Hot Springs weekly star. (Hot Springs, S.D.) 1892-1917, 1893-05-19
THE NUDE IN ART
A Chapter ON Educational I~nnuence. Of
Displays ut the World. Fair.

A1A0 NVGJCb I'm 4AtST
A Chapter ON Educatiunal Influences Of
Displays at the World. Fair.
New York Suns Chicago special:
One Of the most startling conse-
quences Of the opening of the fair is
that the west is brought face to face
with the art work of the nineteenth
century. The west, SO progressive in
all things else, has been slow in its
art progress, and the jump by which
1t now confronts the most Partisan
conditions is such that it is no wonder
the populace holds its breath. This
exposition is fairly Uttered with ex-
amples. of the nude, and especially of
the nude masculine. This is a great
and startling novelty to the west. 1t
Is true that there are now art leagues
in Chicago, Denver, Minneapolis and
st. Paul, and within a year classes
have been formed in these cities for
the study of the nude, but they are
small classes, mere handfuls COM
pared to the great bodies Of young
men and women who crowd the pri-
mary grades. Most of the fifty or
seventy-tlve girls who are now draw
ing and painting the undraped human
figure west Of the Alleghanies have
been abroad. In Europe they have
taken up the whim for reproducing
the beautiful outlines of the human
figure, and have gone miles past the
great majority who stay at home.
The great mass of western homes still
display the most sober English chro-
mos, IL not those old fashioned stand
bys best exempliaed by the motto,
"God Bless Our Happy Home" done
in mothers hair.
With what seems to the west IL bru-
tai suddenness the exposition has
thrust the nude on its great public.
All around the lower end of the mag
nificent court of honor, the roofs of
the casino, the peristyle, the music
hall and machinery hall are fringed
with figures of nude men. They
stand clear of the roof against the
sky. They are of heroic size and very
boldly executed; not a detail has es-
capped the loving care of the fin de sic
Gle sculptors, who learned their call
ing in Europe.
The majority of the figures are of
civilized men, and a few are of sava-
ges. The few savagcs are sculptured
with regard for the feeling of the
west. for each wears a tiny piece of
covering, just is our red Indians do.
This badge of modesty is what the
cowboys call a '::gce string" and what
in the eastis known as abreech cloth.
But the civilized or white men are
guiltless of all covering except their
compilations. They are forty feet up
in the air, but are so large that they
might as we'll be on a level with the
public for all the concealment they
make.
Their effect on the people from the
interior is always interesting, and is
sometimes calculated to excite COM
passion for the people. Some are Wis
IDLY panied and shocked and some are
plainly indignant. Wives drag their
husbands away, and mothers aud sis
tiers, after one startled glance, tug at
their children to lead them out of
danger before they have seen the
statues and it is too late.
Some of those who are more sophis-
ticated, and others who are more SEN
sible, keep right on regardless Of their
feelings, but they must think that a
veritable diabolism is in the hearts Of
the managers, for as they progress
they find a number of these enormous
naked statues of men down on the
ground under the peristyle, where
they can touch them with their
hands. Some of these figures are
ready to go up. some have workmen
laboring to finish them, and some are
dismembered and in pieces.
Elsewhere the examples of the nude
represent both sexes. The statues on
the roof of the woman's building are
draped, and so is French's colossal
statue of. the republic, but cores of
the graceful and truly beautiful fig
ures which one sees scattered about
the grounds are such as meet the gaze
of visitors to the galleries and palace
gardens of Europe.
All the figures in McMonnie's beau
tiful fountain r nude, and none is
stranger and more surprising to the
western eye than that OF the goddess
who is driving the chariot and who
sits bolt upright in an armchair with
not a stitch on her above her waist.
A much more severe test of the
patience of the western people will
come when the art palace is open. 1t