1947-02-08 — Page 4

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8, *1947.

It's Fun Finding Out

Bernard

Wicksteed'

Saturday

Feature

HERE'S a painting in Burlington House, in the

THE

exhibition of the King's pictures, that's said to

be worth £200,000. As it costs only 1a, Gd. to have a look at it and you don't have to queue I thought we might go along and try to find out what makes it so valuable.

..

You could

After all, £200,000 is a lot of money. buy an obsolete American destroyer for less than that or a half-dozen Churchill tanks,

The picture we are going to look at is described in the catalogue as "A lady at the virginals,, and a gentleman, listening" and it was painted by a Dutch- man in Delft about 300 years ago.

Jis name was Johannes Vermeer and very little is known about him ex- cept that he married at twenty, hud eight children and sometimes gave the baker a pleture instead of cash. Transactions like that were not con-

idered criminal in those days.

You've probably ren reproduc- tims of the picture cause you can by almost anywhere, but they're inst of them a very poor substitute for the real thing.

Art experts all over the world have praised the painting and writ- ten tout it in their boots, but only ence in a long while du people fikë You and me get a rhance to see

for ourselves.

All through the war it was hidden

in an air-conditioned cave in Wales,

and when this present exhibition 14 ever it will go back to the King's private gallery to

Palace, and that is

open to the public.

Buckingham generally

Why

value

this picture at £200,000?

annnished picture tiside for toonths just to let the paint get hard before going on with the rest.

"You must understand," anid Mr Nicolson, "that there are more Jan Steers about. Vermeers are rare There are only 37 fully authenticated paintings and a few other possibles known, So they

have a scarcity value.

now

Vermeer's 37 pleures are worth several million pounds, but when he died at the age of 43 he lef his wife with 20 paintings and no money,

However, there's no evidence thal the family was ever really poor. In fact, if the atmosphere that the artist got into his work is anything to go by It was one of the happiest families

Juvenile

Delinquency

In Japan Now Lower

Juvenile delinquency in Japan is to-day lower than it has ever been, SCAP officials told nine visiting. American newspaper executives,

The officials said Japanese women police had been ti- verted from their first jobs,us traffic police had now been -trained to combat juvenile delinqueney, which exists as result of the loss of homes and families, during the war. Public Safely experts told the fire departments beat re trucks In history. The suri shone through visiting newspapermen that the Were allotted only 3.7 gallons of gaso the windows even on dull days in Japanese pollee were earnestly and line per month.

honestly trying to become democratie Vermeer's works have been called trying to help the masses with the the most, restful paintings in the development of their new hobby world and perhaps that as much as "demoerney”. The

newspapermen their scarcity, is the real secret of were told the people "tackled this their value,

new hobby" with great eagerness and there is every possibility they will permanently adopt it".

that house.

For nearly 200 years after he died the mina renisined almost unknown

and his paintings were credited to

varlotis other Dutch masters.

Vermeer

The King inherited the from George III, who bought it from a man with the good aki name of Smith.

Smith was a rich Englishman, and art collecting was one of his hobbles, He got together a great many well-} known paintings and also a number of others.

George III gave him £20,000 for the lot, and the Vermeer credited to another Dutch artist, Van Mieris, was one of the odds and ends,

A$

we left the Dutch room Sir Alfred Munnings looked Find and repeated regretfully that no one could paint Hike that tu-day,

But over in Holland there's a man called Hans Von Meegeren who hus already made a million pounds by faking Vermeers. He had so much money when the Germans left that the Dutch police said he must have got it by collaborating and they put him under arrest.

i

the members of the Japanese police They at least 90 percent of force were new, with terms of ser- vice of less than a year. Many old low my and top police officials had members had quit because of the been purged. Experis said Japanese police methods were proving.

that

said Dan

bad shape to-day that 56 percent of.

Tokyo's water system is in such the water in the mains is lost before it reaches consumers, SCAP antisori- ties told the visiting presenten.--w United Pres.

BBC's Youngest

Announcer

Sixteen-year-old Daphne Blackhalt as recently become the youngest announcer in the British Broadcasting Corporation. She is to announce n television

programme for young! people entled "Teen-Age."

Rolling Stock Earmarked Transportation experts Japanese locomotives and 3,000

Daphne is still at her co-educa- freight cars had been marked for tional school studying for matricula- "eparations, but they expressed the Lion. She thinks no one should slew that few of these would leave roke, drink or use make-up before the country because they could not the age of 18. On the other hand, be ured to advantage elsewhere due she thinks grown-ups ought to treat to the narrow gauge system stand-young people of her age not as ards by which they were constructed, children, but as "persons."

The newspapermen were told thal She thinks the British Broadcasting the railway system in Japan annually handled six times as many people as moved by the rail systems In the United States. This was due to the fact that highway trafle was much lower in the country.

that the Japanese fleet was "practi- The newspapermen were also told

cally destroyed twice" during the war.

Alliet officials sold the had no long-range highway develop

programme at this time, but that SCAP hoped to help with such planning.

"Two hundred thousand for the When he told them he'd made it King's Vermeer is £1 conservative out of painting Vermeers they estimate. That's the price it might laughed and said. "Let's see you ment felch in England. But it the Amerl-paint one now."

started bidding there's

trans

ALL this was very interesting andnowing what it would reach."

helped

me

to appreciate the

ло

We werl back to No. 305, and

the two experts tell me other things about the painting and the artist.

If you look in the mirror above the

artist's cascí reflected,

So he said, "All right, I will," and after two months, watched all the time by six witnesses, he produced a "Vermeer" that the experts had to

agree was just like the real thing.

A few feet away to the right, for girl's head you will see part of the HF had even mixed the same

the first place," said Sir Al. It's a very fine picture, You can feed, "you must understand that i see that right away. But what Vermeer wRS a superb craftsman. makes 11 0 exceptional?

What You just don't have men like that beauty of palating, but it still didn't makes it worth more than the other i to-day. Why, Vermeer would pui explain the figure of £200,000. very Ane pictures around it" rpo find out the answer I went to Str Alfred Muntings, who paints

"Just look the face of that man horses and is the president of the on the right. It's a perfect little Royal Academy. Sir Alfred

And the graining on the was miniature.

side of the 'cello, and the pattern on talking to one of the hanging com-

son of Harold Nicolson and Victorlo fing, ...

Look at the Sackville-Wext).

brass studs on the chair. Every one has a highlight They came back with me to Gal-¦ where It catches the sun from the Jery 18, and tried to explain picture | window. You won't find artists do- No. 305.

ing work like that nowadays."

mittee. Mr Benedict Nicolsun (the the virginals that the girl is play-Yet Mr Nicoison reckoned its value

instance, is a picture by Jan Steen of a lady putting on her stocking. Some of the detalls in that the folds in the curtain and the creases on the pll- low--are equally carefully done.

£80,000. Queen Victoria is alleged to have thought it naughty and banished it to an upstairs room, but even that doesn't fully explain why It's not worth as much as the Vermeer.

at a

incre

was one in kis

UIE girl was probably his wife

and the room in other Vermeer pictures. own house. The same room appears

Putting the carpet on the table instead of the floor was an old Dutch custom. They had such nice floors anyway that it was a pily to tlicin.

hide

materials in his paint that the old master used, so that it would stand up to a chemical analysis. He sold one of his fakes Goering, who wanted a Vermeer be cause Hitler and one.

to

Occasionally turn up. There's supposed to be one genuine Vermeers

missing in England called "The Boy With a Flute." It measures in. by 7kin, and is worth a fortune.

Currently,

Corporation has taken a step in the right direction with its new pro- gramme. She first read about the auditions for the post of television announcer in

Her A newspaper, brother teased her into applying for it-she was one of a hundred girls who did so,

Japanese FEATHERWEIGHT

much of the Japanese fleet of small vessels is tied up be- cause they lack fuel, officials said.

Electric Cars

Japanese experts were reported to be looking into the possibility of de veloping electric cars for Japan, as well as a system of battery-charging stations throughout the nation to keep them supplied with power. SCAP officials seemed highly in favour of this idea.

It was revealed that during the war days, when Allied bombers started numerous fires throughout Japan, the gasoline situation was so hnd that the

TITLE BOUT

featherweight

It is announced that the world championship bc- tween Nel Tarleton, the British champion and Willie Pep. the American holder, may now take place in February. Originally fixed for January 28, It was postponed owing to Pen Injuring himself in training.

AUSTERITY NOTE

A dog's life and austerity note: John Sammond of London was fined £15 for feeding his hunting dog one meal of corned beef-n week's ratlan for 60 people, reports United Press.

VIGNETTES OF LIFE

"LOOK AT

YOUR

נשים

HAT...

"

'TRYIN' 'T'

TELL

"Mutterers"

BY KEMP STARRETT

I SHOULD THINK YOU COULD

·DO A SIMPLE JOB

LIKE THIS WITH A

LITTLE LESS

GRIPE

THE SEW-ANNUAL MUTTERING ABOUT WOMEN'S HATS...CHIEFLY BLASPHEMOUS...

"OF ALL THE

SAV

YOU'D BE QUITE

STARTLED IF YOU COULD HEAR WHAT SOME OF THOSE WEEK LITTLE

| GUYS AUTTER WHEN BAWLED OUT.

#M-M- M-

BLOA-ALIG

BARBERS ALSO AUTTER... ESPECIALLY WHEN

YOU TELL THEAL HOW YOU WANTED YOUR HAIRCUT.

SOME OF THE MOST

BITTER MUTTERING IS DONE CHILE WRAPPING A PACKAGE.

UNDER DURESS ...FOR. THE VIFE'S RELATIVES.

"AND LET ME TELL

YOU ALOMER

THING;

CLASS

THERE'S NO ONE WHO CAN MUTTER SO LOUDLY AND VOCIFEROUSLY AS THE.

MAN WHO CAN'T HANDLE TOOLS AND CANT AIRE A CARPENTER, WIEN THERE'S A JOB TO BE DONE,

MUTTERING IN YOUR SLEEP IS ALL RIGHT AS LONG AS ITS SHOP TALK' LIKE "G'WAN, SVE ME...........BUT FEMININE NAMES ARE MENTIONED. EVEN IF ITS ONLY THE NAME OF RACE-HORSE OI,BOY!

Ledger Syndicate

"SOME LADS DO THEIR MUTTERING WITHOUT A SOUND.