The Colorado statesman., 1913-11-01
AFRO-AMER|CAN CULL|NCS

everywhere. No one seemed to take
me seriously. Indeed. in some places |
could see they thought had perhaps
stolen the pictures and was trying to
dispose of them.
Day after day / visited art stores,
but always with the same result. Then
| remembered had seen in the Metro
politan Museum of Art here a painting
called In the Garden done by George
de Forest Brush, who painted Silence
Broken Mourning Her Brave and
The Sculptor and the King the sub
jects for which he found when he was
visiting New Mexico, and also the
painting Leda and the Swan, which
was in the collection of the late Stan
ford White.
Il began to think that perhaps / was
without actual talent for painting and
that l had overestimated my ability,
and that this was why the art dealers
of Fifth avenue would not give my
work consideration. Desperate. and
with hope nearly gone, determined to
see Mr.. Brush and ask him to look at
my pictures and give me an honest
opinion as to whether they had merit.
| called at his studio in Macdougal al
ley, near Washington square, and told
him my story.
He asked to see my work. When
showed it to him he told me did have
talent, but that | needed directing. He
promised to help me, and he did. What
l owe him in gratitude | can never re-
pay. l went to Keene, N. H, near
which place Mr.. Brush had his sum-
mer home and studio. | studied under
him and, by his guidance, my work i'm
proved greatly. After the summer end
ed l came back to New York and en-
tered the American Academy of De-
sign.
Meanwhile l kept up my studio
work. | offered number of my paint
ings to an art dealer in Fifth avenue,
near Thirty-second street, for exhibit
ton purposes. They remained on ex-
hibition for several weeks There
one of them l called Mount Monad-
mock, N H., was seen by Mr.. Jacob
H. Schiff, who bought it. Last winter
Mr.. Albert Andriesse, an art connois-
seur of Amsterdam, Holland, who was
visiting New York, bought another,
which l named "A Bend in the Stream.
hope to go to Paris to study next
year.
May | say without being thought
guilty of egotism or a desire to boast.
which is far from my intention, that L
think that what | have accomplished
and what has been accomplished by
other negroes in other lines gives proof
that the negro is capable of worthy
things, and that the conception Of
many white persons that the negro is
good for nothing but manual labor
and such other work as does not call
fair but incorrect?
After a people have been held
down for centuries, as we have been,
is it to be expected that we should in
only fifty years of freedom equal or
even approach the white race in ev-
cry particular? Many persons, even
today, gain their ideas of the negro
from story books, while it is fact
that many educated persons who have
not had the opportunity to know the
negro at close range still regard him
as but little more removed from the
position in society he occupied while
a slave.
Meanwhile, the sensible, honest
minded negro everywhere throughout
the United States is endeayoring to do
the work God gave him to the best of
his ability and understanding, conf
dent that in time God will set all
things right. York Sun.