DOI Heft:
No. 68 (November 1898)
DOI Artikel:Baldry, Alfred Lys: The work of F. W. Pomeroy
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19230#0096
F. IV. Pomeroy
estimation. From a condition of sickly incapacity opened up a vast field of opportunities for artistic
it has been raised into splendid and vigorous practice, and has aided materially to destroy the
activity; and from being despised and disregarded tradition which threatened a few years ago to make
as a weak thing of no importance to anybody it the art of the sculptor a thing without vitality or
has grown into a great power, able to make its active capacity. The courage of those men who
own terms with the many people who now desire its frankly broke away from the old conventions, and,
assistance. ignoring the suggestion that they were losing dignity
Among the men who have done much to help by joining hands with architecture and applied art,
on this startling regeneration the place which Mr. set themselves to do well whatever came in their
Pomeroy occupies is one of marked prominence. way, has been readily acknowledged by the more
He has been for some little while a very active intelligent section of the community. Their de-
agent in the establishment of that fashion in finiteness of purpose has been widely appreciated,
aesthetics, the growth of which he considers so and from this appreciation has come the demand
remarkable. With several other young sculptors, which gives the best evidence of the progress that
contemporaries of his own, he has fostered a move- sculpture has made towards complete acceptance
ment which is already producing a most indisput- by the public.
able effect, and promises to have in the near future It is because Mr. Pomeroy has played such a
results of the greatest moment. To the efforts of leading part in the establishment of this new phase
this band of workers is due not a little of the pre- of aesthetic conviction that his work claims a degree
sent-day taste for decorative sculpture, which has of attention which it would be difficult to bestow
upon the productions of
many much older men. He
is an artist capable, as he
has convincingly proved, of
the highest flights in ideal
sculpture and gifted with
qualities of imagination of
an unusually sterling type.
He is a master of design,
and a manipulator whose
technical skill is equal to
the most exacting emergen-
cies of his craft. But he is
not satisfied to limit his
practice to those pedantic
abstractions, to those chilly
personifications of subtle
fancies, which formerly, and
for so long, were accepted
as the things with which
the sculptor should solely
concern himself. He has
elected to put himself out-
side this narrow groove, and
to very greatly extend the
area of his ambitions. No-
thing, in his view, which
will give him scope to exer-
cise his powers of invention,
or will afford him oppor-
tunity for the development
of a technical idea, is un-
worthy of his most serious
tto " bronze statuette by f. w. pomeroy attention; and no branch
78
estimation. From a condition of sickly incapacity opened up a vast field of opportunities for artistic
it has been raised into splendid and vigorous practice, and has aided materially to destroy the
activity; and from being despised and disregarded tradition which threatened a few years ago to make
as a weak thing of no importance to anybody it the art of the sculptor a thing without vitality or
has grown into a great power, able to make its active capacity. The courage of those men who
own terms with the many people who now desire its frankly broke away from the old conventions, and,
assistance. ignoring the suggestion that they were losing dignity
Among the men who have done much to help by joining hands with architecture and applied art,
on this startling regeneration the place which Mr. set themselves to do well whatever came in their
Pomeroy occupies is one of marked prominence. way, has been readily acknowledged by the more
He has been for some little while a very active intelligent section of the community. Their de-
agent in the establishment of that fashion in finiteness of purpose has been widely appreciated,
aesthetics, the growth of which he considers so and from this appreciation has come the demand
remarkable. With several other young sculptors, which gives the best evidence of the progress that
contemporaries of his own, he has fostered a move- sculpture has made towards complete acceptance
ment which is already producing a most indisput- by the public.
able effect, and promises to have in the near future It is because Mr. Pomeroy has played such a
results of the greatest moment. To the efforts of leading part in the establishment of this new phase
this band of workers is due not a little of the pre- of aesthetic conviction that his work claims a degree
sent-day taste for decorative sculpture, which has of attention which it would be difficult to bestow
upon the productions of
many much older men. He
is an artist capable, as he
has convincingly proved, of
the highest flights in ideal
sculpture and gifted with
qualities of imagination of
an unusually sterling type.
He is a master of design,
and a manipulator whose
technical skill is equal to
the most exacting emergen-
cies of his craft. But he is
not satisfied to limit his
practice to those pedantic
abstractions, to those chilly
personifications of subtle
fancies, which formerly, and
for so long, were accepted
as the things with which
the sculptor should solely
concern himself. He has
elected to put himself out-
side this narrow groove, and
to very greatly extend the
area of his ambitions. No-
thing, in his view, which
will give him scope to exer-
cise his powers of invention,
or will afford him oppor-
tunity for the development
of a technical idea, is un-
worthy of his most serious
tto " bronze statuette by f. w. pomeroy attention; and no branch
78