the photographer as you look at me.” “How is that?” asked Mr. Quinn, whereupon the Duchess screwed up her face into an excellent caricature of the frowning impersonal scrutiny of the artist at work. Mr. Quinn has a wealth of good stories with which he is not very bounteous. He thinks that most anecdotes about “sitters” are in the nature of tales out of school, and, unlike many of his contemporaries, he has never thought of writing his memoirs. There is another story about the Duchess of York, however, which he tells to illustrate her kindness of heart. One day, as he was posing her in his studio, he saw a fairly deep gash on her shoulder which seemed to have been done recently. Cut by Scissors. When he asked her how it came there she said that she had come from a fitting with her dressmaker. The frock had been slipped on over the light one she was wearing, and the manager of the establishment was watching while a young woman made some alterations to the shoulder straps with scissors. “She was very nervous,” said the Duchess, "and allowed the scissors to slip, causing that cut.” “It must have been very painful,” said Mr. Quinn. “What did you do?” “I pulled the underneath frock across it and pretended nothing had happened,” said her Royal Highness. “Had I cried out or shown any pain the manager probably would have dismissed the poor girl.” Once when they were talking about the little Princess Elizabeth, then away in Scotland, Mr. Quinn said that he would have liked to have seen her.

“She would love it here,’’ said her mother. “The first thing Elizabeth would do would be to stick her finger on your palette and help you finish the painting.” Mr. Quinn painted three portraits of the Duchess of York, who was a generous and patient “subject.” When the conversation turned to Australia she said, “I liked Australia. During all the time I was there I never met a snob.” The present King, when he was Prince of Wales, had less time to spare for the artist, who was commissioned to paint him in Guardsman’s uniform. When the portrait was finished the Prince came to view it. "You gave me hardly any sittings,” Mr. Quinn reminded him. “Yes, and you see you’ve managed very well without me,” retorted the Prince. Mr. Quinn ranks among his most interesting “sitters” the Duke of Connaught and his friend, Mrs. Ord Marshall, who was a close friend of King Edward VII., and who is still one of the most stately ladies in English society. Early Difficulties. When Mr. Quinn left Melbourne for Paris as a national scholarship student 36 years ago he had £l5O, his scholarship money for the year. Out of that he paid his steamer fare and rented a studio in the Quartier Latin at the equivalent of £3O per annum. A similar-sized studio on the same site is now rented at £2OOO per annum. He had as companions George Coates, Rupert Bunny, Charles Condor, Max Meldrum, and Lionel Walden. Cezanne, Renoir and Degas were their elder associates. “Most of use were poor and hard working,” said Mr. Quinn, "but we were lighthearted.” He sniffs, however, at the popular novel-reader’s idea of the Quartier. “Did you ever know poverty to be ‘picturesque’?” he demanded. In his case success was rapid, and his pictures were not only hung in the Salon and the Academy, but were purchased for galleries all over the world. Sometimes a “picture of the year” brings fame to the sitter as well as the artist. When Mr. Quinn’s picture of an English schoolmistress received a place of honour in the Academy during the war her school was only two-parts full. Since then it has had a formidable waiting list. Feminine Beauty. In Parts Mr. Quinn married a fellow artist, Blanche Guernier, of whom his painting entitled “Pattes de Velour” was exhibited in Melbourne recently. One of his favourite models, of whom several studies appear in his Melbourne exhibition, is Lorna Rolland, a brilliant and

beautiful London authoress. She is sft. lOin. in height, dark and radiant, and he regards her as the perfect type of English beauty—“just as my wife is the perfect type of French beauty,” he added. This reminded him of how he once paid a tribute to Australian womanhood under very embarrassing circumstances. An actress from Hollywood who had visited London said that Englishwomen were the most dowdy in the world. English newspapers took up the challenge and sought the opinion of famous artists, including Mr. Quinn. Over the telephone he told the pressmen: “I. always thought that Australian women were the finest racial type hr the world from the artist’s point of view—they are so beautifully well built and keen-looking—but since I met my wife I think that French women are the most beautiful.”

“Yes, but what do you think of English women?” asked the pressman.

“Oh, they are very, very beautiful,” replied Mr. Quinn, “but not more beautiful than the French.” “More beautiful than American women?” persisted the pressman. “Well, I think English women are, yes. But the French are just as beautiful.” “We don’t want to know about French women,” exclaimed the baffled reporter. “I can’t help that,” Mr. Quinn replied with equal exasperation. “Can’t you realise my wife is standing just behind me? She’s French.” “Strike” at Royal Academy.

Mr. Quinn’s elder son, the late Rene Quinn, had his father’s love of a jest. With his boon companion, a son of Augustus John, he led the one and only “strike” at the Royal Academy about eight years ago/ Both boys were reproved by the president (Mr. Frank Dicksee) for having used methods of drawing which he considered were too modern. They resisted his authority, and he expelled them, with several sympathisers, from the Academy. Unfortunately half the number “sent down” were prize winners of the year before, and the most brilliant students of the current year. When they proved that they intended to keep up the “strike” Mr. Dicksee asked them to send a deputation for a parley. Young Quinn and young John led the procession into the venerable precincts, singing lustily:— “We’re gwine back to Dicksee, “To the picture-postcard land.”

All were reinstated, but the song still lives.

At a farewell party on the eve of his departure for Australia Mr. Quinn was given a solemn message by Will Dyson, who said: “Give my love to all the girls in Australia.”