Page:Constable by C. J. Holmes.djvu/53

 over a moor; while a very large study of a waterfall, also in water-colour, exhibited at the Guildhall some years ago, showed a feeling for space and a sympathy with the grandeur of a great cataract that recall the noble conceptions of Hokusai. De Wint was a less gifted man, but his two landscapes in oil at South Kensington make one regret that he did not use that medium more frequently. The view over a wooded country, with a river winding among the trees far away, is especially notable for the perfection of its cool silvery colour.

The clever theatrical sketching of Müller was more directly indebted to Constable, but, like the laborious accumulations of John Linnell, it deserves no lengthy notice. Frederick Walker and George Mason are more definite links between the old art and the new. In their work there is a real attempt at definite design: though their conception of the world is merely pretty, their colour has too often an unpleasant tendency towards pinkness, and they always paint to catch the public eye. They certainly may claim to have inherited something of Constable's affection for English country life, and we should perhaps be more inclined to pardon their cheap graces and their sentimentality, were they not imitated and diluted by our feebler contemporaries. With them Cecil Lawson must be classed. His early death is often supposed to have been a heavy loss to English art, but his extant work is hardly strong enough to warrant the supposition. It is well intentioned, safe in colour, and fairly accomplished, but such qualities do not go very far towards the making of a really great painter.

The landscape work of Ford, Madox Brown, and the other artists associated with the Preraphaelite fraternity, in spite of occasional similarity in outward aspect, has no real connection with the work of Constable. The Preraphaelite realism was a realism of fact. The realism of Constable was a realism of effect. The difference can easily be understood if we think for a moment of three of our modern marine painters, Brett, Hook, and Henry Moore. Brett might serve as an example of a worker on principles akin to those of the Preraphaelites, while Hook and Henry Moore would represent the point of view of Constable. Of the last two painters Hook seems to have best understood Constable's true excellence. His composition is sound and sometimes original, his handling is skilful, and his colour harmonious, except in the 33