Art; Literature, Modern -- History and criticism; Music -- History and criticism
Grant the Germans fertility of fancy, invention, science in building
up a figure, force, humour, sentiment, philosophy, and artistic
ability generally, yet they have a deficiency in the colour sense and
an absence of a marked personal style. An exhibition of new art on the
Odeonplatz, Munich, did not give me much hope. There were some
pictures so bad as to be humorous; a dancer by the Holland-Parisian,
Kees van Dongen, had the merit at least of sincerity. Erbsloeh has
joined the extremists, Kirchner, Guimi, Kanoldt, Kandinsky, Utrello--a
good street effect; Werefkin and several Frenchmen were in evidence.
The modelling was both grotesque and indecent. The human figure as an
arabesque is well within the comprehension of the average observer,
but obscenity is not art--great art is never obscene. The blacks and
whites that I saw in Munich at this particular show were not clever,
only bestial. I only wish that German art of the last decade had not
gone over, bag and baggage, to the side of vulgar license. Certainly
Matthew Arnold could say of it, as he once said of Paris, that the
great goddess Lubricity reigned in state.
In the Moderne Galerie--I am still in Munich--I was reassured; I saw
Israels, Gauguin, Van Gogh--what masters!--Truebner, Hodler, Zuegel, Von
Uhde, Max Slevogt--a fine view of Frankfort--and some children at the
seashore by my favourite, Max Liebermann. Then there were Langhammer
and Reumaini, the clever Max Mayrshofer, Bechler of the snow scenes,
Obwald, Tooby, Leibl, Marees, and a very strongly conceived and
soundly modelled nude by the Munich artist, Ernest Liebermann, one of
the most gifted of the younger men and no relation of Meister Max of
the same name. Local art in Vienna did not give me a thrill. I
attended a retrospective exhibition of two half-forgotten
mediocrities, Carl Rahl and Josef Hasslwander, and also the autumn
exhibition in the Kuenstlerhaus. There, amid miles of glittering,
shiny, hot paint, I found the best manipulator of paint to be a man
bearing the slightly American name of John Quincy Adams, whose
residence is given in the catalogue as Vienna. He has studied John
Sargent to advantage and knows how to handle his medium, knows values,
an unknown art in Germany and Austria except to a few painters. The
glory of Vienna art is in her museums and in the private collections
of Prince Liechtenstein and Count Czernin.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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