THE OTAGO ART SOCIETY

Otago Witness, Issue 2804, 11 December 1907, Page 13

THE OTAGO ART SOCIETY

TC&E WATE&-COLOISR SECTION:-*-^ :- No. H. I

Ara'ong {|Sic names which have sto6d',a.r guarantee i," for pleasure in former- 1 exßibi-^ tions, that^of C. N. Worsley has been prominent. 2Fhi3, however, is not a. Worsley y«ar — ratlfir is it Woreley at his worst! Of his tjjo largo water-coloiirs, N#... 319, ("Otira G»rge") is much the better, ~mi& indeed wsjthy» of his reputation. iTiX-'isd efceentiallySa gallery picture, is in a familiar colouS scheme,- and^exercises ». de» cided oha£(n from of^ distance it Hg seenLff? Afc. cSsec^q^iacferic- one is disposed ?t^nk^jithst is ■ fOQi much of it, so mighty is the bulk of the huge mountains that, olothed with lightlyparted mills, occupy the whole background. There is, &or*ovej,^a_ certa^ the woodffi spftf *idb' 5 the "right. "But "the foreground with shepherd, and dogs rounoing-.the bend of.; the^ roadr^fche is clever ?jn execution and composition. No. 323 p" Anderngait," "Switzerland) is also a large picftwe^ .flowing"- a quaint; village stredf or courtyard; with figures, animals, and vehicles in the foreground and middle-disj^nce, tho; *»#«r^ of the- villagechurch olowng the^vfsfe. It is rfaecMmcal. soulless,' find in its lack, of atmosphere and suggestion^ resemble? i*n* enlarged t photograph. ¥,o. WS^tensferfom, *Bbllas»d' 1 ) has already found a purchaser — proof Dositive of the? old truism thqt " tastes differ." No. 440 (£On tihe Riarer TeigxT) is also sold, and Jne ejw^£*l£3fc^WeivTfcip Iftfe as a very cnarming picture, containing some fine work end rich colour. The old bridge spanning %he riferV^l^e/jt^iadlf-distanc^. is agreeable in colour 3a?idfJ#cJtllent in drawing apd perspective, while the trees, in all theKnaeaivo wealth of their midsummer folia^s«^*ihw«msMfcib»nfe.-i«gBJiHl»~ no less thaff The thick braefcenjn tbe-imme-diate foi*gKHßi;*'akK B tf l rea^^cfeiignftul landscape;. „Qf No. 441^ ("In the, Otir» Valley") jit' may. be said to just escape being a igfttiefaotory bit .of ; work:/ it.latsks some subtle harmony which should bind it together,* 2nd:: -enable the eye" • <to rest with greater repose on the pleasant colour 1 effects of the- 1 " eun-bathed •' rocis ! and the t bold, free treatment, of the mish which clings to the* steep, overhanging" bluff on the rights NoV -285 v ("A' Spanish Coquette") is common in v conception and unbelievably poor in "treatment^ Mies M. O. Stoddart shows a good deal j of work, but to those wh<^ admired her ' earlier style, ibis woxk of f. disappointing irind. Her, tw^^ flower pieces— No, 218 and No. Ai2 — art in that vague, washy, woolly -sfevle which is understood by the school affaoting it to express delicacy and j tenderness. In No. 218, a mass of daffodils and narcissi, loosely arranged; is pleasant enough in composition, but dim and mossy in colour, while all, of the beauty of form and purity of colour which constitute the decorative" possibilities of tho flower-painter htfve been lost in successive j washings out. No. 238 is a somewhat sad and gloomy landscape. There is a ; nice suggestion of distance, and the trees ' silhouetted against tho sky' give a good effect, but the sanw woollinees of treatment tells agein6t ' the picture. In* No. 361 ("The Anchor Inn") an interesting, but not in the : least attractive, subject is redeemed by the good drawing and .clean colouring. Nos. 267, 389, end 427, though widely differing in subject, .are all of a singularly sombre type of colouring. Perhaps No. 427 ("St. Ives Harbour, Evening") will be most. . appreciated. It is a study of shore, shipping, and quaint old tenement houses crowding down to the water's edge, with a bit ' of still water in the foreground, and an air ,of gloomy, approaching night. W. Lister-Iristcr shows three pioture3, none of them indicating any perceptible j advance on his former work. No. 331 , " Coast, near Manly") is certainly a rich i "Lit of colour, absolutely decorative in the full tones of the great rocks on tihe foreground shore, the sea of the middledistance, and the bold blue of the upper fiky. No. 354 ("The Williams River") shows a typical Australian landscape, with carofullv-worked-up foreground of wooded banks sloping to some Tather solid water, and marred by a heavy and laboured sky. No. 397 ('Freshwater Beach") is quite a large and ambitious picture, in which the lovely delicate tones of the slack water in the shallows is the only satisfvin? thing. Tho futile figure of a fashionable young i woman playing golf on a wide stretch I of golden sands is absolutely wearisome. I and the attempt to render the pulsating \ effect of atmospheric heat and light by j broken tints and brushwork is a failure. A. Hanson has shown so many a deightful ' picture that his name awakens pleasant anticipations. These, perhaps, ere best fulfilled in No. 321 ("On the Risdon River, Hpbart"), wfhere a picturesque village drowses in the warmth of a sunny day, and is hacked by the exquisite blue of Mount Wellington, whose great bulk is softly outlined against the sky. This is an eminently pleasant picture. So, too, is No. 434. ("Where Shore and Ocean Meet, Falmouth"), though the theme, as indicated by the title, ia so different from No. 321.. To begin witih, the composition is f resli, the colour scheme rich, full, and well knit together. The great masses of rock on the beach the distant cliffs, and the cloud of sea birds circling against the splendid blue and purple of sea and cliff are all both delightful and full of harmony. ' No. 367 ("A Young New Zealander") is an example of Mr Hanson's skill in portrait- ' painting, representing a young girl who*e , bright and cheerful personality is in per- ( feet harmony with, the pleasant colour scheme. Ncs. 304 and 316 are two Eng- ( 1 i-sh landscapes. In, No. 304 ("A Surrey Cornfield") the foreground i 6 more pleas- ; ing than the distance, which .gives not too ( successfully tho rising of the> harvest moon over the dietant corn lands. In No. 316 i ("Near Guildford") the position is reversed, for the warm radianoe of a sunset §ky. ', with ohuroh spire and woods silhouetted against the evening glow, is very happy. : In the middle-distance the ever-useful j " ploughman homeward wends his weary : way," and ' a broad, slow-flowing stream sweeps beneath the bridge in the foreground. v | In No. 443 the same artist exhibits a case of miniatures, some of which are ' admirable, notably the portrait of a child on the bottom row. This is instinct with life and gaiety. i Miss Every shows some good work. No. 221 (" A Village Forge ' ) may probably indi-

cate high-water mark, though the -- more showy ' West Country Garden " runs it hard. "The Village Forge," however, despite its strong effects of light and shade, preserves a fine harmony' throughout, is crisp and clean and clever in handling and drawing, -the figure of the smith beside -ai«" :gJaTOJngr little: thoroughly ; well re*nttered. ~~ \_i.-_ - - - No. 228; (" A West Country Garden"), which exhibits the encouraging- red star of purchase, is a very happy colour achievenaent, of wjtjch. the spjgndour ofT-the crimj©6tt^rairibler^r6BeriiiidWay in the garden-is-thafdcßßninafing^n'ote. JNo. 289 ("On the Moore, near Loch*Etive") is a charnrng bit of moorland, of which—the foreground -work and colour are really bjeautiful. - Unfortunately both ileucLs and distance are. rrather too strong. inftf colour for the foreground. ' - In No. 237 ("A London Barge"), Mr H. R. Cole shows a ver^ pretty bit of painting, deircate> pleasant, andj restful. . Sky -and saa : alike are" in pale, "cool tones, and * the solitary barge gives and impression of slow and graceful. motion. No 246 ("The Bend <i£> &ie Riiir-"),- by W. S.iSoberts, k in a full, rich chord of colour; the perspective, also, of the bend and the far-reaching distance is: good. The' rejections fn the water -are so perfect that a certain unavoidable air of stiffness is, however, given to the picture. A number of pictures, most of them small, stand to the credit ef E. W. Payton. Most of them are in the nature of a brief episode — pleasant, sunny episodes — rendered iif. clear' colour' and strong contrast. This particularly applies to Noe. 260, 263, and 272, all of which present clever colour contrasts, which are exstrjStnely decorative. In * litle bit of 'summer sea and shore, distinguished by great purity and delicacy of colour, are emphasised by the bold mass of the great trqe J-,to x ' the right, the drawing of which is excellent. No. 270 ("Te-Kuirau, Ohinemutu ") is a more comprehensive which a country road, en"cTOacnea T 'upon by wayside grass and ~fringted l t>y-46w and scattered bush, winds away towards the foothills, where the mists drift 'up to the mountains beyond. Theee - last are somewhat harsh in outline. No. 333 is a clever study of a dead tree from which a luxuriant new growth springs in splendid masses, premising to restore the original symmetry and hide the bleached 'skeleton limbs of former years. No. 392, as a really good study of one of our most interesting New Zealand trees — the Nikau palmg — bearing its great clusters of ver-million-coloured seeds, should have been bung much lower. The^ Nikau is scarce i in those sduthern forests, 'and the sight of one in full seed scarcer still. " Of Datillo Rubbo's three contributions, the principal one is No. 343 (" Charcoal Sketch "), under which non-committal title ■ one hails a very excellent piece of work, j somewhat unfinished as becomes a sketoh, but full of character and admirably rendered in the drawing and shading of the face and texture of the skin. Miss J. Wimperis sendts some characteristic Venetian and Florentine pictures, of which perhaps No. 245 ("The Ponto Veccnio, Florence") will j be most popular, though the much smaller sketch on the Grand Canal, Venice, is a ; charming little thing. In No. 245 the quaint '■ old bridge, to which the tiny dwellings cling like barnacles to a ship's side, is the central interest. The river is hemmed by crowded buildings down the vista of its banks, and on the right rises a wcoded height, the whole bathed in an atmosphere flooded with light. No". 248 (" Grand Canal,' Venice ") is quite a small picture showing richness of colour and conveying a pleasant sense of abstraction. No 380 (" Golden Sails ") is also a small picture, striking the colour note presented by the tawny sails of quaintly-shaped boats, drawn in to shore. Mts G. Joachim has several pictures on the walls, all good in drawing and refined, though somewhat cold in colour. • No. 281 (" Edge of the Bush, Granity ") is a bush study with the dip of . the hills and the distant sea pleasantly 1 suggested. No. 352 (" From the Hill. ■ Denniston ") is a clever and most successful rendering of a typical West Coast landscape, with the wooded ranges seen through the scattered trees of the foreground. It is wonderful what effects of distance and light have been worked out within a very limited range of colour tones. No. 371 ("The 'Beach, Granity") will perhaps be more generally admirct). Here, as in all Mrs Joachim's work, the colour k restrained — in this instance cold, — but the 6ketoh impresses one with a sense of absolute truth, and the drawing and perspective of a wide stretch of grey shore receding to the wooded hills of the half distance, and ! melting again to those which stretch fold ! beyond fold, and are merged in the cliffs ' which meet the sea on the far horizon, ie } excellent. i Mabel Hill has a long list of landecapes large and small to her credit this year. No. 231 ("The Bathing Place, "Brighton") is a small, simple, and very pretty little bit of landscape and seascape, just the thing to make iteelf at home on the walls of a breakfast or morning room. Her most ambitious picture, No. 319 (" Springtime "), cannot be considered her most successful exhibit. In many respects it is a remarkably well painted piece of work — there is enough material here for half a dozen pictures or a dozen " pot-boilers." The subject. a landscape with a house and neglected j orchard in the foreground, is difficult to summarise, the interest being distributed over the whole picture rather than swept into any definite centre. This fact militates against a sense of repose, juet as the excessive use of blue tones in tho 1 colour scheme does away with the tender gaiety of spring. The drawing and per- ' spective are both very good, and the distance admirably suggested. No. 401 (" The Road Home'") is a pleasant land1 «cape with an excellent foreground. No. 374 ("A Summer Afternoon") is clean, sunny, and very fresh in colouring, with a ; nice sense of distance. No. 402 ("The Duck Pond") is a good example of the ' genuine attractneness of a homely subject gracefully handled. It is, however. ' in No. 430 ("Low Tide") that the best of I this artist's work 16 seen, and the result is a really good picture, as full of truth •as it is charming. The delicate effect of I passing rain showers on the 6ea\vard ! horizon i 6 rendered with beautiful limpid;- ; ness; while the foreground, in which the 1 pools among the rocks show liquid reflcc- | tions. ia an admirable bit of work, clear and clean, and withal etroner. 1 In No. 278 Mrs Hocken shows " Forest Glade, Kaka Point," a, careful and detailed study of old wind-clipped trees dwarfed ,by the strong sea breezes ; and No. 385 ("Beach Avenue, Paradise "). a difficult theme carefully and conscientiously ren-

dered, unaided by trickery of exaggerated lights or colour. C. Howarth'6 three pictures are all of the popular order in composition, style, and colour, 'and one is safe to find' ah halt made in' front of their familiar charms. No. 256 (" Lifting Mists. Mount Cook"): Mountain fdis-staace,f disstaace, veiling anists," el^mbej^pg :Pi;eek ;eSd -tussock-clad banks^— saH-* ther jrecfagnified" iogredients for a thoroughly pretty picture; yet there is left a sense of want and incoraptetenese. No. 302 (" Milford JTrack, Ajthajr V. a^ e y "), ""-despite the exaggerated cdloUr effects ; op. the-- foreground (birch tjriinfe), captwabgS "the imagination with that eternal allurement of the path which leaves the, immediate foreground to follow unseea. -hfiauties^, of whifth the .cleverlypaihte'd inas^es of bush $1 the : iniildUjt .distance and! the upward <Slisofl tbs gjblntains beyond give promise. " No. 351 (" Clinton River ") is, in its way, as finished a piece of technical skill as Sir E. "P<>ynter's " Asten^e " — anjd.^aa. eoullesg. Everything iS here,, the majesty v»f mouii'tains, the wealth of wood, the unruffled surface of sun-warmed water. Delicacy of- distance,^ rie&nese of ; shadow/- »U - accurate, are &H awept into the narmoiry of a most pleasant colour 6cheme.. Yet — is there not always -a want when ■everything is duly set out with such fullness that nothing is asked of the imagination ? Mrs Woodhouse, in No. 326 ("The Old Mill"), has. a lightr and pleasant thenie* In' which the 'Homeliness of the mill, the placid pond, and the bush green of pasturage-and spring foliage all combine to ' prdduSe a delicate and cheerful whole. No. 299 "Ford on the Silverstream") is as charming as it is light in execution and slight in character. The fioa'd sweeps ufjUfrom the ford and the reflection of the bb * J Jroup of'-trteee png fchef. left Kand-.js flung M&ross tlfe Jjuiet «a^ei§ of* the ford. . Miss Webster has several 6mall pictures, all of which' ehow' a -nice feeling and an artistic sense much in advance of their mere technical merits. Perhaps the best thing' "Misl ' Webster' shows ' i* N»t- *379"Autumn<^int*''),,a..p_leasant pastoral with a clear and effective horizontal distance of rolling hills,- , capital,, -middle grouping of stackyard and trees ;" while ' fhe sheep in the foreground and the autumnal trees which border the winding path all -blend into a simple and charming whole. Pso. 255 ("Suneet, Frankton") shows an effective sense of colour, and is full- of restful suggestion. N0. #279 "Evening") .is another very pleasing pastoral— a ,6implo landscape with a nice effect of distance and the laet year's stacks standing, amid the greeu of this year's pasture. Miss Sale's pictures exhibit- the cheerful red star of practical; in several instances— they aIK-have a distinctive etyle of colour and method which enables one to pick them out at once, and nearly all are foreign studies.; ..No. 257 represents a row of gaily-painted boats drawn up high and dry, their shadows clear upon the sand, and the life interest imparted by the figures of two fishermen in the foreground. No. 283 is a street scene of a narrow winding way between, old stone cottages whose steps rise clumsily from the deeply-worn footway. There is a nice effect of sunshine here. No. 6UJ, (" Richmond, Yorkshire ]') shows a group of enormous trees, dense with the fullness of summer foliage, casting their shadow across the quiet country road; cottages to the left.- No. 444 ("Evening '), » a group of quaint old buildings whose weather-stained walls are the raison d etre of some nice rich colouring; in the foreground a boat rides ligh^y on the etill surface of the back-water. In No. 300 ("Shady Nook, Greenstone River") F. Leary is to be congratulated on some very happy work in the limpid renderingof the deep shadows cast on the gliding current by the steep bank and the trees. There are plenty of faults, which make the excellence of this particular rendering the more noticeable. Of Mt Bowring s work in this section of the exhibition his portrait of Mr A. Hamilton (formerly Registrar of Otago University) is the most important. It is a very fine piece of work, no less than a moet characteristic portrait: the tteoh tones are somewhat too youthful but any further impression of unfamilianty is probably duo to the fact that one is not accustomed to seeing Mr Hamilton without his pince-nez. In No. 426 ("Her Lad>ship ) Mr Bowring has a most delicate portrait study in monotone. Dr Scott's pictures show ac usual, his accuracy and facility in draughtsmanship. The large *Judy of " Moeraki Boulders " (No. 305) will be appreciated from the familiarity of these curiou= stonos. so closely connected with Maori legend ; but his smaller study of An Up-country Smithy" (No. 416) is worth long and close inspection. The fire is out, the smith deserted, and through the open shutter window the light streams in cold and clear, showing every detail of the rough interior, where even the corrugated iron of the walls is faithfully represented. Miss Richmond's work is essentially her own and perhaps the most generally appreciated example of it will be found in So. 370 ("The Lamb in the Wood"), a quaint and charming little work. . The name of Julian Ashton stands against a great many pictures in the catalogue, and, once one has identified the artist's style his duodecimo sketches— some of them pood, all of them catchy— may easily be picked out wherever hung. No. 215 ("Morning Effects ") is one of the best, t.he pearly tints of the distance and sky, the green of the springing grain in the mid-dietance, and the great tree throwing its long shadow across the foreground make a very fresh and unhackneveci theme. No. 377 ("Reflections ) is a clever little study rich in colour and moet effective. No. 404 " Morning Mists ) is more bizarre than beautiful in its comHnation of yellowish-greens and bright blue. " , . , Of W. M. Gibb's water-colours special mention must be made of the delightful landscape catalogued as No. 235 ("Heathcote at Cashmere "). It is admirable in delicacy, distance, and colour. The lazy river flowing in the foresriound between the low water broken by poplars and plantation's, silhouetted against the low horizon, constitutes a most agreeable picture. In concluding these notes it must necessarily be the case that much stringent criticism is left unsaid, and many works of perhaps equal merit with those selected have been unavoidably overlooked.

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