Omaha daily bee., 1920-01-03
10 there not q choir invisible.
Binding every heart to hearth
-Babcoek.
. Grea Nation
Cannot Exist
Without Art.

The roots of the old vine Of art
strike deep and spread far. Sculp-
ture and painting may be the bios
som and the fruit: architecture Is
the stem from which these depend:
but the sustenance of the ord vine is
drawn from the sweet earth ,tsel,
through a myriad of tiny fibrils, the
esthetics OF every day, through
which the rlain people retain their
habit of loving the beautiful and oil
requiring it
Broadly speaking our national sir
with regard to the finer things OF
life has been a sin of isolation. We
have been prone to relegate our ar.
and even our culture and on. re-
ligion--to particular classes of peo-
pie or places or days. We have re-
garded "the finer things" as in
gradients. instead of seeing them az
outlooks on life or distillers Of il.
As our development has progressed
we have, it is true, come more and
more to regard these ingredients as
desirable. but we still failed to grasp
them as forces, as instruments of
more complete living, as our Euro
pean friends (even the peasants)
Lave long since done. This is prob
ably because we have grown with
out the constant reminder which ar
cent monuments afford Of the cs-
sential humanity of our race and he
cause we have had our esthetic feas.
IN the great uncultivated natural en-
vironment which has been ours 10
subdue. The latter is condition or
which the esthetic sense doubtless
tends to vegetate and go to seed.
But art is on the whole a moral
proposition, and as such it knows no
bound of time or place or person.
Art is an attitude toward produc
ton. Production is a peculiarly
clearlcut form of conduct itself
Production without recognition of
the possible ideal, without regard
for that univedsal longing which
outreaches the irreducible minimum
of necessity is not wholly sincere.
not wholly conscientious, form Of
conduct. "A great industrial na:iot
without an industrial art" can, after
all, be great in bulk only. When
practically every industrial and corr
mercial nation in the world except
ing ours has long seen the light on
this subject. it would be perilous
thing to venture forth with our
wares upon the seven seas without
new reckoning.
But the new reckoning is being
taken. Business is taking an initia-
tive in the matter and turning to thu
art museums and the art schools for
cooperation. The thing is felt in
the home; the best attended lectures
in the art museum are those ir
which a discussion of the furnish
ing of the home is offered. In other
words, the new art awakening
which must ultimately lead to
greater sculpture and finer painting,
if such are our need, is beginning
at the rcots-in the everyday art;
that touch all the people. For art
is democratic in its growth. As
public opinion, in the last analysis,
determines the course of democ-
racy, so the recognition of the uni
versal desire that outreaches neces-
sity sweeps upward with cumulative
force--ike that OF the wave Of greer
that we cafl a vine-and having this
force, the force of life itself. it can
not but burst forth when its time
comes, in undreamed of fragrance
and beauty over the land.-George
Eggers, Director. Art Institute OF
Chicago.