PICTORIAL EDUCATION.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXXIII, Issue 15968, 29 June 1912, Page 10

PICTORIAL EDUCATION.

Ix portions of the evidence submitted to the Education Commission the smouldering dissatisfaction of teachers and guardians with the prevalent tone and theme of the modern picture theatre breaks out afreshNo institution has made more phenomenal progress during the last decade than the übiquitous kinematograph, and no institution, perhaps, has leaped into a fiercer light of controversy. At present the discussion is confined almost entirely to the effect of the "picture show " upon tho juvenile mind, and as far as the mature pleasure-seeker is concerned fall weight must be given to tho negative argument, which sets forth that the pictures arc cheaper than betting and eai'er than whisky. The negative

argument, however, does not in any way meet the grave charges which educationists and parents alike have mado from timo to time regarding tho matter and the atmosphere which often greet the youthful mind and eye at this kind of entertainment. The proprietor's business is to amuse, not to instruct. If visualised vaudeville and petrified melodrama pay best they will predominate, whatever 6pecioue promises may be made to people who want something better. It is true that an occasional bid is made for the patronage of the children, but there is often a vast difference in this respect between the judgment of the parent and tho teacher, on the one hand, and the judgment of the entertainer, on the other. Whichever may be right, there can be no doubt that tho pictures are exercising a very strong influence on our young people, and that the trend of that influence is being assailed with ominous frequency. Psychology adds its testimony to the rest in affirming tho immense power of visual impressions on immature minds and characters. Bunyan put the same truth in the veil of allegory two centuries ago by pouring visionary armies through Ear-Gate and Eye-Gate.

Yet with all this admitted it is difficult to find a final solution of tho problem.. To a sturdy democracy "censorship" has a medieval flavour of the pillory and the ducking-stool, and it is not from the decaclents that the literary censorship of Britain is receiving the hardest knocks today. We think, however, there is one democratic and effective method of dealing with the question. A national picture theatre for children, worked by the Educational Department, as the "School Journal" is worked now, is surely within the range of practical reform. We are already far on the way to the Fabian Utopia, whero the means and the processes of the country are quietly and efficiently nationalised. Our railways, our postal system and our lending department compare more than favourably with any similar services controlled by private enterprise, and every year sees an extension of the functions and responsibilities of the State on broad and beneficent lines. When the present scope and power of tho picture-habit are realised it will be found in the end as legitimate and fitting a subject of national concern as tho monthly reading matter of our schools. Once the picture show were nationalised the Dead wood Dick element would disappear from its programmes altogether and the teacher's opportunities to obtain tho best results from the new material committed to his care would be enormously enlarged. Wo do not anticipate, of course, that the youthful picturegoer would be cozened of his lawful enjoyment by tho creation of such a department; the spirit of Gradgrind is nearly as extinct as that of the earlier educator who pinned her faith to " prunes and prisms." A healthy, vivid, varied national picture theatre, it seems to us, could be worked into tho educational fabric of tho future with the happiest results, and if the upshot of the experiment were the nationalising of the picture theatre altogether the net result, wo are confident, would be a triumph for clean recreation and good citizenship.