W

HILE in the practice of the profession all of the known recipes for the production of the work of art are being tried by thoughtful men, it may be worth while, for the moment, to take up the question from the other end. If we find that all masterpieces of whatever time, and in every sort of art, have been marked by a certain unity, that they have consisted of related, and not merely of associated, parts, we may assume that the works of art to come will have this characteristic also. If we further conjecture that in the clearness with which this unity and consistency are shown, by simplicity and exclusion of the superfluous, we have found the quality which carries conviction and defends the work of art from time and from the confusions wrought by the change of standpoint, we are probably not far from the truth. How has this unity been secured? How has this perfect consistency been maintained?

It is part of human experience that while knowledge and care may do much in this direction, they are far from infallible, and that personal reaction against a need or cause for expression is the one way to the result.

On this basis works have been produced of such force as neither taste nor judgment could have commanded. On this basis, too, we obtain that individuality in the result which is so closely and universally associated with strength that, although it is only a concomitant, it is often assumed as proof of greatness.

The attempt to develop a living style from the relics of one that is dead, fails, not because the forms themselves are outworn, nor because the

masterpieces have lost any of their power to interpret between us and those who went before, but because, being constructed to fill one need, they are not the logical expression of another, which in its turn must find itself new forms, desired from its own character. On the other hand, if we attempt to use them by reviving the ancient spirit, we find that, as that spirit lives only as recorded in these works of art, we are restricted to copying merely, on pain of foolishness. When the inward necessity for a form no longer exists, the utmost erudition and care cannot supply its place-cannot by themselves maintain the unity demanded as the first essential of the work of art.

Homer is forever an invaluable poet, but no Iliad can be written by an American of to-day, because the whole Greek attitude of mind and the whole Greek environment are things of the past, and no one can reconstruct an epoch and live in it to the exclusion of the ideas and facts of his own time. Even the old phrases are foreign to us. Moreover, if this indeed were possible, it would be the surrender of the birthright of standpoint merely to do what had been done before.

A crystal is built on an inward law, not in an external mold, and spontaneous expression is of the same sort. So, if the need that calls forth the work of art is able to define itself, and is allowed to work in freedom in its environment, a form of beauty and dignity will result as a matter of course.

The part of genius is to know this need, and to measure it, to live and feel, to have positive emotions, and as definite as strong; emotions that will not satisfy themselves in the forms which

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grow about other ideas, but which build with regard only to their own demand and the opportunities of their environment.

This, we take to be the perennial foundation of art, and our purpose here is not to speak of Mr. Sullivan or his work as an isolated result, but to have especial regard to the importance and universality of the principles upon which his work is founded, his executed work being the exploitation of his standpoint, according to the skill with which he has perceived the vital need for the structure to be designed-how well he has defined it, in fact, and how far he has satisfied the need with the means at his command.

Born in Boston, September 3, 1856, Mr. Sullivan is therefore forty-five years of age. His education, beginning with special courses from primary to high school, was continued in the Boston Institute of Technology, after which he spent several years at the École des Beaux Arts, being a student of the Atelier Vaudremer.

By nature a mathematician, it was by contact with Professor Clopét, a French mathematician and an instructor in the école, that his powers of exact reasoning were developed. The impression made upon him by the city of Paris was of its cleanliness and order, and its artistic wealth, and he especially liked the people for their tendency towards the logical habit of mind.

One can easily understand from this why it is that he insists that he is following the principles of that school but not its methods nor forms; and, as it has been well said, he is not to be regarded as an eccentric in any sense, but as concentric, rather, revolving about a few basic principles which belong to him, not as an individual, but as one who recognizes that art is the outcome of the reaction of temperament upon environment.

The creed of his art is therefore democratic and progressive; it finds its inspiration neither in the past nor future, but in the immediate and present, and its optimisim and vitality are of the kindred of the spirit that has brought forth the greatest art of the world.

At the present time when the minds of men are in a state of ferment in architectural matters, and when we see able men rushing to and fro in a search for the true light, or returning in weariness or disgust to the conventions of their forefathers, a voice like this, speaking in the confident and victorious tone characteristic of the MiddleWest, which is Mr. Sullivan's home, is in itself a notable thing, and we see the performance of new works, unlike what has gone before; and yet with a certain balance and propriety which are the proof of fitness and the safeguard of permanence, when we see further evidence of the vital

origin of this work in the fertility of the designer, we feel that Mr. Sullivan's life-work is more than a celebration of himself and his standpoint; we feel that it is one of the few visible centres of organization of the architectural thought of this country, that his principles and his spirit are a much-needed example and inspiration to the whole profession, and are doing much to bring clarity of thought and conviction into the midst. of the present confusion of ideas. His present following consists on the one hand of a few of the younger men, who, missing the essential idea which runs throughout his teaching, content themselves with adopting the outward manner of his work, greatly to his own disgust, and, on the other hand, a less obvious but more important group of men whose work has gained in confidence as a result of his teachings. Among these must be numbered those, who, without being imitators, having seen their problems solved by Mr. Sullivan in his work, have accepted his answer as the true one, and have followed him, but with the freedom and understanding which marks the true disciple as distinguished from the copyist.

That his influence is more widespread than ap pears on the surface is seen in the fact that, while he had personally nothing to do with the organization of the Architectural League of America, that body, brought together by the common desire of its initiators towards the American Renaissance," which Mr. Sullivan has long been preaching, has been in large measure guided and developed during the three years of its active life by the force of his example and teachings. To diffuse his ideas more effectually, he has more than once entered the field of literature, usually as a contributor to the polemics of architecture, but often dealing with his subject in such general terms that his writings may be regarded as a contribution to the literature of art as a whole. It must be admitted that his tendency to metaphor and the fluency of his thought occasionally leave his writings overloaded and somewhat obscure, bnt even in these cases he compels attention by his power in the construction of single sentences, many of which are both original and forcible.

With Mr. Sullivan's literary work, however, we have to deal only as the statement of his artistic creed. His latest example of this is the series of "Kindergarten Chats," in which he is gradually creating an atmosphere of credible ideas about the mind of an irreverent Western boy, with the evident intention of leading up to a healthy belief in principles of art derived from personal examination of the causes and meaning of art, unsophisticated by the theories to be found in so many books and schools, which, however

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true, do not assist the creative effort. These Chats" occupy but one page each, are laid in with a broad brush and with the brush-marks showing and Mr. Sullivan refuses to stop to explain the jokes-nevertheless, they are telling shots at the commercial, the unmeaning, and the insincere in architecture, and are perfectly fearless in their arraignment of these faults as exhibited in contemporary work, without regard to the prestige of the authors concerned.

Their critical value, moreover, is the least of their claim to consideration. In them is developed an organic thesis, in which he has set forth the fundamental philosophy of creative architecture. "The Tall Building Artistically Considered," an article of his that appeared in "Lippincott's" in 1896, he is at his best, and for simple and direct English the essay is only excelled by the logic and clarity of its reasoning. And he has made good his thoughts and speech in executed buildings. As yet no one has excelled him in the treatment of the "sky-scraper." It is something more than a real-estate problem with him; "this loftiness is to the artist-nature its thrilling aspect," he says.

The exercise of the gift that thus elevates a necessary characteristic to the point at which it becomes the keynote of a structure of beauty and unity is the function of the architect upon which he lays stress in another essay, read before the A. I. A., at New York, entitled "Objective and Subjective."

When, in addition, it is remembered that Michael Angelo, Wagner, and Whitman are his ideals of the artist, held in high estimation, not because they departed from accepted forms, but because they created new forms, and especially because they established independent points of view, and because he finds in their work, to paraphrase his own words, the highest conjunction of objective and subjective thought, it is possible to appreciate the scope and breadth of his thought.

That he is himself one of those artist-natures to whom the chief requirement of a new form of structure constitutes a "thrilling aspect," and that he is not confused by a vague wish that his buildings might be like something else, marks him as a man whose spiritual eye sees deep and perceives the real native forces underlying American life. If, in addition, he has succeeded in making this loftiness thrilling to others, others not gifted as he is or who are of another epoch -and this, time alone can determine then he ranks among those who, for want of a better term, we call inspired leaders.

By many, Mr. Sullivan is regarded as an ornamentalist," so fertile is he in this branch

of design, so original, so profuse and complex. But they who see no more than this in his work make a serious mistake. The vertical planes of wall-surface, the height of which he emphasizes rather than disguises, are not disturbed by the detail with which they are enriched. Near at hand the ornament takes its place as such, and as unsurpassed of its sort, but at a distance from which the wall may be viewed as a surface, the surface-detail becomes a matter of texture, and does not fret the eyes by enforcing its interest at the expense of the general effect.

Moreover, this textural value is only enhanced by the dust that settles upon it in time, herein attaining to the result which is forever sought by the most skilful designers.

Since Richardson, no American architect has attracted the interest of foreign critics to the degree that Mr. Sullivan has. Recently, a Danish reviewer, writing of the art of optimism, quoted his work to uphold his belief that Europe would ultimately have to learn architecture in America, and French and English critics in general take him much more seriously than his own countrymen. Some years ago, when the Commissioners of the Museum of Decorative Art in Paris were visiting the World's Fair in Chicago, they secured a number of his original drawings and had many photographs and casts made of his ornament for their museum in Paris, this being the only instance in which an American was so honored. Later on, the same Society gave him a medal. When this exhibit was installed in Paris it created so much stir that the directors of a similar institution in Moscow asked to have duplicates made for them, and finally permission was granted to a firm in Paris to prepare copies for various institutions throughout Europe, which can now be obtained by application to the Museum above mentioned.

The condition of architectural thought and sentiment at this time makes the presence of such a man doubly valuable; while we believe that the "benumbing influence of education" is a reaction that can only sway personalities naturally weak, and that the true need is, not of less teaching, but of more men like Mr. Sullivan to be taught, and while the vigorous younger men who count him as their leader sometimes seem to forget that the ancient modes were once as near to men's lives and aspirations as anything that the present or future can give us, and indeed are the means by which we can step back into the old standpoints and gain, as it were, a reflected and prismatic view of this world as it then seemed, nevertheless, it is through these younger men that a new art, the equal of the old, must

come.