DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.41193#0009
ARTANDTHE BEAUTY OF THE
EARTH* A LECTURE DELIVERED
BYWILLIAM MORRIS AT BURSLEM
TOWN HALL ON OCTOBER 13,1881*
WE are here in the midst of a population busied
about a craft which may be called the most anci-
ent in the world, a craft which I look upon with
the greatest interest, as I well may, since, except
perhaps the noble craft of house-building, it is se-
cond to none other* And in the midst of this in-
dustrious population, engaged in making goods
of such importance to our households, I am speak-
ing to a School of Art, one of the bodies that were
founded all over the country at a time when it was
felt there was something wrong as between the
two elements that go to make anything which can
be correctly described as a work of industrial art,
namely the utilitarian and the artistic elements.
I hope nothing I may say to-night will make you
think that I under-value the importance of these
places of instruction ; on the contrary, I believe
them to be necessary to us, unless we are prepared
to give up all attempt to unite these two elements
of use and beauty*
Now, though no man can be more impressed
with the importance of the art of pottery than I
am, and though I have not, I hope, neglected the
study of it from the artistic or historico-artistic
side, I do not think myself bound to follow up the
subject of your especial art; not so much because
b 1
EARTH* A LECTURE DELIVERED
BYWILLIAM MORRIS AT BURSLEM
TOWN HALL ON OCTOBER 13,1881*
WE are here in the midst of a population busied
about a craft which may be called the most anci-
ent in the world, a craft which I look upon with
the greatest interest, as I well may, since, except
perhaps the noble craft of house-building, it is se-
cond to none other* And in the midst of this in-
dustrious population, engaged in making goods
of such importance to our households, I am speak-
ing to a School of Art, one of the bodies that were
founded all over the country at a time when it was
felt there was something wrong as between the
two elements that go to make anything which can
be correctly described as a work of industrial art,
namely the utilitarian and the artistic elements.
I hope nothing I may say to-night will make you
think that I under-value the importance of these
places of instruction ; on the contrary, I believe
them to be necessary to us, unless we are prepared
to give up all attempt to unite these two elements
of use and beauty*
Now, though no man can be more impressed
with the importance of the art of pottery than I
am, and though I have not, I hope, neglected the
study of it from the artistic or historico-artistic
side, I do not think myself bound to follow up the
subject of your especial art; not so much because
b 1