“ART IN AUSTRALIA”

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21995, 3 July 1933, Page 17

“ ART IN AUSTRALIA”

The June issue of Art in Australia is devoted entirely to the later work of Elioth Gruner, one of the best known of Australian landscape painters, and is a most satisfying number. Through the medium of eight plates in colour and a like number in black and white it conveys a most interesting impression of Gruner’s more recent work in oils, acquaintance with which cannot fail to intensify a discriminating admiration for his artistic achievements. The quality of these landscapes will be immediately recognised. They bear the unmistakable stamp of truth. THejr dominant feature is perhaps that of restfulness. Yet while they have no kinship with the sensational there is no lack strength in their mellow harmonies. Very appropriately John Cam. Duncan writes in this number of “ Ellioth Gruner and the Sanity of Art,” for this artist’s work, in comparison with some of the productions that are styled modernistic, is entirely refreshing and reassuring. According to J. S. MacDonald, who contributes the principal account of *G rimer's career, methods, and progress, a simple, clear, statement, without footnote, is all that he concerns himself with.” If as, the argument that a simple clear statement is enough could not find better support than in his pictures themselves. Among the reproductions in this issue it is not easy to make distinction, so much of charm is there in all these landscapes. In colour “ Tamarama, Bondi,” ‘‘ Terrigal,” ” Sheep Country,” “ The New Crop,” and “ Gippsland Lakes ” are of the type of scene upon which the eye rests lingeringly, while “ Frosts,” with its capture of substle atmospheric effects, its cattle and its trees, is a fine and arresting effort. In black and white again “ Dissolving Mists ” and “ Spring in the Orchard ” are object lessons in composition and treatment. Lovers of landscape should find this number of Art in Australia extraordinarily interesting.