Читать книгу A guide book of art, architecture, and historic interests in Pennsylvania - Various Authors - Страница 12

A QUIET HOUR

Painted by John W. Alexander Courtesy of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

P.M., Sundays, 1.00 P.M. to 5.00 P.M.; fee for special exhibitions; was the first art institute in America, founded, 1805; its history is in no small measure the history of American art itself, and dates back to 1791, when Charles Willson Peale attempted to organize in Philadelphia a school of art; from this grew, in 1794, the Columbianum, which held the first exhibition of paintings, in 1795, in Independence Hall. The permanent collection of paintings and sculpture now includes the Gallery of National Portraiture, with the largest number of portraits by Gilbert Stuart to be seen in any museum; and notable works by other early American painters—Benjamin West, Washington Allston, Matthew Pratt, the Peales, Sully, Neagle, Inman, Eichholz, Trumbull, and Bass Otis; the Gibson Collection, largely composed of the Continental schools; Temple collection of modern American paintings; important works by many of the world’s greatest artists; and the Phillips collection of about forty thousand etchings and engravings. Annual exhibitions are, miniatures, water colors, illustration, and etchings in November and December; oil painting and sculpture in February and March, considered the salon of living American artists; also special exhibitions and lectures on art. The Academy coöperates with the system of International Catalogue Exchange.

Since the beginning of the Academy’s existence, men and women whose names have become illustrious in the annals of American art have been enrolled as students. The schools are equipped in every way to teach the technique of painting and sculpture, the faculty is composed of representative artists of the day; collections, galleries, classrooms, models, and casts are admirably fitted to afford instruction fully equal to that obtainable in Europe. Many substantial prizes are awarded annually to students upon the merits of their work. The William Emlen Cresson Travelling Scholarships send, on an average, sixteen students abroad yearly for four months, and enable them to return to the Academy and continue their studies without payment of tuition fee. The Fellowship of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, organized 1897, sends out annually two exhibitions of original oil paintings by notable artists; one to other cities, the other to the Philadelphia public schools, where they remain one month in each school; while there, the paintings are explained by a member of the Fellowship to school children, thus teaching them true appreciation of art. A Picture Purchase Fund was established in 1912, with which pictures have been bought, from Fellowship Exhibitions, and placed in Philadelphia libraries and public schools.

John Graver Johnson Museum of Paintings, 510 South Broad Street, left by bequest April, 1917, to the City of Philadelphia, is open to the public; throughout Europe and America this vast collection of old and modern masters is famous for extent and merit. “No other American collection has so wide a range and so even a quality,” says F. Mason Perkins; it contains scores of examples which could not be duplicated at any price. Noted for the completeness of different schools of painting.

Philadelphia School of Design for Women, southwest corner of Broad and Master Streets; first industrial art school in this country; similar to the “Ecoles Professionelles des Femmes,” in Paris; was founded in 1844 by Mrs. Sarah Peters, the American wife of the British Consul in Philadelphia, in her own house; later, the Franklin Institute assumed charge of the classes until 1853, when it was incorporated, and a Board of Directors elected. Its aim is to put art students in touch with business demands, as well as to cultivate, to the highest degree, their artistic ability. The Normal Art Course embodies all the special studies required by modern educators for teachers of art and design, and with courses in the fine arts, illustration, and costume illustration; has trained many women, now earning handsome emoluments and winning distinction. The residence on Broad Street, forming entrance to the school, which occupies large buildings in the rear, was the home of Edwin Forrest, a famous tragedian; the fine gallery which he erected to house his collection of paintings, now at the Forrest Home for Actors at Holmesburg, is used for annual exhibitions of the school’s painting classes. Edwin Forrest died here in 1872 and John Sartain in 1897; John Sartain was celebrated as a mezzotint engraver, and lived here with his daughter, Miss Emily Sartain, then principal of the school, herself a skilled painter, and engraver in mezzotint; who with her well chosen faculty of eminent artists, carried to a prosperous fulfilment Mrs. Peters’ initiative effort.

Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art was founded in 1876, as a concrete embodiment of the lessons taught by the Centennial Exhibition, and has developed forms of artistic craftsmanship that were practically unknown in America. The Museum is housed in Memorial Hall, Fairmount Park, memorial of the Centennial; Modern Renaissance; architect, Herman J. Schwarzmann. Open free, Mondays, 12.00 M., other days 9.30 A.M., closing 5.00 P.M., Sundays, 1.00 P.M. to 6.00 P.M. Established as a museum of art in all its branches and technical application, with a special view to the development of the art industries of the state. Among its important collections are the W. P. Wilstach paintings, about five hundred old masters, with their schools; and contemporary international paintings, belonging to the City of Philadelphia; with $700,000 endowment, interest to be used for their care and increase, by the Commissioners of Fairmount Park; among the many brilliant artists represented are, Whistler, Munkácsy, Sorolla, Zuloago, Velasquez, the Barbizon, Italian, and Dutch Schools of Landscape. The famous Bayeux tapestry is here; laces; vestments; porcelains; enamels; carved ivories; period furniture; some of the Edwin Atlee Barber collection of American pottery and porcelains; Lewis collection of Swiss stained glass, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; Frishmuth collection of colonial antiquities. A Bureau of Identification is maintained where art objects may be classified.

The school is at the northwest corner of Broad and Pine Streets; porch of this building, facing Broad Street, is a fine example of Tuscan architecture, erected, 1828. The school has forty instructors. Free scholarships are given in each county of this state. This is the leading school in America in associating the study of art with practical training; through its equipment students not only design, but actually manufacture; it includes a complete textile plant with looms, dye house, and all related appliances which make possible the production of most artistic fabrics; other courses are cast and wrought metal; furniture; leather work; pottery; garden furniture in cement; mosaic; also the Normal Art Courses, illustration; architectural drawing; modeling; interior decoration; book binding. Classes are attended by men and women, who pursue exactly the same studies. Graduates are sought to fill lucrative positions as designers; artistic craftsmen; and art teachers.

Drexel Institute, Thirty-second and Chestnut Streets. A day and evening technical school of Art, Science, and Industry for men and women; founded by Anthony J. Drexel, 1891; Renaissance, brick; architects, Wilson Brothers. The leading American and European current periodicals relating to art, science, and technology are in the library. Art Gallery contains collections owned by John D. Lankenau, works by modern German masters, and Anthony J. Drexel, works of International, contemporary, modern painters. The Museum, open free 10.00 A.M. to 5.00 P.M. daily, except Sundays, includes examples of Industrial Art and the Decorative Arts of India, Egypt, China, Japan, and Europe.

Graphic Sketch Club, 719 Catharine Street, founded by Samuel S. Fleisher in 1899, to provide, free, an art center which should give the culture craved by many intelligent young people, to whom it had been denied by circumstances. The Club House is open only at night, Saturday afternoons, and all day Sundays. This is an Art Club in effect, as well as name; rooms are artistically furnished in beautiful color harmonies, and embellished with choice bronzes bought at our Academy exhibitions, and fine porcelains. Students are educated in art, for the practical good it will do them, and cultural growth; all are day workers. The faculty is composed of well known artists; classes include portrait and still life painting; illustration and sculpture. From this school have gone some of the most original workers in the schools of the Academy of the Fine Arts. Landscape classes are in session during the summer. Lectures are given on art or musical topics. Membership in the Club is attained by attendance in the classes for three years.

Public Art School, Park Avenue and Master Street, founded by Charles G. Leland, now under the direction of the Board of Public Education; open to pupils in grammar grades of public schools. A course of study was planned, including drawing, clay modeling, and wood carving, to train students to originate design, and do the manual work as well, so that the designer should be the artisan also.

Art Club, 220 South Broad Street. Annual exhibition of paintings and sculpture, gold medal awarded; and special shows by individual artists.

Art Jury, City Hall, Philadelphia, created by Act of Legislature, 1907, providing, “That in every city of first class, there shall be an Art Jury, composed of the Mayor and eight others, of whom shall be, one each, painter, sculptor, architect, and Park Commissioner, to pass upon design and location of all buildings; bridges; arches; fountains; or fixtures to be erected in the city.”

City Parks Association, City Hall.

Darby School of Painting, Fort Washington, Montgomery County. Outdoor classes. Hugh H. Breckenridge, 10 South 18th Street, Philadelphia.

Fairmount Park Art Association, organized, 1871. 320 S. Broad Street.

Pennsylvania Society of Miniature Painters, organized, 1901. Annual fall exhibition, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

Philadelphia Chapter, American Institute of Architects, 1301 Stephen Girard Building; organized, 1869.

The Philadelphia Sketch Club (men), 235 South Camac Street, organized, 1860. Annual fall exhibitions of members’ work; also special exhibitions.

Philadelphia Water-Color Club, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, annual international exhibitions; also Traveling exhibitions of members’ work.

Plastic Club, women, 247 South Camac Street; organized, 1897. Annual and special exhibitions; lectures, and sketch classes.

T-Square Club, 204 South Quince Street, founded, 1881. Annual architectural exhibition; drafting; decorative painting; modeling; and architecture in coöperation with Society of Beaux-Arts Architects, New York City.

The D’Ascenzo Studios, for Stained Glass, 1604 Summer Street, founded twenty years ago, include designing; painting; firing; and glazing; work is begun and completed, in both modern and antique, with preference for the antique school, for architectural fitness and conventionality; also glass mosaic and mural decoration. D’Ascenzo’s art may be seen in many important churches and buildings in this country; in the Chapel at Valley Forge, and in Philadelphia may be mentioned St. Mark’s Protestant Episcopal Church, Frankford; St. James’ Protestant Episcopal Church, Twenty-second and Walnut Streets; St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church, Twentieth and Locust Streets; Synagogue Rodeph Shalom, Philadelphia.

William Willet and Annie Lee Willet Studios, for Stained Glass, 226 South Eleventh Street, formerly of Pittsburgh. While all the world is deploring the loss of the magnificent old glass in the cathedrals of Europe, here the art of fused glass has been raised to such perfection that their great windows have all that the old work has, of depth, glow, and shadow, under modern conditions of stability; among their notable windows are, the Sanctuary Window, West Point Military Chapel, New York; Proctor Hall, the Graduate School, Princeton, New Jersey, great west window; many in the churches and public buildings of Pittsburgh, Chicago and elsewhere; in and near Philadelphia, in Summit Presbyterian Church, Carpenter and West View Streets, Germantown; St. Michael’s Sanctuary window, High Street, Germantown; John Chambers Memorial Church; The Buchanan Memorial, St. Nathaniel’s Church, Kensington; the Harrison Memorial; Holy Trinity Church, Nineteenth and Walnut; the Leta Sullivan in the Assumption, Strafford.

Notable private art collections in Philadelphia, that may sometimes be seen by writing for permit, which for variety and value, have few peers are:

THE TRAGIC MUSE

From the Edward Hornor Coates Memorial Collection

Painted by Violet Oakley Courtesy of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

P. A. B. Widener’s, several hundred choice and rare paintings, mostly masterpieces of great artists of the Renaissance, and modern.

The W. L. Elkins; many fine examples of medieval and modern portraiture, landscape and genre painting.

The John McFadden, best collection of solely eighteenth century English paintings in this country.

The Edward T. Stotesbury, masterpieces of the English School and international contemporary art.

Should these collections accompany the Wilstach, now in Memorial Hall, to the Municipal Art Museum in Fairmount Park, now under construction, it would begin its career with a wealth of paintings, more comprehensive and valuable than any that ever inaugurated a similar institution, not excepting the Louvre, Pitti, Dresden, National in London, and Metropolitan, New York, which grew from small beginnings, thus placing the highest products of art within equal and easy reach of all classes. This Museum will constitute the central feature of a comprehensive plan in progress, at the head of the Parkway, for a real art center, more imposing in scale and impressive in its entire effect than any similar art center in any American City. The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts has been granted a site facing the Fairmount Plaza, also the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art.