NEW ZEALAND SCENERY.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1159, 16 April 1872, Page 4

NEW ZEALAND SCENERY.

The following is from the Argus:— "Four water-color drawirgs by Mr John' Gully, of New Zealand, have been ailddd to the' of the Victorian Academy of Arts within the -last, few dayb, and two of them may take rank with the be^t productions of his, fertile , pencfl. The first in merit is a view'of Cape Farewell, seen under the influence' of one of; those violent storms which sweep through Cook. Strait from the west, filling the sky, with gloom and turbulence, and lashing the sea into foam and fury.' Thrdug'h 'a rift in 'the laboring clouds and driving showers,.a stray gleam of watery sunshine falls with a saddened lustre upon one of the white cliffs of the rugged headland, and on the crest of a 'wave which 1 - is • lifting; the fragment of ; a wreck s into .mpmepijary, prominenco., ,A small , fishing ; craft is driving before the .gale, and a lone seabird flits ' across tlie boiling watew/but^yond these; objects there; is nothing to lessen 1 the -feeling pfspli^d^ which brjeathea from the picture,, which is' poetically conceived and powerfully executed. Its atmospheric effects are superior tq any with which Jtr Gully has familiarised us in his former works. In striking contrast to the stern gloom and sullen grandeur of tHis scene are the stinriy serenity,- the balmy brightness, send the rich verdure of the landscape representing a distant view, of Tasman's Bay, . with the snowy ranges beyond, seen from the head of a beautiful gorge, with'a fore-' ground of diversified foliage charmingly treated. In th.e<view of^ Botoiti, after sunset, the. sky fe handled with striking skill, but the artist has failed to invest the mountain range at the extromity of the lake with that evanescent plum-bloom which such eminences assume under certain conditions of the atmosphere, but which appears to be almost, if not altogether,' incapable of being transferred to canvas, or cardboard. The picture of the Awatere . Gorge possesses some good points.; as, for ci ample 1 , the artist's successful representation of the hot haze: which, broods over such a landscape, and some other matters of detail ; but the glare becomes almost painful to the eye after long looking 1 at ■the picture,: and you .turn with arsense of relief to the cool freshness and English leafiness and moisture of Mrs Parson's Cornish Valley, hanging closeiby^i i .