Studio: international art (67.1916)

Reviews and Notices

VIEWS OF MOSCOW : SILHOUETTES BY ELISAVETA KRUGLIKOVA

divers modes, but all in complete unison, sing the
praises of Paris and testify to her charms, her art,
and her renown as a centre of enlightenment
and culture. The literary contributors are
K. D. Balmont, Alexandre Benois, M. Voloshine,
V. Ivanoff, V. Y. Kurbatoff, A. M. Remisoff,
N. K. Rerich, Fedor Sologub, Count A. N. Tolstoi,
G. Chulkoff, and A. Chebatorevskaya. The book
is, moreover, rich in decorative ornament, the
whole of which, including binding, end-papers,
etc., is the work of Mile. Kruglikova, a special
feature being a large number of silhouettes, repre-
senting her first essays in this direction. In the
form of initials, head- and tail-pieces, portraits or
simple text illustrations, these deftly cut silhouettes
are dispersed at intervals throughout the volume,
scarcely a page being without one, and especially
attractive are those which have for their subject
characteristic Parisian street types and scenes from
the National fete, which are at once very expressive
and decorative. Both in its contents and the
mode of presentation the volume does credit to
Mile. Kruglikova and Russian book production.
In addition to the silhouettes which figure in this
book Mile. Kruglikova has executed a series of
Moscow subjects, two of which are here reproduced.

What Pictures to see in America. By Lorinda
Munson Bryant. (London: John Lane.)

ior. 6d. net.—It is common knowledge that
during recent years a large number of masterpieces
of pictorial art have been transferred from Europe
to America, chiefly owing to the readiness of
wealthy American collectors to pay prodigious
prices for really first-rate examples. In England,
which perhaps has been the principal source of
supply, the migration of art treasures across the
Atlantic has caused great concern, and it will be
remembered that only a few months ago a report
on the subject was made to Parliament by a com-
mission which had investigated the
question. But though from the
point of view of the English art-
lover the exodus of masterpieces
is to be greatly deplored, there is
some consolation in the fact that
most of them find their way sooner
or later to the public museums of
the United States, where they can
be enjoyed by multitudes of people,
whereas if they had not changed
hands they would probably have
remained secluded and unknown
to more than a privileged few. In
America the numerous public collec-
tions have come into existence almost wholly
through the munificence of wealthy citizens, and to
this circumstance is mainly due the fact that it is
now possible, as Mrs. Bryant points out, to find in
these collections paintings that “form a consecutive
history from Giotto through Fra Angelico, Botticelli,
Raphael, Titian, Rubens, Rembrandt, and Velasquez
to the modern masters of European and American
art.” It is, of course, for Americans that this book is
intended by the author; she takes them first to
one gallery and then to another, beginning at the
Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, where master-
pieces by Velasquez, Rembrandt, and other great
Old Masters may be seen in company with Turner,
Corot, and other great moderns, and ending at the
Crocker Art Gallery at Sacramento, in California,
where are examples of Rembrandt, Hals, Rubens,
Diirer, Holbein, Tintoretto, Ribera, Luini, and
del Sarto, as well as some by the men of Barbizon.
Over 200 of the works referred to in the text—
and these, it need hardly be said, represent only a
selection from each of the numerous galleries
visited—are reproduced in excellent half-tone
illustrations, so that the book is of interest to
others than those for whom it is primarily
intended.

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