Page:The Building News and Engineering Journal, Volume 22, 1872.djvu/383

 May 3, 1872. THE BUILDING NEWS. 361 FINE ART AT THE INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION. ARCHITECTURAL DRAWINGS. ee present collection of architectural drawings compares unfavourably with that which formed part of the Exhibition of 1871, both as regards the number and the quality of the designs exhibited. They are fewer than one hundred in number, and there is not more than a fourth of the whole possessing anything approaching to con- spicuous merit. That many of the drawings have been exhibited before is only a circum- stance which occurred last year, and may be expected always to occur at these Interna- tional Exhibitions of works of fine art; but it is to be regretted that architects have not more cordially embraced this, the only opportunity now open, of contributing to an exhibition of works of their art under the direction, to a large extent, of members of their own profession. No doubt the locale of the Exhibition of last year was open to grave objection, and we can easily believe that if the first display had taken place on the well-lighted and accessible screens now provided a far larger number of exhibitors would haye come forward this year; but allowing for this, and for very natural professional distrust of the South Kensington authorities, there isa deeper and amore potent cause to be foand in the com- parative indifference with which, in our opinion, architects of the present day regard their art, and in their unreadiness to take even the smallest trouble necessary for the display of their works. The drawings will be found on screens placed in the easternmost of the two quad- rants that connect the permanent Exhibition Galleries with the Conservatory and Albert Hall. Here they receive an abundant light, and are very readily accessible. The princi- pal drawing on the first screen is No. 3605, a group of Manchester warehouses, by the late Edward Walters, a man of original mind and much artistic power. ‘The buildings shown in this drawing were among the earliest, and remain to this day some of the best, of the architecturally-treated commercial buildings which so abound in Manchester. Dignity has been obtained by simple means, and though the grouping of stories and happy mixture of arcading and fenestration shown here is now a commonplace expedient in such works, it must be recollected that to a very large extent the design before us showed the way. The drawing is a good one. Two pleasing little churches in red brick, by Mr. F. Chancellor, are shown in exterior and interior (8601-3-7-9.) They resemble one another toa considerable extent, being both apsidal and with waggon-head ceilings ; they are not re- markable efforts, but are unquestionably satisfactory as far as they go. A large facade by Mr. Power (3602) of one of the premiated designs for Messrs. Spiers and Pond’s much exhibited ‘‘Criterion” competition hangs here ; it is specially remarkable for the inartistic weakness of the treatment of the ground-floor story, which seems as totally inadequate to carry the weight above as any London shop- front. Mr. Steane exhibits a pen-and-ink drawing (3604), carefully done, but rather overworked, of a design for a Wesleyan Chapel. This building is marked by a tower with a gabled roof, surmounted by a central lantern. The design, like the drawing, is over- laboured, and will probably benefit should it become necessary a little to ‘cut it down” before execution, but it has points of considerable merit. A far higher level both of design and draughtsmanship is reached by Messrs. Ernest George and Vaughan, in their admirable pen-and-ink sketch of No. 36, Cornhiil (3606). This building reminds one a little of a Venetian palace by its solid dignified massing, its use of surface ornament, and its open loggia with large round shafts, and capitals of a Venetian type; but the main features are more French and Flemish than Italian; the whole is of good Gothic, well put together, and the architects unquestionably under- stand what they are about. Mr. W. Young exhibits (5608) the elevations of a house, and on other screens, a design for a school at Northampton (38617), and a_ series of lodges and other domestic examples (8662). All these works are marked by a strong feeling for the picturesque; both drawing and design are often careless, especially the drawing, but where the archi- tect has taken pains he shows great command over the homely elements out of which domestic buildings of moderate size have to be designed, with a fertile and happy fancy. If Mr. Young will never allow himself to do less than his best, he may rise to an eminent position as a designer of this class of buildings. Messrs Alexander and Hen- man (3610) exhibit a design for Gateshead Schools by Mr. C. Henman, and the same architects also contribute (3663 and 3672) two other very similar designs. These are simple and not unpleasing buildings, but more suited, we should have thought, for erec- tion ina country village than in the large towns for which two of them were designed. In a town land generally is scarce and chil- dren plentiful, and a compact building of several stories high is more often called for than that sort of picturesque and rather ex- tended composition with the aspect of which we are all familar in half the villages of Eng- land. The central position on the second screen is given to an excellent drawing by Mr. Horace Jones (3611), exhibiting the new library and museum now erecting at Guild- hall in avery satisfactory manner ; the frame includes an exterior and two interior views and two sketch plans, all well-drawn and tinted. ‘The building or library has a nave and aisles, something church-wise, the aisles being divided into bays by the bookcases. In a kind of erypt below, accommodation is provided for the museum ; and the structure, which is in fifteenth century Gothic, will harmonise with the best portions of Guildhall in style, and appears well devised for its purpose. There is a certain thinness in the arcade separating the centre or nave of the library from the aisles which may be a defect in the drawing, but which, if found on the executed building, will be detrimental to its success ; as a whole, however, this is a very satisfactory design. Mr. William White exhibits a drawing (3616) of a mansion recently erected by him; the execution of ‘the drawing is very defective, and unworthy of the really picturesque design which it attempts to illustrate. Why, however, in the nineteenth century does Mr. White think it necessary to surround an English gentleman’s house (we beg pardon, an Irish gentleman’s, not that it makes much difference) with battlements which have ceased for centuries to be of any use whatever? Architectural effect might have been secured at less cost of propriety. Mr. 'T.H. Watson exhibits (8615) a rather telling sketch from Venice, and Messrs. Woodzell and Collcutt a competition design (3615) for Winchester Town Hall, not without merit, but damaged by a weak tower anda kind of want of connectionamong features which individually are most of them good. Mr. Thomas Cox exhibits a design (8613) for the decoration of a ball-room, where the colour is much too dark in key and too erude and inharmonious for its purpose; some of the patterns and features employed are good, but the whole is spoiled beyond redemption by the introduction of something which, as far as it can be made out, is a headless female trunk to do duty as a bracket, and to be re- peated all round the room. These novel and unpleasing caryatides would compromise a far more successful design than Mr. Cox’s. Mr. Alfred Smith, Mr. Came, Mr. Fogerty, Mr. Sorby, and Mr. Worley follow with de- signs which it is hardly necessary to notice here, and we then come to the best drawing in the gallery. This is contributed by Mr. Henry W. Batley, and represents the end of a sitting-room (2623) in elevation. This drawing affords an apportunity of showing architecture, mural decoration, and furniture, all harmoniously designed, and treated in a most artistic manner. The author is evidently a student of Mr. E. W. Godwin and Mr. Talbert, or at least follows in the same line of study, and has produced an excellent whole of which the parts are also excellent. We shall hear of Mr. Batley again. On either side of this hangs an architectural in- terior ; the one is a view from Burgos (1622), by Mr. Dobbin; and the other a composition by Mr. Schoy, of Brussels (1624); this last is the finer drawing of the two, and a good Belgian example. Mr. Galsworthy Davis exhibits two students’ prize drawings, both of which were noticed here at the time they gained their distinction. His Academy gold- medal drawing (1626) is, whatever may be thought of it as a design, a remarkable speci- men of finished tinting. Mr. Seddon ex- hibits a large drawing, full of elaborate work (38636) of the decorations for a chapel, the subjects by Mr. Rosseter. ‘There is some- thing oyer-laboured about the design, and the colouring is not altogether satisfactory, but there can be no question as to the great care and thought which have been expended upon this remarkable design, and there is little doubt that if executed with such in- crease in the power of the colouring as is natural when a finished sketch is translated into actual mural painting, a splendid interior must be obtained. The same architect ex- hibits a large and telling drawing of his University College, Aberystwith, an exe- cuted design of which the irregularity and picturesqueness are, we believe, unique. Many an architect has had such a dream: no one else, so far as we know, has had the oppor- tunity andthe courage to put it into stone and brick. ‘lhe design has been seen before, but this drawing is none the less welcome, and will tendtoraise Mr. Seddon’s reputation asa master of vigorous picturesque composition. Mr. Edis exhibits his restorations and additions to the Bishop’s Palace, Buckdon (3633) in a well-executed drawing of a rather low but pleasant tone of colour. This drawing was noticed in the Burtpinc News when ex- hibited at the Academy, we need, therefore, only here say that it shows practised skill in its adaptation of ancient architecture to modern uses, at once harmonising and distin- guishing the old and the new portions. The same architect exhibits two specimens of Londonstreet architecture, at Queensborough- terrace (3632) and Southwark-street (86584). Mr. Knightley exhibits a well-executed pencil sketch of a pleasing Renaissance design for the East India Railway Company’s Offices (3634), a good piece of street architecture ; also a much less successful interior of a concert theatre (3661). Some sketches by Mr. Batterbury, Mr. Cooper, and Messrs. Perry, Hanson, and Lee, hang near here; also two specimens of simple internal decoration by Mr. Robins, and an unfortunate drawing by Mr. Plumbe (3631), which entirely fails to do justice to what is in reality a very effective London facade, remarkable for a novel and ingenious mode of lighting the lower stories. Mr. Waterhouse exhibits a small, brightly- executed drawing, or rather finished sketch, of his Manchester Town Hall, and a photo-. graph of the entrance to his Assize Courts. ‘These are too well known to need description here. The same architect sends a clear and effective photograph of part of Allerton Priory, showing a cleverly-executed feature of domestic architecture. Why, we ask, if drawings are expensive and troublesome, will not architects follow the example thus set and exhibit photographs of their executed works or of features of them? An excellent archi- tectural exhibition could be so formed, and at small cost to the exhibitors. Mr. Roger Smith exhibits three drawings of mansions of considerable size (8640, 3654-5), two of them