Evening star., 1935-10-20


was elected TO membership in the New
York Water Color Club. and a second
paintings water color-was pur-
chased by the Maryland Institute,
Baltimore. Honor came to her first
through her water color Painting, but
as soon as she took up oil painting
prizes were awarded her. The first
picture she painted in this medium was
given the Julia A. Shaw Prize in the
National Academy of Designs annual
exhibition and was later purchased by
the Montclair Art Museum. A "Por-
trait by Night" of which the prelimi-
nary sketch in color will be shown in
this exhibition, after winning the
Thomas B. Proctor Prize, N. A. D. and
the Lippincott Prize. Pennsylvania
Academy of Fine Arts, was purchased
by the latter institution for its per-
manent collection and after being
placed therein was cut from the frame
in December 1882 and stolen. no trace
OF it or the thief having since been
found. During the past year Miss
Belcher has spent much time in the
South, holding exhibitions in Atlanta
and Savannah and executing numer-
GUS commissions for portraits. At the
same time she made various studies Of
Negroes and Negro life which have
attracted much favorable attention.
Best Of all, it is said, she likes to paint
and has excelled IN painting portrait
studies of the country and village peo-
ple-"characters"-in her own State.
One Of these to be included in this
exhibition is in oils and portrays an
old woman and black cat, very sin
lister in appearance, and entitled To
morrow and Tomorrow" Another is
Of little country girl surrounded with
apples. This is in water color Miss
Belcher will help to hang the exhibi-
ton here and. it is understood, will
be present at the opening.
STUDIO HOUSE. 1914 Twenty-first
street, reopened last Wednesday
with an exhibition of New Prints by
Contemporary Printmakers" in its
gallery, which during the past Summer
has been redecorated, the walls covered
with a neutral colored fabric, monks
cloth, which makes an excellent back
ground for prints and painting in
q high key. This exhibition supple
ments very Interestingly the larger ex-
hibition at the National Museum, in
aSmuch as 1t is all modern snd COM
pletely up-to-date. With the excep-
ton of four wood engravings by Thom-
as Mason, there is not one thing in
this entire exhibition that has in
trinsic beauty. but also it is a fact
that the ma jority of works set forth are
rendered with great capability-are
very we'll done and distictively out Of
the ordinary. 1t is interesting to note
that there Is in all this modern work
distinct trend toward illustration
to story telling-anecdote- kind of
grim drollery. This may be refiec-
ton Of the SPIRIT Of the time or merely
the long swing of the pendelum. Also.
apparently hthography is having a
new vogue. The majority OF the
works in this exhibition are In this
medium. There are, however, some
in aquatint by Harry Sternberg which
are remarkable and some etchings by
Paul Cadmus that are distinctly
achievements from the technical
side as well as in matter of
composition. That in several in
stances these modernists have found
inspiration and direction in the works
Of the masters of the past is quite evi-
dent. Sternberg has done two prints
of wrestlers, has gone into allegory,
and has attempted to render musical
sounds in abstract linear forms most
Interestingly. At least he is venture
some. Benton Spruance has had much
to say of contemporary life, which he
has observed with keenness and with
out sentimentality. Two of his litho-
graphs are foot ball subjects, one is an
allegory Of Germantown, a skeleton in
the door way, a fourth Is Of two stamp
collectors riding their hobby-very
Daumieresque-a fifth is of subway
station in the wee sma' hours, bleak
and dreary-full OF "the creeps.'
Edith Newton gives an exhibition OF
cold realism in her New England
kitchen Dried Beef" and Peggy Ba-
con in her four contributions Is as
clever and as ribald as ever. A very