ART AND ARTISTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2363, 8 June 1899, Page 58

ART AND ARTISTS.

ROYAL ACADEMICIANS WHO PAINT

PUBLIC-HOUSE SIGNS

Although publichoiii-e signs, as a rule, represent a low and crude grade of art, there are to be seen here and there throughout the country signs of which skilled artists need not feel aahamed, and .t. few which are from the brushes of some of the most famous artists of our day.

Perhaps the most interesting and intrinFieally valuable sign in England swings from a small riverside hostelry at Wargrave, on the Thames, and is the work of two of the most skilful of modern Royal Academicians.

The fatory of the genesis of this signboard is interesting. Mr G. D. Leslie, the Academician (himself the son of a still more famous artist), wab spending a few days at Wai grave in company with Mr Hodgson, also a Royai Academician. Tho signboard of the inn which they had made their headquarters was -jadly in want of repainting, and the holiday aitists, with the impulsive kindness which characterises painters, proposed to Mrs Wyatt, the landlady, that they fahou'd undertake the restoration for her.

Mr Leslie set to ■\york. and on one- side quickly painted a spirited representation of St. George in the act of killing the dragon. When Air Hodgson's turn came lo undertake tho other side of the faisrn. he had but a few

hours left before he must leave for town. He plied his brushes so vigorously, however, that within a couple of hours the signboard was complete, Mr Hodgson's contribution being a presentment of the hot and victorious St. George quenching his thirst with a flagon of the ale for which Mrs Wyatt was famous. The St. George and the Dragon, however, is not the only inn which boasts a sign from Mr Leslie's brush. _At Wallingford, where the kindly Academician lives, there is an old inn which was flourishing in the days of the Stuarts, and at which many a Royalist trooper ciuenched his thirst. It is known as the Row B"arge Inn, in memory of the days when it was frequented by the Lord Mayor's State bargemen. The sign, which illustrates this historic association, was painted by Mr Leslie, and represents the State barge, pulled by lusty rowers, and bearing the Lord Mayor and his suite in stately progress up the river. Although riverside inns may boast signs from the brushes of Academicians, it is reserved to the little village inn of Roseneath to have a feign painted by a Royal hand. Roseneath is a secluded village on the Argyll estates, and here the Marquis and Marchioness of Lome love to retire for a time from the world and make their home at the village inn. The gifted Princess_ has not only designed an extension of the inn, but is said to have painted a new signboard for it. The Smoker's Inn, Plumbley, is distinguished by a signboard of uncommon interest. Trie board, which swings from a support wreathed in graceful "creepers, was. painted by Miss Leighton, niece of the late Lord De Tabley, owner of the estate on whi^h the inn stands. ' * „ On one side of tho board is a spirited painting of Smoker, a once-famous racer, o,wned j by the first. Lord De Tabfey; and on the other | s-ide arc painted tuo Tabley arms, with the 'family motto, " Teriebo." Another signlward from the brush of the same gifted artist swings in* front of the Windmill Inn, Tabley, and is cleverer and more ambitious than the Smoker sign. On one side of the board is a very spirited : picture of Don Quixote in the act of tilting at a windmill. H^ is mounted on a powerful grey horse, and with visor down, a shield on his i left arm, and a heavy lance poised in his right hand, is riding at the windmill, silhouetted against a blaze of crimson and gold which marks the setting sun. The reverse side of the sign, like that of the Smoker's Inn, bears tho family arms. These "aristocratic signboards" have ex- t oilotl much attention, and for some time after j they were painted were an object of pilgrimage 1 to tlicvusands in the districts in which they are to bo found. These ore but examples of art in unexpected places; and there are probably at least 100 such signs in England, painted by men who have become famous, from the early days of David Cox tc the Leslies and Marcus Stones of our day.