Studio: international art (35.1905)

Reviews

He analyses the constituent parts of design in the
abstract, and thence proceeds to dwell at length on
each of those constituents in its practical applica-
tion, beginning with the point or dot and the
straight line, and ending with descriptions of their
combinations with curved lines, in every case sup-
plying a great number of excellent drawings, some
reproduced in colour, to enforce his meaning. In
a word, the work is a most valuable one and should
find a place not only in every art library, but on
the shelves of all architects, builders, and designers.

The Royal Academy of Arts : a coifiplete Diction-
ary of Contributors and their Work from 1769 to
1904. By Algernon Graves, F.S.A. (London:
Henry Graves & Co., and George Bell & Sons.)
Vol. I. fP2 2s. net.—In his interesting preface
to a work on which he has been engaged for
some thirty years the author relates how its first
inception arose from an accident that befell him
on February 24th, 1873, when he fell and injured
one of his knees, whilst taking a present of wine
from his father to his uncle on a slippery day. He
amused himself during the eight weeks before he
could walk again, by arranging the names of the
exhibitors at the Royal Academy alphabetically,
and became so enamoured of a task which to
almost anyone else would probably have appeared
dry and irksome in the extreme, that he resolved
to continue his labours after his convalescence.
He added to his Royal Academy lists those of the
other art societies of London, and became in due
course the cataloguer, par excellence, of his day,
producing no less than fifty MS. volumes, which
he intended to keep for reference during his life-
time and eventually to bequeath to the British
Museum. He explains, however, that he found
himself compelled to yield to the repeated requests
of friends, and to undertake the preparation for the
press of Royal Academy sections of these books.
He thus found himself launched once more into the
work he had come to love, and the result when his
task is complete will be a practically exhaustive
record, that will be of great time-saving value to the
collector, the connoisseur, and the art historian.
A specially important feature is the identification
of the sitters for certain pictures catalogued merely
as the “ Portrait of a Lady,” or the “ Portrait of a
Gentleman,” and the tracing of the names of many
artists who chose to remain anonymous during
their lifetime.

Artistic Anatomy of Animals. By Edouard
Cuyer. Translated and Edited by George Hay-
ward. (London : Bailliere, Tindall & Cox.)
85. 6d. net.—English students of anatomy will no

doubt be grateful to Mr. Hayward for his able
translation of M. Cuyer’s book, which is an en-
larged version of a series of lectures given at the
Ecole des Beaux Arts. Finding that his pupils
were greatly interested in the subject of animal
anatomy, the erudite French professor resolved to
appeal to a wider public, and has supplemented
the descriptions in his text with a number of
illustrations, including examples ot the work of
Barye, drawings of complete skeletons, and details
of anatomy, each exhaustively explained by num-
bered notes.

Reklamekunst. By Walther von Zur Westen.
(Bielefeld and Leipzig.) 8vo. 4 marks.—This is
one of the richly illustrated Velhagen and Klasing
monographs. Up till now art in advertising has
been a subject of treatment only as far as posters
are concerned. The present volume considers it
under the aspects of the book-cover, the business
card, the poster, the programme—in short, of art
in every form, in which it is made to attract the
attention of the public to some negotiable object,
or to some performance by which money may be
earned. The author begins with an historical
chapter—unfortunately very short, though in his
popular treatise we must admit that there was no
room for a longer one—in which he shows that, as
early as the fifteenth century, tradesmen, principally
booksellers and scribes, were moved by the same
spirit that caused our modern business men to
resort to art as a help to advertisement. He re-
produces a number of specimens of their efforts.
It would be most interesting to pursue this line
of study more thoroughly and establish on a
broader basis in what manner and to what
extent, different times, different countries, and
different classes of men have made art subser-
vient to their business interests. Anyone enter-
ing upon the attempt would find valuable hints
and directions in Zur Westen’s volume. The body
of the work is occupied with the products of the
last decade, especially those which appeared in
Germany. Zur Westen admits that the interest in
the picture poster has suddenly and pretty com-
pletely vanished, and seems at a loss to account for
this rapid decline. It seems to be easily explain-
able. All quiet and harmony has gone out of our
life at this beginning of the twentieth century.
Whenever anything new appears anywhere it has
no longer to work its way slowly into the favour of
the world. The cable makes it popular within a
few days in Sydney, Montevideo, and Klondyke.
New ideas, new inventions no longer fall upon us,
they glide by us at the rate of 210 kilometres an

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