Then may we not see in “Pan” an embodiment of his experiences of passionate youth? Truly it is also the reincarnation of the spirit of the old golden legend of the world, before it was burdened with seriousness, still irresponsible and sportive; when the woods and streams were haunted by creatures close akin to the animals, but gifted also with something of man’s higher opportunities: lazy, sensuous and luxuriously content. But this is only to refer back to a mythological type the perennial characteristics of the birth of passion in a youth. It seems to me quite one with the philosophic bent of Barnard’s mind that he should have comprehended both intentions in his “Pan.” It is as if he had analysed himself and then exorcised his vagrant desires by imprisoning them in bronze. As an artist he takes his opportunity in the recumbent figure of enforcing the sensuous charm of the long, sinuous limbs, and once more indulges in the luxuriousness of firm, soft fleshiness; this time, however, with muscles not relaxed in sleep but unstrung in the sweet lassitude of lazy ease. Then what a subtle insinuation of contempt for the type as he conceives it! He sets one long asinine ear acock, and lets the other droop ridiculously, while in the slanting eye there is a leer of mischievous, foolish wantonness. I do not forget that this is later work, executed after Barnard’s return to America; yet his point of view is so subjective that he can scarcely fail sooner or later to express the struggles of his own soul.
But apart from these psychological considerations the statue is one of extraordinary artistic interest; the composition highly original and to a grand degree sculpturesque. It has, that is to say, qualities peculiar to sculpture; the impressiveness of bulk, of form in the round, with vigorous appeal to our tactile sense in its bossy elevations and deep hollows, and with that aptitude for changing effects of light and shadow, bold in parts, in others mysteriously subtle. Moreover, it is remarkable in its expression of character in pose and gesture; for subtle expressiveness could scarcely be carried further in the line of this conception and it is continuous throughout the figure and harmoniously complete. These, moreover, are the traits conspicuous in all Barnard’s work.
We shall find them in the group “I Feel Two Natures Struggling Within Me,” which, perhaps, more than any other of his works breaks away from the usual canons of composition. I can remember that when I first saw it the abruptness of the composition startled me unpleasantly; but this feeling has worn off and I recognize an inherent reasonableness in the arrangement, a harmony of fitness in the conception. It illustrates, in fact, the liberty of the western spirit, which dares to free itself from formula; it is not to be taken as a subversion of old principles, but as a justification of the right of freedom of will, where the originality of thought demands some freer method of expression. For, as a matter of fact, the salient feature of this group is the expression of character; and by the time that you fall under the spell of its intention, you are reconciled to the abruptness of the composition. It may interest those who are distrustful of “literary” expression in a work of art to know that the metaphysical title of this group was an afterthought. It had its inception in the chance grouping, afterward slightly modified, of two models, and the idea was to reproduce the character of pose and gesture. Then the standing figure suggested the notion of a conqueror; not one of the theatrical sort with action of defiance, but one who through defeat has reached an ultimate victory; and so by degrees the group began to partake of the fulness of the sculptor’s own thinkings and conclusions, until it finished by presenting in generalized form the conflict of the two natures of man.
The evolution of this group very fairly illustrates the balance of impulses in Barnard’s work. He is by natural instinct a sculptor; one whose imaginings inevitably shape themselves in form. On the other hand he is a thinker of thoughts and a dreamer of dreams that press for utterance, and he finds the utterance in plastic expression; but there is no confusion in his own mind between the mode of expression and the thought expressed. He recognizes both the possibilities and the limitations of his art, and in the working out of his thought confines himself to those aspects of it which lend themselves to plastic interpretation. At the same time his nature is so earnest and intense that it would seem impossible and horrible to him not to use his art to some serious end. But, be sure, it is less the bigness of his purpose than his power as a sculptor, or, shall we say, the happy adjustment of the two, that gives ultimate importance to his work.
In further proof of this let me refer to two more of his statues, one of which had its origin in chance, the other in deliberation: The former is “Maidenhood” which was primarily suggested by the pose of a model, spontaneously assumed. It had character and was evidently characteristic of this individual type of girlhood. He studied the figure, first in its ensemble and then in the correlation of its parts, and as he worked the floodgates of sentiment were gradually lifted, until there poured into the work his pent-up feeling and convictions concerning female beauty, his personal ones as a man and the abstract devotion that he felt for it as an artist. The result is a statue, lovely as a piece of technique, lovely also in its inspired interpretation of beauty of form and soul; a figure that has the allurement of individual personality, as well as that higher quality of abstract loveliness which belongs to an ideal conception, rendered with exquisite reverence and a spirit of purest poetry.
The other statue, “The Hewer,” was begun with the deliberate purpose of embodying in a series of figures the gradual evolution of mankind and, I fancy also, of the human soul toward higher possibilities. There is nothing unusual in the theme, but much in the way in which Barnard has comprehended and expressed it. He has felt it in its elemental significance and set it forth with monumental simplicity. The background of his imagination, and he makes it part of ours, is the nebulous immensity out of which primitive man emerges toward the light. The step is won by putting forth of strength; but tentatively, gropingly, with only partial consciousness of strength; there is an exertion of power, but a
TWO FRIENDS
By George Grey Barnard