far higher than that of the Royal Academy or of
the New English Art Club. For this we have chiefly to thank Mr. Walter
Sickert and his pupils. They set the tone. It is extraordinary that any
master should have led so many pupils so far along the road to art. All
have been taken to that point where work ceases to appear utterly
negligible. All have been made to search life for realities, and not for
pictures. They have been taught to simplify and to select; and they have
been taught not to select the obvious, the romantic, and the pretty.
They have not been taught, however, to discover and express the
profoundly significant, for that cannot be taught. Even Mr. Sickert
cannot turn sincere and intelligent painters into artists.

Entering the arena, the visitor will probably turn first to the large
picture by Mr. Wyndham Lewis. To appreciate this, he should take the
lift to the gallery, whence, having shed all irrelevant prejudices in
favour of representation, he will be able to contemplate it as a piece
of pure design. He will be able to judge it as he would judge
music--that is to say, as pure, formal expression. So judging, he cannot
fail to be impressed by the solidity of the composition, to which the
colour is not an added charm, but of which it is an integral part; he
will feel that the picture holds together as a unity in the way that a
good sonata holds, in a way that nothing else does in this exhibition;
also he will feel a certain dissatisfaction which may cause him to
inquire whether Mr. Lewis has altogether succeeded in expressing
himself. We believe that he has not. There is a laboriousness about this
work which seems to represent the artist's unsuccessful struggle to
realize in paint his mental conception; and it is for this reason that
we admire it rather as a promise of something great than as an
achievement.

The other striking thing in the arena is Mr. Epstein's statue.
Approached from behind, as the present writer approached it, this has
very much the air of an important work of art; and that it well may be.
Closer examination, however, raises some doubts. Is it, perhaps, only
the imitation of one? Mr. Epstein is a baffling artist. His skill and
scholarship are amazing, and he seems to have convictions; but what are
they? Has he merely a brilliant gift for description, helped out and
sophisticated by a subtle taste? Or has he a queer entangled sense of
the significance of form. Is he a plastic artist or