Studio: international art (18.1900)

Arts and Crafts

severally belong. Such art as
we have is sporadic ; is manu-
factured of deliberate intent;
self-conscious, not spontane-
ous ; lacking, for the most
part, that artlessness which
denotes the genuine artist;
nor can we, except in a few
instances, or in vague and
qualified manner, trace its
continuity with that which has
gone before it. We cannot
foresee whither it may tend ;
whether, indeed, it be destined
to have any prolonged organic
existence at all, or whether it
be doomed instead to perish
in order to make way for an
art of the future that has yet
to be born.

The problem now is how to
attain concentration and unity
of aim without at the same
time stifling individual genius.
The metropolis itself presents
perhaps the greatest difficul-
ties. Its very vastness is ad-
verse to that helpful inter-
course among brother-crafts-
men which is practicable else-
where. Thus, whereas in the
provinces we have flourishing
art schools, each with marked
characteristics of its own, as
at Birmingham or Glasgow, in
London, on the other hand,
we are rather isolated from
one another or grouped into

r „ . . OAK CABINET DESIGNED BY C F. A. VOYSEY

separate sets following certain
individual masters. We have
schools and originators in

abundance, as also many derivatives therefrom, which began as a tentative experiment in London

Never, indeed, have the agencies for instruction eleven years ago has now developed into an estab-

in the arts and crafts been more numerous or lished factor in our industrial life ?
better attended than at present. The handicrafts, While dealing with the present condition of

in short, have no longer now to plead for the decorative art in this country I can hardly omit to

bare licence to be regarded and be practised as refer to St. Paul's Cathedral and the recently intro-

arts. And do not the numerous exhibitions of duced mosaics to which Sir W. B. Richmond, him-

Arts and Crafts that, independently of the original self a member of the Arts and Crafts Exhibition

Society, are frequently held in the provinces and Society, has contributed no inconsiderable share;

even occasionally in the colonies, to name only and that more especially since the name of the

such recent exhibitions as those of Cape Town and society has, rightly or wrongly it does not here

Glasgow, or forthcoming ones at Dublin and Not- signify, been freely mentioned in connection with

tingham—do not these all testify alike that that the matter. I am constrained, however, to speak
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