The English teachers make good use of the exhibits for themes, for here is, in truth, something concrete, visible, and near at hand to write and talk about. Of course interest runs high. By Grades. It is an interesting sight to see fifty sixth-grade pupils, seated on the gallery floor before one of Elizabeth Nourse's most beautiful paintings, answering all the teacher's questions as to why the figures were placed on the canvas as they are, where the artist stood when painting the picture, what was on the level of her eye, where the window was that let in the light so beautifully on the baby's face, why the mother's dress was blue instead of red, and, finally, what was the really beautiful thing the picture had to say, to which the worst boy in the class answers quite solemnly: "A mother and her little baby." Would any one contend for a moment that arithmetic would have a more valuable influence on the life of that boy than this kind of art study or that any drill subject can so function? Yet he has years of arithmetic and only rare days of art, even in favored Richmond. By Clubs.-The Art Study Committee of the Art Association meets in the gallery to study the exhibits with the aid of lectures and the best works on modern art, as, for instance, "Landscape Painting," by Birge Harrison. The various women's clubs of the city visit the gallery to hear talks on the exhibits. The Music Study Club has placed pianos in the gallery and uses this as a regular meeting-place. By Local Artists. To the local painters and craftsmen the gallery furnishes a place to display their own work and the opportunity in the passing exhibits to get help and inspiration from the work of their contempo raries in art. That this has been valuable to them is shown in the remarkable improvement in their work during the years of these exhibits. This Richmond community has profited by the work of its local painters and has learned from them to see its own familiar landscape with new, "seeing" eyes, to get the artist's point of view, and to love first when they see them painted things they had passed, perhaps, a hundred times, nor cared to see, as Browning so well says it. Open Days. The art gallery is open to the public during all school hours, Saturday and Sunday afternoons, night-school evenings, and many special evenings. Artistic catalogues are sold for ten cents, containing much information about the pictures and artists. Permanent Collection of Works of Art.-The permanent collection of the Art Association hangs in one of the smaller galleries and is always on view. It contains the following works of art: THE ART ASSOCIATION PURCHASES 1899. T. C. Steele, "Whitewater Valley." 1900. J. E. Bundy, "Blue Spring." 1901. 1901. 1901. John Vanderpoel, "Sunlight and Shadow." 1902. 1903. 1903. 1904. 1903. 1904. 1905. Frank Girardin, "Sunshine and Shadow." PURCHASED WITH THE REID PURCHASE FUND Henry Mosler, "The Duett." Ben Foster, "Late Afternoon, Litchfield Hills." 1906. H. M. Walcott, "Hare and Hounds." 1907. Frank V. DuMond, “At the Well.” 1908. Albert L. Gro. "The Hopi Mesa." 1909. Robert Reid, Peonies." 1910. John C. Johansen, "Fiesole, Florence." GIFTS TO THE ART ASSOCIATION 1902. J. Ottis Adams, "A Summer Afternoon." (Presented by Tuesday Aftermath Club.) 1909. Janet Scudder, "The Tortoise Fountain." (Presented by Warner Leeds.) 1910. Gladys H. Wilkinson, “A Corner in the Studio." (Whitney-Hoff Museum Purchase, presented by International Art Union, Paris.) 1910. Robert W. Grafton, "Portrait, Timothy Nicholson." (Indefinite loan by Nicholson family.) 1911. E. T. Hurley, Three etchings. (Presented by E. T. Hurley.) 1911. Misses Overbeck, "Vase, Overbeck Pottery." (Presented by the Misses Overbeck.) 1912. Walter Shirlaw, Sketches, three oils, one water-color. (Presented by Mrs. Walter Shirlaw.) Conclusion. This Richmond experience seems to demonstrate that an art gallery for art exhibits fills a deficiency in our high school education and meets the natural human demand for beauty in life. It proves that an art gallery is as useful in a high school as is a laboratory or a gymnasium, a library or an auditorium, and that it is as interesting and educative for children to learn about art and artists as about war and warriors or any other of the subjects that make up the curriculum. The qualities possessed by a work of art-unity, sincerity, harmony, simplicity, idealism, beauty-stand in closer relation to the building of a perfect life than the laws of physics or chemistry; and the "whole boy" is to be educated for complete living. |