International studio (16.1902)

Liverpool School of A rt


houses, the necessity of being able to handle them
well will be felt at times by every designer of
original talent; and for this reason alone a thorough
mastery of their characteristics should form a
part of the curriculum of all art schools. This
knowledge, moreover, need not interfere at all with
a systematic encouragement of fresh ideas ; there
is no reason that it should be in the least hostile
to the growth of individualism in the students’
exercises in design. As the most original writers
have always been great readers—and frequently
great plagiarists, like Moliere—so the original
craftsmen of to day may achieve their ends and
yet be learned in the past history of design and
decoration.
But the fact best worth noting here is this : that
the art schools, with but few exceptions, are
progressing along the right lines, and some among
them are now doing for the arts and crafts what was
done for them during the Renaissance by the

DESIGN FOR A CLOCK BY VIOLET E. BRUNT0*

MODELLED DESIGN FOR A NEWEL POST BY AGNES D. STEVENS '

famous guilds, that is to say, they are form'11?
distinctive ways of handling, distinctive styleS'
This is one reason why The Studio has so ofte11
called attention to the .students’ work done 111
Glasgow, Birmingham, and Liverpool. The efforts
thus made known are not always satisfactory ; some'
times, indeed, they are self-assertive and somewhat
eccentric; but they have, happily, a develops
character of their own, and young talents need
time in which to mature. Time, rather than the
pruning-knife of criticism, will cut away their wil
shoots.
In thinking of the Liverpool School of Art, and
of others like it, we cannot but wish that the)
would carry their usefulness a step nearer to thac
of the ancient guilds. They might easily f°rlT1
themselves into self helping associations, keep'11?
in touch with their former pupils, meetnL
regularly for the discussion of artistic s'd1
jects; and last, but not least, bindin?
themselves to give assistance to a'1)
student or former pupil, who, through d
fortune, should need help. This goS'
fellowship is met with in the statute of dlb

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