WHERE WOMAN IS MAN'S EQUAL.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3136, 25 September 1922, Page 8

WHERE WOMAN IS MAN'S EQUAL.

(By L. G. Redmond Howard, late Editor of Art.) Then' are only two positions still close to women to-day—the House of Lords and the Royal Academy—for goth the Bar and the pulpit are open to them. II ever there vyats a case made out for their equality in art and their right to equal honors it is that made by the exhibition of pictures by feminine artists now on show at the Daily Express Woman's Exhibition at Olympia. Never before has such a collection of works been brought together for the simple reason that it did not exist. A couple of decades or so ago women were still, with a few exceptions like Rosa Bonheur and Lady Butler, more or less unknown in art. or spoken of with curiosity or pity—which many Victorian amateurs certainly deserved It is this which makes the collection selected by Mrs Laura Knight, Sir William Orpen, R.A., and Mr Paul Kenodv, the famous author and critic, such an absolute revelation. It proves that art has ceased to be merely a pastime—it is a profession, and all professions depend on merit. Few associate St, James' Palace, lor instance, with real industrious craftsmanship, but the work of Lady Helena Gleichen, the top lights of whose studio can be seen over the wall leading into the park, proves that its prominence! is in no way due to the courtesy usually shown to 'those of royal blood. In range the exhibition is probaib V the most catholic example it is possible to conceive, for it covers everything from academic portraits to futurism, thus showing, if nothing else, that women have all the versatility of the male artist. True, there is no Augustus John, no Oirpen. no Sargent, no Nevineon among them, but it i« quite simple to parallel most of the great names in English art. Mrs Maltwood, for example, whose bronze. "The Mills of God," stands out among the sculpture, might be called Ibe Kpstcin among the women. Brangwvn finds a parallel m A. St. John Partridge: Duncan (.'rant iinds his counterpart in Vanessa Bell; Alfred Wolmark in Julia Creamer, though she is emerging as an individual after being a faithful disciple. As to the London g|roup. Ruth iJoggett represents all that is best in such types as Oilman and Giuner, but with her own individuality emerging all' the while. Again, take Walter Sickerfe; he has his representatives in Ethel Sands- and Sylvia Oosse. and Napier Heniy, the well-known seascape painter, in Alice Fanner. The British school of portraiture, again, is well represented: i" Gertrude dew Waves, Flotra Lion, and Ann Fearon Walk'e, just as is the Brit;<*h school of miniatures by Mrs Byaui Shaw and Mrs Gottschalk, and the British school of still life by such work as that of Isabel Codrington. The one thing that strikes one about the whole collection is the absolute masculinity of power and outlook in the work, and the fact that the sickly amateurism of the Victorian society woman can find no place in it. K ven the work of the very youngest ol' the exhibitors, Pauline Konr ./, incidentally the daughter of the wellknown art critic, shows a, mastery of handling and grasp of composition rare even in schools of advanced men students. Standing out. facile prineeps. is, of course, the work of Mrs Laura Knight with her famous gold medal (San Francisco Exhibition)-of "The Artist and Hvv Model"—typical of paintings which, had she been a man, would have placed her amid the immortals of llio Royal Academy. Will she be the first to open those conservative gates to women! It is a pity that some permanent home could not be found for the exhibition, or at least it be made the subject of a monograph, for it is a record of progress by English women in art the like of which no two decades can show. It i.s nothing less than a. national achievement, and should remove the last obstacle that stands in the way of women Royal Academicians.