The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1897-05-22
PERlANDER IN PARIS.
(Continuad from Fourth Page.l

CONTINUED from Fourth Page)
ture about 15x1O feet by Paul Jean Ger
vals. Size has become of late years a
prime factor in French pictures. Pic
lures to attract French attention must,
TO begin with, be big. Laurens cannot
be very far from sixty. He may be
over sixty, He has taken every honor
an artist can take, He Is an officer of
the Legion d Honneur and member
of the Institute He has two pictures
in the Luxembourg and ranks among
the very first artists and art authorities
of Europe. Up to q few years ago he
was faithful to the teachings and tradi-
tons of the old school. Now he has be-
come an impresslonist. Exactly what
that is nobody knows; for no two agree,
Martin is young enough to have been
one of Lauren's pupils. He has already
taken a number of prizes, Is undoubted-
ly destined to take many more, has
lately had one of his pictures admitted
to the Luxembourg and is one OF the
brightly shining and impassionately
misleading lights of the impressionist
school. Gervais Is q still younger man,
who seems to be coming to the front
with a rush. He represents an entirely
different tendency of the art of the day
That Is, not a return to the study of ma
ture, but q return to careful technique
and to conscientious work,
OF the three pictures, the one by Mar
tin is the most typical and attracts the
most attention, If possible get pho
tograph of it. 1t Is called ''Vers
Abome." Towards the Abyss" The
action of the composition, which is from
the right of the picture to the left, is
laid in a dreary landscape of low bar
rem hills. The abyss does not appear,
but must be about where the spectator
stands. On the left by herself, strides
woman. She has an abundance of
dark hair and wears a dark purple
wreath of flowers which can hardly be
made out She wears a long cloak of
black gauze through which her person
appears DULY The cloak is fastened at
her breast; and is gathered about her
hips by girdle on which are punches
of large red peoples. Between the CIR
die and the point where the cloak is
gathered at the breast there is exposed
an ugly triangle of her ugly flesh, in
Guiding her navel In her right hand
she carries close to her right cheek
small bundle of withes as if she We're
ready to whip. In her left hand she
holds out to the crowd following her
bunch of large yellow flowers. She
wears slippers and mits. The sleeves
of her cloak are puffed at the shoulders
as fashion puffed sleeves a year or two
ago. Her eyes are blue. She leers dia-
bolically, a leer of triumph. The awful
figure is completed by pair of bats
wings which help her in her rapid, awk-
ward, sidelong stride. A more abhor-
rent figure does not exist in all paint
ing. Back of her. in the foreground,
and slightly in front of the crowd, is the
naked figure of a dead old man. He
has pursued the phantom till his
strength gives out and he falls prone.
His old bones nearly pierce the shriv-
elled skin which hardly covers them.
The nasty senility Of the corpse is made
as conspicuous as possible. Close be-
hind him and in the front rank of the
on-pressing crowd is another old man,
still more offensive than the first; for
though he has fallen to his hands and
knees, he has still life enough left in
him to turn his bleared eyes in longing
towards the phantom. He has white
hair and long streaming gray beard.
lie, TOO, is Idk6u. "A lew SJl4uSy luu5-
cles still hang from his joints. The ar
fist, to make him still more repulsive,
has, crowned him with a wreath of
roses In his fall he has overthrow
young man, who, clothed In long dia-
phanous red night gown, lies between
the old mans shrunken limbs and looks
up at, him with the expression Of man
drowning at sea as the steamer rapidly
leaves him. If you have seen it once
YOU will never forget it. Back of these
two surges the crowd; young men and
old men; young women and old women;
some clothed, some naked; some toss
ing their arms in delirium, others look
ing in dull despair. Some stumble;
others fall all press forward. The
crowd reaches way off into the distance
till Individual forms are lost in the gen.
eral mass. All the colors of the impress
sionist's palette and all the peculiarities
sof his technique are exhausted in pre-
senting the swirling loathsomeness of
the composition. The only fit place for
such a picture is in the halls of hell!
Above the heads of the crowd are
sweeping f1ocks of ravens. Way off in
the very far distance they can be seen
feasting on those who have been
crushed to death and left behind. Still
all thosewho have eyes keep them fixed
on the phantom. There is not a
thought of turning aside, of drawing
back, of repentance, nor of remorse
Sooner or later every one will take his
place with the dead old man in the fore
ground. What is to be thought of an
artist who will paint such picture; of
body of artists who will accept it and
hang it in place of honor, and of a
people who will applaud it, and by their
applause show their sympathy! If the
Trench, as they claim express them
selves in their arts, and if this picture
be evidence, then the nation has
reached depth of filthiness and iniqui-
ty not seen in history since the days of
the last Caesars.
A picture of such size, so conspicu-
ously displayed at the capital of the
French nation and at this time, means
mora than that ma H.