The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1917-02-22
is WIZARD IN HIS Line
Won Minnesota Farmers from Agricul-
ture to Art i'll Six Days Holds
Charm for All Hearers, Old
or Young, Learned or Not.

Kenosha for one short afternoon and
evening will turn its eyes toward things
artistic and revel in the beautiful when
Dudley Crafts Watson, director of the
Milwaukee Art Society, one of the fore
most lecturers on art in the country,
the art editor for the Milwaukee Free
Press, and a painter who has earned his
laurels both in this country and abroad,
speaks here to audiences on both after
noon and evening, next Friday.
Is Native of Wisconsin.
Kenosha may take some pride in the
fact that Mr.. Watson is Wisconsin
man although Chicago claims him be-
cause he spent his student years (not
spent abroad, in the Art Institute of
that city. Mr.. Watson is a native of
Lake Geneva in this state and he is
loyal to the state. While he studied
under the world famous Spaniard, So
rolla, at one time and also under Sir
Alfred East, his art is distinctly his
own and he expresses his own individ-
uality in it. The picture of his which
is best known to Wisconsin people, be-
cause it was bought and placed in the
permanent public collection of the Mil
waukee Art Institute by Thomas A
Buckner few years ago, is the glorifed
presentation Of the sacred mountain,
Monserrat, in the north of Spain, which
he has entitled " Monsalvat" and
which is a wonderful picture, all blue
and vague and poetic.
He's Convincing Speaker.
Mr.. Watson s lectures are the sort
that make one go home after hearing
him, firm in the intention that art shall
be the aim of existence thereafter; con-
WINGED that a picture means more than
bread and butter and beautiful mu-
steal composition or a splendid theatri-
cal production is quite as necessary TO
a we'll rounded life as warm clothing
and comfortable houses. For he is
broad in his conception of art and
would not think Of defining it as con-
sisting of paintings and sculpture only.
And in this connection one may say
he has studied architecture and litera-
ture with the same zest that he has the
other arts and is as appreciative of one
branch as Of another, not forgetting
any.
He has the gift of oratory of a kind
all Of his own, in which constantly are
expressed, no matter on what subject
he lectures, his broad spirit of univer-
sal love and helpfulness for all that is
good in the world; and energy, stirring,
youthful enthusiasm and eagerness
which hypnotic his audience into a
sympathetic spirit of desire to travel
the alluring roads Of art which have
given Mr.. Watson the joyousness and
the love Of work which certainly exist
| in his soul and which somehow seem to
be the direct outcome of the art he
loves SO we'll.
Canny, Too, Though TemperamentaI.
h11hO oO VI Ills UIUGuOE.
he has his practical side and is a good
business man as we'll as an artist. He
has, since he came to Milwaukee four
or less years ago, built up an art soci-
ETY. which is great, powerful influence
in the city with a backing of thousands
of paying, interested members and
which when he came was struggling
along with fifty or so members who
had some special reason to be inter
ested in an art movement. Now the
love of art is being made democratic,
a community asset, and far reaching.
Mr. Watson s weekly free lectures on
art in the society's building on Jeffer-
son street fill the audience hall to
standing room. The school children
flock to the exhibitions on free DAYS
and there is not one of them but finds
a sympathetic listener in Mr.. Watson
if the child has any artistic aspirations
to tell of or any ambitions that Mr..
Watson may help him to attain.
Not Time to Teach often.
Mr.. Watson is natural teacher and
if he gets hold of pupil in art, that
pupil finds himself sliding along at a
breakneck pace on the road to accom-
plishment, filed very soon with the en-
thusiasm of his teacher, as well as with
some of the many things he has to
teach. Mr.. Watson has, however, little
time for teaching, although he some
times INDUCES in special work of this
kind, as when the Minnesota Art Com
mission arranged an open air art school
at the Minnesota state fair.
One of the st. Paul papers said of it
at the time:
Left Pigs to Listen.