ART
EVEN the barest outline, even a critic's truncated catalogue of his choice of the late Sir Hugh Walpole's collection, would, if one were to do any justice -to it, cover a page of this publication. In this, the first selection from approximately two thousand 'sculptures, paintings, drawings, watercolours and prints, there are 146 exhibits ranging over two centuries, and when a second Leicester Galleries exhibition is presented in May, one will still have seen only a fraction of the Walpole collection. From the present show I would choose for myself the Utrillo of La Rue de l'Abreuvoir before all else, but how willingly would I make do with the Constable sketch of SIM- don Common, or the Rowlandson Bacchanalia, or one of the Degas drawings. There are azanne watercolours, there are Renoirs, there are, in fact, works—and fine examples at that—by most of the great 19th century figures, as well as good pictures by lesser artists. There is, apart from the accepted excellencies, a little picture by the much ridiculed Landseer, which should make the ready scoffers think twice, and among the drawings and watercolours, which alone would form a first-class exhibition, special attention might be paid to the Wyndham Lewis and a fine Rossetti.
The discriminating choice of this great collector gives the whole exhibition quality and warmth. There is an atmosphere which suggests something of Sir Hugh's pleasure in the possession of pictures : the excitement with which he visited the galleries, the prodigality with which he purchased works by the great, the gener- qpity with which he lent his support to the promising, and the joy he took in displaying his acquisitions to his friends, is experienced at this exhibition. It has a personality, in spite of its catholicism of taste and variety of interest, which makes it more pleasurable than even the best of the general run of shows. It is most regrettable, though presumably inevitable, that all this must now be dispersed. It is even more regrettable that certain of the finest things now on exhibition were not added to the Tate bequest, or at all events placed where they could always be on public view. At all events, for the next six weeks the public has the rare opportunity of seeing at the Leicester Galleries part of the personal collection of a man with a great loge of pictures and the wherewithal to indulge his
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