Decorative Birds Most English students of birds know perhaps the
ingenious frieze of bird portraits that decorate one of the rooms of the house by Hickling Broad, which is the greatest of our bird sanctuaries. Birds lend themselves to this sort of decorative design. A much more ambitious portraiture of birds is now on exhibition in London at the Greatorex Gallery. The " mural paintings " are by Mr. Tunnicliffe, who is unsurpassed in this vein. He has chosen for the most part the bigger birds, especially the water birds, and like Mr. Massingham, he seems to have a particular admiration for the goose in several varieties. The general favourite in point of design is of a pair of that happily increasing species, the greater crested Grebe. It is a masterpiece of decorative design, suggestive of some of the early Chinese paintings. Personally I like besebne of the simplest : a single coot floating on perhaps a London reservoir. A de- lightful woodcut records the friendship of a bird and a cat.
Previous page
