ART
Three British Artists. Henry Moore, John Piper, Graham Suther- land Exhibition, City Literary Institute, -Holborn.
THAT enterprising institution, -C.E.M.A., under the auspices of the Board of Education, has arranged this exhibition of the works of three living British artists who have come very much to the fore in recent years. Henry Moore was just old enough to serve in the last War, and he then studied at tile Leeds College of Art and the Royal College in London. He is best known as a sculptor, and his work is of the abstract constructional style, which has still to gain popular understanding. At this exhibition, 'however, a number of his drawings are also shown, and they are chiefly representative of scenes in the London underground air-raid shelters. These are remarkable for their masterly drawing, massive composition, and sombre expressiveness. Nothing finer has been seen in our time. .Utterly different, but equally dis- tinguished in their more calligraphic and romantic style, are the drawings and paintings of John Piper, who is well known to our readers as art critic. His originality is immediately striking, but it is a genuine originality based on tradition, and no mere super- ficial novelty. His Cheltenham Fantasia shows what can be done when the discipline of visual thinking confined severely to abstract constructional forms is applied to an imaginative view of reality. This is both Cheltenham and a Fantasia, not a photo- graphic imitation of the Cheltenham anybody may see, or a mere baseless fancy. Byland Abbey is also a superb example of a reality seen and rendered convincingly through the light of ithagination. Imagination is the key to Mr. Graham Sutherland's work too ; in fact, these three artists are united in this that their work is never commonplace, never obvious, and has nothing of the banal which is unfortunately so beloved by that unseeing section of the public which has not yet learnt to use its imagination when looking at pictures. This exhibition shows that English
painting today is very much alive. W. J. TURNER.
Previous page
