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Show Larson Art Exhibit Is Lauded By Local Critic ry 11. K. MKKliil.L Would "vuu like to travel through Franco from north to south. , ' Spain, Andora and Morocco ami . ci-joy the bright sunshine, the n s- , tic and artistic old lane and old ; hi.'ifcs, the quaint people and their customs? : Jf yt.u would, take the elevator in,; the cny and county building anv j day of the week at almost any hour run morning until night and ride u to the ait gallery where Prof. B. F. Larson, of the art faculty of Brigham Young university, is showing show-ing his pictures. These canvases and water colors were made during a sixteen months sojourn in south-err. south-err. Europe and northern Africa. The trip to the art gallery, though r.l-tolutcly free, and though you cm make it unattended, will prove to be interesting as well as educational education-al as 'hose who have mad the trip vviil testify. The show is probably the largest and one of the most interesting one ' man shows ever hung at any one ' time in Provo. One hundred an 1 i thirty paintings of various sizes j and a wide choice of subjects arc j hanging for the inspection of the j public. I I had the great pleasure of viewing view-ing the paintings in company with Prof. Larson. We wandered around the gallery enjoying and talking of the various trends in art. Pictures are there from colder grayer northern north-ern France, from warm and sunny southern France, from old Spain with her picturesque costumes and her unusual white though warm landscapes, from Andora, the little country founded upon the very i n.-r-ntic business of smuggling, from eld Morocco with its plaster houses, it Roman arches, its white, scorching scorch-ing sunlight and its black interest, ing people. The washerwoman bending over her laundry, the river or canal her mammoth tub, vies in interest with the peasant group returning from the fiesta; the sad-eared mule laboring la-boring along his toe path struggles with the barnyard animals for i . place, in one's Inccrest. The exhibit presents an excellent study of modern art, for Prof. Larson Lar-son is modern not too modern. Jlist delightfully modern, modern enough to revel in color and design, but not modern enough to have lost the charm of the old masters. "The old masters." said he, as we sat and enjoyed, "delighted in static symmetry ; in the play of light against shadow. He liked his pictures pic-tures to lie complete little oases of Minnie Christiansen ami Mrs. Ruth lit .'. He tool; one's eyes into hit painting and heid them there by means ot a very modern device that of the spot light. Everything moved to a common center and that center of interest was frequently fre-quently actually spotted with light. j " The modern artist, on the other ! hand, delights in dynamic, symmetry, sym-metry, if you catch what I mean. j He lilies his colors moving -his sub. jects active. Ho uses, so to apenU, autos and aeroplanes against the j older ox-cart and the horse and buggy. "Ho snatches up a bit of It IV, I places it on the canvas, but leave;; it stragling off of it. back into ila ..oiling. He doesn't take his brush and vignette his scenes making them islands; he r.llows them to re- -main a part of the world fivm which they were taken. "He, if his work is rxceiler.f. starts the beholder upon a trip ot exploration of t he village from which the building was taken, over the mountains beyond the confine; of the canvas. He subdues his shadows; he revels in color, lots of it. He not only enjoys the balance between dark and light, but also between warm and cold." Illustrations of these principles of art pi ay be found in picture afu-r picture in Prof. Larson's exhibit. One enters with him a quaint old street in somo foreign village; ho - at the quaint old houses, enjoys the play of sunlight and shadow along the roofs and walls, and then he wanders off into other quaint streets and sees other quaint houses, if his imagination is goqd. Or he lazes along a stream watching the washerwoman at woik; he hears the birds sing; ho sees other peasants, in his imagination, imagina-tion, doing other tasks but peasants peas-ants of the same strong backs, tho same hard hands, the same quaint costumes. The exhibit will remain all this week. The custodians are accommodating accom-modating and kind. They will tell you how to reach the gallery if you do not know yourself. It is one opportunity op-portunity to visit these quaint lands and t step up a -few notches in tho. appreciation of art. |