Eleven British artists

There is something of the romantic tradition also in the work of lyon AIM Hitchens, a preoccupation with moods in nature and with colour rather t han form. 4 Frances Hodgkins is a New Zealander by birth, and her early work is to be seen in most Australian galleries; water-colours very often o f 4 ladies in Edwardian costume reading by the light o f standard lampsAV I and playing the piano. They are works of no particular interest and ;0 bear little relation to those included in this exhibition, which date * for the most pa r t from some forty years later, when years and long Qe familiarity with new developments in painting had ripened a s e n s i t i v e . . . ... I and personal vision. 1 Th e paintings of L. S. Lowry are the expression of a refreshinglyIMM 20 original talent. They are industrial landscapes, people with crowds naïvely drawn, and though sympathetically observed, curiously lacking T ; in humanity. / People, either singly or en masse, have no appeal to painters such as Ben Nicholson and J o h n Tunnard. J o h n Tunnard's interest is confined to curious shapes and the placing of colour, a linear vision not without 4 charm. Th e six pictures shown by Ben Nicholson date from 1921 onwards, and are an interesting exposition o f experiment and develop- F * ment from representational and non-representational expression, but they leave unresolved the problem o f how far painting can be divorced - from all interest in the living world and from all emotion. 06 Amongst those painters who have followed very closely in the native tradition, the group of younger men known as the Euston Road School Cr is particularly distinguished. Two are represented in this exhibition, Lawrence Gowing and Victor Pasmore, and ' Jud i t h a t Eighteen' orCt ' Nu d e ' will show t ha t their work lacks neither vitality nor accomplish XO-, ment t ha t goes with devotion to a craft. Th e two remaining painters, Tristram Hillier and Winifred Nicholson, cannot be classified in any group. Th e former is a painter of severely formal landscapes, though there sems to be evidence of a somewhat less unemotional reaction to the visible world in the series of paintings he recently brought back from Portugal. Winifred Nicholson's reaction WM to the world she sees is, on the contrary, full of feeling, charming in * colour and completely feminine. The works of these few selected from the larger group of god painters a t present working in England, should prove abundantly t ha t the native talent is flourishing and vigorous, and t ha t hope for a distin guished development of the English school is soundly based. - * * -* 6 -