Page:The New Yorker 0004, 1925-03-14.pdf/23

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The New Yorker
21

As we go to press the boy who has been selling carrots, canned soup and eggs at Reeves' all day, is nervously wrapping something in the store's best wrapping paper, preparing to lock the door and sneak down to the Waldorf. For he belongs to the Independents, and his name begins with an S, and as things go alphabetically, his picture might hang next to John Sloan's. By the time you read this you will know the worst, for the show opened Friday, and the dailies will have noted the high spots. Don't wait for us; go right ahead and form your own opinion.


In a week in which we learned that only hundreds saw the Toulouse-Lautrec exhibition at Wildenstein's instead of the thousands who should have crowded the galleries, and that even the smallest of the Arthur B. Davies water colors at Ferargil's cost $700, we were cheered by Frank London's exhibition at the Montross gallery. We haven't quite made up our minds about art. Some days we go in for the painter who has something to say, considering the way he says it secondary; other times we are all for the way a thing is said.

As à matter of fact London often chooses to say it with flowers. And when he does we like him most. Of all the moderns who have flowed under our ken in the last three months we have seen few we like as much as London. There is no to-do about London, no fancy foreword by a press agent. The Galleries, even, are non-committal. A business man, they say, who passed a year in Paris painting. When he makes enough he will go back and paint some more pictures. We hope it is soon, for here is a painter who carries his joy of painting over to the observer.


Willard L. Metcalf

Marie Sterner, who handled the magnificent show of Bellows recently, is sponsoring an exhibition by Randall Davey at the Jacques Seligmann Galleries. Most of the things are of the New Mexico sojourn, the thirty paintings divided between oil and water color. The latter have a bold simplicity about them that 'we like, a strength not often in water colors. And there is a sureness about all of Davey's things. A feeling that he put the paint on and left it there. And he is much bolder than some of his contemporaries, whom we will not name as it is not the thing to do in polite art circles. But Davey goes straight to the mark giving a definiteness to his portraits, especially the Boy In Blue and The Boy Hunter, that is exhilarating. The Randall Davey show continues until the end of this week.


It always gives us a thrill to see the pioneers. An unusual opportunity is there for any one with the same desire as we have. At Durand-Ruel's they are showing ten canvases by Sisley and ten by Pissarro. You probably won't go though, preferring to put it off until the masterpieces are scattered to the four winds or five collectors or whoever it is that buys master-pieces. But an hour at Durand-Ruel's would be more profitable than a day among the chromos of our best museum.


We plead to a fondness for certain galleries places where one knows what to expect. Dudensing, taking off time from his one great love, Stella, manages to gather an army of young painters around him. This week he is featuring five; Lloyd Parsons, Dudley Morrison, Elmer Schultz, Everett Henry and Herman Trunk, Jr. If you don't see what you want, ask for it. There are dozens more behind the green curtains and up in the loft.


We are glad to see a portrait that Wilford S. Conrow thoroughly wanted to do. His study of Dr. Gustavus A. Eisen at the Erich Galleries is undoubtedly the turning of the lane for this painter. It is a sorry job at its best, portrait painting, and Mr. Conrow seems to have had more than his share of deceased bank presidents et al. to do. When you look at the portrait you can see that in pleasing himself Mr. Conrow has also pleased the Doctor. A rather simple formula for portrait painting that most of them miss.


This will be the last week for you to see what the women can do. The National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors is holding its thirty-fourth exhibit in the Fine Arts Building, on West Fifty-seventh Street, We advise you not to go near your meal time; it gave And that is not meant in the way of us indigestion. And that is not meant in the way of disparagement. So much color, so many forms, so many windows, so many dreams. Only the old timers can approach it without vertigo. But as you get your gallery feet under you again, you can have a good time. The good old stuff takes the prizes.