| aa : ; aa : - ae . hn es ce “a : ; c ® ? = -* a: ae a) SA meas ve Pa : ™ a Se ps os tN eas. : . ie 0 om a a ae i F 4 Weta t SINGING TREES Peet | Bel LON OF ver RA. PAINTINGS Dos Weel TER BE.CK MARCH 57x To 24TH, 1925 GRAND CENTRAL ART GALLERIES 15 VANDERBILT AVENUE NEW YORK THE WAY Copyright, 1925 by Walter Beck THE ART OF WALTER BECK By Ratpyx FLint | | boi now and again there appear on the human horizon figures of particular import, visionists with word of special weight, workers with gifts of un- usual consequence. Among such must be placed Walter Beck, American painter. In his present estate, fresh from Roman triumphs, he comes home to claim a new place in a world of art which knew him once, but knew him only as unsuspécting precursor to this later self. His record, prior to a few short years ago, deals conventionally with mu- seum, gallery, patron, with large commissions and accom- plishments. Today, however, his art is so far removed from all that as to be a thing apart, related sequentially and legally perhaps but wholly independent of school, place, or period, a transcendental and full-blown manifestation of new form and beauty. In an age beset with greater di- vergencies of artistic beliefs than ever before, Beck comes like some seer whose tablets have been touched with the “divine fire,’ like some prophet testifying with an un- wonted authority. He stands beside the very considerable product of these few new years of his a veritable bearer of good tidings, of pictorial tidings so joyous to the eye and heart that the question naturally arises if a miracle has not come to pass. These boldly complexioned affirmations are set down with a full appreciation of the facts. To those accustomed only to the conventional in painting, Beck’s art may not be iWin Ae lols telat ce Live a x B= Ey Caer immediately apparent. Those who see painting as a means of trapping pictorial circumstance with photographic mesh may find these productions abstruse, remote. Yet his most symbolic and esoteric compositions are filled with such fresh, assertive form, with such clear and flowing color under fleetest brushmanship that there is something pleasurable to be got from them by all. This union of deeply significant form and handling with an almost dis- arming spontaneity of execution is one of the outstanding qualities of Beck’s art, for while these paintings are made at a single sitting in a tempera medium that permits of no retouching or alteration once the pigment has set, there is depth of meaning put into the work that is out of all proportion to the time element. It is almost as if they were shot from some high-strung bow, and came all quivering and alive to the paper target, a succession of pictorial bull’s-eyes that puts Beck hors concours from the start. There is no real parallel between these paintings and most contemporary work. Except with certain more or less remote phases of art Beck has little in common. The great Chinese painters of the past had the same instinctive sense of searching for the essential idea under its material sheathings, of striving to give pictorial utterance to a belief in that universal permanency of all things which Spencer defines as the only reality. Like the Italian primi- tives in their expression of religious rapture, he achieves certain spatial effects of exceeding importance; and while there is no direct comparison possible except in the way of pictorial significance, such names as Tintoretto, expounder Vee eT 6B GR soe, SS of magnificent themes, Turner, super-sensitive and heaven- storming landscapist, his metaphysical amanuensis, John Ruskin, and perhaps the fiery Blake occur in reviewing this manifestation of twentieth century genius. Beside these purely pictorial qualifications, the range of Beck’s sympathy and philosophic reasoning must be considered in order to reach any true estimate of his work. In these paintings he traverses the humanities at will, and runs the gamut of mythological and scriptural lore both oriental and occidental. He can be satiric on occasion, or playful; often he is humorous, often grim. He pictures “Venom” with a few serpent-like swirling strokes of green over a sienna ground that strikes to the very root of that baneful state. His “Tenebrae” appears the sublimation of all shadowy vales and brooding wings, and in his “Energy” is seen a springing patch of fiery form that almost dazzles. “Mist Fairies” is a gentle, swirling glimpse of lymphatic figuration as only comes in reedy music. “Sleep,” “Sloth,” “Tremolo,” “Arabesque,” “Urge,” “Singing Trees,” “Youth” and “Sorrow,” are a few of the simpler subjects which have come unerringly from his seemingly inexhaustible quiver. There is a host of mythological subjects to dwell on, and the Chinese sub- jects are of a rare delight. Everywhere in Beck’s art a deep spiritual note is sounded, whether in abstractions like “Elevation of the Spirit” and “Triumph of Good Over Evil” or in his illustrations of the Savior’s life. ““Gift of the Madonna,” “The Holy Grail,” “Sandals of the Lord,” “The Voice,” “Let There Be Light,” “The Ascension” — these and many VV eats Ata elvan Deen koe BY SESS Gas others embody a vision of the highest order, are pictorial revelations of a degree that seldom occur in western art. Beck’s work often falls into pictorial sequences and in the series dealing with music, he has produced symbolic de- signs of peculiar poignancy. The music of the violin, the viola, the cello, the cymbals, the piano, the organ, each different manifestation of sound has been captured with astonishing precision. -But the climax of his art comes in his interpretation of the Lord’s Prayer, which he has pictured line by line with transcendent power. His mag- nificent organization of form and brushwork finds its highest expression in the next to the last of this series, and his exalted quality of pictorial thought rises highest in the final “Forever and Ever.” It only remains to say in conclusion that Walter Beck stands in the very fulness of his powers, and that in the seclusion of his Hudson River home he will continue reaching out towards new aspects of beauty and form. In the more than seven hundred paintings already from his hand in these few recent years it is remarkable to find practically no note of repetition, either in color, composi- tion, or thought. Small wonder that an art like this should find immediate recognition from the Italian public, so long trained to understand pictorial revelation, and it seems likely that his unique art will find an even greater response ~ in his own country where independence of thought has ever been encouraged. Art with Walter Beck has come back into its original estate, as a profession of faith, a record of aspiration and longing. This in itself is highest praise. O ONYAnWBRON&] Wie aeeee tet bo ER CATALOGUE OF PAINTINGS Afterglow The Sigh Rhea On the Slopes of Parnassus Sleep In the Presence The Soul ‘Madonna Spiritual Efforescence The Holy Grail Floating Rhythms Energy Tannhauser on His Way to Rome Thetis on Olympus Inter- ceding for Achilles Aurora Borealis The Moth The Expulsion The Golden Apple Will o’ the Wisp Penelope and the Suitors Venom The Curious One Sea Change Winter Above the Battlefield Mnemosyne The Fates From a Distant Clime Tenebrae Circe The Good Shepherd Golden Cascades Oedipus and the Sphinx Tremolo The Signal Emphatic Nereid Pan The Ornate Headdress Arabesque Sloth Iphigenia The Philosopher Vampire The Erinyes Little Nereid Diana Lorelei Ulysses and the Siren Self-control “The Hills of Dream” Singing Trees St. Michael An Encounter Lan t’sai Ho Lyric Cadences Mist Fairies Pluto and Persephone Landscape The Diverse Urges of Youth In the Thralldom of Evil Chinese Dragon Youth Hermes The Miraculous Voyage Li Po Treasure Dreams Penthesilea Victorious Aurora Exaltation of Spirit Soft Grasses of the Marshes, Moonlit MUSIC Viola 76 Overtones ap; Brahms’ Music 78 Violin 79 ESOTERICS Worship 96 Sandals of the Lord Let There Be Light 97 The Voice in the Garden The Gift of the Madonna 98 The Church 99 The Ascension 100 Guardians of the Spirit The Way 101 Wisdom 102 The Triumph of Good Over Evil 103 Sublimation 104 Lightof Unbounded Spaces 105 Life 106 Holy, Holy 107 The Voice of the Cathedral 108 Cello Cymbals Piano Organ “Have Ye Not Known, Have Ye Not Heard” “Lo, He Goeth By Me and I See Him Not” The Religious Instinct “IT Am the Vine” “Tf I Take the Wings of the Morning” “Fear Not” “The Coming Forth In Day” The Miracle of the Heart “My Cup Runneth Over” Faith Grace “God Isa Spirit” Rhea THE LORD’S PRAYER Our Father Who Art in Heaven Hallowed Be Thy Name Thy Kingdom Come Thy Will Be Done on Earth as It Is in Heaven Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread Forgive Us Our Trespasses As We Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us Lead Us Not Into Temptation Deliver Us from Evil Thine Is the Kingdom The Power The Glory Forever and Ever GOLDEN CASCADES HILNOA AO SANUN ASUAAIC AHL OISAW SNWHVUE AUdId NVA LIFE Printed in U. S. by eo. Bartlett Orr Pres ay New York it