New-York tribune., 1920-11-14

uchillte merit OF this exhibition that
the men who have made it take their
opportunity seriously.
This is another way of saying that
they take their art seriously. Whethe,
they have all produced masterpieces
or not is beside the point Nobody in
his senses would expect anything Of
the sort. What matters is that they
give us something to think about
There IS somewhat unfortunate prov
ocation in the canvas which rightly
fills one of the places of honor. 1t il,
at the same time, from a certain point
of view, one of the failures on the walls.
This is the triple portrait, "Eleanor,
Joan and Anna" by Mr.. George Bel
lows. In his direct seizure ofwhat he sees
! in life he Is won't to hurt the claim;
of design and be has treated them most
cavailerly IN the present instance. His
little girl seated between two old
women is linked neither to the one nor
the other by any device Of compost
/ ton. The canvas has no unity at all
- A'-tSHS ~ log AuCHS SNt liOiU
reel Of some movie film. To that ex-
tent it seems failure. But then when
the observer examines, each by itself,
the three episodes flung upon the can
vas he rejoces in the brilliant tech
nique they disclose. The oeads and
hands are beautifully painted. There
is lot Of life in this portrait and
there is some art. If only there were
more art!
Much of the portraiture, by the way,
leaves this rather mixed impression.
| Instead of the given canvas being call
of a piece" it has some phase or sug-
gests some mission which promotes dis
satisfaction. In conspicuous posi-
! ton. similar to that which has been
given TO Mr.. Bellows, there hangs a
large double portrait by Mr.. Carl
Melchers. 1t is called "Winged Vic
tory" but the little plaster cast from
which it takes its title stands almost
unobserved on the mantlepiece which
! fills a great deal Of the space and the
composition is really given to two
young women whose garments repeat
the rather assertive appeal made in
the decorative factors of the room as
a room Now one can see what Mr..
Melchers was driving at. He meant, we
take it, to paint another of those pic
lures in which he has eXtorted delight
fully bright and even gay effects from
textures and patterns skillfully ham
died. But for some reason he has this
time granted himself an extraordinary
scale. In the result he has diffused
! the notes of his harmony till there is
next to no harmony at all, and in a
mode of painting which demands the
caresslng of pigment to q point where
it yields quality he has missed that
boon and come very near to crudity in
its place. The conception IS charming,
but, attempted on SO large canvas,
charm has evaporated These things
are risky. NelasqueZ can take @ seven
foot canvas and fill an astonish-
ing proportion of it with costume.
| When he gets through the magic of
his painted surface validates his theme.
Without 4 magical surface the artist
IS terribly Handicapped.
| Mr. Edmund C. Tarbell is in this
sad case in his MARY, Edmund and
Sergius H." He is accomplished and
graceful after his familiar fashion, but
figures and background alike give US
feeling of nothing but so much up
holstery. We draw little nearer to
the realization Of painters aim when
we come to Mr.. Albert Sterner's "Por-
trait of DR.. Richard II. Hoffman" He
has set cut to achieve a certain quality
of tone, based on a simple, admirably
restrained scheme Of color, and here at
last is canvas "all Of a piece" 1t
leaves in its turn little something to
be desired. In the painters solicitude
for his patina, SO to say, he has for
gotten ths potency of the accent which
is not only permissible, but desirable
| in work of the kind, as witness the
tradition of either Whistler or Yer
Nicer. But unity is good thing, and
sition, in which color and form are gov
crned by conscious purpose, is pecu-
! liarly welcome. There are several por-
traits which excite sympathy through
a certain full-bodied realism and vigor
of workmanship. Mr.. Leon Kroll's
"M. Jules Guillaume" is one of them,
handsome, vitalized performance.
Mr.. George Luks's "Flapper" is an
other. Mr.. Luks goes on painting by
main strength and we groan again be-
cause his dark pigment is not some-
how refined and made lovely, but at
any rate there is a kind of biting force
about the impression he conveys.
There is no force at all about the full
length Of Mr.. Hampden as Hamlet
which Mr.. w. j. Glackens has pro-
duced. One can imagine his drift. He
had q poetic subject and he tried in
his way to poctize it. But he needed
in the process so purely technical a
gift as that which we keep missing in
on