International studio (56.1915)

Foreign Painting at the Panama-Pacific Exposition

ally speaking, the Argentines are awakening to
their inherent possibilities. From the dean of
the native school, Eduardo Sfvori, to Antonio
Alice, one of the youngest members of the group,
the spirit seems encouraging and the desire to ac-
complish something is increasingly manifest. A
word of praise should, in conclusion, be accorded
the disposition of the exhibit in the Palace of
Fine Arts and the unfailing urbanity of those in
charge. Senor Oliva Navarro achieved a most
satisfactory result with the single room placed at
his service, and in his efforts enjoyed the loyal and
sympathetic support of his fellow commissioners,
Seriores Anasagasti, Del Campo, and Masante.
We shall not, at the present juncture, pause to
consider the showing made by other Latin-
American countries such as Uruguay, Cuba, and
the Philippines. Isolated individuals, including
the Uruguayan, Manual Rose, and the Cuban,
Leopoldo Romanach, may rise above the level,
yet the general average is wanting in both
decision and distinction. It is furthermore not
our immediate intention to treat the compre-
hensively organized exhibits of China and Japan,
or the miscellaneous contents of the Annex.
These informal impressions do not aim to be
exhaustive, but merely to bring under closer
scrutiny certain salient features of development.
Surveying in kindly, equable perspective the
undertaking as a whole, one can scarcely resist
the conclusion that its chief shortcoming is a
lack of coherence. This pageant of art, as it has
been christened by coastal panegyrists, while
imposing, is wanting in simplicity. A less
pretentious, and at the same time more con-
cisely formulated programme, must assuredly
have produced different results. Judged for
example by the standard set biennially at Venice,
we have not, thus far, solved the problem of as-
sembling a satisfactory exhibition of international
painting and sculpture. Choice should be more
discriminating, and there must above all loom
behind such a task some concrete, unifying idea.
We do not desire to see, nor should we be subjected
to, all art, but rather those manifestations of art-
istic activity which alone illustrate certain specific
principles. It is not the spectacular, nor is it
mere numerical strength, that we are after. It is
that which is vital and significant.
While maintaining the requisite critical balance,
one must not, however, lose sight of the positive
good accomplished by the Panama-Pacific Ex-

position. The three great cultural waves which
swept across the country following the expos-
itions at Philadelphia, Chicago, and St. Louis
have finally overlapped the Rockies. Upon the
Pacific slope the combined achievements of
Europe and America meet and mingle with the
mellow legacy of Indian and Spaniard and the
subtle magic of the Orient. Geographically
speaking, the circle is complete. It merely re-
mains to be seen how far this flood from the peren-
nial fountain of beauty can enrich a parched and
aspiring community.
J^JODERN ART
In a discerning attitude towards paint-
ing, partly through want of knowledge, partly
through lack of interest, the public stands severely
aloof. Amongst the cognoscenti, art lovers and
critics, however, a continuous see-saw wages
between the followers of academic principles and
the adherents of Cezanne. No one straddles
the plank with a tighter grip than Willard
Huntington Wright, who with all the arts of
balance holds down the Academy and maintains
aloft the apostle of modernism. In the July
issue of The, Forum this able critic in a scholarly
discourse upon Cezanne discloses, within necessary
limits, the trend and bearing of modern art as
displayed in the canvases of this great master.
No one hitherto has probed so seriously and
efficaciously; he has demonstrated with great
clarity Cezanne’s production of rhythmic form
by the means of the functioning elements of
colour; his poising in three dimensions the
elements of light in such a manner as to reproduce
the exact logic of nature’s methods; the impetus
given to the purification of aesthetic form by
distorting and disguising the aspects of material-
ity; his attainment of depth and perspective in
formal composition by applying, through the
medium of paints, the stereoscopic principles to
art; his simultaneous composition of drawing
chiaroscuro and light as a unique whole, all of
which produced rhythmic form spontaneously;
his motif form of organization.
On the following page commences an article by
the same author on “Synchronism,” which is
derived practically complete from his work
“Modern Painting,” just published, and which
probably for many years to come will be the last
word on the Moderns by a man who has made
them his life study.

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