ART SENSATION IN LONDON.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 18865, 1 May 1931, Page 9

ART SENSATION IN LONDON.

Leading Painter’s Lapse. EXHIBITS REJECTED BY ACADEMY BOARD. United press Association—By ldeotrlo Telegraph— Copyright LONDON, April 29. A Royal Academy sensation has been revealed by the announcement that three pictures sent to the Exhibition by an English artist of international repute, were returned owing to the discovery that they were based on enlarged photographs. An Academy official says the discovery was made at a meeting of Academicians and Associates, which was called to elect new associates. Sir William Llewellyn (president), asked the meeting to view one of three pictures which were found to be enlarged photographs, thickly covered with paint, whereupon the name was immediately withdrawn and the pictures sent back. The Academy sensation is unprecedented, according to the “Evening News,” which interviewed the artist, who made protraits of Royalties and many celebrities. The name is not revealed. The newspaper says this is a terrible shock, when the artist’s career was about to culminate with an associateship. It was foolish to send the pictures to the Academy, and emphasises that he did not attempt to secure election by an easy deception. The “News-Chronicle” discloses that the artist is Mr Reginald Grenville Eves. Sir William Llewellyn says that the incident does not bar him from reseeking election as an associate if his artistic work reinstates him in the eyes of the Academy. [Mr Reginald Grenville Eves, Member of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters and the Royal Institute of Oil Painters, was born in 1876. He entered the Slade School of Art in 1891, and later gained the Slade Scholarship there under Professor Brown. He has exhibited at the R.A. and Salon.] ANOTHER ACADEMY SENSATION. ALLEGATIONS OF COPYING. United Press Association—By Electric - Telegraph—Copyright (Received April 30, 10.30 p.m.) LONDON, April 30. The second strange happening on the eve of the Academy relates to a canvas entitled “On Board the Hispaniola,” by a sixteen-year old Convent Garden salesman. The picture is being widely discussed and has been removed from the walls, as the President is convinced it has been copied from a book illustration of R. L. Stevenson’s Treasure Island. The boy artist denies ever having read the Treasure Island, or having seen the book, though he saw the play. He says he painted the picture entirely from imagination. The “Daily Express" interviewed Mr Reginald Eves, who is the painter of the photographic pictures. Eves says he did a foolish thing. He was suffering from neuritis and he used the photos to save time. He recalls that Canaletto used the camera obscura in the painting of similar architectural pictures.