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THE AMERICAN-SC AN DIN AVIAN REVIEW 
new social vocabulary “group consciousness.” The individual activ¬ 
ities of artists, that is, no longer are isolated, sculpture in one compart¬ 
ment, painting in another, the graphic arts in another, and very few 
compartments provided. They all are playing together on common 
ground. 
The exhibitions of the Architectural League serve as illustra¬ 
tion. Formerly they were the dullest exhibitions in New York from 
the standpoint of the public. Now they are the merriest. In addi¬ 
tion to the beautiful architectural drawings and plans and photo¬ 
graphs and models, they contain examples of painting and sculpture, 
of landscape architecture, ceramics, mosaics, furniture, textiles, metal 
work, glass. And these objects are shown, not in a showcase or in 
rows on a shelf with no meaning whatever for the visitor feebly 
endowed with a visualizing imagination, but in some approach to an 
organic relationship. In the now famous exhibition of 1920, open 
for less than an hour before it was destroyed by fire, alcoves were 
formed in the galleries and each space thus enclosed was assigned to 
a prominent architect to be made into a livable room with furniture, 
fabrics, tapestries, and lighting fixtures beautifully arranged to create 
an harmonious interior. It was an unforgetable lesson in the art of 
exhibiting, but it was also a vivid comment upon the idea, new—or 
almost new—in America, of co-operation in the arts. 
The fruit of the great war is not yet a more fervent expression 
of personal or social ideals in art forms, but the war unquestionably 
has had much to do with the fervor of our young designers for the 
industrial field. The necessity for developing native talent in design 
occurred to our manufacturers when the foreign supply was cut off, 
and a small group of devoted patriots and lovers of art have labored 
mightily to bring about a mutual understanding between the artists 
and the manufacturers and at the same time to make the public realize 
that this is the time to call for American design and to honor Amer¬ 
ican designers in the industries. They also have made clear the need 
of adequate technical training for artists specializing in industrial de¬ 
sign, and this training is still an affair of the future. It is the age of 
machinery, and the delicate task of bringing about .a friendly rela¬ 
tion between art and the machine is not fully accomplished. 
It is the artists, however, who must pull the industries out of their 
slough of despond, and the younger ones are eager—too impatiently 
eager—to get to work and reap their reward. Exhibitions of silk de¬ 
signs and cretonne designs, wall paper patterns, and other kinds of 
industrial design demanding the smallest knowledge of technical proc¬ 
esses on the part of the artists, now abound, and competition for prizes 
offered by manufacturers and trade papers lends zest. Among the 
competitors are a number of talented men and women who have had 
their training in the fine arts and who produce mature and interesting 
