Studio: international art (89.1925)

DESIGN FOR DECORATION OF A
CHAPEL. BY STANLEY SPENCER

(New English Art Club)

under the inspiration of a master is far
better than an expensive variety show such
as the decoration of the Royal Exchange.

To my mind the most notable piece of
mural work of the year is Mr. A. K.
Lawrence's Service and Sacrifice in the
apse of the basilica at Wembley. That
Piero della Francesca is its evident source
is not to its discredit, for the passion for
ugliness and distortion needs some correc-
tive in these days, a a a a

And yet one of the artists whose work
has been equally praised and blamed on
this very score of ugliness is in my opinion
the possessor of an almost ideal equipment
for mural decoration, i.e., Mr. Stanley
Spencer. I should be the last to praise him
for his uncouth figures; they arise largely, I
think, from the very nature of his education
as an artist. But what I am convinced of
is the inevitable nature of their growth in
his work. They are no affectation, but

the man expressing himself inevitably and
from the heart. His design for the
decoration of a chapel, exhibited in the
New English Art Club, shows both charac-
teristics of his art, great beauty and
simplicity in the general scheme and
considerable uncouthness in the treatment
of the figures. The design is intended for
a chapel to commemorate the work of the
R.A.M.C., in which the artist served, on
the Macedonian front. The illustration
above shows one side of the chapel only;
the other side corresponds in form, while
the East end is taken up by a large
design of which the Resurrection forms
the chief motive. It would require the
simplest of buildings, about thirty feet
long and fifteen broad, and I can think of
no artistic project of the last few years
which shows more promise than this of
repaying a patron a hundredfold if he cares
for noble art or for posterity. a a

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