bout a dozen years ago Europe began to wonder if America had any art worth considering. She invited us to send samples of our paintings that her critics might judge of our work. Among the pictures selected was Homer Martin's "The Harp of the Winds." At once Europe saw that an American artist had painted a masterpiece.
This scene is on the River Seine, a short distance from Paris. Was anything ever more simple? Slender willow-trees almost leafless, bare rocks with a few scrubby bushes, a tiny village sheltered in a curve of the river—what is there to suggest a picture? And yet something grips us. We seem to be at the beginnings of creation. Nature is confiding in us. We are hearing the winds play on the harp to the listening river. See how lovingly the water mirrors those harp strings all sparkly with gold and green! I wonder if these willows make a harp or a lyre with their tall stalks reaching to the sky? Do you remember how, when Mercury found a tortoise, he took the shell and made holes on both sides and strung nine strings across it—one for each Muse—and gave it to Apollo? I think this Harp of the Winds has nine strings in memory of Mercury's lyre.
Fig. 34. The Harp of the Winds. Martin. Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
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