k, a
Fauve, but who has been influenced by Cezanne, I shall here do myself
the honour of pronouncing the name. Aristide Maillol is so obviously
the best sculptor alive that to people familiar with his work there
is something comic about those discussions in which are canvassed the
claims of Mestrovic and Epstein, Archipenko and Bourdelle. These have
their merits; but Maillol is a great artist. He works in the classical
tradition, modified by Cezanne, thanks largely to whom, I imagine, he
has freed himself from the impressionism--the tiresome agitation and
emphasis--of Rodin. He has founded no school; but one pupil of his,
Gimon--a very young sculptor--deserves watching. From the doctrine a
small but interesting school of sculpture has come: Laurens, an artist
of sensibility and some power, and Lipsitz are its most admired
representatives. At home we have Epstein and Dobson; both have been
through the stern school of abstract construction, and Epstein has
emerged the most brilliant _pasticheur_ alive. Brancuzi (a Bohemian) is,
I should say, by temperament more Fauve than Doctrinaire. Older than
most of Cezanne's descendants, he has nevertheless been profoundly
influenced by the master; but the delicacy of his touch, which gives
sometimes to his modelling almost the quality of Wei sculpture, he
learnt from no one--such things not being taught. Gaudier Brzcska, a
young French sculptor of considerable promise, was killed in the early
months of the war. He had been living in England, where his work,
probably on account of its manifest superiority to most of what was seen
near it, gained an exaggerated reputation. The promise was indisputable;
but, after seeing the Leicester Gallery exhibition, I came to the
conclusion that there was not much else. Indeed, his drawings often
betrayed so superficial a facility, such a turn for calligraphic
dexterities, that one began to wonder whether even in expecting much
one had not been over sanguine. The extravagant reputation enjoyed
by Gaudier in this country will perhaps cross the mind of anyone who
happens to read my essay on Wilcoxism: native, or even resident, geese
look uncommonly like swans on home waters: to see them as they are you
should see them abroad.

Bonnard and Vuillard, unlike Aristide Maillol, though being sensitive
and intelligent artists who make the most of whatever serves their turn
they have taken what they wanted from the atmosphere in which they work,
are hardly