17 MAY 1946, Page 22

Painting in Watercolour

English Watercolour Painters : H. J. Paris. " Britain in Pictures " series. (Collins. 4s. 6d.) THE name of this admirable series indicates that it is the pictures that come first and foremost ; the text which modestly intrudes between the illustrations presents uncomfortable problems for the author who, in this particular volume, has to cover several hundred years of the work of numerous individuals in some 14,000 words. He must dash down the years with a brisk bow to Gainsborough, a quick exchange with Turner, and a handshake with Constable. He must take off his hat in passing to Blake and Rowlandson, and give a nod of recognition to a host of smaller fry. All this, in passing, at the rate of half a decade per page. A difficult undertaking, which Major Paris contrives, if somewhat pontifically, with a fair degree of skill. Most people are acknowledged. The majority of 'the deserv- ing are treated at length, though some are curiously misrepresented. Paul Nash, for instance, one of our most lyrical contemporary land- scapists, is described, favourably but without qualification, as having " turned to the al?stract," and developed his " cubist geometrical forms " as if he find done nothing else in watercolour since the 1914-18 war. The illustrations are on the whole good, if not the most exciting, examples of the individual artist's work—a poor, late Palmer is an exception to this on the debit side, and the Blake in colour seems to me a bad choice. But it is the " argument " at the beginning that seems to me far from final. " English Watercolour Painters is a rather artificial designation, as would be " British Oil Painters," but to suggest that our supremacy in watercolour is due to our inadequacy in other media, our lack of the plastic sense inherent in oil painting, seems to me disputable in view of the fact that several of our major water-colourists were also major exponents of the art of oil painting. I am also unsatisfied with the dismissal of the medium of gouache (which implies body colour) as " a short cut to some of the effects of oil painting "—" rarely satisfactory." I cite Hillyarde, Fuseli, Sutherland and Frances Hodgkins as examples, selected at random, of artists who have used gouache or its counterpart with more success than pure watercolour. However, there are some beautiful pictures to look at, and it seems to me that the most recent volumes of " Britain in Pictures " show a decided improve-