Architects -- Fiction; World War, 1914-1918 -- England -- Fiction
Then came the turn of Mr. Buckingham Smith's paintings. These were not
signed 'Smith' as the etchings were signed 'Prince.' By no means! They
were signed 'Buckingham Smith.' George much admired them, though less
than he admired the etchings. They were very striking and ingenious, in
particular the portraits and the still-life subjects. He had to admit
that these fellows to whom he had scarcely given a thought, these
fellows who existed darkly behind the house, were prodigiously
accomplished.
"Of course," said Mr. Buckingham Smith negligently, "you can't get any
idea of them by this light--though," he added warningly, "it's the
finest artificial light going. Better than all your electricity."
There was a pause, and Mr. Prince sighed and said:
"I was thinking of going up to the Promenades to-night, but Buck won't
go."
George took fire at once. "The Glazounov ballet music?"
"Glazounov?" repeated Mr. Prince uncertainly. "No. I rather wanted to
hear the new Elgar."
George was disappointed, for he had derived from Mr. Enwright positive
opinions about the relative importance of Elgar and Glazounov.
"Go often?" he asked.
"No," said Mr. Prince. "I haven't been this season yet, but I'm always
meaning to." He smiled apologetically. "And I thought to-night----"
Despite appearances, he was not indifferent after all to his great
Viennese triumph; he had had some mild notion of his own of celebrating
the affair.
"I suppose this is what etchings are printed with," said George to Mr.
Buckingham Smith, for the sake of conversation, and he moved towards the
press. The reception given to the wonderful name of Glazounov in that
studio was more than a disappointment for George; he felt obscurely that
it amounted to a snub.
Mr. Buckingham Smith instantly became the urbane and alert showman. He
explained how the pressure was regulated. He pulled the capstan-like
arms of the motive wheel and the blanketed steel bed slid smoothly under
the glittering cylinder. Although George had often been in his
stepfather's printing works he now felt for the first time the
fascination of manual work, of artisanship, in art, and he regretted
that the architect had no such labour. He could indistinctly hear Mr.
Prince talking to Marguerite.
"This is a monotype," said Mr. Buckingham Smith, picking up a dusty
print off the window-sill. "I do one occasionally."
"Did you do this?" asked George, who had no idea what a monotype was and
dared not inquire.
"Yes. They're rather amusing to do. You just use a match or your finger
or anything."
"It's jolly good," said George. "D'you know, it reminds me a bit of
Cézanne."
Of course it was in Paris that he had heard of the great original, the
martyr and saviour of modern painting. Equally of course it was Mr.
Enwright who had inducted him into the esoteric cult of Cézanne, and
magically made him see marvels in what at the first view had struck him
as a wilful and clumsy absurdity.
"Oh!" murmured Buck, stiffening.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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