Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1919-02-21
ONE MORE DECLARATION OF
INDEPENDENCE
O.
By Frederic j. Haskin

picture frames and dozens of other
things that are supposed to be artistic and
beautiful are now designed in America" as
we'll as made here. The exhibition Of work
by manufacturers and designers at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art proves that be-
yond a doubt. And it means that we have
made one more declaration of economic in
dependence from Europe
Perhaps you thought these things we're al
ways designed in America. By no means!
Europe has always been to Americans the
home of beauty and culture. Hence 1t has al
ways been considered right and necessary
that we should go to Europe for designs or all
kinds, or at most take the risk of importing
a designer and hoping he would survive in
the artless American air.
Now this idea that we had to go to Europe
to get an artistic design for piece of calico
or chair or a piano lamp was one of the
greatest of American superstitti0ns, ranking
alongside of WitChcraft and faith in ghosts.
For the Europeans never gave us anything
original, and seldom even pretended to do so.
They simply went to their museums and
copied chairs that were used in the reign of
Louis the Sixteenth, or Pippin the Squat or
Oscar the OmniverOus, some other mon
arch of antiquity. They cribbed from the
Moors and from the Japs, and from every
other people that ever Matched an idea in
decorative art. In word, they simply wan
Q0ToQ AROUND III Ln6lr museums anu picked
out whatever took their fancies.
Anybody could do that who had a museum.
And we have museums just as good as any
one else. So when the war broke out, GER
tain enterprising American museum directors
set out to drive it through the heads Of the
American manufacturers that they could crib
from antiquity just as easily as European
manufacturers could. The result was that
some manufacturers did send their designers
to American museums, and those designed did
crib from the Russians, and the Hindoos and
the Normans and from the Renaissance and
the Paleolithic and ancient Rome with just as
much facility any European designer. The
exhibition is proof of the fact.
The next step is to found truly American
school of decorative art. Why not, instead of
borrowing from all nations and all ages. take
such native American decorative art as we
have, and develop it into something dis
tinctive? The mission architecture for ex-
ample, is indigenous and highly decorative, as
is also the mission fui niture. The Pueblos
have accomplished really artistic results in
pottery, as Lave the Navajos in rugs and in
silver jewelry. If we would study these be-
ginnings Of native American decorative art
and develop them into native American
school, we would not only go to Ecrope no
longer for inspiration, but would have Eu-
rope coming to us.
Since the early days of the war the Metro
politan Museum of Art officials have been car
rying on campaign to make the galleries
work" They were more farsighted than the
manufacturers. They knew that, cut off
from the European source of supply as to de-
sign and taste, American industries would be
at a loss. But they also knew that if the
manufacturer could only learn to the
great museum collections as a part Of his
working plant, he would be in a fair way to
hoo ind 0f fon iY,cn
ton.
The problem was how to get the manu-
facturer to use the museumi The first step
was taken last August when Richard F. Bach,
curator of the School of Architecture, Column
bia university, was appointed to the museum
staff as Associate in Industrial Arts. Mr..
Bach has devoted hiLlself to the needs of
manufacturers, dealers, designers and arti
sans. He is an advise, and it is his business
to render accessible to them the collections of
the museum. In other words, he is a clearing
house between the resources of the museum
and the industrial arts
Coming at the end of the first six months
of this activity the present exhibition con-
firms the opinion of those who believed that
with proper guidance he manufacturers of
this country could make designs equal to any
in the world. The pieces exhibited occupy
two galleries. They include furniture, tex
tiles, decorative accessories, irrors frames,
jewelry, laces, metalwork, pottery, rugs,
mosaics and wall paper. All ages and ma
tions are here represented, of course.
This dainty little cold-cream jar for mi
lady's dressing table is copied from an Athen-
ian vessel twenty centuries old; Russian
laces supplied the design for that dinner set;
the charming pattern for these voiles and
chiffons were suggested by FIorentine glass
bottles; one interesting rug is the result of
study of an old millefeurs tapestry; etchings
of Norman feast halls have given ideas for
beautiful fireplaces; pictures and textiles
have been used to make new anG artistic play
ing card backs; several fashion plates show
that dress designers nave gone to the gaTbs
of ancient priests and war;: ors armor for in
spiration. One of the most striking pieces of
work is the graphaphone cabinet inspired by