The New York herald., 1922-03-17
PenneH Laments
Furore Over Art
With Money Stamp
Remarks i'm Address to Arts
and Letters Academy Sup
posed to Refer to Blue Boy

The American habit of looking for art
chiefly in the past and of valuing 1t in
proportion to its expensiveness was
sharply raped by Joseph Penneli. vet
eran artist and critic and dean OF
American graphic artists in an address
last night before members of the Amer
lean Academy of Arts and Letters at
the Academy Building. 15 West Eighty
first street. The occasion was the open
ing OF the important exhibition of Amer
lean graphic art which Is hung for a
month in the galleries. While he did
not say so 1t was clear to many who
heard him that Mr.. Pennell referred in
n portion of his address to the case OF
THE Blue Boy"
Art with u.s." he said, usually must
have been recognized somewhere else
and marked with the money stamp be-
fore we can appreciate it.
If an Englishman a hundred years
ago painted a portrait as an experiment
and after that portrait has been lost
or stolen and so acquired by it's adven-
lures financial standing. and If after
that it has been completely repainted
vanished. scraped off. cleaned, restored
until not vestige of the original re-
mains. and il then an art patron pays
100000 for a work the artist woald
have been glad to get $500 for when he
painted 1t. and which is really now a
ghost OF its former self, we will swarm
to II in crowds. talk about il at tea
tables and never know that anything
else has been done till some dealer gets
something else to unload on US by the
same methods.
ton of art, the love Of art. the encour-
agement of art in this land But in the
time when art was appreciated things
were different. Collectors and anna
teurs appreciated and encouraged the
work OF their contemporaries-the did
buy some art OF their predecessors. but
mostly that of their own time
Why Rembrandt Lives.
The Burgomaster Six lives and
Rembrandt lives because that wise man
had the sense to patronize that great
| artist The splendid swagger of Charles
! !. and the Syndics live because Van
Dyke painted and etched them from life.
And who would have heard or known OF
Phillip ~. save for Velasquez? He
would otherwise be as insignificant as
his present day successor.
Those mems work and not the work
of the artists OF the present is what the
present day collector wants, failing to
realize that IL he were painted or etched
! by contemporary artists he might have
some chance of being remembered-in
fact. his only chance.
i do not know how the collectors and
patrons of the past knew good work
and got it-there were dealers in those
days, too-but they did. To-day the
collector and the amateur depend on the
dealer. and frequently none Of them
knows anything save the financial side
or the matter--unless it is the advertis-
ing proposition"
Tribute 10 whistler.
That there are or have been America n
artists in plenty seemed to be Mr. Pen
nelPs verdict on the art situation in
America. Though there never has been
an artistic age or an artistic nation.
America has produced during the last
hundred and fifty years as many great
artists as any other country" he said.
Like all great artists. few of them
have been during their lives recognized
BY their country or their colleagues"
The body of his talk was devoted tc
James McNeill Whistler, a remarkably
fine collection of whose etchings and
Autographs hung in the hall where the
address was given. Mr.. Pennell called
| Whistler the greatest artist this country
has produced and the greatest graphic
artist OF all time.
The Exhibition OF Graphic Arts. which
has been arranged by a committee con-
! sisting Of Timothy Cole. Childe Hassam,
Joseph Pennell, chairman, and F. .
| Crasto, Jr., occupies the two galleries,
the retrospective exhibition being on the
I lower floor and the modern group on the
upper. The collection of etchings and
/ autographs by Whistler Is said to be
! the largest and finest ever assembled be.
! fore in one place. There are sixty
/ three of the etchings and thirty of the
! Autographs. all loaned by various mu-
seums. dealers and private collectors
and all Of the choicest quality.
| Other etchings, Autographs and en-.
| cravings In the retrospective exhibition
are by Frank Duveneck, Robert T.
| Blum. C. RI. White. J. W. Twachtman
!. Alden Weir T. Johnson. FredericR
Juengling, w. G. Watt and Henry Wolf
] In the contemporary group are repre-.