London.
A new war of the critics has disturbed London’s calm. Art circles are heatedly engaged in dispute. Letters are being written to the Times. Jacob Epstein has done it again.
The Jewish sculptor, who has provoked so many controversies over his work in the past, is responsible for his new wave of agitation which centers around the eleven-foot, seven-ton carving, “Ecce Home” (Behold the Man), which went on exhibition recently at the Leicester Galleries.
Epstein worked for eight months on this huge carving representing Christ crowned with thorns and with his hands bound by ropes. All but the barest details are eliminated. The head is large in proportion to the roughly outlined body. The face is broad with all but the most essential details eliminated.
Epstein, as was to be expected, refuses to “explain” his work. “I have made it and there it is,” he declares. “It is there for all to see and to interpret for themselves.”
The “interpretations” vary. The Manchester Guardian critic found the work suggesting a “caryatid of suffering.” In Epstein’s work, he declared, “racial feeling is somehow there, and one is aware of a further conception of the race of Christ suffering through the centuries and terribly in our day. It is the most impressive of Mr. Epstein’s great stone figures.”
The Morning Post’s critic reported that “there are intervals in which Jacob Epstein forgets that he is a great artist.” The present exhibition, he declared, finds the sculptor in one of those unfortunate moments. He uses one adjective, “contemptible,” and one other phrase, “bad taste,” to describe the work which is “a mutilated mass of beautiful stone.”
The Daily Telegraph, complaining that one cannot fairly view the monumental sculptor within the confines of the gallery, nevertheless reports that “through all the mass there is a diffused energy inherent in its form and ordered by a discipline of pattern. This form of impulse radiates within the strictly-bounded shape. There is no violence of gesture, no sensational disturbance of the calm, straight pose. The effect is compelling and impressive. . . .
“Epstein’s figure is nearly akin to the earliest Romanesque church sculpture, which with rough primitive shapes yet triumphantly conveyed its idea. This symbolism has survived in peasant art and another relationship may be found in Breton religious sculpture. Faith was never stronger than when the Romanesque sculptors worked and it always was ardent in the Breton carvers’ hearts. There is something of the spirit of these craftsmen in ‘Behold the Man.'”
The Times ventured no estimate of the work, contenting itself with describing at length the technical details responsible for the carving’s impression of great size. It reported, however, that “neither the mass nor the material can be said to have been enhanced by the carving,” and significantly, “to turn from ‘Behold the Man’ to the portrait bronzes is to exchange duty for pleasure.”
James Douglas, editor of the Sunday Express, went into ecstasies over the work. “It is a mighty and majestic work of art, too mighty and too majestic for the blind eyes of this blind age. It is eleven feet in height and weighs six tons.”
The Daily Mail’s critic was disappointed in the work, finding it as shallow as are the artist’s incisions into the marble.
Despite the furor over the huge sculpture, there has been nothing but acclaim for the bronze busts in the exhibition which, according to the Guardian, “finds Epstein at the height of his strange and sensitive powers.”
Among the busts attracting attention is one of Dr. Chaim Weizmann which must rank among Epstein’s best. A lively bronze portrait of George Bernard Shaw, a bronze of Lord Beaverbrook, and several of women, are included in the exhibition.
First visitors to the exhibition were divided in their opinions as were the critics and their comments varied widely.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
