The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-07-08
ARTISTS STUDIOS.
FROM "IHE MAGAZINE OF ART''
 FOX JULY.
Also Word About Scnsnsionalism in
 Art.

Art. Mir. Walter Goodman, in the Nigga zine of Art for July, continues his de- | scription of Artists Studios: As They Were and As They Are" He thus compares Turner's work room with the | palatial studios of successful artists of 1 to-day: Turner's painting-room was OH the first floor of a dreary house i'll Queen Anne street, where the artist 1 lived from 1872 to 1851. But the cham ! Der which gave birth to "Italy,' the
 ''Temerairo," and other great works | now in our National Gallery, was full of accumulated dirt, of greasy hang inss, and of dilapidatcd furniture;
 while further evidence of the positive squalor and discomfort in which the | gdeat painter lived is afforded by the
 fact that on rainy days the water of- | ten streamed down the precious can
 vases from leaks In warped sashes and 1 ill-fitting skylights. Yet this painter Of
 some of the noblest landscapes of any |
 large fortune. But if Turner's draw
 ing -room," as he persisted in calling 1t,
 was scarcely inviting from the social
 point of view, it was sufficiently lotty
 and roomy, while it possessed, more
 over, capital north light. All the
 same, artists since his day have inva-
 riably looked to their creature com
 forts, and, apart from this considera-
 tion, not a few have found 1t necessa-
 " to fit and furnish their homes in
 accordance with their taste or in mar
 mony with the department in art they
 have taken up. Among the first to set
 the example was the late Lord Leigh
 ton;-and who that has visited ms
 handsome abode In Holland Park road
 will ever forget that entrance hall With | it's splendid Moorish vestibule; the me
 staircase of carved oak, leading to fur | ther art treasures on the walls, to im-
 posing passages, and to the noble stu ] dio itself, in which many objects sufii- | ciently characteristic of the painters
 style were to be found? What com plete contrast was, and happily still IS, Leighton's painting-room With that or
 Turner, or, it may be, to any ot the
 late presidents predecessors. Ana
 what of the palatial classic residence
 of Mir. Alma Tadema, with it's tessella-
 ted flooring it's marble columns, It's | Greek and Roman frieZes, and glded
 adornments, all of which, and much
 more besides, are in strict harmony
 with the class of subjects preferred by 1 this delightful artist Then turn to | MT. Frederick Goodall, and see how like
 his favorte art mistress are the MOOT
 ish and Oriental fittings and hanglngs of the elegant suite of apartments | which serve as studio lounge, reception
 room and show gallery. Next carry
 your memory back to the many fine at
 eliers in the palatial houses of Melbury
 road. Kensington, beginning with those of MT. Luke Fildes, and MT. Colin Hum
 ter. and ending, perhaps, with the in
 teresting picture gallery and studio Of 1 MT. Watts, and the bright, cheertul
 habitation of MT Marcus Stone. Go
 the round mentally also of the not less | imposing art homes of South kenslng-
 ton. of St. Johns Wood and Haverstock
 Hill, pausing on the way at Knights
 bridge to see the unpretentious but en1- inently characteristic and serviceable atelier of Sir Edward J. Poynter, r. | R. A.
 MT. M. H. Spielmann, in the Masa-
 zine of Art for July, also utters strong protest against the public de-
 mand for sensational pictures at the
 Academy. He says: This years exhi-
 bition differs little in quality from that
 of 1900, save that it contains, perhaps | fewer works of that highest degree Of
 merit we are accustomed to find there | Yet. for our part we would as lief have an Interesting" Academy as a good
 Academy. It is very delightful, of
 course, to enjoy the sight of the few
 really fine" pictures which make an | Academy a good one But if these pie lures are executed on well-knoWn lines ! and if their excellence is of degree
 rather than of kind, we would sooner
 have an execution in which the works
 were not quite so good In quality, but
 the efforts more original in conception,
 the aim more individual-the mind, on
 the whole, more alert, more alive more
 truly poetical. But the attitude of the
 public itself is wrong-and has set the
 artists wrong. The invariable public
 demand for q picture of the year.
 the picture of the year-betrays all the l rottenness of nsationalism." It is
 this demand for sensation, in it's es- sence morbid and hysterical, which
 brings us to the exhibition in false, | unhealthy frame of mind. We ask for clou-we practically demand from the | Academy every year its Eiffel Tower
 It does not please us that there should
 be half dozen masterpieces; we wish | that one should be pre- eminent to talk l about-not so much that one should be
 better than the others, but that the | others should be worse than the one. 1 The ordinary visitor to the Prado asks which Is the finest Velasquez in the l gallery. and does less than justice to
 the rest. He visits the Salon Carre at the Louvre, and takes but conde-
 scending run through the other galler- ies It Is not wholesome seeking af-
 ter excellence, this; it displays not so much appreciation of the best as ina | bility to appreciate the nearly-best
 And so the public demand produces the
 artists supply. The painters are thus | infected-the less Wellbalanced of
 them-and in course of time are in | duced to offer works which will attract attention not so much by sound excel | lence as by qualities that astonish I The crowd is more completely delight
 ed by fireworks than by other displays more solid and more truly beautiful.