ART EXHIBITION

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 19933, 18 October 1934, Page 11

ART EXHIBITION

WATER COLOURS BY TOM GARRETT To lovers of art the exhibition of water colours by Mr Tom Garrett, the well-known Australian artist, which is being opened this afternoon in the gallery over the Mount Cook Company’s offices in Stafford Street, should be of particular interest. Mr Garrett’s work is well known and highly appreciated in the Dominion. He is rightly called a romanticist, for his imagination is vivid, and he excels in subtle atmospheric effects; his colours are surprisingly soft and lovely, yet rich, and with a masterly technique he creates a harmonious composition of individual charm. There is a decided Core; influence in "Silver and Green,” where in a wonderfully balanced composition colour is used with a sure -sense of values. The still mood which characterises most of his work is emphasised in “A Wet Night,” where has been caught perfectly the mood of a deserted street, the glow of light on the front of a building, and the balance between three figures and a tree. “Ferry Road” is an unusual composition, with the great bulge of a hill, above small white houses and green water, and the road, a thin ribbon of white, zig-zagging up the hill. Mr Garrett is a very fine draughtsman, his treatment of architectural features being impeccable, while his colour is used with a pure water-colour technique that gives light to his painting. This is well shown in “Cement,” one of the most poetic and atmospheric pictures in the collection. A totally different, but most satisfying composition is “After Prayer,” which shows a procession of white-coifed nuns against a background of austere Gothic windows. “Moonlight Bathers” which shows a group of tiny nude figures in a pool, is a choice piece of work, the whole picture being drenched with a wonderful midnight blue. Mr Garrett is essentially an intimate painter, none of his pictures being socalled “gallery” pictures. On the contrary, they are small, painted with a jewel-like exquisiteness, and would be very easy to live with. The exhibition will be opened by the president of the Timaru Art Society (Mr J. P. Newman).