DOI issue:
No. 207 (May, 1914)
DOI article:B. Nelson, W. H. de: At the academy, New York
DOI Page / Citation link: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.43455#0444
At the Academy, New York
PASTORAL
BY CHESTER LOOMIS
AT THE ACADEMY, NEW YORK
/\ BY W. H. de B. NELSON
X X By time-honoured custom the Na-
tional Academy of Design closes its
doors shortly before the clarion call of Pittsburgh
summons artists, art lovers and critics from the
four quarters to America’s one and only Inter-
national. Gone are the landscapes and portraits,
marines and still lifes, women in brocades and
silks, girls in gossamer, and nudes; in fact, women
of the brush have yielded perforce to the women
of the brush and pail. During this interregnum,
it may be well to review briefly the eighty-ninth
annual exhibition, and to recall some of the
paintings which for one reason or another have
left pleasant recollections or the reverse. In spite
of the undercurrent of adverse comment which
assails this Academy and kindred organizations,
the fact that it is now entering upon its ninetieth
exhibition since its foundation in 1825, and that
the Society of American Artists, which painted
under its own standard in 1877, became reunited
with the National Academy of Design in 1906, is
eloquent proof how necessary such a sane and
conservative body is in the republic of art. As
long as its influence is benignly exercised and be-
comes no let or hindrance to newer and more
independent forms of art and to the frequent
admission into this city of foreign and extraneous
exhibits which tend to interest and instruct the
public more thoroughly than ordinary academical
exhibitions can possibly do, all power to its coun-
cils and actions. We need an Academy to keep
the younger artists and some of the older ones
within sober bounds, just as a coach needs sea-
soned wheelers, if the leaders are fiery youngsters,
apt to gib, bolt or kick over the traces. We have
heard it said that this or that show was better
than the Spring Academy, but a careful tour of the
four galleries afforded convincing evidence that
this exhibition, in spite of the absence of several
artists, was truly representative of the excellent
work which is being done around us in the virile-
impressionistic manner of the American artist of
to-day. There were pictures, it is true, which
LXXXVII
PASTORAL
BY CHESTER LOOMIS
AT THE ACADEMY, NEW YORK
/\ BY W. H. de B. NELSON
X X By time-honoured custom the Na-
tional Academy of Design closes its
doors shortly before the clarion call of Pittsburgh
summons artists, art lovers and critics from the
four quarters to America’s one and only Inter-
national. Gone are the landscapes and portraits,
marines and still lifes, women in brocades and
silks, girls in gossamer, and nudes; in fact, women
of the brush have yielded perforce to the women
of the brush and pail. During this interregnum,
it may be well to review briefly the eighty-ninth
annual exhibition, and to recall some of the
paintings which for one reason or another have
left pleasant recollections or the reverse. In spite
of the undercurrent of adverse comment which
assails this Academy and kindred organizations,
the fact that it is now entering upon its ninetieth
exhibition since its foundation in 1825, and that
the Society of American Artists, which painted
under its own standard in 1877, became reunited
with the National Academy of Design in 1906, is
eloquent proof how necessary such a sane and
conservative body is in the republic of art. As
long as its influence is benignly exercised and be-
comes no let or hindrance to newer and more
independent forms of art and to the frequent
admission into this city of foreign and extraneous
exhibits which tend to interest and instruct the
public more thoroughly than ordinary academical
exhibitions can possibly do, all power to its coun-
cils and actions. We need an Academy to keep
the younger artists and some of the older ones
within sober bounds, just as a coach needs sea-
soned wheelers, if the leaders are fiery youngsters,
apt to gib, bolt or kick over the traces. We have
heard it said that this or that show was better
than the Spring Academy, but a careful tour of the
four galleries afforded convincing evidence that
this exhibition, in spite of the absence of several
artists, was truly representative of the excellent
work which is being done around us in the virile-
impressionistic manner of the American artist of
to-day. There were pictures, it is true, which
LXXXVII