International studio (27.1905/1906(1906))

The Society of JVestern Artists


REELECTIONS OE AN OLD MILL J. OTTIS ADAMS

THE EXHIBITION OF THE SO-
CIETY OF WESTERN ARTISTS
BY MAUDE I. G. OLIVER
Since the Society of Western Artists
have alterecl their policy and enlarged their scope
as they have within the past year, it need not
require the most discriminating of juclges to note
a decided elevation of Standard in their present
exhibit as compared with that of previous years.
Seen in the galleries of the Chicago Art Institute,
where henceforth the opening salon is to be held,
the collection presented so distinguishecl an appear-
ance as alone could sufhce to prove the dignity to
which the artists of this vast district of the Middle
West have attained. Comprising fielcls of such
varied interests as they do, the activities of this
guild are of increasing importance. The Chicago
chapter, in undertaking the responsibilitv of the
initial exhibition each year, has assumed an enor-
mous amount of labour, but this it has cheerfully
done in the conviction that the clerical business
thereby will be materially simplified, and strength
will be gainecl by the idea of an annual display
having its initial showing in one certain place from
which it will radiate as a center. This season,
besides the Chicago exhibition and that at St.
Louis, the collection will visit one other city to be
determined later.
The term artist, as expressed in the Society’s
brochure, seems comprehensive of wide latitude.

A glance at the charac-
ter of subjects entered,
includingpictorial works
executed in various
vehicles, sculptures and
potteries, would seem to
show that no restriction
as to dass had been im-
posecl.
In the Installation of
the Chicago show, such
advantages as light and
grouping were carefully
observed, making theap-
pearance of individual
works, as well as of the
whole, eminently satis-
factory in effect. Two
of the principal rooms
in the south wing of the
Institute were occupied
by these works with a
grateful gain of space.
The larger one was devoted exclusively to paintings
in oil and the adjoining roorn to water colours,
photographs of sculptures, illustrative and decora-
tive art, and to a case of ceramics from Newcomb
College, New Orleans. Perhaps it is not generally
understood that, owing to the enormous cost of
transportation, examples of sculpture are not
shipped by this society from place to place, but
are represented by photographic views, exhibited
in the different centers. When the collection arrives
in a city where some original happens to be, the
original is installed with the other exhibits.
Considered severally, the works in the present
showing clisclose an unusually high Order of merit.
They are things that are essentially worthy. Wif-
ness in evidence such performances as the three
matchless decorative treatments by Frederic Clay
Bartlett in Order to realize the power that is
developing in these Western men. With a sound
breadth of understanding, this young painter has
approached these three essays in rnuch the same
manner so as to inclicate a genuine feeling for
monumental dignity. Done in predominance of
rieh browns they readily accommodate themselves
to a frankly decorative tendency. And the most
superb illustration of this feature, if not the most
cogent composition, is that called From Schloss
Grunwald. In this, from the lower right of the
picture up to where it loses itself in a confusion of
distance, winds a ribbon of flowing water which
bears on its smooth surface images of the cloud-

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