The Washington Herald from Washington, District of Columbia • Page 32

S'W -'ban JirASPWf UflR HA 5 iT5 saawysfS w-j fft flT On (u.t -y Tas fefrVf esssgsa SMI 3i FiRSTjiSAlPfv'l t'V VJV-M vj sLaW" "awv- v. f- a HjyW sii MC y.x... i v4tMfrM I V.V-" 'Vf Ksvj4f HB rr? fi' .1 J335 EH Hi E2 G3 13 3 CD EST zm 4 -'(i jLI- flfTV EW YORK has taken the lid of solemnity off of art. The mid-Victorian by-law that art "may never condescend to use Its perfect skill except In ex- pressing the noblest conditions of life" has revocably grare of all artistic manifests-been torn up by the roots and in its place tlons. In literature, in drama.

In acting. has been planted the rollicking Idea that art and artists have a perfect right to be happy, care-free and humorous If they wish to. In other words, the Initial exhibition of the American Salon of Humorists has been held in the Folsom galleries In the metropolis. It Is the first exhibition of this sort that America has experienced, and the Folsom rooms were filled with throngs fT? rL As A -'is A ve a i A -4 mr mr 'f- mm 'CZf' that were puzzled, sometimes shocked and delighted in turn. They found art in caricature and caricature in art; some lightsome humor, some decorative fantasy, some bitter sarcasm and realism; not a great deal of beauty, Cat Jumping on Piano Keyboard! I ORNSTEIN PRODUCES MOST DISCORDANT MUSIC Locomotive Climbing High Grade! LIKE pictures of the terrors of the European war futurism 1 music invaded New York this last winter and frightened the life out of all the old time musicians In "dark and ugly manner." New York had to wait a long time to hear the harshest and most unconventional of musical compositions, but this season a flood of them came down upon the metropolis.

Musical futurism of almost all countries was Introduced Russian, English, French, German, Austrian, Belgium and even American. Only the Italian futurists who have in-Tented noise machines remained aloof, but some New Yorkers think that these noise-makers would have been better than many of the music-makers. The last and one of the harshest of the advanced compositions and for the lMt two yean one ol the saost Ulked- but qnlte a little item desire to teach by whimsy or by sudden shocks. "It seemed odd to me," said Louis Baury. who arranged the show, "that painting should be deemed the most Im humor and comedy may legitimately be artistic.

Why should art be. artistic only when solemn? "One of the basic American characteristics Is the sense of humor. When a traveling salesman sets out he must carry a stock of humor or he will not attract orders for his merchandise. In America humor Is the pith of the swift, electric atmosphere, that capitalization of the mo- 3C? TIOSS yAv VS' Va my'jUi' 'A" Wy. 'u Ask TV i-- 'il dJVS19A iftjl i.

a'K jLn -CV v'-V M.rtJ,t A' '-W riv r' i1 S. -f; vik 'i if x. rz tsj' X' i i-x '-x ment It is a thing as wide as a city street, as free as a prairie, as vivid as an incandescent sign. "It Is as impudent as a skyscraper, as warm as a handclasp, as true as the shift- lng crowds that give rise to It while they about works In Europe, was Alexander Scriabine's "Prometheus," which was played with the accompaniment of a colored light organ. Scriabine died only a few days ago In Moscow of blood poisoning.

Although in late years he had become an ardent disciple of dissonance he first became known as a regulation composer. His earlier works were of charming simplicity and melodiousness. "Prometheus" however was not the most futuristic thing New York heard. Another Russian. Leo Ornsteln, wrote and played the most discordant mnsle ever heard to New York.

Other composers nave written mnsle Intended to sound like a cat Jumping oa a piano keyboard and like a locomotive climbing a grade, bat they were saiM waaa ampared to Mr- Onutalm'a Uttto It" mv '''iCrK'" "-vrVvV af yis VI 4w vVvfr K4K3I t-wrasl! ESI rsss tcl ''fA VvKuryr. SPfW 'i vlrf fS a'J 1 SiVv Vi' mi dream and love and laugh and die. When we fully utilize this characteristic in our graphic arts something very fresh and notable in a new way should result." Most of the examples, according to Mr. Baury, were selected by the artists themselves. As a result, they Indicate what the humorists consider humor.

One thing the show demonstrates conclusively is that American humor is still in the melting pot, for Swedish, Spanish, German. French and Anglo-American viewpoints are all represented. The artists who are exhibiting are: Robert Henri, John Sloan, W. Glackens. Guy Pene du Bois, Boardman Robinson, George Bellows, O.

E. Cesare, Arthur Young, Glenn O. Coleman, Stuart Davis, H. J. Gllntenkamp, Oliver Herford, Her- bert Crowley, Mrs.

Helena Smith Dayton, composition called "Joy" or his "Wild Men's Dance." As yet no one except the composer himself has dared to play these compositions. A rival pianist was heard to remark that they are written with such obscure and unintelligible notation that no one else could even read them. At all events, except for rhythm, all of the rules of harmony and composition used by Mr. Ornsteln seem to have been in-rented by himself, and 'he has kept them all to himself. Some persons have expressed doubts as to whether he has used any rules, but that is absurd, because If he bad no method he could not possibly hare avoided striking' a beautiful chord occasionally by accident.

As It is, beauty sever eaters his music. To Jm really "ap to date" or a little. ahead of the times, the priadpal -requisite la 41asoMS.ee. Taara has sees macs discussion is i W5 P3 "4 la 5 Vfl i 4 "i'' I VH r' -i y. ma.

t- riv il lJ -sa ytmmm svi l9A foggssaa vsk-v5ukc yecttPvrzrjeEJ Marjorle Organ (Mrs. Robert Henri). Edith Dlmock (Mrs. Glackens), Herb Roth, Alfred Frueh, Frank Walts, Maurice Becker, L. R.

Chamberlain, Helen Dry-den, Cornelia Barns. "Pretentious exhibitions have so long been the rule among us, and latterly have been multiplying with such amazing fecundity, that our artists have been afforded almost no opportunity to continues Louis Baury. "Which, as the industrious Jack so perfectly demonstrated long ago In the nursery. Is liable to lead to a very sad condition. It is in an effort to forestall any such dire eventuality that this American salon of humorists is herewith assembled In an effort to reassert the authentic play instinct in its highest present national terms and remind us all once again of the dear, delicious.

Impish. regard to the music of Strauss, of Debussy, of Ravel and others of their class. Strauss, however. Is no longer a futurist; he Is a modernist. This is the music of today.

He has retained beauty, melody and The old rules of harmony mean little to him If he has a good reason for breaking them, but there Is always a reason. But with Mr. Ornsteln it Is different, as it is with Schoen-berg. Mr. Ornsteln has discarded them entirely, and Schoenberg applies them only on rare occasions, apparently to show the public that he once learned them.

Next to Mr. Ornsteln's music the harshest piano pieces heard In New York were some short works of Schoenberg. Here again Mr. Ornsteln was the only pianist sufficiently courageous to play them. Another composer who seems to have Invented a new type of dissonance all his own is Karol.Szymanowskl, whose compositions were introduced by David Saptrstein, pianist, and Paul Draper, tenor.

He also has followed set rules, most of which he evidently invented himself. Of orchestral works the least Intelligible' aad the most dissonant probably was Resnicek's "Schlemihl," played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The same orchestra played a symphonic poem by the American, Frederick 8. Converse, which was in parts similarly discordant, bnt Mr. Converse made the mistake from of the futurists of nsiag oaa really good melody.

Stravinsky's "Fireworks" was aasther piece of ultra modem oiehestrai 1 i. lf-t -v fa fc rf -yv jv.v j. ntww1 si rsi tt- wayward universality of this unshackled thing. "For the fact is that with our quaint modern notions of organization we have been turning play over to the untender mercies of specialists. And specialists make a business of anything they toucn.

"That is their little specialty. In sport they have given us the National League. In the drama they have fabricated the musical comedy. In the graphic arts theirs Is the development of the 'humorous "Now, the artists here gathered are not specialists in play or in humor, which is the name play likes to take when she goes a-Jaunting with pigment and crayon. Nor are they necessarily so presumptuous as to dream of competing In the mere business of being 'funny' with those who Pearl Is Favorite Jewel of America, Says Gem Expert PEARLS are the jewels of America.

Dr. George Kunz, noted gem expert, not long ago declared that more pearls are sold In this country than In Europe; that more than half of the finest private collections outside of royal jewel boxes are owned by Americans, and that necklaces costing $600,000 are not unknown to American jewel cases. It's within the last decade that pearls have arrived at their height of popularity, as figures furnished by J. S. Knapp, auditor at the New York custom house, show that importations of unset stones have almost quadrupled in that time.

In 1904 $1,680,615 worth of unset pearls passed through the New York custom house: in 1912 the importations reached $4,949,216. A connoisseur familiar with opera houses the world over ventured the opinion at a performance of grand opera at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York, last winter, that he never had seen on a like occasion a more magnificent showing of Jewels. The pearls of American women are the envy of European high society; particularly those owned by Mrs. George Gould and the Duchess of Marlborough, formerly Miss Consnelo Vanderbllt. CoBspicaoaa among American owners of waaderfal peerla an Mrs.

OorsaUM is i ti 0 are specialists In that somewhat wearying occupation. When they play it is because they are human enough not to be able to help it and wise enough to know that never is one more truly an artist than when so disporting himself. "The humor that breathes in a line and needs not a boisterous Joke to support It the humor that abides in the interpretation of a fantastic gesture, in the realization of an apt attitude, in the swift pictorial comment upon a seamed face; the humor that cries 'It is to not because it is careless of the great actualities of life, but precisely comprehend! them that Is the humor that this exhibition is striving to bring out the humor that makes life finer in the way that all genuine play makes life finer. "There are, to be Bure, pictures her with 'jokes' appended; there are out-and-out cartoons, and even simple 'comics' one be curious enough to search for them. That Is because these things still hold very definite place in the empire of American humor, and at the present time humorous exhibition could well afford not to admit them.

"But in the specimens of such work aa are here shown, there is a subtler, deeper, inner humor besides and that is what matters. Indeed, It matters as much any other single feature of the exhibition. For surely it is an important and worthwhile thing to show that even a 'comic' need not consort with the flippant and the vulgar. "From all this, though, it should not be assumed that the artists here grouped in any way represent an association or 'cult' People abandoned to the throes of harmonious play have no time for such tedious things as Neither have they inclination for factional squabbles; but the mere existence of their Joyoua artistic democracy is none the less, a fact of high import particularly In this day, when, more than ever before, there is talk of the need of a distinctively 'American school of "For humor is more with us than a mere mood. It Is the very pith and essence of that swift, electric atmosphere which Is so particularly our own, that capitalization of the instant which serves us in lieu of the tradition that Is Europe's.

"And, though the artists here assembled have no mission other than the right expression of the mood at hand, one cannot but feel, looking at these expressions, that If, indeed, we are to have an art nationally our own, it will burst, laughing-lipped, from out this attitude and that it will expand only in so far as we bring the highest, sincerest artistry to minister to the fantastic, the extravagant, the bizarre, the witty, the ironic, the mocking, the Incongruous In short, humor in all its multl-bued phases. "And the fact that this initial American Salon of Humorists strikes the first concerted chord In such tone and does it without recourse to the adventitious aid of any 'new' teebnic should serve to endow It with an interest and significance more far reaching even than the hilarity of the moment." Vanderbllt, Mrs. Ogden Goelet. Mrs. Whitelaw Reid.

Mrs. John Astor, Mrs. Ogden Mills. Mrs. Charles B.

Alexander, Mrs. John R. Drexel, Mrs. James Speyer, Mrs. French Vanderbllt, Mrs.

Stuyvesant Fish, Sirs. Hermann Oelrlch, and Mrs. Harry Payne Whitney. However, these -women comprise a relatively small percentage of the Americans owning rare pearls, for some of the finest pearls passing through the custom house hava found buyers names never appear in society columns of newspapers. One Fifth ave.

dealer told of a New York customer who owns 125 finger rings which contain pearls of varions sixes la many varieties of settings, who never wears more than one pearl ring at time. A century ago a pearl of first' lav portance from a commercial point of view was described as "perfectly round, colorless, of great luster." At the present time pear-shaped and egg-shaped pearls often rank ahead of the round and pink pearls, and black pearls ahead of tha pure white. A pearl of exeeptieaal stss and quality advances is pries from It to 40 per cent when da plicated. The vogue of the pearl la the Unite States was stimulated, say the asthori-ties. by the disappearance ef the belief that pearls are saert-Ursd.

If treated pearis sraeueauy ars i h) V- gkli rMmmW -v-..