New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1893-05-24
A Difference,

sic nude and the realistic naked but the
distinction is unknown in Chicaoo
There IS u place for the sacred works Of
art and place for the profane, but it
does Hot seem to have occurred to the
managers of the Worlds Fair in arranr
ing their art treasures that these places
should be appropriately assigned. AL
tar pieces and brothel pieces hang side
by side. Madonnas, breathing sweet
ness and innocence, are placed in juxta-
position to pictures portraying all that is
lascivious, all that is swanton. Crucifx-
ions, depicting with awful expression the
agony OF the Redeemer, are scattered in
discriminatory with romping Satyrs, Gu
plds and Payci'es. In grouping THEN
tire assures the managers of the Fair fol-
lowed no line of distinction between an
cient and modern, historical and mytho-
logical, sacred and profane, chaste and
obscene. Yet respect for visitors, who
hold different views on these subjects,
who go together, old and young, men
and women, to inspect the exhibits, as
we'll as a regard for the objective dis
tinction between subjects, should have
induced the managers to make some
classification of these works of art.
Thele is a defense of the nude in art,
but it does not by any means cover all
the nakedness that is seen in Chicago.
When the Greek philosophy possessed
mems minds they imagined that there
was somewhere, according to the concep-
ton of Plato, a being of absolute perfec-
ton for each genus or species that we see
here below. This being according to
them was copied in the things around us,
but thus intrusted with material sur
roundings, the copy, no matter how Of
ten reproduced, fell away from the per-
! fection Of the ideal. Whenever therefore
the painter welded his brush or the sculp-
| tor his chisel, he endeavored to make his
| canvas or marble reproduce this ideal
Their gladiators but represented the ideal
Of manly form, their Venus was the ideal
of feminine beauty, but so ideal that
around all these artistic conceptions there
is a vel! of preternatural innocence and
absence of sense. We are apt to contem-
plate these beautiful creations for some
moments before realizing that they are
nude. This is what we call the classic
nude. Art of this kind may be elevat-
ing and may make us look forward to
nobler creation in the future, according
to the words of the eloquent Prentiss:
''There is a realm, where the beautiful
beings which pass before us like shadows
now, will stay in our presence forevel."
Besides this nude there is another.
which we have called the realistic naked.
It represents realism not idealism, it
confuses love with lust, natural attrac-
tiveness with lascivious wantonness. TO
justify the Dissertation of the public
walls of the Fair buildings with such
pictures, it will not do to say that all
things are clean to the clean. The ten
dency of these pictures is to make the
clean unclean, and especially to fill the
minds Of the young with images which
give them distorted view of life and
may cause them to swerve from the path
of noble endeavor, " >. ..~#
If pictures of this Kind must he exhi-
bited the examples Of the galleries of
Europe should be followed, where such
pictures are grouped together in asepa-
rate hall from which the young are ex-
cluded. It is to be hoped that eventu-
ally some such arrangement will be made
at the Fair. Minneapolis Times.
Counsel Fees oung Man 81 wish
your opinion, sir, as to whether your
daughter would make me good wife9"
LaWye mo, sir, she would not Five
dollars, please
Only One Way Mistress How is it
that { saw policeman hugging you in
the kitchen last night?" Maid-s.I dun
: l. 49,
no, mum, unless you was peekin' fru the
4 KEY hole IN Y. Weekly.