A FROST-BITTEN GENIUS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2651, 4 January 1905, Page 73

A FROST-BITTEN GENIUS.

The reminiscences, as given m the Art Annual for 1904, of Mr G. H. Boughton, R.A., in crnnec-ticn with his picture "'Winter Twilijht," are amusing. To accustom himself to the cold which he had to face when working in the open, he painted in a studlio without & fire : — "A visitor came one day, and found him in a bare room, furnished only with an ea-se-l and a chair or two, with an empty stove, and with the snow lying unmelted on the floor where it had fallen from the artist's' feet after a tramp through drifts outside. The impression made on the mind of this friend, to whom the artist's purpose had not been explained, was thaG here was indeed a case of penury heroically endured, and so, to rescue a frost-bitten, genius, he went, away and reported the sad case to a kind-hearted lady of hi 6 acquaintance. This lady promptly came and saw this scene of struggling poverty, and as she was possessed of much money to back up her warm sympathy, she gave the young artist an important commission and left with him a big cheque on account, so Ijhafc he might buy the coals he obviously needed . "to fill his rusty stove". She stipulated that .the picture he was., to _ paint for her shcvuld be a summer landscape, something pleasantly free v fcom snow >or ice. Heiv con"s'fcernation can be imagined when she returned- a week later and found the stove still- empty and rustier than ever,, and the floor more covered with snow-heaps than it had been before." Mr Boughton, to pacify her, had to explain- why he was undergoing such privations, and • his kindly patroness was so amused, at -he^ misunderstanding of his device for acclimatising himself, and so ,-gJeased with his determination to arrive 'at artistic results he desired, that she one of staunchesir supporters", • and was ever afterwards a sincere friend to him. *