Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-06-01
STUDENTS OF ART SCHOOL
AWARD OF MEDALS AND HONORS
AT CoRCoRAN GALLERY.
Address by Mr.. E. g. Messer-Report
Of Committee-Nameso Of
the Winners

Several hundred persons assembled at
the Corcoran Gallery last evening to view
the work of the students Of the Corcoran
School Of Art and to witness the award of
| medals and honors. The whole gallery
was thrown open and brilliantly illumi-
mated, music was furnished by orches-
ira, and the scene was enlivened by the
passing to and fro of the students and
their guests.
The school work was displayed in the
hemicycle hall and the opposite school
room, ands~therein the interest conferred,
high commentator being given to the
exhibit, and much speculation being in
dulged in concerning the probable winners
of awards. Long before the bugle sounded
as signal for attention and silence many
had gathered on the grand stairs, from
the platform of which the announcements
were made. In fact, when Mr.. F. b. Nc
CURE, the director of the Corcoran Gallery,
stepped forward to read the order of exer-
cises he looked both up and down into
veritable of interested faces, and when,
later on, the recipients of the medals ad-
vanced to claim their honors it was with
difficulty that they made their way through
the crowd.
After welcoming the guests Mr.. Mcclure
explained that the awards could only be
given to students who had been in attend
ance at the school for two consecutive
years, and for that reason 1t sometimes
happened that students who had not at
tended the school for the full time who
may have done excellent work were de-
barred from awards. He also spoke in a
laudatory manner of the present exhibition,
saying that it is the best in his estimation
that had ever been set forth by the school
and that much of the work shown was not
only up to professional standards but to
the best professional standards. BY the
distinguished artists committee from out
of town, he said, it was regarded both
nd hot fnr fha
excellent results Mr.. f. c. Messer and his
able corps of assistants should be thanked.
Address by MI. Messer.
Mr.. Messer himself was then introduced
and made a short address.
AT the close of our school year and be-
fore we go several ways" he said,
lit may be well to consider, very briefly,
our work, its spirit and aims, and its rela-
ton to our life. Not hing that fails to fit
in well with the normal activities of ma
ton can have permanent value In that
nations life. An AIT that is exotic, that
Is maintained like rare plant taken from
its natural environment and artificially
nourShed and protected, artificially
nourish and protect a tropical orchid, is
not art that can have a vital and per-
manent interest. 1t must be the simple
and direct expression of normal desire and
be intimately related to the thought and
feeling of the race and of the time to
make it worth while. A poet not only
speaks for himselef, out for all the dumb
poets of his race, and the painter gives
expression to common but unexpressed per-
ceptions Just how far the art school can
develop this wholesome and normal art
expression is debatable question-not
that question the value of the schools, but
the question is debatabe because it is de-
bated, and there are those even in the
ranks of the painters themselves who ques-
ton the value of academic work. The
academy cannot create the genius, 1t may
orI Ii1-ar HI da1-nl nrn-
ment, but 1t is certain that the schools
enlarge their scope and experience the
painter becomes less provincial and the
general achievement is distinctly bettered.
The truth is that the academy like the race
or the individual may sag into an unvital-
lied routine losing its vital impulses and
depending upon formulas that, like shorn
plants, lose their vitality through the sever
ance from currents that furnished them
with sap. 1t is well that the school should
keep this in mind keeping its finger l
might say, the universal pulse and
watching its formulas, as careful housewife
watches the plant in her window, for any
possible signs of debility or decay. If
by the practice of our art We are to be-
come any the less worth citizens then
let us have done with it and close our mu-
seums and school houses.
AS to Stable Landmarks
'It is not uncommon for the young art
worker, especially when -emancipated from
wholesome home influences and brought
into contact with the deteriorating infiu-
ence of an over-ripe art. to lose sight of the
stable landmarks, to conclude that the art |
which renOunces, or is Indifferent, to moral
principles, is a freer art. and finer through
its freedom. Let the student rest assured
that there is no absolute freedom in this
life. The whole fabric of life is woven of
multitudinous and diversified threads and
drawn from this continuity of relations
these threads become rawlings to be
thrown into the waste nile | have been
moved at this time to this particular
prea chment, for such it will seem to be, be
cause / have recently come into contact /
with certain so-caled art work, which is |
assumed to be representative of certain |
phases of foreign and current art-an up-to- |
date, reactionary art to which the atten- |
ton of our young art workers has been
called. Now it is necessary in our critical |
Judgment of the varying phases of art to