London Art Schools are filled by Students from all over the Empire.
As London is truly the City of the World, other students of a different race and colour are to be found studying side by side with the student from Balham or Bristol.
As I feel that the presence of the fellow worker and student, working side by side, day after day, for months at a time, is as strong an influence as that of the Instructor; who in his turn is also a man of large sympathies — so to say “ What is the movement of Art to-day in London Art Schools? ” is like saying what is the direction Art is taking in the modern world to-day; and I personally feel that the answer in both cases would be the same.
In London to-day there is no limit to the knowledge and examples which any student can have at any moment, he or she may so desire; Museums and Libraries filled with the accumulated knowledge and works of Art and beauty, from the hands and minds of the artist, craftsmen, and thinkers, of the whole wide world; from the times when Man first started to behave as civilised man.
Examples of works from the East and from the West, from the minds of a very different people, living under very different conditions; are to be seen for the asking, with a staff of officials only too willing to help you in any query you may have.
This has not the effect one might expect, the tendency is to ignore what has gone before; unless it is to give a passing gaze at the primitive; these works have been done, and done well, we could not do better, so why try to do so.
Without asking, the Art student is thrust into the midst of life as we live it to-day; the whirling, throbbing, palpitating life of this city, where the eye does not rest for a second, and the mind is disturbed by noise.
From this the London student enters his or her particular School of Art or Training College; the student from distant Palestine, together with the student from Putney, into a school where the traditions of working are the same as in the time of our fathers; and the quality of the work is first considered, if time is a factor, it is not of chief importance.
But the personalities are not the same as those of our fathers and mothers, a big change has taken place in outlook with this changing world.
Life to-day, and early training have done much to change us, and set us before entering these schools.
In the case of our own young people and also those from our colonies over seas, where conditions of education in the cities is much the same; from the age of ten years, they have worked to a given rule, and time governed by a bell.
The desire to be original is great, but the early training is there, they are trained to think alike! and this I believe is why so much modern Art is so mannered.
When different, they are different by effort, while our fathers were different by nature.
Through this and some other points, Art, Industry and Schools have lost ground, in others they have gained.
The student of to-day is very bright.
Detail is not thought so much of to-day; we must get a good effect quickly, by the simplest means, must not waste too much time in becoming a Laboured craftsman, because however good finish you acquire the machine will do better; but the machine cannot think, so you must produce ideas, and yet more ideas.
Emerson said somewhere: “ All minds quote. Old and new make the warp and woof of every moment ... By necessity, by proclivity and by delight, we all quote. We quote not only books and proverbs, but arts, sciences, religions, customs, and laws; nay, we quote temples and houses, tables and chairs by imitation.”
To-day we don’t admit this; we must always be new and original, or be thought so, but in spite of this, good as the work done in the schools may be, there is much that is very alike in the studied crudeness, and simplicity, of approach.
This pleases when the form is abstract, but why portray trees, houses, the human form, etc., as if the mental age of the student were three years; when we are all a sophisticated people, of a sophisticated age.
Surely pattern does not depend on distorted form?
There was a time when we thought of Art schools as schools of Painting and Sculpture; first the Royal Academy Schools, and then the Slade School. These two schools still follow on the same lines as before, Painting and Drawing from Life, Modelling from Life, Figure composition, etc.
The Academy School is the oldest in the country, for the teaching of fine Arts; and in the past all the finest Painters of the day passed through its portals.
The names of Sir Joshua Reynolds, Landseer, and many others of the same standing in our realm, are here family by-words ; and the spirit of the past lives to-day, keeping alive a tradition which is England.
The Academy Schools should come first, and the Academy yearly Exhibition second ; but I wonder how many English men and women who visit that well-known Art show, know of the Schools which exist in the same building.
To-day we think of Art Schools as Schools of Design, in this I think is the big change, which started after the war.
As at all time in history, the Arts of the countries have expressed the minds of the people, so to-day.
Has there ever at any time been so much Design in Statesmanship as at present; if we take the literal definition of the word, which is—to mark out, to form a plan of, to scheme—much of the paintings of our Artists and Students might be looked upon as formula.
The individual units, sacrificed to the plan.
An Exhibition held a month or two ago at the County Hall was a striking example of change and progress.
The standard of lettering is better to-day than it has been for years, also fabric printing has reached a high state of proficiency.
Furniture is simple and good.
The Schools now teach the Arts and Crafts of the home, they include Leatherwork, Basketmaking, and Embroidery.
After the design is made, anyone with a neat way of working can accomplish charming and useful objects, and by teaching these, there is a way of starting the village industries, and encouraging the craftsman in the home.
Sometimes embroidery becomes more ambitious, and in the desire of the students to be original, the result is just peculiar.
I see no use for framed needlework which is half sewing, and half an odd collection of beads and feathers, and small pieces of lace ; all looking as they are only held together by the glass and the frame ; our grandmothers knew much better than this.
Many who have had to do with school teaching feel that much more attention should be given
to all cultural subjects in general education ; when the Arts of a country are thriving, the Nation also thrives.
What good will it do us, if excellent work is done in our Art Schools, if the people of our Nation have not the knowledge or taste to encourage it when they see it, for what is the good of colour to a blind man.
Given encouragement by the industries, and get the manufacturers to employ the students, much progress might be made ; in fact another revival as in the days of William Morris, only how much greater it might be with the L.C.G. behind it, and the world trade ahead.
That is only possible if we can get the manufacturers and the Art Schools to pull together more than they are doing to-day.
The fees of the Schools are not expensive for the tuition they receive ; but will the students be able to obtain employment to compensate for the time and money they have spent ?
After training it is often found that there are not the vacancies in the firms for the young people.
Firms prefer their own people whom they have trained in their works ; they say that they understand the factory conditions, and can adapt themselves to the demands of the public.
The cost of putting new designs on the market is so great, that they are timid in trying anything new ; and the Art Schools’ aim is to give new ideas.
They give these ideas to the public free in Exhibitions, and when the public has got used to them, and grown to like them, they are copied by the manufacturers, and the amount the designer gets is very small.
All this is bad for students, who realize that their’s is a losing game ; it also is depressing for the Instructors who lose many of the best Students who drift into other occupations.
The Board of Education and the L.C.C. who have done, and are still doing so much ; if it is in their power, could turn their attention to this very vital question and extend education beyond the willing student, to that lethargic citizen of mass mind ; that they may develop an appetite for beauty in all things, and demand satisfaction for that appetite.
ARTS AND CRAFTS EXHIBITIONS
On November the 4th, two interesting Arts and Crafts Exhibitions will be opened in London, one at Dorland House and the other at Sunderland House, Curzon Street.
The Dorland House Exhibition will remain open until the end of the month and is being organised by the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, which is formed of 120 artist-craftsmen of established reputation and of other (lay) members who are in sympathy with the craftsman and his
works. Their first exhibition was held in 1888. The exhibition will be divided into eighteen craft sections. John Farleigh, Gordon Russell and Edward Barnsley will be exhibitors.
The Sunderland House Exhibition which is open only until the 9th, is being organized by the Home Arts and Industries Association, which was founded in 1884, with the object of reviving and encouraging handicrafts, and furthering their developments in improvement in both design and workmanship.
