Art
'Young America'
Evan Anthony
Aware though 1 am of the dangers of using superlatives, I advise you unflinchingly that the most beautiful exhibition seen hereabouts in months was the Ashe-Connors battle at Wimbledon — a most artistic happening, worthy of mention in any context, and not altogether inappropriately in this particular space, especially when one thinks of past occasions when one has been required to indulge (not too happily, admittedly) the whims of those who would palm off gold-painted people as sculpture, or the antics of navvies hired to shovel piles of dirt around a gallery — all in the name of art.
I have, in any case, a somewhat sturdier connection: the name of the new show at the American Embassy in London: Young America. The young boy riding on a bicycle through Wyeth country easily suggested the title for his painting 'Young America' to America's 'old master', Andrew Wyeth, and the inclusion of that picture obviously suggested the apt name for the splendid collection of forty-eight American paintings now touring this country while 'the house back home' is being renovated. The 'house' happens to be the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, founded in 1805, and currently undergoing a face-lift in preparation for the national bicentennial celebrations coming in 1976. These are tourists that anyone would welcome with open arms — and eyes. Indeed, seeing these paintings may arouse greater interest in what came before the abstract expressionist boom.
Pictures dating from 1769 to 1962 give, if not a comprehensive survey of American art at different stages of development, at least a tasty bite of the apple that should whet the appetite for more of the same. From the early derivative efforts to the later more individual and personal attempts at depicting an earthy and sensitive reality, the collection includes both the pomp and circumstances of life in the United States. There should be no surprise at finding a definite American flavour in this show, but these
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