16 APRIL 1983, Page 28

Recent art books

Richard Shone

William Blake: His An and Times David Bindman (Thames and Hudson £12.50)

Drawing in the Italian Renaissance Workshop Francis Ames-Lewis and Joanne Wright (Hurtwood Press £11.95)

Balthus From Holhein to Hockney Simon Wilson (Tate/Bodley Head £5.95) William Morris Textiles Linda Parry (Weidenfeld and Nicolson £20) rr wo of the titles reviewed here belong to

that relatively new species, the book of the catalogue of the exhibition. They are designed to impress and to keep; their texts and illustrations reverberate beyond the confines of the exhibitions they served. On William Blake, I hesitate to recommend another book, so large and mystifying has the literature become. He would, if alive now to read them, surely turn in his grave, as one of Blecher's charwomen was fond of saying. Most books on Blake should carry a Government Health Warning, particularly those in public libraries where they become tinder-boxes for every roving hand or eye. To counteract much current nonsense we can rely on the sanity of David Bindman, which shines through his previous Blake as an Artist (1977) and the present William Blake: His Art and Times (Thames & Hud- son £12.50) compiled for the exhibition at the Yale Centre, New Haven. Although Bindman is an accurate guide to Blake's writings and the ideas that fuelled his im- agination, he keeps the pictorial image steadily before his eyes as he takes us through Blake's life and labyrinthine work. Unlike Kathleen Raine in her recent study of Blake's Job, Bindman is attentive to the artist's technical resourcefulness, visual sources and contemporary context, achiev- ed almost in spite of rather than through 'the direction of Messengers from Heaven, Daily and Nightly ...' The American set- ting for the exhibition gave a rare oppor- tunity to compare works from English and American collections showing prints in dif- ferent stages of evolution, Blake's manual additions and the often electric leaps in detail from one state to the next. The book has over 200 illustrations and is excellently produced.

The other book, which catalogues the ex- hibition showing until 15 May at the V&A, Drawing in the Italian Renaissance Workshop, is by Francis Ames-Lewis and Joanne Wright (Hurtwood Press £11.95) with well over 200 illustrations and 24 col- our plates. It is a revealing anthology of mainly 15th-century drawings examining the relation of studies and studio modelbooks, to finished paintings and the place drawing occupied among the master and his assistants in their day to day ac- tivities. All the drawings in the exhibition (74 are catalogued) come from English col- lections, the largest groups being those from Chatsworth, the British Museum and Christ Church, Oxford. The slightly text- ured, creamy paper does less than justice to many of the illustrations, especially the frozen detail of animal and bird studies from the early 1400s. But how exhilarating to see this collection, so varied, intimate and engrossing. What thin, miserable stuff it makes of so much that passes for good drawing today. And the examples are by no means the cream only — included are sheets by assistants, not especially skilled, but who had that essential faculty for creating form rather than simply describing what was in front of them. If the book had been a general study rather than a catalogue, the authors might well have blurred and cross- referenced the categories, which then' scheme involves — nudes, draped figures and so on, and their section on composi- tional drawings would have been, I im- agine, less abrupt. But it is a selection to linger over, making the whole subject less intimidating.

In the magnificent display of modern drawing from New York's Museum of Modern Art at the British Museum last year, there was a Balthus nude study of very middling quality accomplishment. It was also one of the few representational draw- ings from the post-I945 years. Two recell.t books on Balthus have only emphasised his overrated position as a father figure (or sugar daddy) of the recent 'return' lc) figurative painting. Balthus can be a charal. - ing artist with an individual, feline volce and a pretty colour sense. His son, Staruslas

Klossowski de Rota, has gathered 80 colour plates and written a brief, rather ridiculous preface (Thames & Hudson £15). He chastises writers on art for misinterpreting Balthus's aims: they read far too much into the paintings, particularly into those of adolescent, half-naked girls lolling in in- teriors, which have 'nothing whatsoever to do with sexual obsession except perhaps in the eye of the beholder'. Who saw them first? These girls are, he continues, 'emblematic archetypes belonging to another higher realm'. We are in the 'French' school of art writing. There are some respectable landscapes (from Derain out of Corot) and the justly famous early works such as 'La rue' and the stylish `Vicomtess de Noailles'. But the bulk of the Pictures contradict the master status with Which Balthus has been too lazily confer- red.

In a second-hand bookshop recently, 1 came across an old account of European Painting briskly entitled From Giotto to John. The average browser today might be hard pressed to think who is meant. I wonder if the same reaction will be award- ed, years hence, to From Holbein to Hockney (Tate/Bodley Head £5.95), the Paperback re-issue of Simon Wilson's British Art (1979). It is almost a certainty, especially as the Times recently referred to Mr D.H. as one of the great artists of the century. Nevertheless, Wilson's is an ex- cellent survey, especially when he reaches the 19th and 20th centuries. He is a little ec- centric in the earlier chapters with too per- sonal omissions to make the book an ideal guide. Two artists Wilson admires, William Morris and Paul Nash, are the subjects of two recent, specialist studies — William Morris Textiles by Linda Parry (Weidenfeld £20 hardback, £9.95 paperback) and Paul Nash Book Designs (The Minories, Col- chester £3.50). The former is handsomely done with plentiful illustrations, good col- our and descriptions of the Merton Abbey Works (that 'colossal kindergarten for adults') and Morris's Oxford Street shop as settings for the design, production and marketing of those now ubiquitous textiles. The Minories arranged a travelling show of Nash's work as designer and illustrator and Clare Colvin has compressed her research into a definitive catalogue. It shows Nash's amazing fertility in finding just the ap- propriate yet often simple image — from the Shandyesque black page for Genesis ('the earth was without form and void') to the stunning transmitter and pylon for the Radio Times Christmas Number of 1930. , Last, a heavy glamour book, window- dressing at its best and most expensive — , Watercolours and Drawings of the French inTeressionists (by Horst Keller Abrams Ig-.37.50), translated from the German. As a anee will prove, it is not quite what its title sul ggests. Impressionist here is used broad- ly., catapulting us from the 1840s with all its t%Eiln-air rumblings, to Bonnard and Vuillard in this century, a scintillating after- glow nearer in spirit to Colette than MauPassant and Zola. The main figures are

here however and some of the plates are superb and not all of them tired (unlike the text which is as full-blown as one of Manet's roses). Alongside familiar works from the Louvre, the Budapest Museum has been raided for a languorous, boating Renoir and Sisley's squawking geese, im- peccably true to type.