Edward Seago: Henry Melchett and Italy

"Gondolas by the Santa Maria della Salute Venice"
by Edward Seago

"One of Edward Seago's patrons, Henry Melchett, not only commissioned him to paint. At the same time he provided him with material security, treated him like a member of the family and also perceived the need for him to broaden his painting horizons. While he believed in his work, he perceived the weaknesses, particularly an inability to draw, and he was in a more subtle position than either Priestman or Munnings to do something about it.

In Venice that summer the family had rented a villa, Casa Leone, and Melchett confronted Edward with the work of the great Italian masters and watched while he reacted to the wonders of the Titians and the Tintorettos, the Canalettos and the Bellinis and marvelled at the Italian skies over the lagoon and the sheer flamboyance of the Venetian sunset; skies such as Constable and the English school of painters had never attempted, where a painter might indulge in a riot of colour yet still paint well within the bounds of nature. But despite the exuberance around him, Edward was intrigued most by the subtle differences in light and atmosphere and expressed himself in a series of dark, emphatic waterscapes.

Before he left Venice, as Melchett had foreseen, its centuries of history gave him a new perspective and his letters reflected the first signs of real humility:

'Actually, I am trying to paint here,' he wrote. 'No very marked success so far! I have seen some pictures which clearly show me that (1) painting is the greatest of all; (2) I don't possess it!!! and what is more I see no way of attaining it!' 

In the end he completed twelve pictures, nailed them up in a coffin and sent them to England for his next summer's exhibition at the Alpine Gallery. Five of the canvases for this show would be lent and of the rest, among some fine equestrians studies, was a painting of Foxhunter, latest winner of the Ascot Gold Cup; an impressive portrait of Michael Hornby in pink coat and silk hat riding his magnificent horse over the Oxfordshire countryside; and also a poignant study of a middle-aged man in bedraggled ruffles and conical hat and with an anxious, puzzled expression discernible under the grease paint, with the caption: 'Smile at us, pay us, pass us. But do not quite forget,' a fitting epitaph to Edward's own life with the circus people."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Edward Seago: The Other Side of the Canvas" by Jean Goodman.)