Art

READERS of The Atlantic who followed the letters of An Academician last February and before, in reply to our statements about the finances of the National Academy of Design,¹ will take an interest in hearing that a secession from the Academy drawing-schools has been made by a number of students who, with Professor Wilmarth (the head of the Academy schools) for their president, have formed an Art Students’ League for securing satisfactory and sustained instruction, and for “ the attainment of a higher development in art studies.” This league has taken rooms on Fifth Avenue, and now holds three sessions daily, hiring models, and opening the classes to ladies at special hours set apart for them, at a cost of live dollars per month to each student; Professor Wilmarth having generously offered his personal supervision as a gratuity until the league can afford to pay him a salary. President Whittredge, of the National Academy, wrote a letter to The Evening Post, attempting to refute statements made by the league in a circular explaining their action; but his logic does not seem to have been convincing. In the course of this letter, however, he made an admission which is pertinent to our discussion with An Academician, saying, namely, that at the very time when that champion was so courageously making light of the pecuniary troubles of the Academy, the institution was using strenuous efforts to raise money to pay Professor Wilmarth’s salary with, and keep the schools going. We ask for no better proof than this circumstance affords, that we were not speaking without good ground when making our original assertion that the Academy was on the verge of bankruptcy.

Mr. Suydam some years ago left to the Academy fifty thousand dollars on condition that it should keep open a free school of art. It will be remembered that An Academician said, “ Such financial embarrassments as the Academy has had have been brought about simply because of the establishment and maintenance of the free schools.” Now, according to his own account in a preceding letter, the total debt of the Academy is thirty-five thousand dol-

lars, of which fifteen thousand dollars only was incurred for schools. He also admitted that all the property of the Academy, aside from its non-productive real estate and the Suydam legacy, is in “pictures which yield no income.” The Academy, therefore, has no very clear moral right to grumble that its financial embarrassments have been caused by the schools ; for the schools secure to it the only profitable investments it has, and some, at least, of the income from those investments there is good reason to suppose has been applied to other needful ends in the economy of the Academy. The reason the Academy grumbles is this. To keep up a free drawing-school and to keep up a good free drawing-school, with a professor, are two very different things. The government of the Academy was perfectly willing to keep a school open, in order to retain the yearly income of Mr. Suydam’s money; but some inconsiderate younger members suddenly got into power, one year, and made the schools good. This took money, and the money could not be used for other things. Two parties, accordingly, came into being, one of “the old artists,” opposed to having the schools useful and consequently expensive, the other composed of more ardent men, who were resolved to keep the schools good if they were to be kept at all. Under the rule of these men the schools were very useful, as An Academician’s list of the number of students has shown ; and the “old artists’ ” party, which has now returned to power, takes a great deal of credit to the Academy, in defending its indebtedness, for the good which the rival party thus accomplished. But so well known has it been that the “ old artists” were “ down on ” the schools, and so distinctly have they shown their animosity, that the students, hearing that they were to be left without a professor this winter, were not to be cajoled into quiet and docility even by Mr. Whittredge’s mild and plausible letter, with its ingenious allusion to “ rebellious spirits.” The truth is. the affairs of the National Academy have been very badly managed. An expensive building was erected, which involved the corporation to the extent of twenty thousand dollars, instead of a modest one which could have been made partially to pay for itself by subletting of portions; and then, when Mr. Suydam’s property came like a godsend, the institution, not having provided any other source of income, naturally felt averse to spending its only interest-money on good schools instead of on its debt. It is a deplorable condition of things, but it cannot be improved by the sort of defense which has been offered to our casual remark upon it last year; and we trust that the present account of the matter, together with the very significant proceeding of the Art Students’ League, may bring to the Academy schools the needed relief which its managers, under a mistaken notion of dignity, so resolutely ward off, even while admitting their crippled condition.

—The Essex Institute, of Salem, held an art exhibition last spring, which was so successful that the experiment has lately been repeated; and it is now hoped that an annual display can he made. The collection shown last month contained nearly three hundred paintings and drawings, and nearly two hundred other objects in pottery, porcelain, bronze, silver, or cabinet-work, together with some exquisite miniatures. Among the pictures a number of portraits by Frothingham, Copley, Trumbull, and Stuart stood first in merit. A deliciously vital and spirited piece of portraiture was Trumbull’s Alexander Hamilton, with its fine color, its alert and gay aristocratic refinement of feature. The number of Salem artists and amateurs represented was large enough to surprise those unacquainted with the active interest in the arts which exists in that city ; and many of their productions were promising, sincere, and skillful, though frequently wanting in the grace that comes of long practice and of a more rounded æsthetic culture than our communities as yet possess. This, however, the Essex Institute is taking the right measures to supply; and it is intended to follow the exhibition by a course of lectures on fine art this winter. An excellent example has thus been given, which every town and village that has any resources should emulate. Exhibitions alone, it is true, will not suffice; there is need of the best lecturing, to cultivate a simple, healthy, unconventional taste in matters of art. This, too, the officers of the institute have foreseen. Of course few towns have the resources of Salem; but we discover no decisive obstacle to a system of movable exhibitions, in time, which may be accompanied by competent lecturers.

— Mr. White has shown an ability hardly less than genius in the preparation of his Art Studies.² The elementary series consists of four portfolios, containing twelve cards each. These portfolios are : A, Lines and their Combinations; B, Cubic Diagrams; C, Light and Shade; D, Practical Studies. In the first, beginning with straight lines and their combinations, the author proceeds to curved lines, their measurement by straight ones, and a few of their combinations. But what is particularly noteworthy is that in this initial portfolio the pupil has a clear and accurate notion given him of the perspective of rectangles and that of circles. Nothing could he wiser than this arrangement. At a certain point, as Mr. White justly says, students feel the need of something to assist them in getting the more delicate variations of straight and curved lines, and the projection or recession of parts of objects. The prime defect of the Walter Smith system seems to us to be the unwisely prolonged course of lifeless " judging of distances” and painful practice of outlines which never let the eye go deeper than the surface of the paper. The intention of this is to secure accuracy, but the system is no doubt answerable for those fatigued - looking, nerveless results which characterize much of the drawing in Massachusetts schools. In Portfolio B, Mr. White introduces the cube, and applies it to the drawing of complex objects. This method, much developed, is taken from Harding’s hint; but its use here is extremely ingenious. The third set of cards takes up light and shade ; and every lover of sincere drawing owes Mr. White thanks for giving here the true method of sketching, which is neither by dotted lines, nor firm, hard ones, but by hold and at the same time tentative and light ones. The examples of “ hidden form disclosed by shadows,” and of ” form determined by cast shadows,” are very excellent; the selection of objects being here, as throughout the series, graceful, picturesque, and refreshing. The fourth portfolio is less successful than the others; it is marred by a too great proportion of conventionality, and a regrettable tendency toward broken lines — the relic of inferior systems. Notwithstanding this, the series presents principles and practices which will lead not to mere mechanical dexterity but to something more like genuine artistic sensitiveness.