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active educational body, originated in 1888, namely the Royal Drawing Society, has for its definite object the teaching of drawing as a means of education. The methods of instruction are based on the facts that very young children try to draw before they can write, and that they have very keen perception and retentive memory. The society aims, therefore, at using drawing as a means of developing these innate characteristics of the young, and already nearly 300 important schools follow out its system. Lord Leighton, Sir John Millais, and Sir Edward Burne-Jones took an active part in the society’s labours. The Art for Schools Association, founded in 1883, has also done steady work in endeavouring to provide schools with works of art. These are chiefly reproductions of standard works of art or of historical and natural subjects. The wave of enthusiasm aroused by Mr Buskin’s teachings caused Societies of the Rose to be founded in London, Manchester, Sheffield, Birmingham, Aberdeen, and Glasgow; but some of these eventually ceased active work, to be revived again, however, by the Ruskin Union, formed in the year of the great writer’s death (1900). Most of these societies were formed in 1879 ; but it should not be forgotten that two years earlier the Kyrle Society was started with the object of bringing the refining and cheering influences of natural and artistic beauty to the homes of the people. Under the presidency of Earl Brownlow, the Home Arts and Industries Association continues a work which was started in 1884, and anticipated much of the present system of technical education. Voluntary teachers organize classes for working people, at which a practical knowledge of art handiwork is taught. In remote or poor districts isolated workers are also assisted. Training classes for voluntary teachers are held in such varied pursuits as bent iron work, spinning, embroidery, and smocking. An interesting type of society has been established in Bolton, Lancashire. Under the title of an Arts Guild the members, numbering over 200, devote themselves to the advancement of taste in municipal improvements. Societies of Special Study, Practice, and Protection.—Under this head should be placed those associations which affect a cult, or are composed of particular workers, or which protect public or private interests. Perhaps the chief of the first kind is the Japan Society, which, since its inception in 1892, has been joined by over 900 members interested in matters relating to Japanese art and industries. The Dilrer Society, formed in 1897, has for its main object the reproduction of works by Albert Dfirer, and his German and Italian contemporaries, and is in a way the successor to the defunct Arundel Society. In this category of special study the Society for the Encouragement and Preservation of Indian Art may also be placed, and the Egypt Exploration Fund. The Ruskin Union may also be mentioned again in this connexion. Of the societies of special practice it has already been noticed that some are purely exhibiting associations, such as the Portrait Painters, the Pastel Society, and the two miniature bodies. The formation of the Society of Mezzotint Engravers in 1898 is an example of the leaguing together of particular workers to call attention to their interests. Original and translator engravers, together with collectors and connoisseurs, comprise the membership. The decaying art of wood engraving is also fostered by the International Society of Wood Engravers, and the Society of Designers, founded in 1896, safeguards the interests of professional designers for applied art, without holding exhibitions. Special practice and protection are also considered by the Society of Illustrators, composed of artists who work in black and white for the illustrated press. This society was inaugurated in 1894, and fifteen of the members of the committee must be active workers in illustration. As an instance of the tendency of
art workers to combine, the Society of Art Masters is a good illustration. This is an association of teachers of art schools, controlled by the art branch of the Board of Education, and has a membership of over 200. Good work of another kind occupies the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty. The Council of the Trust includes representatives of such bodies as the National Gallery, the Koyal Academy, the Boyal Society of Painters in Water Colours, the Society of Antiquaries, the Boyal Institute of British Architects, the Universities, Kyrle Society, Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, and the Selborne Society. Foreign Art Societies.—The following are brief particulars of the chief art societies elsewhere than in Great Britain:— Austria.—Vienna, Vereinigung hildender Kuenstler Osterreichs (Society of Austrian Painters) and the Association of Viennese Artists (L’Association des artistes de Vienne). Belgium.—Brussels, Societe des Beaux Arts, the Libre Esthetique, Societe des Aquarellistes et Pastellistes, Society royale Beige des Aquarcllistes, and numerous private societies {cercles) in Brussels, Antwerp, Liege, Ghent, and other cities. France.—Paris, the Societe des Artistes Frangais (The Salon), SociM Nationals des Beaux Arts (The New Salon), Societe des Aquarellistes. Exhibiting societies are the Societe des Artistes Independants, Societe des Orientalistes, and Salon des Pastellistes. Germany.—The small local societies are affiliated to one large parent body, the Deutsche Kunstlergenossenschaft, in Berlin under the presidency of Anton von Werner. The Deutsche lllustratorenverband watches over the interests of illustrators and designers. In Munich there are two bodies—the Old Society of Artists, holding its exhibitions in the Glaspalast, and the Secession. Italy.-—Four exhibiting societies: Rome, Societci in Arte Libertas, Scuela degli Aquarellisti; Milan, Famiglia Artistica, Societa degli Artiste ; Florence, Circolo Artistico; Naples, Instituti di Belli Arti. Po rtugal. —Sociedxule promotor a das Bellas-Artes and Gremio Artistico. Russia.—There is no exclusively art society of importance, but there is at St Petersburg the Societe Litteraire et Artistique. Spain.—Madrid, L’Association des Artistes Espagnols. Sweden.—Stockholm, Svenska Koustuareruas Forening. Switzerland. — Berne, La Societe des Peintres et Sculpteurs Suisses. United States.—New York, the Academy of Fine Arts, the French Institute; Boston, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (founded 1861). (A> c. E> Art Teaching'.—It is the tendency of all departments of the human mind to outgrow their original limits. Traditions of teaching are long-lived, especially in art, and new ideas only slowly displace the old, so that art teaching as a whole is seldom abreast of the ideas and practice of the more advanced artists. The old academic system adapted to the methods and aims in art in the 18th century, which has been carried on in the principal art schools of Great Britain with but slight changes of method, consisted chiefly of a course of drawing from casts of antique statues in outline, and in light and shade, without backgrounds, of anatomical drawings, perspective, and drawing and painting from the living model. Such a training seems to be more or less a response to Lessing’s definition of painting as “ the imitation of solid bodies upon a plane surface.” It seems to have been influenced more by the sculptor’s art than any other. Indeed, the academic teaching from the time of the Italian Benaissance was no doubt principally derived from the study of antique sculpture; the proportions of the figure, the style, pose, and sentiment being all taken from Grseco-Boman and Boman sculptures, discovered so abundantly in Italy from the 16th century onwards. As British ideas of art were principally derived from Italy, British academies endeavoured to follow the methods of teaching in vogue there in later times, and so the art student in Great Britain has had his attention and efforts directed almost exclusively to the representation of the abstract human form in abstract relief. Traditions in
