Abstract
THE one hundred and seventy-second exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts, which opened on May 6, is a typical “Royal Academy”. That is to say, it is conservative and consists of the same kind of interesting, promising, or sometimes even satisfying works largely by the usual artists. Its subjects for the most part are retrospective, concerned with the personalities and events of the past rather than reflecting the tendencies and affairs of the present. It is therefore natural that the general tendency of the works is to portray the splendours of the seasons and those rural and coastal charms accessible to the country cottage rather than the stirring, if unpleasant, realities that confront us now. Artistic licence, however, like that of the poets, stipulates no adherence to the apparently stupendous events of the day, a fact which may explain why art is more enduring than the news-sheet.
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SWINTON, L. Science in the Royal Academy, 1940. Nature 145, 730–732 (1940). https://doi.org/10.1038/145730a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/145730a0