International studio (35.1908)

Water Color Exhibition

Modern needs demand ample light in the second
story, forcing the breaking up of the long, plain roof
of the old work. This problem of lighting the sec-
ond story without destroying the effect of the simple
lines of the original houses is the hardest problem in
the adaptation of this style to modern work, and in
the examples shown here the architects have found
very different solutions of it: by inconspicuous dor-
mers in the Speer house; by a single long dormer, as
in the Barber house ; or by frankly cutting the win-
dows into the roof, as in the Woodmere house. All
may fairly be called successful, and the choice of
which to use will depend upon the particular case in
point. The materials of all these houses are sim-
pler than those of the old ones, and are confined to
one or two varieties. There seems to be a consen-
sus of opinion that the color should be kept either
white or light in tone, and in all cases a certain
roughness of texture giving play of light and shadow
on the material itself has been aimed at.
The illustrations will show without further com-
ment how excellent is this type of house for modern
needs. Especially in small work is it good; easily
adapted to simple plans and to a very free treat-
ment of the exterior.
American water color so-
ciety EXHIBITION
BY MINNA C. SMITH
For twenty-five May days the Forty-
first Annual Exhibition of the American Water
Color Society occupied the Fine Arts Galleries in
New York. There were a number of pictures of
genuine distinction, several with those qualities that
make pictures last beyond passing fashions in art,
but the exhibition as a whole was not inspiriting.
It lacked vigor and brilliance of unity. To produce
this effect, rightfully looked for at a metropolitan
exhibition in these days of art’s strengthening life in
this country, it would have been necessary to leave
out at least one hundred of the pictures, both water
colors and pastels. There would then have been
room in the Vanderbilt gallery for all those in
both media that were really alive. A few years ago
some five hundred hymns lacking poetry were
excised from the hymnal of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, in the effort of moderns in that body to get
their worship back to dignity of form equal to the
day when Wesley emphasized, in the Church of
England, method (truth, technique!) in devout ex-
ercises. Water-color painters may exclaim, “What
is Hecuba to us ? ” The point is that in serving the
highest standard of communicable art in painting,

as in song, no master is more worthy of deference
than masterful elimination.
Some of our famous artists sent pictures which
they must have chosen to help fill space rather than
to represent their best or to give cachet to the show
and help impart to it, as an organism, the vivifying
breath of life. It was all good work, good work!
No one man or woman sent much which alone de-
tracted from the exhibition. On the other hand,
many single pictures by artists who had no second
contribution on the walls are of importance.
The Summer Day of I. A. Josephi has distinction,
power, arrived repose. It is a landscape of peculiar
poetry of vision and firmness of realization. A
group of trees at the right in the foreground are on a
bank above water. They are unforgettable trees,
high, wind-leant from past storms, quiet in domi-
nant strength. They are subtly painted, with spon-
taneity of intimate knowledge. The composition
gives full appeal, too, to a sky dappled, stippled
over its entire expanse of blue with white cloud.
The rather daring handling is successful in result.
Strand Life, Katwijk, by W. Ritschel, was an-
other notable single contribution, vigorous in per-
ception and handling. Browns were used with
glowing effect. Half a dozen horses strenuously at
work on the beach under direction of three men, all
keen in action, make this picture dramatic.
To Ross Turner was awarded the annual prize
for his Dawn, large, sumptuous in color, yet re-
strained, showing a wide slow-flowing river waken-
ing to light of early day. Shimmer of blue and
pigeon-breast iridescence of gray, purple and rose
on the stream, morning freshness of green on three
thickets across the water, are all interpreted with
serene force. Picnic on the Beach, by F. Luis
Mora, is a most affirmative picture, capital in fresh
white and blue, composed with utmost wisdom of
technique, but efflorescent with nature both in com-
position and in gaiety of spirit. To give with a lot
of figures, shore and sky, all the joy of outdoors and
its drama, and yet escape the hint of story, is to be
expected of a man of Mr. Mora’s rank, but it is none
the less worthy of congratulation.
Speculation, a man-child in blue, standing on a
faded blue rag rug, close by a wall, the wonder of
life itself on his infantile face, painted by Hilda Bel-
cher, was deservedly a popular “hit,” a well-mod-
eled figure. Pauvre Petit Orphelin and Three Lit-
tle Books, by Alice Schille, studies of children, have
that something which, in addition to excellence,
makes child pictures remembered, living sympathy,
also firm technique. The Orange Boy, by Tony
Nell, is capitally drawn, good, too, in color, the little

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