New-York tribune., 1920-05-04
Tang of the Sea
I'm Sale Exhibit
OF Marine Art
Max Williams Collection
at American Galleries
Different From Anything
Displayed This Season
By Royal Cortissoz

1t is, we suppose, as such things go,
a minor sale, the sale Of prints and
pictures which occurs at the American
Art Galleries tomorrow evening. But
nothing quite like it has been offered
this season. The things in it belong to
Mr.. Max Williams. They consist of
naval portraits, which is to say the
pictures and images of ships. A kind
OF tarry smell exhnles from them, for
they date from the days in which the
steel dreadnought was not. Here, in
stead, are the wooden walls of that
historic past which was, nominally At
least, more romantic than our own,
Heroism, of course, is the same in all
ages, but its investture was beyond
all question more picturesque in the
eighteenth century and earlier than it
is to-day
There have been few great painters
of ships. Claude produced some en-
chanting harbor scenes. In modern
times Turner's "Fighting Temeraire'
magnitcently illustrates the dramatic
and beautiful effect to be extorted by
genius from the theme of mans rela-
tion to the sea. And behind Turner
there lie, in the Dutch school, the nu-
merous manifestations of naval art
maritime nation. Van de Velde, by the
way. was a superb master of what we
may call pictorial shipping. He painted
charming compositions, and some of his
drawings show that the Veracity of his
ensembles was based on the curefulest
study of details.
Familiar with Construction
He knew all about naval construction.
But in the comparatively small group
or frst class artists whose names are
associated with pictures of shins it is
noticeable that the tendency is toward
distinctly broad conception of the
subject. The sea is as important as
the ship. The habit of a man like
Canaletto, painting the state barge
OF the Dogc of Venice with meticu-
lous solicltude for every inch of "Bu-
clentoro's' decorative carving, is rare.
1t is piquant fact that the most ia
nous OF the humanized pictures of the
sea is Gericaults "Wreck of the Medu
sa,' n which all that the sailors have
saved of their craft is the timber out
OF which they have fashioned the raft
on which they float,
Naval art, strictly speaking, has been
left almost exclusively in the hands of
secondary artists. Salvador Rosa was
such type. But he was prodigiouslv
sibly trace of the theater is not
inimical to the good naval painting At
all events, the two canvases by him II
the Williams collection, both illustrat-
ing the Battle of Lepanto, are undenia-
bly, handsome, spirited compositions.
With them should be cited Nicholas
Pocock's Battle Of the Nile" Pococl5
had the gist of the matter in him. lie
grasped the significance of sails and
sails, and then more sails. This paint
ing of his might be designated an epic
are imposing enough, but the glory of
the picture lies in the billowing tex
ture above them. 1t does not matter
that sails and flags are indicative of a
strong wind, while the ships are evil
IDENTIFY as steady on their keels as
though they were so many stationary
forts. That is one of the naval paint
er's bits Of artistic license.
Occasional Free Touch
The bulk of the paintings in this cxhi-
bition recalls Canaletto's tradition of
immobility Occasionally, it is true, the
touch is free, there is certain at
mospheric quality, as in lie Grand's de-
lightful "View of New York Harbor,"
painted in 1852 But mostly the artists
represented are devotees of the old
maplike method which is exemplified
in the anonymous Harry Booth, Amer
lean Bark" picture of one of our
traders as she swept out Of Province
town Harbor under full sail. The
painter was not concerned half so
much about composition as he was
about the minutia of rigging and the
like. This was the preoccupaton of
nearly all the old craftsmen, those who
painted and those who Autographed
and engraved the prints abounding in
Mr.. Wlliams's collection. Their names
are written only rather dmly in the
book of fame. Who remembers Rob
ert Dodd, and J. F. Butterworth, and
T. G.. Dutton and the rest? Not the