The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-01-14

NiSNN'NSS
controversy elsewhere-is now in this city, on ex-
hibition at CARES In Paris, it was excluded
from the Exposition, grounds of public morality.
In Boston, the staid city of the Puritans, it was
exhibited upon the walls of the Atheneum. In
New York, The Herald abused it as indecent, and
everybody, consequently, went to see it. We have
no idea of Initiating the example of The Herald,
with view to the like result, but at the same time
thinki but common fairness to advertise our readers
in advance-those of them who may be inclined TO
attend the exhibiton-of what they must expect to
see.
The Goddess is represented perfectly nude and
facing the spectator, standing erect in a shell,
which the London AthenGum describes as "small
'as coracle in DREAM" and the London Builder
speaks of as enormous" and which is drawn
by two doves upon tranquil sea- Additional
motive-power is supplied by two wingess Cupids,
who are apparently steering as well as pushing the
shell. The figure of the Goddess is size occu-
plying the centre and almost the entire depth of the
canvass from top to bottom. The sea and sky con-
sttute what, at the risk of a bull, we will
call the background. The Trojan galleys. which
the Goddess is supposed to be guiding towards
the Italian shore, are seen in the distance The
shell is gently rocking upon the surface of the
water, and the Goddess despite her divine char
acter is evidently not exempt any more than was
her luckless husband, from the influence of the
laws of gravitation. With one hand raised and
one foot just touching the shell, she is endeavor-
ing to preserve her balance and keep herself from
falling into the sea. This gives to her attitude
somewhat the constrained air of dancer stepping
upon a tight-rope. The type of beauty selected
by the artist best suited to his subject is that
which the old Greeks most admired, and which
TITAN and the Venetians excelled in painting-a
sunny golden-haired, amber sort of beauty, full
of light and warmth. The coloring, indeed, is
the most remarkable thing in the picture-partic-
ularly the ripe, warm, carnaton-tints, toned down
and subdued to the whteness of flesh, by contrast
with the bit of red ribbon by which the doves are
harnessed to the shell, and the black armlet which
encircles the left wrist of the Goddess, and which,
albeit more scanty than the costume of Georgia
Major, constitutes her entire clothing.
So much, then, for the picture, which. consid-
cred simply as work of art is exceedingly
fine. A few words more with reference to
the point of public morals involved
which the reader who is not prepared
to admit that Art can be indecent, and the reader
whose squeamishness revolts from discussion OF
the question in print are equally at liberty to
skip. Nakedness is not indecency, necessarily OF
per Sc The modest woman who bares herself to
undergo painful surgical operation-it may be,
in public hospital, and before many Witnesses
neither suffers nor is guilty of an ndelicacy. But
for the indiscretion of our First Parents, we are
told, even the primitive fg-leaf would never have
been called into requisiton, and the craft of the
tailor and the mantua-maker never existed. In
all ages, habit and education, rather than any in
flexible rule of morality, have regulated these mat
tiers, and determined the bounds between that
which is proper and permissible, and that which is
not. The old Greeks and Romans used TO sur
round themselves in their houses and gardens, in
the public baths and on the public ways, with
statues and emblems which nowadays would be
universally considered grossly indecent. The Ro-
man ladies wore ornaments which no Uirtuoso who
has them in his cabinet would show to any respect
able woman of his acquaintance. Yet we do not
believe that the daughters of the METELu and the
GRACcHI were particularly immodest any more
than we will admit that our great-grandmothers
who used to talk in mixed company upon sub
jects which are now tabooed in all decent soci-
ETY., were less virtuous than their descendants
OF our own generation. In Tartary, at this
day, so M Hue tells US, the women think it
immodest only to allow their faces to be seen, and
conceal them at the risk of any other exposure
We may assume, therefore, that mere nudity,
whether in nature or in rt iS not ;,
decent, and that if PAGE-who is Bostonan, we
believe-had lived and painted in Athens in Greece,
instead of the Athens of America young men and
maidenS might have flocked with propriety to see
his Venus, as the Coan ladies did 10 see ApELLEs'
portrait of CAMPAsPE when it was first placed in
the temple of EscULAPUs, or exhibited at the Acad-
envy of Fine Arts, in the three hundredth year be-
fore CHRIST
1t may be PAGES misfortune, perhaps-his fate,
at all events-not to have been born in the reign of
ALEXANDER. Living in the nineteenth century, it
is his duty to conform to modern ideas upon the
subject fwhat is decent and proper in Art. Tried
by the standard they afford, his picture has been
pronounced, by many persons, immodest; and we
are inclined to accept the censure as correct We
do not deny that this refinement of modern taste
for such we esteem it, rather than any proof OF
superior virtue is often exaggerated, even to the
extreme of pradery. When it takes that form. as
when it excerpts to PowERs Greek Stare or PAL
MERs White Cdpti0e we have no sympathy with
it. We think the squeamishness of the good peo.
pie in HOlns street, who found fault with the
nude figures in Mr.. WINANs' garden, and of the
Managers of the Maryland Institute who draped
BARRIERS C0queHe in pink tulle to have been
quite as ridiculous as that of the old maid
who cased the legs of her piano-forte in pan
talettes, or of the gallant Commodore who,
when entertaining party of ladies, al
the navy-yard at which he commanded,
spread sai-cloth the timbers in the yard that
his visitors might not be shocked by the sight oil
bare ships knees. The instances to which we refer.
however, were extreme cases, and do not prove
modern morality to be wrong-but only to have
been misapplied. According to the standard of ex-
listing ideas the subject, we have no hesitation in
saying that PAGES picture is not proper one to
be viewed by mixed assemblages of both sexes,
particularly the young. If troupe of model
artists were to announce for exhibition at the
theatre series of tableau1 riUants, one OF which
should be representation of VENUS balancing her
self shell, and plotting the galley of ENEAs to
the Latian shore, we presume there would be no
question about the indecency Of the spectacle.
Does the indecency become less when the exhibi-
ton is painting, which does not pretend to be
anything else than the presentation of the same
subject on canvas? The Directors of the French Ex-
position were therefore right in excluding PAGE's
picture from place in an exhibition where people
would have been forced either to see it or TO STAY
away. Here in Baltimore, it is true it is present.
ed to the public under different auspices. No one
is bound TO see it, who does not choose to 90 for
the purpose We do not, therefore, quarrel with
the mere exhibition of the picture, any more than
we should object to the delivery of course of lee
lures on Anatomy, illustrated by models The
artistic value of the one may not be less than the
scientific value of the other-but neither is de-
signed for everybody or for mixed assemblages.
GEOLOGICAL MAP OF Misunderstanding TYSON
Esq, our State Agricultural Chemist has laid ON
table the geological illustrations ACCOMPANYING
his first report, which is now passing through the
press This understand, is the first ATTEMPT to n
for Maryland what has been ably performed for
Pennsylvania and other States, by distinguished
biologists employed for that purpose This an
pears with Mr. Tyson to have been purely a labor
of love- the duties of his station strictly. not re-
quring any such task at his hands Having