THE

"HE town of Catskill on the Hudson was for many years the home of a painter who was the first to insist upon the beauty of American landscape in general and that of the Catskill region in particular. He exhibited in Europe and America very brilliant epitomes of our autumn splendors, in the face of protests on the part of foreigners that such colors could not exist in nature. He was one of the pioneers of the Hudson River School of painters and he pointed the way for the bands of later-coming artists to the picturesque banks of the Kaaterskill. In his honor a peak in the Catskill hills has received its name-Thomas Cole Mountain.

Thomas Cole was born in 1801 and passed his early years in England, his parents having relations with the American colonies, enough, at any rate, for Thomas to claim that, despite his English birth, his parents as well as himself came of colonial ancestry. His father made wall-paper and floor-cloth with small success in various towns of Ohio and Pennsylvania; and as he grew up Thomas learned something of colors, designs and presses at first hand. He was a retiring, music- and poetry-loving youth, whose soul responded passionately to the beauties of nature. His teachers, if one may dignify them by the name, showed him only the worst of examples, so that if there ever was an instance of a self-made artist it was Thomas Cole, struggling for bread as a rustic portrait painter before he had learned the elementary handling of oils.

Thus brought up in the school of adversity, Cole developed qualities of insight that made his landscapes differ widely from those of his contemporaries in England and America. He showed poetic, creative work where the majority of Artists were still embarrassed by the real and literal. In contrast to their timidity he displayed uncommon boldness, and during a comparatively brief career impressed his own individuality as artist on the men of his day. Like Benjamin West, a colonial who had made a great name and place for himself in London at a somewhat earlier date, Cole painted symbolical and sometimes religious pictures that met the ideas of his period as to art.

Having suffered eclipse for half a century or more, the stronger men of this period are beginning to be studied in a spirit of greater fairness and sympathy such as we extend in general to the artists we call old masters, now that we are shaking off the tyranny of the realists.

Thomas Cole painted several grand series of pictures embodying moral and religious ideals, the more famous being the allegories of "The Voyage of Life," a set of four large landscapes with figures, illustrating the four main stages of life, which may be familiar to those who have seen the engravings issued by the old Art Union. To illustrate this work we reproduce by means of the marvelous skill of Timothy Cole the painting called "Youth," a masterpiece of poetic, lifting art which is now in St. Luke's Hospital, New York.

Considered from the point of view of an ideal landscape, the composition has a finely felt arrangement that carries one naturally from the angel on

OF LIFE

the bank, brilliant against the tropical tree-masses, down the winding river, past picturesque crags and foothills, toward the phantom castle in the air. The Youth with uplifted arm, steering his bark of life, holds the attention firmly as against the river and mountains, the foliage and "cloud-capped pinnacles" of the apparition in the sky. The spirit is earnest and even grave, like that of the poetry of Drake and Bryant, but it expresses finely the optimism and enthusiasm of youth by the gesture of the angel, which calls attention to the aerial portent. It is signed T. Cole 1840, and therefore belongs to the later years of his life. He died in 1848.

Technically speaking, the method of Cole and his way of expressing leaves and the sheen of light on water will not satisfy modern painters of landscape, who inherit many innovations made long after Cole died. Wherein he appears ahead of his time is the handling of Aerial Perspective, the gradations of Atmosphere, nearby and afar. One feels that Claude of Lorraine was the chief God in Cole's artistic pantheon. This appears particularly in the "Course of Empire" series. One feels, too, that no amount of eloquence in John Ruskin's beautiful prose would suffice to make Cole admire Turner. Admirers of the latter found Cole's work conventional, likewise dull in color. Nowadays it is hard to realize, in view of the varied talents among great numbers of American pushers of the brush, how few and far between were the artists who could attempt anything beyond portraiture. Even the elect, like Asher B. Durand, Thomas Cole, William Dunlap and a few others depended for their livelihood for the most part on portraits; it was much the same with Gilbert Stuart, Malbone and Vanderlyn. Neither leisure nor wealth nor a high grade of education permitted the vast majority of citizens to take so much as a lukewarm interest in the simplest forms of Art.

Cole carried on the old traditions of the Italian and Netherlandish painters of landscape, perhaps because he went back to Europe when he was too old to get the new spirit of Constable, Delacroix and Turner. Yet compared with the paintings of the engraver Asher B. Durand, a very careful draughtsman and monotonous colorist, the landscapes of Cole had the advantage of poetic feeling. The Metropolitan Museum has a "Roman Aqueduct" and an "Expulsion from Eden" which are full of imagination, despite their technical drawbacks. It is also only fair to say that time has not improved their

appearance.

The series of "The Voyage of Life" to which this painting belongs was bought by the Art Union, and the four engravings-of which we give reproductions-issued by that society to its members did a good deal to keep Cole before the public. When we recall the great vogue of the Hudson River painters up to the time of the Civil War-and considerably beyond that date, it is something to remember of Thomas Cole that he was the first of American painters to earn a livelihood by the sale of landscapes. So it is only fair to call him the Father of the American landscape school.

The four pictures are now hanging over steamradiators in the corridors of St. Luke's Hospital, Cathedral Heights.

An eminent artist has said concerning this series: "No other allegory in the world, by any artist of the past, surpasses this one in pathos and sentiment. It is a triumph of fine thinking and lofty idealism." His attention being called to the condition of the pictures, he was asked how it came about that they should be suffering neglect:

"Why? Because the stupid school of 'pushers of paint,' too dead spiritually to appreciate such fine things, have derided them on the ground that Cole's technique, to them, is out of date, not 'clever'

enough! How I despise that word clever! And yet there is not one artist in America to-day, perhaps not in the world who could create anything superior to this series in the line of Allegory-and few who could equal it.

"The whole series of four should be bought from the Hospital," he continued, "relined, cleaned and finely framed anew, then properly established in some gallery by themselves, either at the Metropolitan Museum in New York or the National in Washington."

Who will be the Mæcenas to do this wise thing and, while helping a deserving hospital, preserve a priceless art treasure for the nation?

Two

WO marbles which have been for three or four centuries among the treasures of art in private hands at Florence have been added to the notable art collection of Mr. Widener in Philadelphia. They were imported by Percy W. French & Company, who are the agents for the Barbarini tapestries, acquired long ago by the late Mr. Ffoulke of Washington, and more recently were the buyers of the Pierpont Morgan tapestries. The marbles are by Donatello of Florence (1386-1466), the great forerunner of Michelangelo, Rosellino, Cellini, Sansovino and other famous sculptors of the Cinque Cento.

One marble is a full-length figure, the young David holding his sling, with slingstone in it, at rest on the ground beside his right foot, while the left rests on the neck of Goliath. In the forehead of the decapitated giant of the Philistines one sees the stone that has overthrown him. The left hand rests with palm outwards on the left thigh of the youthful hero. The face is mild and thoughtful, without any look of boastfulness or pride, and the figure is in perfect repose.

The other marble is the bust of a boy, the figure cut off just above the elbows. This boy has been called a Saint John the Baptist because beneath the cloak that covers the left shoulder and left breast, leaving the right shoulder and neck and right breast uncovered, one sees a tunic or tabard of goat-skin. Notwithstanding the goat-skin undergarment, there is good reason to believe that the bust is a portrait. These marbles come from the Casa Martelli in the via della Forca, Florence, and are heirlooms of the Martelli family and well known to many generations of art-lovers and tourists in the Tuscan capital. Mention of them is made in all the best guide books, and the volumes devoted to Tuscan Sculptors usually include them in their illustrations.

The Martellis had the best of reasons for owning sculptures by Donatello, for, when his father, Nicolo Bardi, became involved in the civil broils between the Medici and Albizzi factions and had to fly for his life, the little Donato was taken in by the Martellis. He was apprenticed to a goldsmith, the father of the famous sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti, and learned to model in clay, cast in bronze and carve in stone and wood, after the all-round education of artists

in the fifteenth century. All his life long, and he lived to be eighty, he was intimate with the Martellis, who brought him to the notice of Cosimo and Piero di Medici, those art patrons and tyrants of Tuscany.

Reasons are many for believing that in the guise of a little Saint John we have a portrait. Compared with other statues of Saint John the Baptist, it lacks the gaunt, ascetic, fixed look that Donatello gave them. It has a sweet and innocent expression without a trace of sentimentality, earnestness without excitement and very lovely modeling round the eyes, mouth and chin, such as hardly suits the dweller in deserts. Doubtless a boy of the Martelli family would be asked to take part in religious mysteries and processions, wearing a goat-skin, attendant on some lady who figured the Virgin, some favored baby who represented the Holy Child of Bethlehem. It has been argued that we have in this delicious child a portrait of Roberto Martelli, who was a score of years younger than Donatello.

Cavaluzzi wrote about this bust in 1886: "If in this portrait the sculptor appears a naturalist, in the patient, minute study of the parts, this naturalism becomes poetry when, having obtained the resemblance as to lineaments, he impressed an ineffable sentiment upon this adorable little head.

"One feels that the small model was not merely an object to be imitated, a chance model, but a beloved being, in representing whom the sculptor's affection has doubled his strength, has sublimated the æsthetic powers of the artist. The marble has given itself over to the will of the sculptor, has made itself flexible, soft as flesh, lending itself to the most delicate finesse of execution, to the imperceptible gradation of the mezze tinte (half-tones). Each stroke of the scalpel answers to the purpose; every accent is a note which increases the effect of the general harmony in an image which might be said to have begun with a kiss and have ended with a caress.'

"

The "David, Conqueror of Goliath," was designed like the celebrated "Saint George," now in the Bargello, Florence, for a niche high up on some wall, perhaps outside a church or palace. Donatello was like the anonymous sculptors of the Gothic cathedrals in his care to model figures for the very places they were to occupy. When they are taken from the

For the more recent of the official results ungrudging thanks are due to the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. McAdoo, who has warmly seconded the National Commission of Fine Arts.

Secretary McAdoo's laudable service to the general artistic education and his sense of responsibility in this matter make it all the more regrettable that the Administration has not come up to the expectation of the country in some other æsthetic matters, in which it could have accomplished much.

THE MALL

In two respects, both connected with the beautification of Washington, the friends of artistic progress, who reckoned on the Administration's support, have been sadly disappointed. The first of these concerns the postponement of the construction of the new official buildings for the Departments of State, Justice, and Commerce and Labor, the architects of which were chosen by competition in 1911. The need of a beautiful building for the State Department, to replace the conglomerate structure of the Mullett era, has long been recognized. To say nothing of the artistic defects of the present building, it has no adequate provision for diplomatic congresses, receptions, or hospitalities. Mr. Brunner's design for the new building was recognized as meeting all practical as well as æsthetic requirements, but the construction was indefinitely "hung up" by Secretary Bryan. Moreover, no progress has been made in the execution of the other buildings that for the Department of Justice designed by Mr. Donn Barber and that for the Department of Commerce and Labor designed by Messrs. York and Sawyer, the whole group conforming to the Burnham-McKim-Olmsted plan for the rearrangement of the public business of Washington by an orderly, harmonious and effective disposition of the needed new buildings. It is greatly to be hoped that the Administration will feel its responsibility for taking up this part of the great project and carrying it to a finish, in consultation with the Commission of Fine Arts, which has done, and is still doing great service to the country.

THE POWER HOUSE AND SMOKESTACK INVASION

The other point we have in mind is of much more importance, for it involves something more than negligence, namely: indifference to the large artistic treatment of Washington city, a national asset

of which Americans are justly proud. We refer to the action of Secretary McAdoo, unfortunately confirmed by the President, in approving the construction of the Government Heat and Power Plant, the position of which, as planned, will seriously damage, from many points of view, the beauty of the Capitol and the Washington Monument. The President, who made an irreparable error in permitting the national beauty of the Hetch Hetchy Valley to be sacrificed unnecessarily to commercialism, should find some way to retreat from the untenable position in which this new blunder has placed him.

On page 74 will be found a detailed presentation by means of drawings reproduced from those in Art and Archaeology of the evil effects which would be caused by this unfortunate mistake, which is all the greater by reason of the fact that one of the most difficult things in the world is to rid ourselves of wretched official architecture, constructed by untrained hands in the sacred name of Beauty.

In general, it cannot be too often insisted-since the personnel of our Senators and Representatives is constantly shifting-that among statesmen the beginning of wisdom in architecture, painting and sculpture is a humble recognition that some phases of art, like engineering, are a matter of technical knowledge. To know or even to suspect-that one does not know, is a long step in candor toward the acceptance of the judgment of those who are qualified by experience and training to direct the public.

THE FACTORY PLAN OF BUILDING POST OFFICES

The recent proposal to construct post offices hereafter on the factory plan is a "practical" move in thẹ wrong direction and one which, for even more practical reasons, the public is likely to disapprove. It is not "economical" to impair the pride of our people-in this case both a local and a national pride— by laying down a rule that the public business shall be housed inartistically. The dignity of the nation should be reflected in the beauty of the structures which represent it to the imagination of the beholder, and which, entrusted to capable architects, stimulate the patriotism and self-respect of the citizens. If we wish the people to be proud of our cities, we must give them cities to be proud of. The country has a right to expect from the President, as a cultivated gentleman of large horizon, an enlightened oversight of all such enterprises and a no less cordial support of the Commission of Fine Arts than it uniformly had from Presidents Roosevelt and Taft.

ON

N the 2nd of August, 1916, was unveiled a new group of statuary placed in the tympanum of the House wing of the Capitol at Washington. There were present on this occasion many notables of the country. Addresses were made by the Hon. Champ Clark, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and by the sculptor Paul W. Bartlett, giving the point of view from which the latter made his composition.

The solution of the problem of properly decorating the left tympanum of the National Capitol, the most

THE CAPITOL

majestic building on earth, has been one of the most important Art matters in the control of the U. S. Government. Hence, the entrusting of this problem to Mr. Bartlett for a solution, is a manifestation of an appreciation of his talent, as a sculptor, of which he has every right to be proud. It is too early to estimate the degree of success with which he has solved this problem. Meanwhile, the "appreciation" of Mr. Brown is most interesting reading to those who love our splendid Capitol. See page 41

AT present, when the inquiring Public which pays for works of art enters the gates of the world of art in search of knowledge, it becomes bewildered by the fog and nauseated by the Anarchy it finds there.

In order to know how to thread its way through this miserable Confusion, in its effort to obtain sound notions as to what constitutes Enduring Art, the only sort worthy of being paid for by public savings and taxes, the first thing the Public must know is:-That there is no more distressing impertinence in life than the criticizing of Art-above all adversely-by a man who has not a well-defined Standard by which to judge a work of art. how few among Artists and Critics have even so much as a sane, not to speak of an invulnerable, Definition of Art? How unlike a Banker, who judges a gold dollar by a clear and fixed Standard!

And

Tolstoi spent, he said, twelve years writing his book: "What Is Art?" and he came near answering it correctly. He spoiled his job by assuming that a moujik can appreciate every great work of art as well as a master and a man of æsthetic culture. By this sort of mental bias, moral excessivism and slipshod thinking, the anarchy in the world of art has been propagated, until that field of human endeavor is no longer one of unalloyed joy.

The anarchy in the Intellectual World ceased when Bacon substituted Inductive for Deductive reasoning, common-sense for cryptic ratiocination. He insisted that we begin, in our reasoning, at the bottom of things, and reason up to God, instead of the reverse. And Kant destroyed the anarchy in the Moral World when, out of the muck of speculation, he drew his common-sense "Categorical Imperative: "Act so that your action may be made the standard of universal action!" And the world of art will never be purged of its anarchy until we use baconian common-sense: go first to the bottom, find the broadest foundation, and build up from there to find an invulnerable Definition of art.

What do we mean by the word-Art? The word has been used to designate everything under the sun, from "The Art of Poetry" to "The Art of Goose Washing"; from "The Art of Living" to "The Art of Dying!" until every charlatan has his pet definition which he knows he cannot successfully defend.

One of the causes of the anarchy in the World of Art is: the joy some would-be thinkers seem to find in throwing out half-truths, more bewildering than deliberate falsehoods. For example: The painter Abbey nailed up in the Dome of the Harrisburg Capitol this dictum: "Art deals with things forever incapable of definition." As though anything in art is beyond human definition! Not only can we

define art, but it had been completely defined when he nailed up his half-true ipse dixit! What we need to do is not to worry about finding a Definition, but select the best and broadest one capable of being made, correct its formula until it is invulnerable and then :-agree to accept it, as the fundamental lawif we really wish to clean out the Augean Stables in the world of art. For, as Voltaire said: "If you wish to converse with me-define your terms?" And, unless we do agree on "What is Art?" we might as well quit all talking on the subject.

Another cause of the lack of an Accepted definition of art is the innate vice of the human mind to Confound things. How many writers have confounded Art with Beauty, with Style, with technique, et cetera, when in reality Art is neither of those though they all may enter as elements into a finished Work of Art?

The final cause is: that there is one portion of thinkers in the world of art which regards art as a PROCESS, or an ACTIVITY, while the public at large-when the word "Art" is mentioned-thinks only of art as a PRODUCT-of completed Works of Art.

For example: Dr. Johnson said: "Art is the power of doing things which is not taught by Nature."

John Stewart Mill said: "Art is but the employment of the powers of Nature for an end."

Coleridge said: "Art is not a thing; it is a way." A certain class of Artists, taking these as a cueand for private, selfish ends-agreed, and then R. D. W. Stevenson said: "Technique is Art, and those who are not interested in technique are not interested in Art."

As definitions of Art: as an Activity, these are all very well, but as definitions of Art: as a Product, as Works of Art, they are all absurd. Because technique is not-Art, it is only a part of art. And if you are going to use the word art to designate every activity, or process, you will have to include among the arts every handicraft in the world and call them all-Art. Take billiards, baseball-pitching, or muleskinning. Does any one suppose that any of these are easy to do? Only a cow-boy knows the "fine art" of "skinning a mule."

Every human activity, from driving nails to driving locomotives can be raised: from a bungling-into an "art." If that is what you mean by Art, let us define it thus: Every simple human activity becomes an Art in ratio of the degree of quick perception, sound judgment, unfailing memory, rapid decision and dexterity of hand necessary to obtain a resultsurprisingly above the ordinary.

But, your would-be æsthetician knows full well we do not include the art of shaving and juggling when