AUSTRALIAN ART.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 13377, 19 March 1909, Page 7

AUSTRALIAN ART.

BANQUET TO A WELL-KNOWN SCULPTOR. United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. LONDON, March 17. At a banquet given iv honour of Mr Bertram Mackennnl, the Australian sculptor, who was recently ma«e an Associate of the Royal Academy, the guests included a number of Australian ( x-Ciovernors and artists. lx>rd Tennyson, presiding, referred to Mr Mackennal as a pioneer. A noble and individual Australian art had yet to arise which, would be the glory of the Commonwealth and reinvigorate British art.

Mr Mackennal, replying, said the riystery of the bush and its vast silences and distances would some day inspire a great art effort. The Federal Capital would afford an opportunity to create a monument to Federation, proving this jjeneration's full belief in the greatness of the nation yet to come.

"The Times" a month aco described Mr Bertram Mackennal's bust of the late William Howard Russell as one of the few thoroughly satisfactory works that St. Paul's Crypt contained, and spoke of the sculptor as one likely to further the advance made in sculpture in England during the past twenty years.