The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-12-07 00:00:00

ENCOURAGEMENT OF THE FINE ARTS

IN FRANCE.

The Paris Correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette
writes :—" What a surprise it would be to Pitt—
whose scorn for art has been so eloquently described
by Macaulay could he read the report of M.
Antonin Proust on the 'Budget des Beaux Arts.'
Pitt refused to grant public money to men of letters or
artists ; the French Government has always pursued
a different policy, and a policy which has proved re-
munerative, The report of M. Antonin Proust deals
with the following institutions which are subsidized by
the Government. First comes the French Academy
at Rome, which was installed at the commencement
of the century at the Villa Medicis, and where French
artists study: this costs the country about £12,000.
Next we have the National School of Fine Arts,
in which there are 274 painters, 146 sculptors,
and 574 architects : this institution costs £6,000.
Then comes the National School of Decorative
Art, which costs about £3,000 ; the National
School of Design for Young Girls, which costs
£1,000; and two similar schools at Lyons and at
Dijon, whii-h cost nearly £640 each. There is also a
School of Fine Arts at Toulouse which has distin-
guhled itself, and for which M. Antonin Proust de-
mands a subvention. The report next informs us
that there are 300 municipal schools where art as
applied to industry is taught. To encourage these
schools the State votes a sum ef £1,200 a year. The
next chapter refers to works of art and the decoration
of public edifices, for which a sum of £30,000 is required.
Under the title of Works of Living Artists,' we find
that in 1877 the State acquired twenty-six pictures
for about £4,000, and forty-six groups, statues, bas-
reliefs or buts, for about £8,:00. What with reeom-
penses, &c., this chapter requires over £20,000. Next
comes •` subscriptions towards works of art, £7,000.
Then encouragement and aid to artists, their widows,
families, &c., over £5,000. For preserving historical
monuments, £60,000, From 1842 to 1847 the sum de-
manded for this purpose was only 600,000 f.; under the
Republic of 1848 it rose to 800,0001., in 1859 to
1,100,00Lf., for this year 1,335,500 f., and for next year
the Government ask 1,500,000 f. The next chapter
concerns 'National Museums' the Louvre, the
Luxembourg, Versailles, St. Germain, &c., about
£35,000 ; and then comes the great 'National Manu-
factories' of Svres, Beauvais, and the Gobelins,
about £37,000. France spends thus annually some
£220,0 tO in matters connected with art. The results
of this expenditure were visible at the recant Exhibi-
tion ; they are visible here every day—no matter to
which side you turn—visible in the taste with which
women dress, with which shops are arranged,
and the graceful turn which is given to the
roost ordinary article. Everything one Eees is
inviting. The restaurateur, instead of piling up in
his window huge masses of raw beef, hams, aeil other
unsightly objects, after the English fashion, has a
glittering fish laid out on a bo:1 of parsley, with a
fountain playing over it, and surrounded by fruit
artistically arranged. I remember at a parliamentary
inquiry under the Empire a French workman being
asked his opinion about English files. He said the
English files were the better of the two, but they were
not pleasing to the eye, and therefore French ones
were preferred. I heard a similar remark made
about pickles: English pickles are excellent, but they
are crammed any way into an ungainly bottle. French
pickles ca,`ch the eye, being arranged with taste in
graceful bottles. When art descends to files and
pickles, its importance in higher spheres may be
easily inferred."