International studio (45.1912)

Sir George Frampton, R.A.

“ INDUSTRY ” : SKETCH FOR QUEEN VICTORIAL MEMORIAL,
LEEDS. BY SIR GEORGE FRAMPTON, R.A.


sculpture is legitimately entitled to play
among the arts.
The dominant idea by which this tra-
dition is governed is a conviction that the
sculptor, whatever may be the type of work
which he proposes to produce, must start
with the intention of doing something that
will be decoratively satisfying. There must
be in his productions the quality of design ;
there must be, that is to say, a kind of
architectural coherence in the arrangement
of the various parts of the work, and there
must be established, too, the same sort of
constructive relation of part to part that is
necessary in architecture. This convic-
tion, after all, is quite in accordance with
the beliefs of the greater masters of sculp-
ture in the past. The ancient tradition
prescribed design as the essential basis of
the sculptor’s work and recognised frankly
the need for architectural restraint in the
planning and carrying out of his perform-
ances ; and our modern men in adopting
similar principles of practice have only
made a wise reversion to a purer aesthetic
belief from which their immediate pre-
decessors had foolishly fallen away. For
what the sculptors were attempting half a
century ago in this country was to tell
stories in marble or bronze, and to tell
them, too, in a way that would appeal to
the sentimental fancy of the public.
Among the exponents of the modern tra-
dition in sculpture there are few who more

so seriously hampered.
These modern men have
restored sculpture in this
country to its right position
as a close ally of architec-
ture and as a medium for
the working out of dignified
and expressive schemes of
decoration. They have
purged it of its earlier taint
of pretty sentimentality, they
have broken away from the
old affectation of sickly clas-
sicism, they have abandoned
the past fashion of sham
idealism, and, instead, they
have set up a new tradition
which is based upon a true
perception of the part which
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MEMORIAL TO DR. BARNARDO, ERECTED AT BARKINGSIDE, ESSEX
BY SIR GEORGE FRAMPTON, R.A.