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BOOK REVIEWS
GEORGE CHINNERY 1774-1852, ARTIST OF THE CHINA COAST. By Henry and Sidney Berry-Hill. 61 pages text, bibliography, and 76 pages of black and white photographs. F. Lewis, Publishers, Ltd., England. Price U.K. 10 Guineas, U.S. $30.00.
The various phases of the artist's life - early years, the English and Irish periods, the sojourn in India, and the final years in South China are described. The 76 plates of photographs comprise 154 subjects.
Since the Arts Council exhibition of 1957 in England and Scotland, there is renewed interest in Chinnery. As information about him is frequently fragmentary, there is definite need for a comprehensive biography. However, enthusiasts and scholars will be disappointed by this book. The approach is lyrical and romantic instead of factual, authoritative, and scholarly.
It is all very well to quote the inscription on the silver palette presented to Chinnery by the Artists of Dublin (even though this information appears in Plate 1), but why describe it as “measures 16 inches across and was made by one of the leading silversmiths” when actual measurements, hallmark, date letter, and silversmith mark are all known and recorded.1
To claim Chinnery painted unsigned oils of sporting scenes2 in India on the sole basis of a label admittedly dated at least eight years after he left Dacca, strains imagination to the bursting point. Those who know what Chinnery sketched and painted in India and China - houses, temples, people, domestic animals — all placid scenes - will find it difficult, if not impossible, to accept this attribution.
The false alarm of Mrs. Chinnery's prospective arrival in China, amusingly described by W. C. Hunter, intimate friend...
1 Arts Council Catalogue 1957 15" x 13", Dublin hallmark, date letter "E" (for 1801), and silversmith mark "R.W.” (for Richard Whitford).
2 Page 25, Plates 18 and 19.
* Page 268, W. C. Hunter Bits of Old China,