American Masters of Painting: Being Brief Appreciations of Some American PaintersCaffin, Charles H. (Charles Henry)
General
American Masters of Painting: Being Brief Appreciations of Some American Painters
Caffin, Charles H. (Charles Henry)
Painters -- United States
In the presence of nature he makes studies, intent for the time being
solely on recording what he sees; later, in his New York studio, the
poetic suggestion of these studies will come to him, and he composes a
picture. But the process is from realism to poetry, and not
contrariwise, as one suspects to be the case in the poetical landscapes
of some painters. Tryon’s way is not unlike a man’s regard for a good
mother. In the days of his habitual intercourse with her, it is her
dignity and sweetness that grow into his life, the changes of
expression in her face and voice that win upon his devotion, her
beautiful reasonableness that is accepted as quite a natural thing. It
is only when the son’s life is drawn apart from the habit of her
presence that the sentiment of a mother’s love is realized. So Tryon’s
withdrawals to city life allow the poetry of nature to steal in upon his
imagination; when he resumes his face-to-face communing with it, the
life habit of absorbed regard comes back to him. The result of this is
that the sentiment of his pictures grows out of the actual, and
represents the soul of a fact. One finds one’s self admiring the
extraordinary truth of the visual impression, and then often surprised
that material so homely should yield such abundance of poetic
suggestion; forgetting, for the moment, that poetry is not an element of
nature, but a quality of the painter’s mind, representing the degree of
sincerity and elevation of purpose with which he has approached his
subject. Tryon’s poetry comes of the associations garnered through a
life of affectionate intimacy with the country of his birth. It is as
true and spontaneous as filial love.
His technical skill has secured the respect and admiration of his
fellow-painters. They assign him that final title of approval, “a
painter’s painter;” meaning that only those who know by practical
experience the difficulties and trials of technique can properly
appreciate his ability and resourcefulness, and certainly not implying,
as is sometimes the case when this expression is used, that the
admirable qualities in the picture are primarily and solely technical
ones.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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