DOI Artikel:
Hutchins Hapgood, What 291 Is to Me
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.31336#0015
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WHAT 291 IS TO ME
“291 ” to me is a “ Salon,” a laboratory, and a refuge—a place where
people may exchange ideas and feelings, where artists can present and try
out their experiments and where those who are tired of what is called “prac-
tical” life may find a change of spiritual atmosphere.
I go there when my irritation is intense—as to a cooling oasis. I go
there to meet a rare human group in which is nourished a strenuous love for
human expression. I go there to see Alfred Stieglitz, to live for an hour in
his spirit, to realize his pure courage and to feel his genuine attempt to get
at what is called the truth, which is something that may be felt but never
defined. Because he loves the truth he is hospitable to all who feel they
have some vision, no matter how slight, and even to those who desire the
vision but know they have it not.
Any serious sincere person is always welcome at “291”; and for no
ulterior motive—just because this is a centre where the “truth” is sought.
To me a strenuous morality is the highest way in which the human spirit
expresses itself and at “291” the dominant note seems to me a strenuous
morality. This place given up in largest measure to the exhibitions and the
discussion of the various arts is yet the home of a profound morality. Stern
sincerity is the largest element of a morality that does not concern itself
with the pious, the hypocritical or the conventional. A sincere man like a
sincere art is not merely beautiful—or the art is beautiful because it is stimu-
lating to human relations, to an enhancing vital morality, which is the art of
arts, the most complex of all forms, the only art that permanently is of
greatest value to the mature spirit.
Hutchins Hapgood
11
“291 ” to me is a “ Salon,” a laboratory, and a refuge—a place where
people may exchange ideas and feelings, where artists can present and try
out their experiments and where those who are tired of what is called “prac-
tical” life may find a change of spiritual atmosphere.
I go there when my irritation is intense—as to a cooling oasis. I go
there to meet a rare human group in which is nourished a strenuous love for
human expression. I go there to see Alfred Stieglitz, to live for an hour in
his spirit, to realize his pure courage and to feel his genuine attempt to get
at what is called the truth, which is something that may be felt but never
defined. Because he loves the truth he is hospitable to all who feel they
have some vision, no matter how slight, and even to those who desire the
vision but know they have it not.
Any serious sincere person is always welcome at “291”; and for no
ulterior motive—just because this is a centre where the “truth” is sought.
To me a strenuous morality is the highest way in which the human spirit
expresses itself and at “291” the dominant note seems to me a strenuous
morality. This place given up in largest measure to the exhibitions and the
discussion of the various arts is yet the home of a profound morality. Stern
sincerity is the largest element of a morality that does not concern itself
with the pious, the hypocritical or the conventional. A sincere man like a
sincere art is not merely beautiful—or the art is beautiful because it is stimu-
lating to human relations, to an enhancing vital morality, which is the art of
arts, the most complex of all forms, the only art that permanently is of
greatest value to the mature spirit.
Hutchins Hapgood
11
