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Salient: Victoria University Students' Newspaper. Vol. 24, No. 9. 1961

Around the Galleries

page 7

Around the Galleries

In recent months, Wellington connoisseurs of the visual arts have had much to see, and, judging by the large number of sates made, liked much of what they have seen. So far, Autumn academy sales total £1096. The recent Bodcock show netted over £2200; MacDiarmid—truly a landscape painter par excellence—netted over '£800. and local artists exhibiting in Manners Street during the Festival, added some £500.

Work exhibited lately has been, on the whole, of very high standard, and has ranged from the very successful N.Z. Industrial Design Display and the recent Japanese ceramics showing in the central Gallery, to an exciting little exhibition of Danish prints and an exhibition of water colours by C. D. Barraud. We have seen exhibitions by Douglas Bodcock, Cedric Savage. Douglas MacDiarmid. Arthur McGhie and Peter Mclntyre. The Autumn Exhibition of the Academy of Fine Arts is, of course, now snowing.

What a splendid painter in oils Douglas MacDiarmid is. Every canvas is a delight to the eye: ail are, as Professor Page remarked at the opening, meticulously finished. One of his canvases will grace our National Gallery. MacDiarmid, unlike Peter Mclntyre, gives me the impression of having something to say in every canvas: the latter apes the camera too much. One can see how much he loves the French countrvside, especially the south of France, which is seen so often. After suffering many privations in his early years, MacDiarmid is coming into his own. All will wish him well, I am sure.

Arthur McGhie

The recent exhibition in the Willeston Galleries of oil paintings by Arthur McGhie, who is a Wellington lawyer and graduate of V.LT.W. was, in my opinion significant and well worth seeing. McGhie has been painting for some 20 years and, surprisingly, has studied under Adrian Heath, He has also worked with David Romberg and has exhibited with, and is a founder member of, the English Free Painters Group; a group formed from the painter members of the Institute of Contemporary Arts.

Quite clearly, McGhie exhibits some considerable talent—both latent and manifest—and has, as has been remarked on, a surprisingly flexible outlook considering his 20 years experience. The first impact one feels on meeting his work is that of his sense of colour. Indeed at first sight I was reminded in more ways than one, of the Fauve Vlaminck, of whom the critic Dorival said, "he does not suggest, he delivers a punch." McGhie, too, is a painter full of ideas. He possesses an enquiring mind and is concerned much, as evidenced in the canvases' titles, with a social awareness of a host of matters.

Perhaps McGhie's best point is his extreme freshness and its accompanying vigour and vitality. He clashes his colours together like cymbals and the effect is by no means unpleasant. McGhie s New Zealand landscapes—"Mount Egmont," "Wairarapa" and "Maraenui Lookout East Coast"—are especially fresh and vibrant and well worth seeing. The artist applies his paint very thickly and all illustrate his interest in mass. With these, are contrasted such semi-abstract studies as "Comrade Gagarin, I Presume" (which, by the way, though the technique employed resembles closely that of the Australian William Dobell. is no Dobellian pastiche), and "Coffee Bar Cameo." McGhie also does such titles as "Last Train" (one instinctively asks—where to?) "All Fell Out," "Women's institute Palaver" and "For Whom the Bell Tolls." These latter canvases illustrate his use of symbolism.

McGhie has been criticised for " unsubtle use of colour," but I do not think this a particularly valid criticism: he would appear to be influenced by the modern French school. That he was influenced by Goya's more freely treated work e.g., Pilgrimage to San Isidro (novel in its own day) is, I think, certain. El Greco too, may have given some ideas as to colour; McGhie came under both these artists' spell.

Despite some concrete evidence as to a conflict between "accomplishment and aims," as Russell and has noticed, McGhie's progress should be worth watching, for as his exhibition brochure says: this show suggests some fairly clear lines of endeavour for future development. I personally, would like to see some more New Zealand landscapes.

—G.L.E.

Peter McIntyre

The most outstanding feature of the recent exhibition of paintings by Peter Mclntyre, was the masterful use he makes of light. I remember this quality, in his painting of a Dunedin square which won the Keiliher award, two years ago. The paintings in the present exhibition are mostly of Hong Kong: and it is interesting to see the light haziness associated with the Oriental landscape—a contrast with the clarity of his New Zealand and Antarctic studies. The certainty with which the atmosphere of the place is captured is impressive, particularly in the coastal scenes. Water was a main theme in these paintings: sea, beaches, harbours, rivers. The sea seems to be a main source of livelihood in Hong Kong; there is a congestion of sampans and junks in the harbours and rivers. I liked the line and wash paintings of these subjects better han the few in oils; the water-colour was used with a subtle effect which suited the subject matter.

There was a most decided sense of place about Rainy Day—Tolo Harbour, with fishing boats in the foreground and gaps of light in the clouds over two ranges of hills which were an extraordinary soft green and blue, that was reflected in the sea. Fishing Junks had an immediacy about it and a sense of excitement—perhaps piracy, or a storm brewing—in the sky and water shadows. There are scenes of net-drying and rocks, fisher folk at Tool harbour, folding nets and widows in sampans, where the pen is used very effectively to give them all this precise definition of place. Market Scene and Street Scene show the crowded Chinese in the city, colourful and busy. Here you can sense the heat of the place; the brilliant colours are emphasised by deep shadows.

In Junks at Anchor (oil), Hong Kong from the Peak and Cheoung Chow Island, the extraordinary-diversity of colours in the sea is apparent. In Hong Kong from the Peak, the sea is a brilliant deep green, with little hint of blue. Patches of bush on the hills are in startling contrast—their green is dark but contains yellow. More startling at first glance were the shadows cast from sampans in Cheoung Chow Island: bright green, reflected from the hills in the background, in a very pale transparent sea.

Some portraits of Oriental children are included in the exhibition; they are all, most sympathetic studies. I thought the oil, Small Girl had more general appeal than the others. I liked the circus scenes too; but the thing that most impressed me were the unusual seascapes and the decisive handling of atmosphere.

—K.N.B.