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The American Academy at Rome.
. in M 1:, Sat urtl 11y.
HE plumb line of the world’s new
T interest in all phases of art is
again pointing to Rome, where the
1m lous national academies of art are now
retovering from the shock of the war,
and where new excavations are inclosing
one after the other layers of
former civilizations and for-
gotten forms of beauty.
' Twenty-live nrtists are hard
at work this year in the
American Academy. An equal
numb r are busy in the
Frenc Academy. the oldest
foreign school of art in Rome,
which goes back to the days
of Louis XIV. The British
school is now solidly on its
feet after a period almost of
suspension during the war,
and the Spanish school,
which crowns the honey col-
ored Fiona (M 'Spagna. has
reopened its doors. Only the
Belgian school remains closed
temporarily for want of
funds.
These academies represent
the vanguard of national
tastes und present an inter-
esting variety of method and
iiuuglnutitm. The
school tends toward the clas-
sical and toward a merging
of a mutual worlt, the French
” displays a marked individual-
ism and the liritisli a sturdy
modernist trend.
Amer ican
In a large sense Rome is
(let-iding what sort of public
buildings and monuments will
go up in America to form the
taste of the next generation.
The artists who finish three years work
in the academy here return with their
ideas formed, and return also with an
authority which is bound to influence
their colleagues in America.
,' The reaction of the American mind
coming into contact with the art forms of
Home, Greece and earlier civilizations is
it very positive one. Traveling circus
baroque with curllcues of heavy plaster
and overnourlshed cherubinl is doomed.
American spellbinder architecture of the
sort designed primarily to eat up public
appropriations is bound to give way more
and more to the straightforward building
' on simple lines. The next generation of
Young America will know enough to
laugh at the building with Doric columns,
Colonial doorway, Renaissance windows,
with a Byzantine mlnnet tacked on the
top.
a: The ideal of the American Academy
since it was founded in 1897 has been to
‘maieIan intensive study of Greek and
. Roman classics the main work of the
three years awarded to Rome prize win-
ners. There are prominent American ar-
tists among the trustees of the academy
who realize fully the need in America of
pointers. sculptors and architects, who
balance their own ideas by a. thorough
knowledge of classic art.
The work of the artists at the Ameri-
can Academy is better to be appreciated
yhen compared with that of the fellow:
in the other academies. The British
bohool ll distinctly modern. English or-
tists ruin rather to rebound from the
em monuments dbout them than to
”shallot. them. They are stimulated by
the sunshine god the clear Roman dime-J
phuo happy colored, bold imprec-
Ilodflio and oven expressionieflc pic-
W Mfg: ”egg-—
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An American sculptor I!
work l'n one of the four
general studio. in
the Academy.
lures as modern as
thosé done in radical
art centers of Paris
and of lierlin.
The British school
has only existed as
an art academy for
ten years, and there-
fore, as the director.
Dr. Thomas Ashby.
said, has not rolled
up traditidns like the
American Academy.
The department of
archmology, art and
letters has been in
existence for {wenty
years, however, and
the school possesses
a. notable library on
ancient and classi- "
cal art. In fact resenrch has constituted
one of the great achievement: of the
school, which is now working among
other things on a catalogue of municipal
collections of ancient sculpture.
In 1912 depa: 1.2m“ oi architecture.
sculpture, painting and engraving were
added. and the school is now lodged in
a white marble structure next to the
Italian Museum of Modern Art. It has
accommodations for only tourtun fol.
lows, who are on scholarships club.
llshed from fund! from the only internu-
uonal art exhibition that ever made
money. the one held in the Crystal Pg;-
ace in London in 1851.
Although the British school in still
soyoungtbntlittlouubeiududotitl
work it can point to solid accomplish.
ment on the port of moral artists Who
have completed their study Two groan
emu. QBrIdshow.onorchitoot.&nd
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214:4
The proposed American Embnuy IQ Rome.
designed at the Academy.
toc’t in Philip T. Shutue; the sculp-
Eor Thongonec, the load-
ucnpe artist Edwnrd C.
meow 30mm evaluate amour. ' . ‘ i‘ ' 7‘ “
I he IN“:-
Low-on.
won the competition
Guards memorial wh. c ~
struzted in a few yars in Loud-.1: :—
lin Gill, another graduate. new “as sev-
eral canvases in the Ward Museum at
London. His work shows the decided
modern tendency which is a character-
istic of the school.
The most notable school in Rome for
its traditions in the French. Louis XVI.
built it for young artists whom he re-
cruited to make copies of pictures and
statuary in Italian palaces for Versailles
and for his vorioul chateau. When
royal prerogatives were abolished the
Academy become o school where the
fellow- were picked purely for their
artistic mility in all of the arts, includi
ing millio- Nanci? n mailed the ochool
in the Villa undid. on mpooing palace,
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§’_ .7 of things iinds himself handicapped be-
'3? 3 cause he has no specific space or wall to
3 .9 cover.
1, ‘ There is. for instance, one artist who
' _. ‘, paints pictures in gigantic proportions
. adapted only for a cathedral or a railroad
.~ station. He is handicapped because there
7; ‘ E is no museum whichflcould hang his
paintings.
Then there are two other drawbacks
which go together with the old traditions.
Because Louis XIV. wanted copies, one
of the conditions of the prizes still is that
artists must make a copy of some classi-
cal monument or art object. As this is
usually a bore and superfluous because
the artist is Supposed to have his technic
and‘power of observation before coming
to Rome, artists very often get an Italian
hack sculptor or painter to do their copy
tor them without trying to deceive any
onecas to how they fulfilled this anti<
quated regulation.
The other limiting condition is that
artists must keep to alle‘
gorical or historical subjects.
Such objects as railroad
\trains and even modern
trousers and 5!: irts are con~
sidered far too profane.
But the French artists
who come to Rome usually
have enough ability and in—
genuity to rise above the
regulations. They have the
great inspiration of work-
ing in the studios. with the
art treasures about them of
fellows who a. century or
two ago were making art
history. In the salon. for
example, there was a series
of Gobelin tapestries of a.
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rumors“: ‘1’
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.Ln‘.‘ the very amiable director, M. biblical snbiect. noble in conceitlion 9"“:
his fellows are ’quite willing line in execution. The director declare:
the aims of the academy that these were one of the first sets 0
output before d13— tapestries to leave the Gobelin 100mm
ideals one is struck Then there were busts in bronze and
first by the brilliant but uneven talent terru cotta. also the {work of former
of the artists. The war has left no follow. which were already classics. _
marks here in young artists killed or re. The American Academy is essentlauy
tar-dad in their work- -'i‘en oi the fifteen ' a workshop for the artists and builders
fellows were married, living with their of our skyscrapers. our villas and our
wives and children in their small studios, parks. The Academy is housed in several
preoccupied with the problems at llvli. commodious buildings on severe Ren-
hood on their small pensions as well_ul_ nuisance lines. not on the Juniculum
with their art. Hill. the highest point in. Rome. Like
The fellows of the French lendemy
work absolutely independently of each industry. ‘tho studios are large and light
other. They do not collaborate on a com- and built tor work. “if? .
man problem such as building and deco- mutilate come and go with yet-led
rating a public building one villo. Each impressions. A cggtaln Chime M
does his work thinkiiig of the my in spent‘niéw minutes at the Academy and
Paris which will pass on it. Too men comeswoywithanimpression oflnnguld
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laboratories of a university or of a large _
We: visitor mm polity, sculptor and
1922.
Painters and Architect‘s Revive Busy
Activities Interrupted by War—‘—
OZd Rivalries Resumed
Occasionally visitors confessed they felt
that they had not received enough atten-
tion.” .
There is a reason for these conflicting
reactions. The impressions of palatial ac-
commodations could only have been gath—
ered from standing outside and contem-
plating the gate and courtyard. These
are built on impressive prope .rtions w. Mir:
exceed the modest spacing of studios and
libraries inside the main building, The
other criticisms are also partly founded
on. fact. The scholarship holder receive
$1,000 a year, and living in many respectq
costs as much as it does in New York or
Chicago. They cannot give banquets
very often and themselves have a simpla
diet. Then the studios are not 09'ch at all
times. Nothing is more distur'ing to
concentrated art work than a constant
stream of visitors. The ”management
within these limitations gives VlSlIOl'S 3
cordial welcome. 7 ‘
No characteristic is more
standing than the works“. op strong-her
about the American Academy. The Stu-I
tiles are light and spacious and not clot-1
iered with too much furniture. The
twenty-five artists now here are all of
them busy on practical problems for the
May annual exposition in Rome, the some
0":-
one which is given a few months later in
New York. There is little dilettantism
about these studios. The tabla-s are cleared
for work. The rooms are not made junk
shops for miscellaneous trinkets picked
up at the antique shops and rug fairs.
They also are not turned into board-
ing houses for relatives and friends 33
most studios in Rome are, t‘SPC-Cldiiy a:
the Easter season. Even wives are taboo
at the Academy, Pri;3 winners who are
married or reluc-
tantly perznittel t.)
have their wires {:1
Rome, but officially
at the ace they
do not txi. . .
The three years ‘5
the fellow a; the
American Academy
are three years given
to concentrated
study and work. He
is usually an artist who
has finished most of his
technical - tudy already in
America and who comes, if
81f architect, with several
years' practical experience
at designing buildings. In
Rome all the fellows have
problems, specific tasks con.-
’ nected with their scholarships,“
and as the most powerful incenfi
tive a tradition of solid accom-
plishment of 300 fellows behind,
‘them to maintain. Such names as
Burnham, Laiarge, Saint Gaudens.
French and Blashfield. interwoven.
with the history of the academy, 3rd
a spur to "carry on.’
In the pale gray city below and in:
the colonnading hills are layer on la) 81'.
of former civilizations. The touns ac'
cumulate one above another like the
rings on a tree. In these rings are the
treasured Greek, Roman and older Etrusw
can models which form the basis for
the study of the American art students.
The Renaissance too has left some of
its most lavish masterpieces in Rome.
But here the American fellow is up
clincd to pause. The snare and pitfall
to many an art student who comes ta
Rome has been to be carried away by:
the brilliancy and splendor of Renaldo
sauce architecture and painting. Onco‘
the taste for the orgy of color and the
broad sweeping lines. which do hog
correspond to an idea but to a sensatlojng‘
is acquired an artist in Rome is likelsfi
to give way to an imitative splendor t
often passing into excessive baroqulds
which is lacking even in the charm pg
originality. The American artists and
tectaduring their three Years 8
me are inclined to remain mo
severely classic than the art about th
and more so than they later became wh
v their backgrg Q...
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In addition to 8 vol tary fidelity .
studies the Marleen t
Norwalk Chronicler