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THE MANSARD GALLERY 201
appreciate the exquisite scholarship
of an
artist who can use the masters of painting as
a very fine man of letters Charles Lamb, for
instance uses the masters of literature ? For
Derain is one who has gone to the root of the
matter and can remind you of the Siennese
school or have a joke with Pinturicchio by a
subtler method than quotation. When such
a one bases his art on Cezanne and the douanier
Rousseau, treating them quite simply as
masters, an intelligent spectator is bound to
unlock his most finished prejudices and take
another look at them.
Marchand and de Vlaminck dominate one
end of the gallery. There are three
pictures
by each, they are admirably hung, and the
effect produced by this pool of distinguished
and beautifully ordered colour is marvellous.
One is brought to a stand by that indescribable
sense that has come to most of us on entering
for the first time some well-arranged room in
an important continental gallery a sense of
being in the presence of great art. Closer
examination, without destroying the unity of
effect, proves these two men to be about as
different as two very good artists of the same
school and country can be. On Marchand I
said my say two years ago when I wrote a
preface for his show at Carfax : he is preeminently
solid and architectural, and obviously