New-York tribune., 1918-11-20
Art
New Water Colors-Mr.
George Bellows
Orientalia
By Royal Cortissoz

organizations to make an exhibition at
the Fine Arts Building. 1t thus opens
the season pleasantly enough, but not
(to tell the truth) in a manner at all
distinguished A rather colorless fate
appears to have overtaken one of the
most delightful of artistic mediums.
There was time when some of our
best painters used it with enthusiasm
/ In the hands Of the late Winslow
Homer, for example, water color easily
rivalled the brlliance Of oil. To-day,
save when it serves as the instrument
! for Mr.. Sargent's virtuosity, it seems
| to be altogether the property of con-
vcntional types, making agreeable but
conventional pictures. There are few
exhibitors who detach themselves from
the ruck at the Fine Arts Building.
Mr.. Clifford Beal does so by virtue Of
the boldncss and breadth of his Porto
Rican impressions. and one or two
new talents manifest themselves. Mr.
G. II. Litchfeld is a welcome recruit.
His "Docks" and "White Walls" dis
close a fresh, direct touch. There is
SAVIOR of originality, too, in the studies
of Miss Fclicie Waldo Howell, who has
only to extend her scale OF color and
tc let little sunny light into 1T IN
order to make her mark. The clever
ness of Mr.. A. Molarsky we'll asserts
itself in half dozen blithe sketches.
| There is charming note OF romantl-
cism in Mr.. W. E. Emerson's opalescent
landscape, "12th Symphony" and Mr..
Lief Neandross achieves interesting
effects in his drawings of birds and
"high lights" the show keeps to a de-
In the large room to the right of the
entrance hall the New York Society OF
Painters is holding its second annual
exhibition. In small way. with its
twoscore canvases, it repeats the ex-
perience of the water colorists. MISS
| Howell, again, PAINTS an old New Eng.
| land house in a simple, indivlduallzed
, way, investing her subject with pc
guiling atmosphere. There are per-
suasive landscapes by Cullen Yates,
Charles Warren Eaton and Mrs. Conan.
! Mrs. C. W. Parrish and Miss Jane
, Peterson send slight but skilfully
handled figure subjects. and Miss Anna
Fishers "Rocky Neck" is a capital
little study of shipping. There are
few good portraits led by MISS Con,
tent Johnson's solidly painted and
handsome "Mrs. c. Buell. Inc rest IS
all rather commonplace material. AS
an independent body this organization
has not yet justified itself.
The so-called "modernists" give
| somewhat thin, weedy account OF them
selves thus far this season. At the
Daniel gallery, where Mr.. Samuel Hal
pert,Mr Preston Dickinson, the Zorachs
and divers others of their cult hold
forth, the prevailing atmosphere Is
chilling. A sparse handful OF works
by contrast, a clew to what is wrong
with most CT the contributors. Mr..
Hayley Lever, who is modifying his
style to good purpose, replacing his
=, 'urgid surfaces with a certain suavity.
paints in his "Gloucester" merely
charming picture. Mr.. Ernest Lawson
does the same thing in his admirable
Autumn" landscape that in pure
feeling is one of the most sensitive
things he has ever produced. And Mr..
Rockwell Kent's big winter scene, with
against the snow, is as amusing in
style as it is truthful in substance.
All these painters feel their way
toward something sensuous and fine.
The medernist group, prooccupied with
queer theories and clumsy methods, is
chiefly remarkable for the dull medioc-
rity of it's paintings. 1t aims, possibly,
at the truth. 1t evidently regards
with Indifference, if it is not inimical
to, the loveliness in nature and art.
And in throwing tradition overheard it
makes jcttison Of technique
In the kindred exhibition at the
Bourgeois gallery the key specifically
differs. This is a collection of lighter
pieces, of water colors and drawings.
But at bottom there is the same half
baked philosophy of art, the philoso-
ply which would discharge the painter
from all duty to the lessons of the
past and leave him to work out his
technique according to his own sweet
Mr.. Joseph Stella, is willing to pay
tribute to the immemorial standards Of
sound workmanship. He also, to be
sure, must indulge in esoterlc divaga-
tions and paint in his might" and
"Solitude" couple Of pastels of quite
incomprehensible Enthusiastically. But
he knows how to draw and IS willing
to prove it in some silver points and
in stunning "Head of an Old Man"
The others in this company, Mr. Horace
Brodzky, Mr.. Arnold Friedman, Mr.
Oscar Bluemner, Mr.. Maurice Sterne
and Mr.. Abraham Walkowitz, are too
busy with aesthetic theories, with little
rebellions Of their own against the
modes of the ages, to paint we'll. They
may be prodigiously modern, but they
are also prodigiously crude and unin-
teresting.
At the Keppel gallery Mr.. George
Bellows presents collection of forty
or fifty of his Autographs, heading it
with illustrations to some Of the hor-
rors of the Bryce report and bringing
forward again those studies of pugi-
lism and Of Billy Sundayism which we
have seen before. The Belgian draw
ings--a dozen, all told-have the grew
some impressiveness of so many vivid
documents. They suggest the "spe-
cials" of some reporter in black and
white, printed without the Intervention
Of the blue pencil. They are unques-
tionably moving transcripts Of certain
appalling historical facts, and as such
it is desirable that we should have
them. The crimes Of the Hun must not
be forgotten. Drawings like these are
"remaindcrs" to be treasured with
justly wrathful purpose. And ono Of
them, the Murder of Edith Cavell."
will go into the collectors portfolio as