Studio: international art (71.1917)

The Lay Figure

THE LAY FIGURE: ON MAKING A
WAR MUSEUM.

HAT do you think of this
scheme for the creation of
a great museum as a memorial
of the war ? " asked the Man

with the Red Tie. " Does it strike you as a
happy idea ? "

" Yes, certainly ; it is quite a good notion,"
replied the Critic. " But whether it is a success
or not will depend entirely upon the way in
which it is carried out—the best of schemes
will go wrong if their details are not properly
considered."

" I do not see that there is much that can go
wrong in this one," broke in the Plain Man;
" it ought to be a very simple matter to collect
and classify the many war relics that are
available."

" That is not quite the point," returned the
Critic. " I admit that to gather together war
relics and odds and ends would be easy enough,
and that to arrange them in some sort of order
would be a task that would not tax severely
any patient person ; but do you think the result
would be satisfactory ? Do you think that in
that way you would get the right kind of war
museum ? "

" But, why not ? " cried the Plain Man.
" Is not the object of a war museum to provide
a record of the war, and is any better record
possible than a collection of things which have
been actually used in the war ? What could
bring the whole thing more vividly to our minds
than contact with objects brought from the
battlefield itself ? "

" There are some of us, I expect, who will not
care to be reminded of that contact," suggested
the Man with the Red Tie ; " and I am not at
all sure that the general public will be much
interested in a collection of scraps from the
battlefield."

" I am with you in that," agreed the Critic ;
" and I believe that any interest people may feel
in such a collection will be of the briefest
possible duration. The ordinary man after he
has seen it once or twice will forget all about
it."

" Surely, though, it will remain as a permanent
attraction for future generations," objected the
Plain Man. " In years to come it will bring
home to students of history the realities of the
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war, and will enable them to understand what
it meant to us who went through it."

" I very much doubt whether it will do any-
thing of the kind," said the Critic. " The
student of history will read all about the war
in his textbooks and will form his opinions
from what the historians tell him. The museum
full of odds and ends will teach him nothing of
real value."

" But the museum will provide the illustra-
tions to his textbooks. That seems to me its
function," argued the Plain Man ; " and that
' will be its chief value."

" Ah, yes, that should be its function,"
declared the Critic ; " but it is a function which
cannot be fulfilled unless the museum records
not only the facts of the war but the sentiment
also which it aroused throughout the country.
It is not only what the nation did but what the
nation thought that must be preserved for the
instruction of future generations."

" How is that to be managed ? " asked the
Plain Man.

" The only way, I imagine, is by gathering
in the museum as many examples as possible
of the art which was inspired by the war,"
replied the Critic. " We must have pictures
symbolical and realistic, war posters, photo-
graphs, and drawings; we must have the
sketches of the architects and sculptors, and
their designs for memorial works; we must
have medals, rolls of honour, portraits of men
and women who were prominent in the years
of stress, every sort of artistic production that
bears any relation to the war and to the life
of the people during the period over which the
war lasted."

" That is right," exclaimed the Man with the
Red Tie. " That would be the only museum
worth having."

" Yes, and that would be the only sort of
museum which would remain for centuries as
a living interest," continued the Critic. " It
would be an abiding assertion of the character
and spirit of the nation, and if it were done
worthily and with sound judgment it would be
the greatest war memorial that we could possibly
erect. It is what the country suffered and
endured in its years of trial that our descendants
must be made to realize, and it is the way in
which these sufferings were endured by all sec-
tions of the community that we want to put
on record." The Lay Figure.