ART WORLD

And no craftsman, of whatsoever craft he be, shall be found any more in thee; and the sound of a millstone shall be heard no more at all in thee.

—Revelation 18:22

289 Art Works As Tax Payment

In Mexico, painters and sculptors can pay taxes with their own work. Each April when taxes are paid, an artist hands in the work which he believes covers his debt to government. A commission of experts decides if it is acceptable. The work becomes the nation’s property.

290 Napoleon Rejects Money For Art

The victorious Napoleon demanded twenty of the choicest pictures of the Duke of Parma to be sent to the Museum of Paris. To save one of these works of art—the celebrated picture of St. Jerome—the Duke offered the equivalent of two hundred thousand dollars.

Napoleon declined the sum, stating to the army, “The sum which he offers will soon be spent, but the possession of such a masterpiece at Paris will adorn that capital for ages, and give birth to similar exertions of genius.

—Little’s Historical Lights

291 World’s Largest Painting

The largest painting ever done by man was one by John Banyard in 1846. The canvas extended 3 miles long and depicted 1,200 miles of actual sceneries from the mouth of Mississippi to New Orleans.

Being 12 feet wide and over 16,000 feet long, the whole thing was exhibited by being passed between two upright revolving pillars on the stages of large auditoriums. Although it required two hours to be shown, it was a long-term success during its years of exhibition in both America and Europe. It was finally purchased by an Englishman who took it to India, where it vanished from sight.

292 Art Before And After

In the early days of oil painting, artists like the Van Eyck brothers painted with microscopes, and it is possible to count the tiny pearls on the robe of one of their queens, the hairs of an angel’s head, or the stubble of a man’s beard. This was one form of “truth” in art.

By the end of the nineteenth century, the Impressionists were taking blobs of paint and smearing them upon canvas with a broad brush. Close at hand, the effect was meaningless. Standing across the room, with the proper light upon the picture and with eyes half closed, one could get a distinct impression of what the artist was trying to convey. These latter masters insisted that theirs was another form of “truth” in art.

—Donald Grey Barnhouse

293 Mao A Saint?

Someone anonymously donated a portrait to the Vatican. It was accepted and interpreted to symbolize “a devoted missionary priest” and it was hung near a portrait of Pope Paul VI. It hung there for more than a month—until someone recognized it as a portrait of Chairman Mao at the age of twenty-seven.

—Christian Victory

294 Meant As A Joke

In London, Jean Wiggins mistakenly sent her two-year-old daughter’s painting to the neighborhood art exhibition of professional adult painters, instead of to a children’s competition as originally intended. Surprise: the painting entitled “Sunset,” described by enthusiastic critics as “a chaotic splash of colour” won the certificate of merit.

Again—British painter James Nobles submitted two paintings to the Royal Academy—one representing his usual meticulous style and called “Herring for Tea” and the other entitled “Galaxy.” In painting “Galaxy,” he had spent about 30 minutes splashing yellow and white paint on a blue canvas. The academy rejected the first and accepted “Galaxy.” “It was meant as a joke,” Noble later confessed, to test the Academy’s standards.

295 Bits Of Abstract

In the Munich’s Can de Loo Gallery Italian painter Pinot Gallizio did a booming business by snipping his 10- and 20- yard canvasses of abstract art into appropriate lengths and selling them to any who wanted to buy. “Normal quality” sold for $25 per yard; “more profound quality” for $60 per yard. Leftovers went at a discount.

—Prairie Overcomer

296 Chimpanzees As Artists

Hardly had the chimpanzees in the Portland, Ore., zoo been introduced to poster paints than the talented little critters turned art into a cottage industry. Their work has been so well received that the zoo has been selling their paintings.

Now, a Seattle organization, the Foundation for the Advancement of Human Awareness, has presented the chimps an award “for advancing a better understanding of animals among the human population.”

The last recipient of an award from the foundation was Henry Kissinger.

297 Art In The Making

William Green, 23, a student at the Royal College of Art, revealed his painting technique. First, he puts a large, fresh white canvas on the floors; then does the following in the order named:

1. Pour paint and a tint of printer’s ink on it.

2. Jump up and down on the paint, dance on it, and skip over the surface.

3. Ride over the canvas on a bicycle, skidding to scatter the paint; later use the bicycle to spread it around further.

4. Soak the canvas in paraffin.

5. Shovel sand on the painting to give “added texture.”

His paintings sell for up to 100 pounds. ($280).

—United Press

298 Epigram On Art World

•     Art is the universal diplomat. We seek French painting, and love the French; we read Russian novels, and love the Russians; we hear German music, and love the Germans. If races and nations communicated with each other solely through the medium of their art, would there be any national prejudice?

—Forbes Watson

•     A zealous art student went to a gallery and spent a bewildered hour looking over abstract and cubist works. She was finally attracted to a painting consisting of a black dot on a field of white and framed in brass. “How much for this?” she asked.

“That’s the light switch,” she was told.

—Chicago Tribune

•     A man who purchased a small piece of abstract sculpture from an art gallery later received a letter from the gallery. It began: “Dear Sir or Madman.”

—Evening Standard, London

•     In 1961, a Matisse hung upside down for 47 days before a visitor to the New York Museum of Modern Art caught the mistake. A record wrong-side-up display.

See also: Fashions ; Musical World ; Skillfulness.