EMPIRE ART EXHIBITION

Evening Star, Issue 21822, 11 September 1934, Page 1

EMPIRE ART EXHIBITION

LOAN COLLECTION AT WANGANUI GOVERNOR'S ADDRESS ART AND INDUSTRY MUST RE-WED [Per United Press Association.] , WANGANUI, September 10. The Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, in the presenbe of a large representation of the public, declared open to-day the exhibition of the Empire art loan collection at the Sarjeant Gallery. His Excellency was welcomed by the mayor, .Mr N* G. Armstrong, who presided. Lord Bledisloe said the collection owed its presence in the dominion to tho enterprise and artistic enthusiasm of Mr Percy Sargood, of Dunedin. It comprised pictures executed at different periods during the last sixty years, and the names of the artists represented were a guarantee that it was well worth inspection. Quite appropriately it included . modernist, impressionist, or cubist pictures, which, although not conforming to the canons of art laid down by the rigid technicians of the old school, were at least characteristic of the post-war period, and represented an important phase in artistic taste and expression. He confessed to being among those, who were sceptical as to its permanence or cultural value. However, these ebullitions of so-called modernism were not without their value in stemming ultra-conservatism in the use of pencil or palette, and stimulating originality of artistic conception. If New Zealand was to evolve a distinctive school of artistic effort, inspired perhaps by her incomparable scenic endowment and picturesque Polynesian association and folklore, it was right and proper that she should allow herself the fullest possible freedom in its expression, unfettered by old-world convention or want of reasonable elasticity of technique. The crying need of the day was the intimate association of art in all its higher manifestations with the lives of the people. The mechanisation of industry, its ever-increasing specialisation, and the shrinkage _of human industrial effort to a single isolated task in the building up of a single product in our factories, had threatened to kill the soul of man and his artistic instincts, as well as his resourcefulness and creative zeal. If man was to enjoy greater leisure .he must recover his soul and learn to_ indulge happily and profitably his artistic and literary instincts and_ cravings, and not merely those of physical hedonism. Concurrently with the artistic culture of the world’s workers there should'develop ail artistic improvement of their industrial output, and artists should lie encouraged by industrialists to participate sympathetically and zealously in the process. Three centuries ago craftmanship and the arts formed one vocation, and craftsmen of the highest repute were also great artists. _ There was now a growing consciousness throughout the civilised world that art must be once more married to industry. Opportunities for developing and accelerating this trend were especially abundant in a country like New Zealand, which possessed such natural treasures as greenstone, gold, and richly-grained timber, and was in a position to make her future hives of industry things of beauty, instead of blots upon the landscape. Let them carry art into their homes, and tho thoughts of the people develop a demand for what was beautiful, well proportioned, and spiritually satisfying. It was not necessarily the case that the application of art to the common things of life involved more expense, as by its encouragement they would be giving much-needed employment to many thousands of people, and incidentally augmenting the nation’s most precious asset—namely, its spirituality and love of all that is beautiful, harmonious, and ennobling.