ART THE major criticism to which Fled Uhlman lays himself
open
that of being a false nail in his approach to still life and the figure, this and an irritating tendency to fiddle around with a small brush charged with black oilpaint. On the other hand, the rural and urban landscapes which comprise the majority of his pictures at the Redfern Gallery are of their class and type very good. Uhlman is by temperament a follower of the fifteenth century Flemish land- scape tradition, with something of the spirit of " Velvet " Breughel. He does not strive after grandeur, his approach is delicate, his use of colour charming, and within these modest limitations his art is fully developed. "The Bridge (No. 9) and "Night Scene" (No. 41) are Uhlnian at his best. 'The latter is almost a modern counterpart of Patenir, and with suave glazed surfaces and subtle atmospheric colouring, it possesses the same exquisite green distances at which the Flemish master excelled ; though curiously the bare winter trees are not worked out twig by twig as this manner of painting requires them to be. Here would have been an excellent opportunity for Uhlman to use his spindley black line, so over-used elsewhere. Happily, the new paintings do not invite damaging comparisons with Utrillo, as did some of his earlier work.
Anyone who requires convincing that French painting has been run out after scoring a great century should go into the other ground floor rooms at the Redfern. The juniors playing rounders on the pitch, after the retirement of their elders into old Mastery, are Bores, Masson, Roux and Roger. Their pictures are maudlin versions of Matisse and poverty-stricken posthumous Picassos. A certain decrepit elegance ir. the most that can be vouchsafed any one of them. The only rounder scored is by Bores's "Nature Mort; Rouge," a picture painted mostly in turpentine but containing a certain nostalkic and pleasant echo of days gone by.
MICHAEL AYRTON.
Previous page
