A JEWISH SCULPTOR
No Career for a Jewish Artist, Who is a Nationalist
There was an air of reticence about the man, a dignity weakened by forlorn distress, which, together with his massive head and erect bearing, distinguished him from the variegated crowd of diners and idlers in the dirty restaurant.
As he looked down in to his glass of tea, he seemed to be observing his neighbors, as if seeking a fact that would remind him of the dream he once dreamed of the Jewish people, a Jewish face that would illuminate the sordid surroundings in which he found himself. He had hoped life would hand him roses, but instead it had given him thorns, and in all the cities he had visited, he seemed to question Life, to implore of it gifts that would make his existence more tolerable.
He was a sculptor, and, as if that were not enough, he was also a Jewish sculptor. Not a sculptor who by sheer accident had once created a work of art based on a Jewish conception, but a sculptor whose delight in his art would have been the creation only of Jewish works. But the world, including the Jews, would have none of them, and the world was his master. That was why he chafed, and the wrinkles of disappointment were mingled with furrows of desperation.
Once he unbosomed his sorrows to the writer, but not as so many luftmenchen had done before. He spoke of himself with that impersonal disdain, which implied that the self he alluded to was something quite beyond the self speaking.
"Why is it," I asked him, "we do not see your Jewish compositions?"
"You do not see them," he said, "because they have been destroyed. When I was young, I attempted several Jewish themes, but found that they could not be placed anywhere; and in the course of my wanderings, moving in
cramped quarters, where space was valuable, in a few years every one of them disappeared, and the only mementoes I have of them are a few photographs. I once fashioned an allegorical group. The model was seen by a number of experts, who said the work was good, but I could not raise the money to purchase the material for its completion on the scale required. In a few years the model crumbled to pieces, and so, I have my masterpiece on a photograph."
The man was born in Russia, was praised by Antokolski, went to Vienna, where he continued his studies; was praised there, and encouraged to devote himself to the art; while in Vienna, he was one of the original members of the famous Kadimah Society, that courageous Jewish students’ organization, that was the intellectual vanguard of Herzlian Zionism. From Vienna he wandered to Germany and from Germany to France. In Paris he lived through a period of privation, of which he speaks now wi‘h a shudder, but he studied his art, working in the ateliers of famous sculptors. Then in an evil hour, he came to New York, where for past few years he has been living on the verge of starvation, though never with a lowering of his dignity, but the smile of his bovhood has left his face.
“It was in Paris,” he said, “I learned that Jewish art, that is, devotion to art for the Jewish people, was impossible. Sculpture is an art which demands national support, and where can a Jew find his nation? As a last resort, I was engaged to decorate a Catholic church, and there I worked as a day laborer, one might say, beautifying the worship of our enemies. The Jews could not support me, then let the Catholics.do it. But when the head of the church, who himself was suspected of having a Jewish origin, discovered that I was a Jew, he dismissed me.
"I have no illusions about Jewish art. There can be no Jewish art, while Jewish artists must look to aliens for their support. An art becomes this or that, according to the class of people who support it. The Jews do not support Jewish art; therefore, there can be no Jewish artists. Of course, that leaves me in the lurch. Even here in New York the few patrons I have are Catholics; probably because