[45] H. A. H., Vol. I, pp. 205, 206.
The man who goes to a modern exhibition of pictures and sculptures, experiences visually what they experience aurally who stand on a Sunday evening within sight of the Marble Arch, just inside Hyde Park. Not only different voices and different subjects are in the air; but fundamentally different conceptions of life, profoundly and utterly antagonistic outlooks.
The Academy, The International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers, The Royal Society of British Artists, The New English Art Club, The Salon des Artistes Français, and the Salon des Beaux Arts, are all alike in this; and the International's scorn of the Academy,[46] or the Academy's scorn of it, is as ridiculous as the Beaux Arts' scorn of the Salon, or vice versâ.
It is quite foolish, therefore, to inveigh against the public for their bad taste, Philistinism and apathy. How can they be expected to know, where there are no teachers? How can they be otherwise than apathetic where keen interest must perforce culminate in confusion? How can they have good taste or any taste at all, where there is no order of rank in tastes?
We know the torments of the modern lay student of Art, when he asks himself uprightly and earnestly whether he should say "yes" or "no" before a picture or a piece of sculpture. We know the moments of impotent hesitancy during which he racks his brains for some canon or rule on which to base his judgment, and we sympathize with his blushes when finally he inquires after the name of the artist, before volunteering to express an opinion.
At least a name is some sort of a standard nowadays. In the absence of other standards it is something to cling to; and the modern visitor to an Art exhibition has precious little to cling to, poor soul!
Still, even names become perplexing in the end; for it soon occurs to the lay student in question that, not only Millais, but also Leighton, Whistler, Rodin, Frith, Watts, Gauguin, John, and Vuillard have names in the Art world.