International studio (49.1913)

Contemporary Art and the Carnegie Institute

the master realist of his particular coterie. Cottet
was more profoundly emotional, Menard harked
back to the stately calm and spaciousness of
classic times, Blanche was elegant and mundane—•
Simon alone sought simple, sturdy objectivity of
presentation. As years drifted by, this art, which
in essence marked a specific reaction against the
appealing evanescence of Impressionism, grew
brighter in tonality and in temper, until to-day we
have almost a new Simon, the painter of scenes
such as The. Bathers, Summer Day, The Pursuit,
and kindred canvases wherein the play of light
and air is as important as the delineation of per-
sonality. While certain of the earlier composi-
tions seem dark and heavy in their harmonies and
over-deliberate of mood, there is a spirited free-
dom and spontaneity to the water-color sketches
which make them in a measure the most precious
feature of Simon’s contribution. Powerful and
searching as are the Breton pictures, they lack
enduring potency and freshness of appeal. Per-
haps our taste for Pont-l’Abbe art has been
spoiled by the recent ascendancy of the individual-
ists of Pont-Aven and their compelling radicalism.
However that may be, the art of Lucien Simon

brings to America a sense of sustained, consecu-
tive accomplishment, an absence of triviality, and
an integrity of craftsmanship all the more notable
in this period of hasty processes and overnight
reputations.
Of kindred importance and decidedly superior
piquancy are the two full-length fancy portraits
by the incomparable Signor Mancini, christened
respectively The Toast and The Musketeer. Origi-
nally seen at the International Exhibition at
Rome two years since, where they were features of
the Mancini group in the Belle Arti, these two
canvases, sumptuously orchestral in coloration,
recklessly surcharged with pigment, and typical of
the painter’s peculiar manner and vision, here
constitute in no small degree the focal point of
popular as well as critical attention. At once the
king of Bohemian Rome and the despair of May-
fair and his distinguished British friends, this
same Mancini, whose proudest title is that of the
Wizard of the Via Margutta, appears with in-
creasing years to lose none of his cunning and none
of his indisputable artistic individuality. The
two costume studies in question reveal him in all
the opulent eloquence of mature genius. He

Medal of the Third Class, Carnegie Institute, 1913


THE MANOR HOUSE BY GIFFORD BEAL

LXXI