Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1939-07-09

Philadelphia. Also, by the same
artist, is picture of the raising of
the SHELTON of mastodon found
in pit near Newburgh, N. Y, and
destined for Peale's museum.
There is view of Harvard Col
lege in 1921, painted BY one Alvan
Fisher, and picture of "A Fourth
of July Celebration in Center
Square, Philadelphia" about 1910,
by John Lewis Krimmel. There are
two views of Mount Vernon as it
was in the early days, painted by
William Henry Bartlett, and from
the Corcoran Gallery of Art has
come the famous painting by Sam
uel F.. B. Morse Inventor of the
telegraph and first president of the
National Academy of Design of
the "Old House of Representatives, "
which, not having proved lucra-
tive venture, probably increased the
painters inventive efforts.
The inventive genius of America
is brought to attention in West
painting of Franklin coaXing the
lightning from the clouds, little
realizing what a force he was letting
loose for man to harness. Then,
later on, there is painting by Rob-
ert Dudley of Cyrus Field and his
associates awaiting reply to the first
message sent across the ocean by
the Atlantic cable.
Pioneer Features
Pioneer days in the Middle West
are admirably illustrated in this ex-
hibition by George Cabel Bingham,
who was a pioneer himself, living
most of his life in Missouri, and who
had, as seen here, extraordinary
power of pictorial expression, and
great as we'll as convincing veracity.
One of the best of his canvases is
"Raftsmen Playing Cards." good in
color and an excellent composition
The way of the covered wagon is
well pictured by Samuel Colman
in a painting entitled Ships of the
Plain and the gold rush in Cali
fornia, in l849, finds pictorial COM
memoration in a painting by T.
WEIGH, california Placer Mining. ,"
Twenty years later the first CONT
mental train left Sacramento in
May, bound east. and this epoch
marking event is here pictured by a
painter named Joseph Becker with
naive simplicity.
All of the pictures in this engag-
ing exhibition do not record his
torical happenings; not a few mir
ror instead the everyday life of a
simple and contented people, such
as huskies and quilting bees COR
parties; the news of the day dis
cuSsed around the wood stove or
on the porch of the village store;
horse trading and horse racing:
skating and sleighing, fishing and
boating; going about ones daily
tasks and taking them, as it were,
all in the days work 1t is rather
a pleasant glimpse we get of life in
America before it got speeded up
to the present state of high tension.
One of the best recorders of life
of the Civil War period was Wins
low Homer, whom we think of
chiefly as painter of the sea and
the seafaring people of Maine, but
who in fact was reporter par ex-
cellence of American life wherever
ne saw 1t. There are no less than
II paintings by Winslow Homer in
this exhibition, the majority of
which, by the way, are by no means
familiar, hence true finds" Homer
was, it will be recalled, artist at
the-front for Harpers Weekly dur
ing a part of the Civil War, and
this experience is reflected in two
paintings here of Negro life, THE
Carnival and plantation Scene
both very characteristic; and in
three pictures painted within the
lines, The Bright Side Prisoners
From the Front" and Rainy Day
in Camp" The Veteran shows a
man moving with a scythe and is
supposed to represent a landowner
who returned from the war and has
become a laborer, but in all proba-
billty 1t was the rhythm of motion
rather than social significance which
appealed to the painter.
Pictures Child Life.
Child life is delightfully."- brought
to remembrance in this group by
a picture of New England School,
and of school children playing hi
lariously the old game of crack
the whip" There also is a picture
of game of croquet on the lawn,
the young ladies in hoped skirts
which touch the ground. High
Tide" a painting of three women
and dog on sandy beach by the
sea, and Hound and Hunter" a
man in a canoe, his dog swimming
beside him, are undoubtedly of a
later period and in the better known
Homer genre, but utterly unfamiliar
is the little canvas, Amateur Mu-
sicians,' which, it is said, was paint
ed in the studio Homer occupied in
the old New York University Build
ing on Washington Square before
he deserted the metropolis for the
coast of Maine. In tone and quail
ity this has rather a Whistlerian
note, but it is, as all must agree. a
beautiful piece of painting.
That the 300 years before the
Great War were not all work and
no play in America is made very
plain in this Special Exhibition al
the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Here we see coaching parties, one
painted by F.. StanWood, making
it's way with dashing speed through
the White Mountains, another of 9
private character, THE Fairmar
Rogers Four-in-Hand," painted by
a no less distinguished artist than
Thomas Eakins. On one wall is 9
painting of two ladies in poke bon
nets and furs and little girl rid
ing in a double sleigh with high
hated coachman and footman or
the front seat, signed "A. Wende-
roth, Brooklyn, near New York
1886, and on another may be seen
"Mr. Morgan and Mr.. Vanderbilt,
seated side by side in a sleigh