Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-12-28
ART NOTES.

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on the 23d of December, and continues to
January 10, 1891. A press reception was
given in the morning on the ed, and a
general reception in the evening. Works
were received at the galleries on the 18th
and 18Th, and will be collected and re-
turned at the expense of exhibitors. As
usual, the range of exhibits is wide, in.
Guiding designs for decoration, furniture.
etc., photographs Of executed work, car
toons for stained glass, models of proposed
work, carvings in stone or wood, wrought
iron objects, mosaics. stuffs, drawings and
paintings.
In New York recently there was an ex.
hibition of bror yes and clay models, terra.
Gotta busts and medals by the Irish sculptor
Albert Bruce Joy. 1t included reductions
from his bronze aud marble busts of Glad.
stone, Salisbury and John Bright, portraits
of General Roberts, Earl Cairns. Prince de
Solms Braunfels, aud medallions of the
late William Siemans. DR.. Longstaff, and
DR.. William Bruce Joy, the sculptor's
father. There is also bronze female fig.
ure called The First Flight and por-
trait in brorzs of the late Duke of Albany,
together with medal from the medallion
of Sir Humphrey Davy executed for the
Royal Society of Great Britain.
One afternoon the Duke Lorenzo de
Medici in walking through the garden
came upon young Michael Angelo, who
was busily chiseling his first piece of sculpt-
ure. The Duke saw in the stone the face
of faun which the boy was copying from
an antique mask, but which, with his usual
Impotence OF imitation, he was changing
so as to show the open lips and teeth.
How is it," said the Duke, drawing closer,
that you have given your faun complete
set of tech? Don't you know that such
an old fellow was sure to have lost some Of
them?" Michael Angelo at once saw the
justice of the criticism. Artists are not al
ways ready to receive adverse comment.
Michael Angelo himself was quick tenn
pered and hard to move. A hot word to
one OF his boy companions on a certain oc.
casion brought SO severe blow in the face
that truthful portraits of Michael Angelo
have since had to show him with broke
nose. But the Dukes criticism was kindly
given, and was plainly warranted, and
the young sculptor could hardly wait
until the Duke walked on before
beginning The correction. When the
Duke saw the faun's face again he found
some Of the teeth gone, and the empty
sockets skilifully chiseled out. Delighted
with this evidence of the lads willingness
to seize and act upon suggestion, and i'm
pressed anew by his artistic skill, the
Duke made inquiries, learned that Michael
Angelo had borrowed stone aud tools on
his own account in his eagerress TO begin
sculpture The was first set at drawing from
the statuary), and ended by sending fer the
| boys father. The result of the consulta.
ton was that the Duke took Michael An
gelo under his own special patronage and
protection. and was so well pleased after he
had done it that no favor seemed too great
tn hQstnU Tho -
Michael Angelo, then only 10, not only re.
ceiyed key to the Garden of Sculpture
and an apartment in the Medici Palace it.
self but had place al the Dukes table
In fact, real attachment grew up between
Michael Angelo AMI the Duke, who fire..
quently called the boy to his own rooms
when he would open cabinet of gems and
| intaglios, seek his young visitors opinions
and enter into long and confidential talks
Alexander Black. in January 81 Nicholas.
The policy of state.aided art, says Birgs
Harrison, in his article on The New De.
parture IN Partisan Art lin the Atlantic
for December), inaugurated by Napoleon
was continued under the various paternal
governments which succeeded him. Mon.
uments were erected continually; palaces
and public buildings were decorated with
mural paintings: the Ecole des Beaux Arts
WCiC AO0Eucu, anu IildUS II ee 10 the students
of all nations; the use of the galleries OF
the Louvre, and afterwards of the splendid
Palais de fIndustrie, was conceded to the
artists for the purpose of their yearly ex
nibitions, and medals of considerable in
trinsic value were awarded to the mos
meritorious works exhibited therein. AL
these things were paid for out of the public
funds; and it was considered so natural anC
proper thing that the state should thu.
support and encourage the art protection o.
the nation that no one ever thought O.
| questioning the legality or the advisa
bility of the proceeding. With French
| men the financial part of the bushes.
| never seemed worth discussing. With
them the vital side Of the whole question
was the aesthetic side; aud even to-day
condemnation of the policy leave thu
question of political economy entirely
on one side, and base their objection.
to the system upon the ground that it he:
become directly deleterious to the best anC
highest interests of art Itself. They DE-
| not deny that contemporary srt owes
much to the careful nursing and fos
| tering which it received in its infancy 81
the bands Of the Government, but they
claim that the child of 1900 hes grown
10 the estate of manhood, and il
now only hampereo by the leading
strings which were useful enough in il.
earlier years. They also state that the sys
| tenn is responsible for very great evil
an evil which was not contemplated by il:
| founders, but is none the less a direc
result ard consequence of all its ten
| denotes; and they further aver tina
! this parasitic growth has attained sucf
| formidable proportions as at last t.
smother and destroy all the good which
may at one time have belonged to thu
| system. The evil thus referred to is th,
formation and gradual development of {,
distinctly official school of art-an ar
which is admirably adapted to the decora
| ton of ceremonious apartments of state
smooth, polished and impeccahle in tech
nlque. but utterly lacking in the qualitie
| of soul and sentiment.
Stanley declined to give his autograph I
the pages in Washington, who make
business of collecting signs-manual of grea
men.