MURAL ART AT “THE WHITE CITY”

It was on the occasion of the planning of the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago that the first real impetus to mural decoration was given in America. This occasion disclosed to the citizen the possibilities of the native artist, as well as the esthetic value of such embellishment in public edifice and in private home. The administrative body of the fair, determining upon a decorative scheme to be properly carried out, appointed to take charge of the mural painting Francis D. Millet, and as assistant, Charles Yardley Turner. A selection of artists was made to execute the work, who were J. Alden Weir, Edwin Howland Blashfield, George W. Maynard, Robert Reid, Edward Simmons, Charles Stanley Reinhart, Carroll Beckwith, Kenyon Cox, Gari Melchers, William De L. Dodge, and Walter McEwen.

THE CUMÆAN SIBYL, by Elihu Vedder

At Wellesley College

SAMSON, by Elihu Vedder

Blashfield and Maynard had had some slight experience in decorative work; but the rest were practically novices, though all had been serious, capable students in Paris, and were familiar with examples of the decorative arts of history. Millet was a rare executive, a man who was subsequently to do an enormous amount of just such work. It will be remembered that he went down to his death in the ill-fated Titanic. Of the rest of the group Weir, Reinhart, Beckwith, Melchers, and McEwen returned to their easel picture work after the Chicago fair, with only an occasional decoration. Blashfield, Maynard, Simmons, Cox, and Dodge have, however, continued to be strongly identified with mural work, and these men must receive closer attention. The decorative scheme at Chicago was a remarkable achievement, all things considered, and the grounds were referred to as “The White City,” “The Fair City,” “The City of Dreams,” and finally, alas! as “The Vanishing City”; but in reality nothing like it was ever seen before and probably never will be again.

THE PROPHETS, by John Sargent

In the Boston Library. Center panel, showing Elijah, Moses, and Joshua