International studio (35.1908)

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INTERNATIONAL
STUDIO •
VOL. XXXV. No. 137 Copyright, 19OS, by John Lane Company JULY, 1908

The national sculpture so-
ciety’s EXHIBITION AT BALTI-
MORE—I. MONUMENTAL WORK
AND PORTRAITURE
BY LEILA MECHLIN
The exhibition of American sculpture held by
the National Sculpture Society last April in Balti-
more, under the auspices of local organizations,
was more than commonly notable. Not only did
it make significant revelation but it created a deep
impression. Even the pessimists, who habitually see
no good in current production, were obliged to ad-
mit that therein the sculptors rendered a good ac-
count of themselves, and the general public, which
as a rule is indifferent, manifested no small measure
of appreciation.
Over five hundred works of sculpture, in plaster,
bronze and marble, varying in size from a colossal
statue to a miniature portrait not larger than a but-
ton, were set forth in this exhibition, and among the
sculptors of America but few were unrepresented.
To have installed such a number of exhibits of this
description must have been a difficult task, and
though the arrangement was not entirely satisfac-
tory, it was eminently good. The great drill hall of
the Fifth Regiment Armory, which was generously
loaned, was converted, for the nonce, into a formal
garden, with broad avenues, bypaths, parterres and
screens of greenery, and thus an environment was
created which assured effectiveness and prevented
disparagement through discrepancy in scale.
Four equestrian statues were shown, three of
which were portraits of military heroes. Facing
the entrance, though on the opposite side of the
hall, stood a full-size plaster cast of Mr. Henry M.
Shrady’s statue of Washington at Valley Forge,
which has been erected in Brooklyn, and to the
right and left on the broad avenue running east and
west, forming dominant centers, were casts of Mr.
Solon H. Borglum’s statue of Gen. J. B. Gordon,

which is in Atlanta, Georgia, and Mr. Karl Bitter’s
statue of Gen. Franz Siegel, which has also been
erected in Brooklyn, New York. These, topo-
graphically, served as peaks to which at the outset
the visitor’s attention was directed, and while
furnishing an introduction to the mass of cur-
rent output, brought to remembrance the history
of the art.
We are so young in America that we are impa-
tient for results and give undue weight to brief peri-
ods of time. What it has taken other nations cen-
turies to accomplish we would do in a decade, and
that which is just achieved is straightway accounted
long passed. For this reason the youth of Ameri-
can sculpture is not always taken into consideration
or its phenomenal development duly appreciated.
The first equestrian statue to be erected in this
country, that of General Jackson, in Lafayette
Square, Washington, was not unveiled until 1853,
and at the time Clark Mills modeled it he had never
seen an equestrian statue, photography was in
swaddling clothes, and there was not a bronze
foundry in the United States. Thus it will be seen
that in this particular branch of American sculpture
the entire period of development falls within the
span of an ordinary lifetime and has been witnessed
by many who are still not infirm. To-day there are
more equestrian statues in the United States than in
any other country, and though many give small
occasion for boasting, some are of exceptional
worth.
The Federal Government has not at any time
patronized art for art’s sake, but delighting to honor
its military heroes it has given liberal commissions
for monumental works in sculpture. In a measure
this was well, but to a degree it proved detrimental,
for, while it gave opportunity for practice, it put in
permanent form before the public works which did
not possess enduring merit. Horatio Greenough,
the first American to take up sculpture as a profes-
sion, said, when his statue of Washington, intended

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