ART
Artists of Fame and Promise. At the Leicester Galleries.—John Armstrong. At the Lefevre Galleries.
WHAT do the famous artists promise, and what fame will the promising artists achieve? The Leicester Galleries very wisely leaves this to the public, and perhaps the majority of the best exhibits fall somewhere between " fame" in terms of Sickert and promise in terms of _Ursula McCannel, who I believe is very young indeed. To be as famous as Sutherland or Moore or Piper is to be just famous enough to need all the promise in the world, for it is a stage at which to slip into the use of an easy formula presents temptations, because the name is worth the money. Sickert once said that " genius is the capacity for self-preservation in a talent " —or words to that effect, an aphorism containing a fair degree of truth. It remains to be seen which of the so-called " young painters "—a term used to describe anyone between forty and sixty —will preserve his talent intact, for some are in very present danger of petrifying. Be that as it may, "les jeunes" have a number of excellent pictures on view. Ivan Hitchens' Tree Painting is well up to his usual standard ; David Jones' The Edge of the Wood is delightful, which is more than can be said for his oil Self Portrait. Duncan Grant exhibits a large pastel, Spanish Girl, which seems to me good, but which I confess I dislike. Frances Hodgkins, a very young artist in the early seventies, whose work is more promising than most, shows Parrot with Poppy, dated 1945, which is as fresh and lovely as any work of hers I have seen. Stanley Spencer, Paul Nash and Graham Sutherland are all represented with works of average quality. Of the painters either dead or past the doldrums whose work is on show, there is a fine Sickert, The Red Blouse, and a large oil of the New Bedford by the same artist which would have been excellent had he completed it. James Pryde's The Archway is a first-rate example of his gloomy baroque manner, and Sir William Nicholson's still-life Pink Cattleyas displays his customary impeccable taste and wonderful facility. The usual vague display of `ssensitive" impressions of dull weather by artists of nether established fame nor definite promise make up the bulk of the rest. Some of the best of the really young artists are not represented, which is rather a p:ty. There is much about John Armstrong's new paintings to com- mend them. They are persuasive in mood and they are, on the whole, consistent in quality, both of execution and intention. The deserted towns lack the curious power to disturb of Clfrico's early pictures, for all they are technically more proficient, and the con- structions in landscape have not the static dominating emptiness of Moore's lead sculptures, some of which they slightly resemble. Mr. Armstrong's best pictures in this exhibition are of water-lapped cathedrals and motionless trees in dusty landscapes. The water fills the buildings but no drop escapes to the parched earth outside. These paintings have a haunting quiet which would grow on the beholder without his knowledge—as would certain of the small, rather Florentine, figure pictures of draped women dancing. Mr. Armstrong's subdued colour and mosaic-like application of tempera are highly suited to his subjects. I recommend Nos. t6, 29 and 33 as being something more than purely decorative.
MICHAEL AYRTON.
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