DOI Heft:
Nr. 332 (January 1925)
DOI Artikel:Eglington, Guy: Art and other things
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19984#0078
mueRnAcionAL
ART and OTHER THINGS
/have been dreaming—an absurdly Utopian word—at the opening of the new American Wing
dream—of the museums of the future, when last week. Well, no, in spite of Mr. de Forest's
they shah have ceased to be vast torture- charm,Mr.GrosvenorAtterbury'ssprightlinessand
chambers, to become palaces of delight. They Mr. Kent's wit, they were not exactly gay. They
could be so easily, you know. Almost nothing became in fact long before the end of Elihu Root's
prevents them. A few by-laws; a few committees, half-hour address excruciatingly dull. The blessed
presided by elderly academicians; a few conditions word "Education" threw a gloom over the
of bequest. Set these aside—a mere trifle in these assembly. And yet behind the solemnity and at
days of revolution—and in a year or so, without odds with it, especially among those who were
the purchase of a single work of art, by the mere responsible for the New Wing, one was conscious
process of elimination and arrangement, the Met- of a certain spirit that is all too rare among
ropolitan could be so transformed that strained museum people. I am sure that what the real
puzzled faces would be no longer seen there, but Mr. Halsey would have liked to have said, had
instead happy faces. And one would hear he dared, was simply: "It's been great fun." And
laughter. . . . the real Mr. Atterbury, when he made the pretty
Laughter in a museum. It sounds almost remark about his work being unfinished until the
blasphemous. And yet it really seems as though spirits of the Past decided to return to their old
some few people were beginning to realize that haunts, was thinking, I am sure, as a good archi-
art is not such a deadly solemn affair as most of us tect must, rather of the spirits of the Present,
pretend. I have in mind the Exercises—terrifying But unfortunately these gentlemen, unlike their
ROOM FROM HAMPTON, N. H. SECOND QUARTER EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. THE EARLIEST ORIGINAL WOODWORK IN THE WING
SET UP AS A BEDROOM WITH FURNITURE OF THE PERIOD
Courtesy oj the Metropolitan Museum of Art
three thirty-eight
JANUARY 1925
ART and OTHER THINGS
/have been dreaming—an absurdly Utopian word—at the opening of the new American Wing
dream—of the museums of the future, when last week. Well, no, in spite of Mr. de Forest's
they shah have ceased to be vast torture- charm,Mr.GrosvenorAtterbury'ssprightlinessand
chambers, to become palaces of delight. They Mr. Kent's wit, they were not exactly gay. They
could be so easily, you know. Almost nothing became in fact long before the end of Elihu Root's
prevents them. A few by-laws; a few committees, half-hour address excruciatingly dull. The blessed
presided by elderly academicians; a few conditions word "Education" threw a gloom over the
of bequest. Set these aside—a mere trifle in these assembly. And yet behind the solemnity and at
days of revolution—and in a year or so, without odds with it, especially among those who were
the purchase of a single work of art, by the mere responsible for the New Wing, one was conscious
process of elimination and arrangement, the Met- of a certain spirit that is all too rare among
ropolitan could be so transformed that strained museum people. I am sure that what the real
puzzled faces would be no longer seen there, but Mr. Halsey would have liked to have said, had
instead happy faces. And one would hear he dared, was simply: "It's been great fun." And
laughter. . . . the real Mr. Atterbury, when he made the pretty
Laughter in a museum. It sounds almost remark about his work being unfinished until the
blasphemous. And yet it really seems as though spirits of the Past decided to return to their old
some few people were beginning to realize that haunts, was thinking, I am sure, as a good archi-
art is not such a deadly solemn affair as most of us tect must, rather of the spirits of the Present,
pretend. I have in mind the Exercises—terrifying But unfortunately these gentlemen, unlike their
ROOM FROM HAMPTON, N. H. SECOND QUARTER EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. THE EARLIEST ORIGINAL WOODWORK IN THE WING
SET UP AS A BEDROOM WITH FURNITURE OF THE PERIOD
Courtesy oj the Metropolitan Museum of Art
three thirty-eight
JANUARY 1925