The philosopher tells us that everything has been done, yet
we must do it again - personally.
Art is so much a part of life that to discourage it is to discourage
life itself - as if one would say: "Others have lived; all imaginable
kinds of life have been lived. Therefore it is unnecessary for you to
experience life."
The plastic and pictorial decoration of an Exposition offer unusual
opportunity to the Artist, at the same time imposing handicaps - the
briefness of time, the poverty of material. It affords chances for
experiment, invention, and originality only limited by the necessary
formal settings of the architecture, out of proportion to the initiative
of the artists, a majority of whom prefer, either from inclination or
necessity, to take the safe course, the beaten path of precedent.
Artists are of two kinds - the Imitators and the Innovators. The public
also is of two corresponding kinds - those who accept only what they
have learned to regard as good, preferring imitations of it to anything
requiring the acquisition of a new viewpoint; and that other kind,
receptive to new sensations. The first class is the more numerous, which
explains why most of our art, in fact most of all art, is imitative -
that is, imitative of the works of other artists.
The sculpture and mural decorations of the buildings and grounds of the
Exposition adequately represent the output of American art today.
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