1955-05-30 — Page 4

THE CHINA MAIL, MONDAY, MAY 30, 1955.

IF YOU DECIDED ON A PORTRAIT

Whom Would You Choose

By

To Paint It?

THE COUNTESS OF HUNGTINGDON

HAVE never had my portrait painted, and am not likely to, but when

I look at other people's por traits and wander round exhibitions I play a private. game.

If I were "done," with money of course.no object, whom would I choose? Picasso? Sutherland? Anni- goni? Dali John?

Orone of the fashionable painters

in who specialise celebrated beautics for the Kelly,

want that

beauty

Academy-Brockhurst, Gunn, Simon Elwes, Lamb?

It all depends, of course, on ivhat you want. Most worher with any pretensions to beauty

recorded perfected, flattered; they are less concerted with the portrait, as a work of art.

imagine the Duchess of Argyll must be pleased with her portrait by James Gunn in this. year's Academy. It shows her a beautiful woman which she is in an expensive dress of which every separate thread has bean carefully painted.

ts

T

Dali

Picasso Sutherland or John?

+4

#

THE AUTHOR from its subject? I doubt it. A

well as as

beauty, and second visit leaves one oddly beauty of its own, transcending dissatisfied: there is a theatrical the poor sitter's limitations. I touch; the figure stands out in

painter whose exaggerated reliat from a fancy know of no

canvas would seem more liko background. These

elegant

home to me than Augustus mock-Florentine portraits" Arc

John's. attractive, but. I almost think Gerald Brockhurst does them better. His women are he still points portraits, but

ones I have beautiful, too,

his the

mysteriously satisfying. Ко technique is superb.

draws with genius; he has a Like Home

wonderful feeling for beauty in children and women; he sees It in all sorts of humble and unexpected places.

all

and

I don't even know whether

seen are

One would sit to John, I be. 39 #real person; he would not be bothered with * mask

seeing how one appeared in the NO, I think I would hardly aspire to the glossy school, ere of so powerful a painter.

aesthetic leve. of an But I might come out us a being more hag of a tumbril, and I am sneb than a vain woman. These caly cast down about ap- are the professional pointers of

beautiful women, confecting world in which I could never feel at home.

pearance.

What about Dall? He com- mands huge prices in America, his technique is marvellous, he It is important to feel at ease made Lady Mountbatten look

with one's portrait, to know very magnetic with her hair that it has some truth to tell full of snakes, and I hear he is going to Olivier,

fel

paint Sir Laurence.

But no. no; he would not be my choice. He is a wonder- craftsman, one always

his examines pictures with Interest, but I don't horrified think the next generation will want to keep them..

me he's

brilliant eventually mour.tebank, and in 50 years

four time his will be comic embarrasses, like the

seaweed land- guinea presentation chocolate curiosities, box that one can't quite bring scapes or Gothi railway tun oneself to throw away, and can't nels. That's it; they are follies.

Perhaps, then. I'd

But to me it's the kind of portrait, that bores after the first glance and

find a use for.

WELL

19

The Difficulty

whom, shall I have?

What do I want? Ah, there's the difficulty!

I want a portrait to be like me, to be pleasing to look at, to make some intelligible state- ment about character, and to be a work of art. I would want the picture to live, on its own merits and also

personal to me.

be

rather

If one had anything to give it would appear. The painting would have • life and strength of its own,

It would not be a record of one's preterices.

-PREPARING to be a BEAUTIFUL POLITICIAN

SCENERY KINDLY

LENT BY

SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL

'Splendid, gentlemen, splendid! No one can say you look uninspired now."

The CROCODILE

HORTLY

after the war a friend

and I went on a shooting holiday in the exotic Northern Territory of Australia. This curious: ad-

venture of mine came about when Jack have one of our own fashion-and I were shooting crocodiles

on the

wouldn't be

able afraid it

Simon

portrait painters? 'n West Alligator River, which empties Elwes. I locked carefully at his itself into Van Diemen Gulf. (The early portrait of the settlers thought the huge reptiles were Queen, and it was quite realligators).

печ

markable. how it failed to meet one of my require- a single menis..

women's

We hunted from a flat-bottomed boat, drifting quietly by the lily-lined banks of the tropical river, seeking to surprise the great salt- water crocodiles while they sunned themselves on the

Women Boring

course, there is Henry. wo be very O safe, nicely painted, mud banks. One of us took

..but sometimes a I know that it Picasso could elegant. persuaded, the portrait would little dull? Mind you, I don't the paddle in the light craft

general

dullness of while the other stood at the be worth think the probably live, and

portraits can be all ready with one of our two thousands.

blamed on the painters.

Women have become

both.3033. ユッグ boring difficult

their paint, fault. In Helbein's cr even Gainsborough's

the Graham Sutherland, would be an exciting gamble. sitter brought the painter a He has never painted a woman's naked face, and no two human portrait yet, perhaps never will, countenances were alike. Today but his Churchill, Maugham, we are universally masked with

Beaverbrook show and

But, however chic and valu able, can

can I risk being handed down to posterity with my eye in my car and my teeth repre- sented as fishbones?

now,

and

It's

the in bullet to Slamming a

creatures grey-brown own scaly

before they slithered into the water was our chief hope of a trophy.

In the water

There

an make-up, smoothing out lines.

were targets in the We all appear better looking water, of course-from time to which cemands, some courage than we are, and much less in-time we came up with a croco in the sitter.

by teresting. It is not really inspir-dile lying still, almost submerged Worth it, if not paid for

on the edge of the Uly and reed oneself,

just for the fun of ing to have to paint the 2,000th

copy of the same artificial face. patches.

But a dead crocodile

absolute integrity of approach obliterating character.

Against

skin disease and itching

Mitigal

AGENUINE BAYER' PRODUCT; MANUFACTURED IN LEVIRKUSEN. DERMANY

"This

is

Is it surprising that, by many in the water invariably sank artists, portrait painting is re-before we could reach it and

and the

CAMERA

* By Dal

Stivens

"Camming

London Exoreas Service

It could have happened, but.....

DID

IT HAPPEN?

The boat rocked perilously

. Then in a flash the boat overturned ...

DAL STIVENS'Skill in oneragmous ececdote is familiar to readers of The Gambling Ghost and Other Stories,

JJ

Stivens, like his father, in an outstanding that with a rifle and was an ardent bunter in Australia, where he had established a rich reputation as a writer before he came to this country with his wife in 1949.

Stivens fives in West Hampstead with his wife and two childrens. He is 43.

An

buy

Near enough

We came back all right, ap from the everhanging trees. garded as the ultimate bore? though we might have dived proaching up-wind. but we inch or two wide and we'd

Pietro Annigoni, whose por- for it well, it wasn't the folliest didn't find him on the bank on trouble. trait of the Queen is surrounded of notions in a river which had that occasion-nor on any one by a permanent crowd in the not Academy, betrays no sign of Alligator for nothing. boredom.

Art critics, I find, condemn this picture to a man, but to my uniformed eye it is at least interesting, out of the common rut. Its flattery is not extreme, it is a likeness; it has dignity. and the artist has seriously tried to suggest character.

But is it a work of art? Is it important enough to live, apart

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name of West of a dozen others. We would be scarcely round the bend before he'd go splashing into the water. And, provokingly, on several occasions, he did not submerge but stayed near the top of the

Sometimes we put the rifle down and just shot pictures with my reflex camera.

We bagged 10 during our first week-the largest, 14ft. 2in. long water, and the smallest 10ft 8in. That

somewhere

was

QUT

camp

one

stayed for a yarn.

Some left.

zet.

dile in a berserk fury made for us, jaws clashing....or so it looked to us. Actually, I sup- pose he was in as big a hurry to get away as we were. Some- how we backed out of his reach. Then we broke a few Northern Territory speed swimming. ré cords to reach the shore, mer. cifully only 20 yards away. From the bank we watched Old Dread- notight streaking stream, the haft of the harpoon breaking the surface from time to time.

down

the

We were wet, had had a bad

scare, and had lost all our gear -boat, rifles, knives, ammuni-

Drawing by RUOIMAN

"He's coming aboard,” I shouted.

CHAPMAN PINCHER'S COLUMN:

Bad Teeth Bogey

Is Dispelled

Seventeen

Sixteen. tion and a valuable camera. But HEWING chocolates, of licking too many lollipops by Fifteen-near enough

for Jack later that day the aborigines

the bad tooth Old Dreadnought stared at me from the nearby camp offered to

sucking sweets or even bringing up contemptuously. I squeezed the recover it for "a quid, boss, and crunching sugar cubes will bogey. trigger. An instant after, Jack some baccy" We thought it anot weaken your child's The tests were carried out

#good bargain.

Scared!

hurled the harpoon.

Old Dreadnought lay still i the water and the harpoon was Armly in his body!

"

teeth and from today he can at children's homes in London, call on the authority of the Liverpool, and Sheffield, Medical Research Council to

about the "Let's have a crock at shoot- average size here, a cattleman ing him in the water," I said one ridden up to night. We had now spent eight told us. He had

evening and days hunting the monster....

sugar was fed in the "Got him!" we yelled, jubi- "Okay," said Jack, and we'll

of sweets, jam, honey; We were eating breakfast next prove it. After tests lasting form lantly. But Old Dreadnought try the professional method."

Irad been merely stunned. Before morning when we saw a file of two years the council's doc- syrup, and plain sugar. Then "All right," I said, 'Ughtly.

could squeeze the trigger again, ing in front

near-naked aborigines approach tors now report that eating the children were given a de- tailed dental inspection every Much too lightly.

were the bucks, he exploded into fierce tordadie Profesional crocodile shooters life. He plunged down. He came quite empty-handed, and behind sugar in any form does not six months, the Cocters say two big ones still feft in this who were getting £4 a skin at up, rods, wisting, gyrating in them the women (gins) with our make children's teeth decay. their report.*

though I doubt it," he that time bagged many of the the water, trying to rid himself gear. Six of them bore the boat

their shoulders. Others car- The doctors fed 265 boys and shooters went through here it by gelting close to the bruis lors, laws, popped is four-fect red the rifles, ammunition and giris

bed knives. Only the camera had much as two and three quarter

"They say there are one or

river, said. "A couple of professional crocodiles in the water. They did of the harpoon.

in a boat. Behind them stood His tall whirled in murderous.

smashing the

wiki

not been recovered.

mon

he

on diets containing as

pounds of sugar a week

The children's ages ranged from two to 14 at the start of

the experiments. They all took

for part

in the sweet-tooth for at least a year and

test some

а

about six months aayed late, an aborigine with a harpoon. The circles,

Our new friend

"Weren't you scared the each child filling us with the lore of this instant after the hunter fired, heavily. We were soused from gators? I asked one of the vast, empty, untamed territory the aborigine hurled his harpoon head to foot.

Their teeth decayed no taster stayed in it for two years, -nearly six times as big as the into the crocodile to ensure that

We'd hitched the rope round

than those of children whose boss,"

A few of the children

were "Plurry scared, United Kingdom,

of the bow seat and common sense

diet provided only 110zs. gaid,

given crude sugar to test grinning broadly, "Flurry but with only

would have been to cut it, for.

refined #theory that modern scared We sendern gins into sugar per week,, Old Dreadnought's unges for the water." 10,000 white men

For 50 years dentists have sugar lacks some natural sub- and; perhaps,

freedom now dragged the bost

The noble savage is not always believed that the. protective stance which protects teeth." 30,000 brown-

forward and once when he went

so noble-or simple! skinned

down to the bed of the stredm.

enamel of teeth is eaten away Those receiving it developed abori-

the gunwale sont and the water found Old Dreadnought dead on fermentation

The same day the blacks by acids produced from the as much decay, as the others... gines. There was

came, within an inch of the top

of sugar in the a camp of them

mouth near us," by the

Now if is no longer safe way.

You may think

DID IT HAPPEN? Tomorrow

you will know and there will be another story by a famous author

to set you pondering.

A giant!

Fited again.

the

sandbank.

take his belly 'skin,

I aid. "We'll get

2

to

• The Efects of Eupar · Supple- ments on Dental Caries in Children;

e back for

the loss of ty talking your youngsters out H.M. Stationery Ozic, 48

Bow

then

2.

THE 3 P.M. DROOPS

it was easy shooting because a rope was made fast to it should

the co

(Only the belly no mind for

camera" the targets were so big.

But we had. But the dead crocodile start to sink. ̈

common sense. We were fast to skin has any commercial use.) the only place you can kill a

I skinned him and in the curiosity crocodile instantly is through So blithely we made a harpoon the biggest crocodile

made me cut him open. his brain, which is about the and set out, feeling very pro bucketing boat, I fired the rifle

Kneeling in Territory!

There I

"I found my camera not size of an egg and situated be- fessional

to improved by salt again and again. Jack fired, to strong stomach acids.

water and

The doctor, led by Bo droopy feeling, THAT.. tween the eyes.

which steals over you at Bjerner, analysed the mistakes We approached quite noisily. Some of our shots got home

Kong was Old Dread-about three.In the afternoon, so made by workmen who bad to "Old Dreadnought" (as we'd one 1. fired into his throat and named him) sauntered casually another into his shoulder Jack Dought? He let us down. He that you carrot concentrate on note down readings from meters

measured only 231t. 22in. Well your

is. natural and and malo, simple calculations into the water and then, waited, also hit him twice. But only

normal, doctors report, today. every hour lying almost still, his nostrils brain she would have served short of the record.

From the workomen's · records. We went on hunting fan- and bony eye ridges showing

Studies of buman alertness Rogers I reloaded other week but now shot, many like four large walnuts.

The

urgent fingers

spread over many years books the doctors were able to more pictures than we did crec, rest of his. Immense body lay

the magazine, Then Jack

yelled, ૧

have shown that the power of trace back at their mistakes and odiles: we'd rather lost interest under the water; from time to "Cut the mope!!!

concentration ... slumps. sharply the times when they had made in them.

time he waved his tall. and the Things were getting too, hots

after lunch, reaching a "low" at them over 20 years. Then something happened to serrated vanes broke the aur I was content to quit now. I

three. p.m. make

us put the camera hastily face.

grabbed the knife, jumped to the rope. away. We drified quietly round

Then I leapt bock. Old

114,

a bond and a great grey-brow with the current. Jack held the alongside the boat Now be

We closed on him, drifting Dreadnought had come up

shoved

bome the began savaging and clawing it boat rocked perilously. His

farm hurtled down the right hand bank and crashed into the harpoon I

water send me if he was MU Leet The over wale,

the spray flying bolt in 303. We got within The bo

The poon. Twenty-five feet,

CLOC was.

we declared on inch, Northern Territory record was just over 27M.

the He's coming i did not move. I was sighting shouted

clohteen "Old DTEASES

aboard!”

WORLD COPYRIGHT RKJERYKO,

DID IT REALLY HAPPEN?

YES NO

Put your tick la tha spoca absive and keep this panel by yet, mudil, komarow *** when the unrver =}{} 1-giremowy/La

another story in this series b

STEPHEN POTTER

Did. Baturday's story--Exclu- EVA Ours!?! we exuited, now for the small brain. And I Then in a flash the boat overs, sive Ringside Report from War SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST, LTD. We'll eak back in a couple of was concerned by the ripping turned and we were all in the saw. "by George Whiting—

KOWLOON hours and catch him on the of the water over the beast's water together. We gulped actually happen? The answers

head and the flickering shadows, water and then air. The crOCO= YES, bank

HONGKONG

work

They found that the, work- made up to 50 percent Then it recovers rapidly so men that alertness is back to normal morg, errors round about three by four o'clock,

This happens even if you do The number of mistakes minde not start your days work until

Pál by the night shift noured by 70 2 pm, 6wedish doctors claim

percent round abbat 3 Fam in a report published by the present? Brish Medical Association, So No reason for these Andings. three o'clock droops cannot be could be discovered apart from the result of fatigue or boredom, the time. So the doctors believa Night wwkers get their low that the three o'clock. "How s at three in the morning, and it part of the human body's is far more intense,

natural rhythm.