Studio: international art (77.1919)

THE ROYAL ACADEMY EXHIBITION

“ST. GEORGE’’
BY J. ANGEL

at present to foresee. At any rate, British
art has done its duty during the war and
has kept soundly in touch with the spirit
of the people, reflecting in its earnest
acceptance of responsibility the determina-
tion with which all sections of the com-
munity have met the demands imposed by
a great crisis in the affairs of the country.

There are, no doubt, many people who
would honestly consider this exhibition
rather dull. Any one who goes to the
Academy simply as a sightseer—and that
is surely the motive of a large section of the
visitors—is apt to condemn a collection in
which the sensational things that provide
food for discussion are few and far between.
But the serious student of art is much
better satisfied with a show that keeps at a
reasonably high level throughout than with
one which presents here and there some-
thing remarkable in a jumble of work which
does not deserve consideration. It is
partly because the 1919 Academy is so even

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in merit and so free from startling con-
trasts that it is acceptable to the art-lover
as a worthy exposition of the artistic senti-
ment of the moment. a a 0
Yet it is not wholly lacking in sensations,
though these are, fortunately, prominent,
because they are achievements of real dis-
tinction rather than merely popular suc-
cesses. Mr. Sargent's great war picture,
Gassed, is, for instance, an example of the
way in which a work of art can be made
to interest the widest public without losing
the right to be held in high estimation by
men of deep aesthetic conviction. He has
recorded vividly and dramatically an inci-
dent irresistibly appealing in its sentiment
and calculated to stir the deepest emotions
of the people, but he has at the same time
made it the motive for a composition of
monumental dignity, in which the student
of art will at once recognize the hand of a
master of the painter’s craft. It can fairly
be said that he has painted the most arrest-