EGYPTIAN DANCE
By William De L. Dodge
In the Majestic Theater at Boston, Massachusetts
WILLIAM M. HUNT
Before we come to the group of present workers in mural painting it is necessary that we consider an earlier man, again one of the pioneers, the artist William M. Hunt of Boston, who in 1878 obtained the commission to decorate the New York state capitol at Albany. The result was a fine series of pictures, well composed; but unfortunately they survive only in reproductions, the originals having been painted directly on the walls. These, owing to faulty construction, did not long remain intact, falling out of plumb, and they had to be supported by beams until they were finally entirely destroyed. Hunt had been a pupil of Thomas Couture (koo-toor´) in Paris, a man who had strong influence on his work, and these decorations were very reminiscent of his master. The pictures were fifteen by forty-five feet in size, and the themes were “The Flight of Night” and “The Discoverer,” of which only photographs remain to tell the tale.
Today the mural painter produces his work on canvas instead of on the wall, a process that enables him to do most of the labor in the studio, and in case of necessity this, after being attached to the walls, can be taken down again and so preserved.
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