human skill. Another kind of reproduction
of outward aspect, however, virtually exact, which does show the
evidence of human skill, is yet not entitled to rank as art,--the
imitative or deceptive picture. Photograph and picture are ruled out
equally on the one count. Neither selects.

In an exhibition of paintings were once displayed two panels
precisely similar in appearance, presenting an army coat and cap, a
sabre and a canteen. At a distance there was no point of difference in
the two. A nearer view disclosed the fact that on one panel the
objects were real and that the other panel was painted. The beholder
was pleased by the exhibition of the painter's skill; but in so far as
the work did not reveal a significance or beauty in these objects
which the artist had seen and the beholder had not, it fell short of
being a work of art Just as the key of the Nuremberg craftsman was
a work of art in that it was for him the expression, the rendering
actual, of a new beauty it was given him to conceive, so only that is
art which makes manifest a beauty that is new, a beauty that is truly
born of the artist's own spirit. The repetition of existing forms with
no modification by the individual workman is not creation, but
imitation; and imitation is manufacture, not art. Inasmuch as the two
panels could not be distinguished, the presentment signified no more
than the reality. Tried as a work of art, the imitative picture, in
common with the photograph, lacks the necessary element of
interpretation, of revelation. That the representation may become art,
there must be added to it some new attribute or quality born of the
artist's spirit. The work must take on new meaning.

As lending his work significance of an obvious sort, a significance
not necessarily "pictorial," the painter might see in the objects some
story they have to tell. The plaster of the garret wall where they are
hanging he may show to be cracked; that tear in the coat speaks of
faithful service, but the coat hangs limp and dusty now; the
inscription on the canteen is almost obliterated, and the strap is
broken; the sabre, which shows the marks of stern usage along its
blade, is spotted with rust: the whole composition means Trusty
Servants in Neglect. By the emphasis of certain aspects he picture is
made to signify more than he mere objects themselves, wherein
there was nothing salient. The meaning is imposed upon them or
drawn out of them by he artist. Or agai