De Stijl 2 1921-1932

Rondblik
Engeland - our London letter door Sacheverell Sitwell

In London the Arts continue their long hibernating Exhibitions of interest are few. The theatre has achieved a pitch of inanity, never attained to even in palmy War days. The tiara-Opera, which was practically the

[p. 57]

only one we had, has disappeared for good; and Literature, in the semblance of an old female drowses in satiate sleep, after her Christmas fare, before the logs of the Squirarchy. The Squirarchy is the term used to denote Mr. J.C. Squire, the Journalist-Poet, and his followers, who control a large part of the so-called literary press.

In England the hatred of any form of new beauty is too pronounced to do good. Our countrymen are Politically-minded and contrive to confound Art with Politics; yet even in the latter, they are apt to be backward. Having just discovered the existence of a Jewish problem, they roll it into a hard ball with Bolshevism, and aim it at the head of any young Artist or Writer, good or bad. This, then, leads the young man to imagine that he must be a Jew or a Bolshevik, spells confusion, and compels poor Mr. Rodker to write of vibro-massage, or to complain of the lack of English ‘fauves’ (et, tu Brute!) in the cosmopolitan pages of ‘L'Esprit nouveau’.

What else does it lead to? The French Government lend to our Art Museum a magnificent collection of French and Flemish tapestries. A horde of old-women tartars, uglier and more ferocious than any led by Attila, armed to the hilt with parasols and pince nez, march into the South Kensington Museum, get in the way, trip up anyone younger than themselves with the end of their ragged umbrellas, and are loud in their praise of works of Art, whose very principle they would deride, if they could but understand! They praise the Gothic Tapestries, which shew in every stitch a complete disregard of realistic likeness and a sacrifice of everything for expressive form, a contempt for sentimentality, and an almest Cubist insistence on shape. But age has made these qualities respectable, and what the old ladies themselves call ‘quaint’ - besides ‘think’ said one of them ‘of the time it must have taken to make.’

At the Leicester Gallery is an interesting Exhibition by

THÉO VAN DOESBURG
GLAS-IN-LOOD COMPOSITIE VII (1918)
UILGEVOERD IN DE ATELIERS VAN J.W. GIPS, DEN HAAG VOOR ARBEIDERSWONINGEN ‘SPANGEN’ TE ROTTERDAM. ARCHITECT J.J.P. OUD

[p. 58]

a young Czecho-Solvak Artist, M. Jaroslav Hnevkovsky, who worked for many years in the Indian Jungle. His work is very uneven, but he shews a genuine feeling for colour and form in the best of these pictures. It is curious however, to find in his work that rather unpleasant greasy quality which is so common in Indian works-of-Art, and it is difficult to tell whether its existence is unconscious or intentional.

We look forward with eagerness to Mr. Wyndham Lewis's promised Exhibition at this Gallery.

One of the most regrettable events of the month has been the subsidence of the ‘Athenaeum’ into ‘The Nation.’ The former Journal has had a long life; and two years ago came under the charge of Mr. J.M. Murry. It was the only purely Literary and Artistic weekly paper in England, and contained work by many of the most talented young writers. Though rather precious and affected, it was of real use and gave us some brilliant Articles on Painting by Mr. Wyndham Lewis, and on Literature by Mr. T.S. Elliott.

Miss Katherine Mansfield, the Novelist, was also a regular contributor to the ‘Athenaeum.’ This gifted lady has just given us a volume of Short-stories. issued, I think, by Messrs. Constable. Her work hat the most welcome and uncommon qualities of wit, observation, and psychological insight. Her phrasing is nervous and clear-cut, and she gives new life to the English Shortstory.

The Poetry Bookshop has in preperation and will issue shortly a new volume of poesis by Harold Monro entitlad Real Property.

His previous volume Strange Meetings (Third Thousend), which has been out of print for a short time has just been reissued in black paper boards, price 4/- net.