The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1898-01-08


night, under the auspices of the Wo-
mems Social union, Arthur l.. Collins
read a very interesting paper on art,
which like all the effusions of this gift
ed writer is we'll worthy of listening
to. Below it is given in full:
The term art" is a broad one, and has
a variety of definitions. Tonight, 1t re-
lates only to the making of pictures.
How any one ever discovered or even
suspected that ] know anything about
art, is more than / am able to tell. That
is a secret which l supposed was locked
in my own breast. | did not tell II, 1
am sure, not even to my most intimate
friends, but the ladies committee, with
that superior intuitive knowledge pos
sessed only by the gentler SEX discovered
it, and here ] am, regularly billed ana
labelled for talk on art.
In my younger days, l may have been
guilty of clipping hairs out of the cats
tail to make paint brushes of, but my
mothers kiss made a painter OF me.
assure you, indeed, if my recollections
serve me rightly, her slipper was more IN
evidence on these occasions, so you see
my youthful aspirations for art were
nipped lin the bud, and l am sorry to
say thty have been neglected since.
1t isl possible, then, you will come to
the conclusion before / am through talk
ing THAT the committee made mistake,
insteaH of a discovery; If so blame them,
do ndt blame me, for my burden is al
ready as great as | can bear
l Hlve a lady acquaintance who has
consil llerable literary ability, of which
she is not a little proud. 1t is her chief
delight to invite friends to her home and
entertain them with her own produce
tionS. Her husband does not find these
entertainments particularly interesting,
but he is good natured fellow, and, like
most husbands, desrous of pleasing his
wfG; and he therefore usually sits the
performances out. on one occasion, how
e h. he made his escape into an ad-
jd ing room. Here he found his coach
mi u fast asleep. Going up to him and
shaking him roughly by the shoulders
he Missed in his ear wretch! You have
been listening through the key-hole." IT,
after l am through talking, you find any
one asleep in the ante-room, you may
know they have been trying to beat the
organization out of the price of admission
and have been listening through the key
hole.
AS TO LITERATURE.
There are a great many people who
know IA good deal about literature; there
are a great many people who know a
good deal abouts music, but there are
comparatively few American people who
know much about art. One reason of this
is that their opportunities for studying
painting have not been as great as that
for studying either music or literature.
There is but one way to get an under
standing of painting, and that is by
studying the canvas of great painters.
In literature, the wealth of all the ages
lies at our feet. We have but to reach
forth our hand and touch the strings and
Homer's Tyre sounds as swcetly to our
listening ears as it ever sounded TO the
ears of the ancient Hellencs. We can at
will turn the searchight of centuries on
the works of Shakespeare until every
proverb, every fanciful picture, every
bright scintillating diamond of thought
has been revealed to us.
In music, we have been equally fortu-
nate. Every school child has an oppor-
tunity of a musical education, while Han
ders Messiah has again and again
thrilled the common people to the heuct' $
core.
A3ut in art we have been less fortunate,
there are comparatively few Ameri-
cans who have had an opportunity to see
many great paintings. The Worlds fair
offered this opportunity to many. How
Well they took advantage OF it can be at
tested by any one who pushed and
iammed his way through the throngs that
crowded the art galleries there. But
ART, Wlln some one elbows
punching into your short ribs, or a Chi
cago No. 10 foot rubbing up against
your pet corn, is studying under difficult
ties, and one could get but d hasty
glimpse at best of the exhibitions there,
but enough, perhaps, to make one heart
hungry for more.
The Italian, the Frenchman and the
Englishman have had advantages greatly
superior to the American in the study of
nj
Florentine galleries, and his Vatican,
where are gathered the richest spoil of
all time in art treasure.
When we speak of the Frenchman, we
usually mean the Frenchman of Paris !;
when we speak of the Engishman, we
Nlean the Englishman of Londan, for any
'Yne dwelling in the very outer rim of that
little island, even if he had his feet
hanging over the edge of it, would only
be stones throw from London.
The Frenchman, then, has his Louvre
and the Englishman his National acad-
emy.
When we speak of an American, we do
not mean a Bostonlan, nor a New York
er, nor even a Scrantonian, but we may
mean any one of Americas sons or
daughters dwelling anywhere underneath
that great blue canopy that arches over
three hundred million square miles Of
territory and there are millions of people
scattered all over this vast territory who
have never seen the inside of an art gall
lery
The story of art is a long one. Where
1t begins, no one knows. Back of history,
back even of Iadition-somewhere in the
early period OF the human race, man
commenced to make pictures and
through barbarism, through semi-civili-
zation up to the highest point of civil
iZation, the progress of nature has been
largely registered by the progress they
have made in this art.
Within the last twenty years, or since
the Centennial exposition in Philadelphia.
there has been a rapid advance i'm art
culture i'm this country The importation
OF foreign masterpieces into the country
at that time stimulated and aroused our
artists here. Many of them went to Eu-
rope to study in the best art schools
there; the Art Students league, and the
Society of American artists, were es-
tablshed, and today we have an art body
technically as well trained and as prog
ressive as any European country.
The landscapes of George InnesS and
the portraits of Sergeant are unexcelled
by any artists of u late period; in fact,
/ do not think Sergeant has superior
in any age.
In genre and figure painting, Brush,
Rhinehart and l}lashheld are among the
leaders, but the iist OF names could be ex-
tended almost indefinitely, of those who
do excellent work in portrait, marine,
landscape and genre painting.
AT THE WORLDS FAIR.
At picture that interested me very
much, at the Worlds fair was one OF
Brush's, entitled 1.-THE Indian and the
LfY" l have since seen 1t on exhibition
AT the Academy ir Philadelphia. 1t rep
resents an Indian, arrayed in war paint
and feathers, with tomahawk and scalp
Ing knife hanging at his side and tro-
phles OF the hunt suspended from his
shoulders, In the background are the
huge trees of the forest. dark and SOM