Mr. Southall is a close observer, though no mere copyist, as the tempera decorative composition on linen of The Barque, exhibited at the Salon in 1912, reveals. It is a typically quattrocento composition, reminiscent of Tuscan artists' work in the National Gallery. But it possesses a more perfected detail than the more immature Tuscans attained. How real is the barque, with her yellowish-grey sails and hull, reflecting in the gold tinting of the blue water ground; and in the middle distance of sloping fields, in a combination of earth colours-browns, greens, and reds. The farm on the summit visualizes, so to say, the central invisible line of the perspective illusion. In The Harbour, another tempera on silk, exhibited at the New English Art Club, there is a fine gracefulness of line in the mizzen mast of the barque, and the sweep of the hill background gives a sense of distance lost in some of his similar compositions. Touching upon his distinctively pictorial compositions, the tempera painting on silk of A Bucket of Salt Water, and exhibited at the 1912 show of the New English Art Club, reveals a wonderful characterization in the main composition, vivacity of movement, and vigorous drawing. Fortunately, it is possible to reproduce in colour one of his Southwold shore scenes. The Beach is an example both of the strength and weakness of this artist's designs. As in The Coming of Peace decoration at the recent Arts and Crafts Exhibition, he is prone to mix the types of the forms in their spaces. Yet, in his rendering of sailing ships, he is comparable to Brangwyn as a clever lineal designer. The central foreground figure is an embodiment of Florentine realism at its best; but the maiden is essentially Venetian in her facial idealization and in the colour-scheme, and it does not harmonize happily with the stiff formalism of her companion showing a cornelian. His children, however, are frankly lovable; there is none of the sentimentalism of the later Millais: they are natural, not "studio" types. The tonal scheme might be described as a study in browns and blues. There is depth in the distance of cloud-swept sky, in blue, broken by patches of white. A slight criticism might be made against the grouping of the subsidiary figures; they appear to be dwarfed against the mass of the seaman's back, though the colour ensemble lessens the effect of ill-proportion. Old. In the panel picture of The Sleeping Beauty, now in the Birmingham Art Gallery, his successful employment of large masses of pure colour as contrasting forces is noticeable. The white of her robe heightens the flesh tints of the face. Notice the powerful rendering of the eyes, observable, too, in the delightful Nut-Brown Maid, exhibited in the New Gallery in 1904, and, subsequently, in the Salon. The soft green background, with the light effects in gold Of his essentially imaginative or symbolical tail in his grand composition New Lamps for panel paintings in tempera it is impossible to speak too highly. That such a great decorative designer as Burne-Jones saw in the youth of the 'eighties an artist of no mean talent as a draughtsman and colourist is not surprising, especially if one of his earliest works, finished in 1884, and representing a woman with dove in hand, is considered. Although there is here not the absolute certainty of design, as in those now reproduced, the landscape background reveals quite extraordinary powers of rendering tonal values. Two essentially Primitives are The Daughter of Herodias, exhibited in the New Gallery in 1906 and, later, in the Franco-British Exhibition, and his rendering of the heartening story of Beauty receiving the White Rose from her Father. The draperies in these two designs of both the principal female compositions are frankly Botticellian in character, though the facial delineations point to the influence of BurneJones. The foreground domestic pets recall the space-filling solvents of the Tuscans. To charge his pictures with beautiful colourschemes, the artist, like William Morris, has feasted on the Orientals, especially the Persian colourmasters, probing beyond the Venetians, and finding out the secrets they embodied so successfully in their work. It is especially observable in the leopards aslant the disgruntled passer-by in The Daughter of Herodias; in the patterning of her coat; and in the deep rich blues and golds of the peacock sweeping the foreground with its ably delineated "THE NUT-BROWN MAID" BY JOSEPH E. SOUTHALL on her floral patterned robe, is reminiscent of Byzantine and Persian art. Mr. Southall's greatest work, perhaps, is Changing the Letter. It is a truly masterful narrative in symbolical decorative tempera painting. Exhibited at the Rome International in 1911, it is a good example of the artist's elusive quality. All his powers of architectural design and delineation of the human figure are brought into play for the purpose of fixing, so to say, the story of William Morris's princess, who by her stratagem saved the life of the beggar-son whose death was planned by her father, the King, and afterwards reigned with him. How well he has envisaged the scene those readers acquainted with the passage in the "Earthly Paradise," where the princess with her maid had entered the King's garden and saw the sleeping Michael by the fountain, will agree. It is essentially Pre-Raphaelite in design. The crimson of the boy's gown is a wonderful mass of colouring, the light tonal scheme of the fountain bringing into prominence the main composition. The decorative foliage shows the influence of Botticelli and the conservative Florentines of the Early Renaissance. If an analysis of this artist's work in decorative tempera painting reveals him as a temperamental painter, this quality is the one, more than all else, which stands out in his portraiture. This phase of his art reveals Joseph Southall's sincerity and power of characterization. It is emphasized in the tempera portrait of the late Joseph Chamberlain's niece, Bertha Hope, as a nurse, painted last year and exhibited in the current exhibition of the New English Art Club. That she is a niece of the great politician there is no doubt her eyes are the evidence. His portrait of John Arthur Kendrick, exhibited at the New English Art Club in 1914, is another example of fine brushwork. As to this artist's influence on modern art, it is only necessary to recall the work of the Birmingham group in tempera. Most of them |