Evening star., 1923-03-01
The North Window
BY LEILA MECHLIN,

ruetully: I'm sorry, but don't get
HIM" Don't get him." repeated a /
bystander. Why should you? What
is there to get?" That's just it," the
critic explained, IT don't know. Ger
tainly there is something in his work
which is worth while, something in
dicative of purpose. but 1 don't see
It," If you don't see it. what makes |
you think that it's there?" wonder
ingly asked the layman. Because"
was the answer, people in whose
Judgment I have the utmost faith say
1t is. there; they do get It,"
The picture in question had the
appearance to the uninitiated of an
extremely immature work, g. variety
OF color spots placed in almost a hap
hazard way on paper, after the man
ner of the modernists. 1t was a.
landscape, but 1t was incomplete. The
layman would have passed IT by
almost without thought, but the re-
mark of the critic kept coming back,
opening, as it were, an avenue of in |
auiry. "Is it possible" thought she,
that the painter of that water color.
so meaningless even to the trained
eye Of the critic, had the germ of an
idea which he was striving to eluci |
date and which might in time prove
not merely revolutionary, but iilumi- !
nating?"
One does not commonly look for an
answer to such inquiries as this in
articles on religion, but, curiousiy
enough. the writer discovered such
an explanation In an article on "Mod-
ernism and the Church." by the Rev.
Roland Cotton Smith, for many years
rector of St. Johns Church in this
city. which was published in a cur
rent number of the Outlook. In this
article DR.. Smith says: 1.-The art of
today is not sensual and Materials
tic; 1t is the attempt of man to
express. not what the other man has
seen. but what he sees of the spirit
within the form. The result of his
labors often appears monstrous, but
IL Is a step in the right direction;
Tor when the true spirit Is recap
tured II Will inevitably express itself
in the right form. This development
which we can see most clearly In
whole modern surging of the spirit.
IL springs out of life and demands
reality, and it refuses for the present
TO accept any of the established
forms, but when the spirit Is recap
tured we shall find that it will ex-
press itself more and more in the
old accepted forms" In this brief
paragraph DIR. Smith with marvellous
clarity sets forth the idea back of the
modernist movement in art-some
thlhg which no artist has apparently
been able to do and which no critic
has yet done-possibly because
neither artist nor critic has had the
wisdom nor the intuition to discover
nTy,N 1f d.. I.,r
ing to find expression.
4 X X
Up to the present time the effort,
the struggle, has been ugly and has
brought forth distressing results. but
It is possible that DR.. Smith is right
and that out of this ugliness, this
haze of misunderstanding. may be
coming new art which is infinitely
better than and equally precious as
the art of the past To gain a de-
sired end 1t is sometimes necessary
to go through long dark passages.
Large achievement almost always
comes as the result, possibly as the
reward. of struggle. 1t is easier by
far to repeat what others have said |
than to put forth new. worth While !
ideas.
The leader of great symphony
orchestra said to the writer less than
a fortnight ago: THE musical out
look is dfscouraging. What are we
doing today but repeat what has been
done so well in the past? Oh. yes.
we do it well-the works Of the
masters are beautifully rendered to-
day. But we are making no contri-
Dution; we have no brilliant young
composers either in this country or
abroad-that is, none of the stature of
Beethoven, or Brahms. or Wagner"
To a great extent the same has been
true In painting. An accomplished
Dutch painter said some years ago to
an American traveller in Holland: 1T
is impossible for us to paint any
thing which is original today. II we
attempt a landscape. involuntarily We
do Mauve; If We choose an interior
with figures as our theme. we produce
a weak imitation of Israels. 1t is
for this reason that the modern Dutch
school. which attained such heights
but decade ago. has almost sunk
into oblivion"
The conditions in this country have
not been altogether different. Cur
rent exhibitions of American paint
ing for some time have testified to an
extraordinary technical skill on the
part of the painters, but evidenced an
almost tragic absence of real mes
sage. NOl Only tnlS, Dut In many
instances the artists have seemed to
have lost their ideals of beauty and
to be putting forth work of an eX-
tremely graceless sort. Undoubtedly
it was time for a renaissance.
And yet it has been hard to be-
lieve that out of the confusion of
modernism could come something
new and fresh and fine in the field of
art No one in ones sane mind could
admire the abortions which have been
1 L.. oysth h,y
impressionism. futurism: but hideous
as they have been. in themselves
meaningless to the uninitiated, they
should perhaps have been regarded
as Indicative Of a spirit of progress.
as witnessing to a dissatisfaction
with feeble imitation and a desire
t. search out new truth. Through
al; the grotesque ugliness. though un-
observed, may have run a thread of
purpose, and this purpose may per-
haps later on find beautiful express
sion in the "old accepted forms"
X X X
The Pennsylvania Academy's cur
rent exhibition. which is now in
progress in Philadelphia, goes far to
substantiate such belief. This exhi-
bftion shows work by cotemporary
American artists which is strong, COL
orful, fine; work of real beauty and
charm, exquisitely rendered, and yet
in the modern idiom; pictures which
are not grotesque. which are done
with that same skill which the great
masters employed and with no less
realization of the fundamental prin-
cipIes governing all fine art, yet pic
lures of an essentially different sort
from any that have previously been
produced: pictures which make
room full Of works by distinguished
Int of dftY Yaars ago look dull