ROYAL ACADEMY

Evening Post, Volume CXIX, Issue 127, 31 May 1935, Page 16

ROYAL ACADEMY

OHNIOtfS Ott ART

SPEECHES AT BANQUET

A KIND OR SHEET ANCHOR

(From'"The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, May 11. The Archbishop of Canterbury, proposing "The Royal Academy of Art," at the annual banquet of the Boyal Academy,, told a story of Gladstone and, Disraeli.

"I heard the other day a characteristicstory of Disraeli," he said. "Disraeli was attending this banquet, and he bad-been speaking on behalf of the Ministers of the Crown. He spoke in eloquent terms of the splendid triumphs and trophies of British art which he saw upoji these walls. Afterwards, on leaving, he remarked to a mend, ,*I never saw such a display of rubbish," This contrast between the public and the private word was afterwards reported to Mr. Gladstone. *Was it not flippant?' the narrator asked. "Flippant? It was • worse than'flippant, it was devilish.'"

Points from other speeches at this year's dinner were:-r-

Viscount Lee of Fareham: "There are some who would like the Academy to trim its sails to every shifting breeze, but that is a 1 manoeuvre which is usually more appropriate to mariners and politicians. The maintenance of discipline.is essential in any academic institution,. and I must confess to a speaking sympathy with the tired inotherioif-a tiresome child %ho claimed that spanking feok, yg less-timqjhan

argument, arid penetrated sooner to the seat of memory. . The State ought to ;take, an active part in. the. encouragement of British artists."

Sir John Martin-Harvey: "All art seems to be in a state of flux. There are many of us—the" die-hards in the world of art—who do snot like such changes. The existence of this Academy is, a sort of sheet anchor."

Sir W. Llewellyn: "We are convinced that the main trend of art^ can only flourish in the development of a healthy tradition which keeps in touch with the sympathies and perceptions of ordinary people. For how can the public benefit by arj which they do not understand arid which has very little or no relation to Nature? ' No great exhibition such as this, can cater alone for connoisseurs or 'high-brows,' but must provide'also for people of unsophisticated taste, who visit the galleries to find 'enjoyment and the satisfying of their own tastes. To do this they must have before them works that are intelligible, appealing, and attractive."

There was a cry of "No" when Sir John Simon remarked, "We must content ourselves with the saying of Leonardo that the most praiseworthy painting is that which,has'most conformity to the thing represented. Of course every artist always paints what he sees, but instances have occurred when one is constrained to speculate whether something has gone wrong with their eyesight."

Guests present included Lord Jellicoe, Lord Rutherford, Sir E. Home, and Professor A. P. Laurie.,

In an exhibition of early Bibles opened at Frankfort-on-Main recently were three Old Testaments in Hebrew dating from. 1488, 1492, and 1494.

. Seventy-two pounds of salt are consumed by the average person each year —half of -this as in manufactured things. '